Re: From Yale Child Center's website

[Guest guest]

To the " MD " , My testimony is that 2 of my children continue to grow in

leaps and bounds because of the GF/CF/SF diet,B-12, folinic acid,

Glutathione,and after 7 months of chelation we are a normal functioning

family.One year ago my children were coming out of an emotionally lost

, very, lost existence where talking almost never was heard,a kiss

never happened without a request, and hugging was only BY me TO them. I

Thank God that all is reversed and that my family is now whole.I am

sure that my prayers were heard and answered along with many, many

other parents. Thankfully, Brown.

>

> Through the Looking Glass:

> My Involvement with Autism Quackery

>

> R. Laidler, MD

>

> Ever since I began the Herculean (some might say Quixotic) task of

> exposing

> the quackery and pseudoscience surrounding autism, I have had people

> ask me,

> " Are you the same Jim Laidler who used to talk about chelation at

> autism

> conferences? " To them, the idea that I could once have been an

> impassioned

> supporter of the very thing I am now trying to debunk is hard to

> fathom.

> Well, everyone has something in their past that they are embarrassed

> about-and that is mine.

>

> I consider myself to be a very scientific person. While growing up, I

> was

> skeptical and inquiring and naturally gravitated to the sciences. My

> first

> brushes with pseudoscience and quackery in medical school left me

> convinced

> that " it could never happen to me. " I was sure that my background and

> training would keep me from making the same mistake as " those people. "

> I was

> wrong.

>

> A year or so after my son was diagnosed with autism, with no hope for

> cure

> in sight, I was feeling desperate for anything that might help him. My

> wife

> attended a conference about " biological treatments for autism. " She

> came

> back extremely excited, having heard story after story about " hopeless "

> cases of autism " cured " by a variety of simple treatments. I was

> initially

> skeptical, but my desperation soon got the better of me. We started

> out with

> the simple therapies-vitamins and minerals-but soon moved on to the

> " hard

> stuff " : the gluten- and casein-free diet, secretin, and chelation.

> Some of

> it seemed to work-for a while-and that just spurred us to try the next

> therapy on the horizon. I was " hooked " on hope, which is more

> addictive and

> dangerous than any " street " drug. Meanwhile, my second son developed an

> autism-like disability at the age of 18 months.

>

> The next year, I accompanied my wife to the autism conference and was

> dazzled and amazed. There were more treatments for autism than I could

> ever

> hope to try on my son, and every one of them had passionate promoters

> claiming that it had cured at least one autistic child-usually their

> own.

> There were blood tests, urine test, hair tests, saliva tests, brain

> wave

> tests and eye tests, all claiming to be able to find the specific

> cause for

> a child's autism. And they had specific treatments for each of those

> causes.

> Sure, some of them were contradictory, but nobody seemed to mind that.

> What

> really caught my interest was the proposition that thimerosal, the

> mercury-based preservative in vaccines, caused autism and chelation

> therapy

> could cure it. Advocates of this idea spoke authoritatively, with

> impressive

> lists of references and well-designed PowerPoint slides. I was

> intrigued

> even though the children I had seen with mercury poisoning did not

> behave

> like my autistic son and the recommended dosage for the chelating

> agents

> made no sense to me.

>

> My next step toward the " Dark Side " was to write a review paper on

> mercury

> toxicity and its treatment that might improve what the chelation

> advocates

> were doing. Leading proponents were recommending that the chelating

> agents

> be given every three hours around the clock for up to four weeks, an

> obvious

> source of stress for already overstressed parents. In addition, many of

> these chelation " experts " predicted dire consequences if a dose is

> missed or

> even given an hour late. My paper simply outlined the then-current

> information about mercury poisoning and chelation therapy for mercury,

> using

> articles from peer-reviewed journals. Among other things, it debunked

> the

> dosing ideas I had encountered at the conference.

>

> Before long, I was invited to join a conference to set up a " protocol "

> for

> using chelation in the treatment of autism. I attended and, for the

> first

> time, got to see many of the leading lights in " non-conventional "

> autism

> treatment outside of the conference hall. Most of these people

> appeared to

> hold sincere beliefs but based their assessment of their therapeutic

> efforts

> on anecdotes, surveys, and simplistic studies. I thought they would

> welcome

> a more rigorous scientific investigation of their methods and results.

> After

> the conference, I was asked to compile a " consensus report. " I readily

> agreed, thinking that my editing could temper the unscientific

> thinking of

> the rest of the group. However, my editorial control turned out to be

> nil.

> The final report included large tracts of material that were the pet

> beliefs

> of the senior members of the organization. Worse yet, even though I

> disagreed with significant portions of the report, my name was listed

> as

> sole author! I have been able to get my name removed from the

> " official "

> document, but Internet copies of the original abound.

>

> I was subsequently invited to speak at conferences about chelation and

> autism and went, with an increasingly heavy heart, until I finally

> could do

> it no more. Getting to know the big names in " alternative " autism

> therapy

> had exposed me to some ugly truths. What finally changed by feeling,

> however, was further observation of my children.

>

> After years of " supplements, " restrictive diets and " unconventional "

> therapies (too many to list), our boys were improved, but were a long

> way

> from being cured. We were forced to carry their special foods with us

> whenever we left the house, lest a molecule of gluten or casein

> catapult

> them back to where we had begun. We were nearly broke, despite both of

> us

> having well-paying jobs, and we were on the verge of exhaustion. The

> beginning of the end was when my wife, suspecting that some of the

> " supplements " we were giving our older son weren't having any effect,

> stopped them all-without telling me. I saw no difference, even after

> two

> months (when she finally told me). We had been chasing our tails,

> increasing

> this and decreasing that in response to every change in his

> behavior-and all

> the while his ups and downs had just been random fluctuation. My eyes

> began

> to open.

>

> The final step in my awakening came during a Disneyland vacation. My

> younger

> son was still on a gluten- and casein-free diet, which we both swore

> had

> been a significant factor in his improvement. We had lugged at least 40

> pounds of special food on the plane with us. In an unwatched moment, he

> snatched a waffle and ate it. We watched with horror and awaited the

> dramatic deterioration of his condition that the " experts " told us

> would

> inevitably occur. The results were astounding-absolutely nothing

> happened. I

> began to suspect that I had been very foolish.

>

> In the following months, we stopped every treatment except speech and

> occupational therapy for both boys. They did not deteriorate and, in

> fact,

> continued to improve at the same rate as before-or faster. Our bank

> balance

> improved, and the circles under our eyes started to fade. And quite

> frankly,

> I began to get mad at myself for being so gullible and for misleading

> other

> parents of autistic children.

>

> Looking back on my experiences with " alternate " autism therapies, they

> seem

> almost unreal, like Alice's adventures in Wonderland. Utter nonsense

> treated

> like scientific data, people nodding in sage agreement with blatant

> contradictions, and theories made out of thin air and unrelated

> facts-and

> all of it happening happening right here and now, not in some book.

> Real

> people are being deceived and hurt, and there won't be a happy ending

> unless

> enough of us get together and write one.

>

> My personal journey through the looking glass has ended. I stepped into

> " alternative " medicine up to my neck and waded out again, poorer but

> wiser.

> I now realize that the thing the " alternative " practitioners are really

> selling is hope-usually false hope-and hope is a very seductive thing

> to

> those who have lost it. It is really not surprising that people will

> buy it

> even when their better judgment tells them not to do so.

>

> I suspect that the majority of the people who promote " unconventional "

> or

> " alternative " treatments for autism truly believe in what they sell.

> They

> deserve pity rather than scorn. Most of them will never realize what a

> disservice they provide to the very people they are trying to help. It

> is

> not my intent to make them " see the light. " It is the autistic

> children (and

> adults), their parents, relatives and friends that I am trying to

> reach with

> this Web site, in the hope that they won't have to go through what my

> family

> has experienced. It is to them that I dedicate my efforts.

>

>