Less tantrums and isms with MMS

Nathan’s isms (exclusive, repetitive autistic behavior) and tantrums has been more mellow.  Before he would all of a sudden get irritated (when Amor shouts, for example) and want to pinch, bite, pull hair or clinch his fist or body tense.  Son-rise has helped us a lot to manage his tantrums.  We have been able to bring down an hour of crying to 5 mins or less.  We have been able diminish his need to bite someone by loving and accepting his need to bite when he overstimulated and providing him alternatives. For a child with autism, who has a hard time expressing his needs, it’s understandable that biting is the easiest thing to do.

 

MMS brings us to a higher level.  Now, when he is over stimulated by background noise, I only see him closing his fist, not even clinching with facial expression of anger anymore.  The other day, he cried.  While I am usually on guard against his sudden urge to bite, that time I wasn’t.  His cry was so mellow.  For the first time I could carry and hug him without feeling so alert that I have to be ready to put distance between us in case he will bite.  While he was crying, I was enjoying the fact that he was just hugging me.  He literally just needed a shoulder to cry on and not a teether to release his anger.

 

MMS recovery is so much faster than I had expected!  Miracles happen!  We’re only on day 17 of MMS, not even full dose yet.

Amor has less whining

I don’t have to sneak out to go to grocery anymore! Amor (diagnosis: Global Developmental Delay, age 6) always used to cry, whine and insist to come with me. The fastest way out was sneak.

Today, I carried the shopping stroller to the door (no more hiding) and said goodbye to all my kids. Amor asked, “Where are you going?” Up for the challenge, I answered, “Where do you think I’m going Amor?” She replied, ” To ShengShong (name of grocery).” And with a big proud smile on my face, I said “goodbye” again and walked out the door!

We’re on day 15 of MMS and we’ve been doing lifestyle son-rise with Amor for a year.

New church

I finally attended mass at our nearby Church, Church of the Holy Cross. I liked the atmosphere, I liked the priest and his sermon. There’s a crying room. Nathan and I can stay there in case he has a what-are-we-waiting-for tantrum.

I’ve missed our church back in Japan because of the closeness of the community. So this is a good change.

Amor seems to be responding to MMS

I took Amor to the mall. Today I was more confident, it’s day 9 since starting MMS. I’ve noticed she is more calm and understands/follows instructions better. Usually, her biggest challenge (or my biggest challenge when I’m with her) is her transitioning issues/flexibility. It’s usually hard getting her to go home at the end.

However, today Amor was good. She looked at toys but I eventually steered her away to get some groceries. On the way home she said, “Hey, look at that!” I though, “Oh no, should I move on and keep walking like I didn’t hear her? I’ll never get her home if she really likes what she ‘s seeing.” It was a car ride. I was brave enough to allow her to ride. I even gave her a dollar to drive. Amazing after her ride, I told her it was time to go. Still allowing her full control (son-rise way), I offered that she could stay if she wanted. She decided to come home with me…thank goodness.

Furthermore, while walking to and from the mall, she corrected her steps when I reminded her to “roll your feet.” Otherwise, she unconsciously tip-toe walks.

Day 3 of MMS

Today during our son-rise session, Nathan started singing songs that he learned about 2 years ago from Barney shows but he hadn’t sang them for those 2 years. My eyes started filling with tears because I was recalling how Nathan regressed into autism.

At age 2 Nathan knew his nursery rhymes. In fact we even had our own version of “name that tune” and he even made me his mommy-dukebok as he requested songs.

At age 2 1/2 Nathan was singing all the songs from our favorite kids CD. He would hum as he thought what song to sing next. I got a little worried when his humming between songs got longer and longer….At the end of a year, there was no more songs, just humming. Eventually the shocking diagnosis, autism.

But today, on only the 3rd day of MMS, he’s suddenly recalling songs from those few years when he was slowly regressing. Is this happening?

As I cried, Nathan stopped and looked at me. His face was trying to ask, “why to do you have tears in your eyes?” I just returned the gaze with amazement…and more tears. He was concerned about me. I explained those were tears of joy.

Later in the evening he got an old book that I used to read to them as babies. As I guided him, he “read” through it, instead of flip the pages and feel the texture.

If MMS can get Nathan to his 3 or even 2 1/2-year-old level, in terms of interactive attention….we can son-rise all the way and catch up on those missing years. He is now 6 years, 4months.

More than ever, please pray for us. MMS is giving us so much boost (from viewing stories of other families and now this, only day 3 of MMS). Is this it? The burden made easy?

Keeping faith.

A new adventure

The day after 12-12-12 is literally the start of a new adventure for us. We are trying something new in terms of biomedical intervention for autism. It’s called MMS (Miracle Mineral Solution). Crazy name, but well, can’t do anything about that.

There is so much mixed reviews about MMS online. The people that haven’t tried it have readily criticized it by judging or misjudging it by its chemical name. The folks that have tried it have so many good things to say about it and their children’s progress.

There’s a whole community, guided by Kerri Riveria, that is seeing amazing progress with MMS treatment. So little is known about autism and these families have proven it.

I am convinced this will greatly help Nathan because I know a lot of his issues stem from his gut problems. At age 2, Nathan had good and frequent poop. He wasn’t walking, yes. But nobody would have guessed that he would one day be so autistic. His regression coincides with his constipation and crying almost every night.

Asking again and again

So little is said about Amor, Nathan’s twin sister. Her diagnosis is Global Developmental Delay (GDD). The doctor’s umbrella term for “we don’t know exactly, so we’ll just call it GDD.” :-P. Amor is doing pretty well, she has always been my fighter. It takes her longer than her peers to achieve things, but she always manages to get there.

Amor has, what I call, more advanced “isms” (exclusive or, in her case, semi-exclusive, repetitive behavior) like asking you to tell the same story over and over again. It used to bother me. But now, after understanding son-rise, I understand much better.

Amor’s SPED therapist once told me she has trouble with her working memory. Working memory is what we need to be able to read a book from cover to cover and comprehend it.

When Amor asks to tell the same story again and again, it used to make my think, “Oh no! Here’s her working memory problem.”

But now, after son-rise, and understanding that “isms” are far more important than how they are usually judged, I know that Amor is only trying her best to cope. In fact we do the same.

I remember my amazing HS trigonometry teacher would memorize all the names of her hundreds of students on the first day of school. She would do it like this:
“What’s your name?”,
“Melissa(1)”, (register),
“(next) name?”,
“Alice(2)”, (register)
“Melissa(1), Alice(2),”
“(Next)?”
“Samantha(3)”
“Melissa(1), Alice(2), Samantha (3)”
…and so on, until she memorized all our names. Then she’d move to her next class and do the same.

When we are trying to recall lyrics or the title of a song, we sing, “la, la, la…” until we finally get to the chorus and sing. Then back to “la, la, la”, then sing the chorus again, until we finally find that title.

If you notice kid’s stories like “Three Little Pigs” or “Goldilocks and the 3 Bears,” they intentionally have repetition to help young kids with their working memory.

So, yes, my Amor has issues with her working memory but her asking to tell the same story over and over again, is not an indication of the problem. It is an indication that she is trying her best to overcome this problem. And by patiently answering her, over and over, if needed, we can actually help her overcome her problem with working memory.