Category Archives: Nuts and Bolts

Microwaving Goodbye

Posted on by findingmykid
5

NPR, via Facebook, recently ran a question along the lines of, “I must have missed that day,” or something similar. The idea was for people to write in with some terribly obvious facts/ideas that they did not realize until adulthood. Thousands of people posted.

I’m going to add this obvious fact to my “I must have missed that day” pile: Apparently I should not be using the microwave around Martin, and certainly not for his food. Despite all I’ve learned, I managed to miss that, and I’ve been microwaving left and right, even microwaving the water to “cook” Martin’s homotoxicology drops.

My bad, again!

I still have a lot of environmental changes to make in our apartment, mostly having to do with electromagnetic fields. The cordless phones are already gone, and the flat-screen television and entertainment center are unplugged unless in use. But there are still the wireless router, the wireless printer, the 24/7 Blackberries, and, of course, the microwave.

I’m overwhelmed again. As usual.

Laser Energetic Detox

Posted on by findingmykid
5

Martin and I are in a hotel outside Chicago. We flew here, only slightly delayed by an angry, lingering rain at LaGuardia. Tomorrow afternoon we begin two days of laser energetic detoxification (LED) treatments, which involve applying customized vibrations to help pathogens exit through Martin’s meridians—something like a souped-up, high-tech version of his cranio-sacral therapy. Adrian had to be elsewhere for business, so my mother has flown in from the Southwest for support. The LED procedure sounds more “out there” than Adrian and I are used to, so we’ve been researching on-line and discussing with each other. We’ve found relatively little evidence of potential side effects, so it’s a go. I will post later this week about what happens.

Adrian said, “We’re doing all this work to detox. How do we know he won’t, you know, ‘re-tox’?” I need to do make more inquiries so that I can answer his question.

Meanwhile, Martin is a little off, still. His language is strong, and his behavior is good, with no trouble transitioning and only mini-tantrums that fade fast. But his attention span is zero, his eye contact is sporadic, and he’s engaging in more self-stimming. Understandable, I suppose. We’ve just put a weighty week behind us, with the allergist, new HANDLE exercises, a visit to Martin’s homotoxicologist, a party marking the last day at his old school, and a housewarming for friends in Westchester. And then I hauled him onto an airplane to Chicago.

Martin’s getting better is a lot of work for me and Adrian. It’s easy to forget that it’s a lot of work for Martin, too.

HANDLE this!

Posted on by findingmykid
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Martin has been a little off this week. Not in the same way as last week—his attention span is back up (thank goodness). Instead, he lacks coordination and balance, he’s restless at bedtime, and he’s had a couple difficult nights. (We used to have terrible troubles with Martin’s sleeping, which were misdiagnosed by the experts at the Big Imposing Hospital as Restless Leg Syndrome, or RLS; Martin’s sleeping was more or less the first thing that improved when we started treating his autism biomedically.) I attribute this week’s symptoms to the fact that, on Monday, we visited his HANDLE therapist, Katie Penque.

Of the various therapies in which Martin participates—RDI, PT, OT, speech therapy—HANDLE therapy has proved to be surprisingly powerful. Counter-intuitively so, even, as it relies on simple and gentle “organized movement activities,” like tilting Martin slowly backward and forward, or tapping my fingers across his skull in a particular pattern. The therapy is designed to help Martin gain better control over his physical self, his movements, his actions.

We noticed immediately after we began HANDLE therapy, three months ago, that Martin had a series of restless nights and seemed a little discombobulated during the day. Katie advised us to reduce the HANDLE exercises, then work back to full capacity. We did so. Even so, I sometimes have to skip a particular exercise because Martin seems to resist it. (In HANDLE language, this is called a “state change.”) But more or less, we got the hang of it and proceeded accordingly.

Now we see restless nights after a visit like Monday, when Katie evaluates his progress and recommends new, more advanced exercises. This week we added “hoop elevator,” in which Martin stands still whilst I slowly lower a hoop around him, from his head to the floor and back up again. We also added “joint tapping,” which is about what it sounds like, i.e., me tapping Martin in a bouncy motion at various joints. Doesn’t seem like much, right? But even Katie doing the exercises with him on Monday, to show me how, set Martin on a course of nighttime restlessness and diminished coordination. It was Thursday before I could complete any HANDLE exercises at home without him resisting.

As Adrian and I see it, the HANDLE therapy is as successful with Martin as it is occasionally overwhelming. Martin truly is more in control of himself. He remains still for longer, and many of his movements have lost the clumsy jerkiness sometimes associated with ASD. The improvements are evident even when he sleeps. Martin used to circulate the bed during the night. Head at the top of the bed. Head at the foot of the bed. Head hanging off the side of the bed. Feet up the wall. Blankets on the floor. He continues to toss and turn, like any toddler, but for the most part he has become able to keep his head on the pillow, and a light blanket approximately over his body, from sleepy-time till morning.

It’s Friday night, and he has evened out since Monday. This weekend I will introduce the more advanced HANDLE exercises and see where they take us. I enjoy that Martin no longer attracts curious glimpses from passers-by, who look as if they can’t put their finger on why he appears different from other kids. Day by day, he looks more and more like the others at the playground.