Adam's Story -
Our little boy was diagnosed with ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) in December 03. He had no eye contact and the speech he had acquired had all but gone. He flipped through picture books without looking at the pages, he lined up toys but didn’t play with them or with his sister. He looked at the TV and other objects from weird angles or from the corners of his eyes. He suffered from recurrent ear infections before 1 year old requiring numerous courses of anti-biotics and eventually surgery to implant grommets (“tubes”) in his eardrums.
His muscle tone was low and he had little energy usually wanting to be carried. He suffered continual mild reflux and diarrhea. He was not potty trained. The pediatrician gave us a very sad prognosis of what to expect for his life. We wondered what really was this “autism”. Why had it happened to our son? Where had it come from? Where would it go?
Around the same time as the diagnosis, we heard of the mangosteen fruit and its beneficial effect for those suffering from diarrhoea and decided to give small doses (30ml with breakfast) to our son in January 04. We immediately noticed an improvement in speech and attempts at social interaction. From this we determined that the pediatrician’s prognosis was wrong and we set out to find a new way, a better life for our son. With the help of an open-minded doctor, we started on a biomedical approach to Adam’s autism changing his diet and adding in certain vitamin, mineral, enzyme and amino acid supplements to the mangosteen juice. Also we instituted the more traditional approaches with enrolment at a special needs kindergarten, speech and occupational therapy interventions.
With great results . . .
May 30, 2005 - Adam wrote his own name today.
Our little boy was diagnosed with ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) in December 03. He had no eye contact and the speech he had acquired had all but gone. He flipped through picture books without looking at the pages, he lined up toys but didn’t play with them or with his sister. He looked at the TV and other objects from weird angles or from the corners of his eyes. He suffered from recurrent ear infections before 1 year old requiring numerous courses of anti-biotics and eventually surgery to implant grommets (“tubes”) in his eardrums.
His muscle tone was low and he had little energy usually wanting to be carried. He suffered continual mild reflux and diarrhea. He was not potty trained. The pediatrician gave us a very sad prognosis of what to expect for his life. We wondered what really was this “autism”. Why had it happened to our son? Where had it come from? Where would it go?
Around the same time as the diagnosis, we heard of the mangosteen fruit and its beneficial effect for those suffering from diarrhoea and decided to give small doses (30ml with breakfast) to our son in January 04. We immediately noticed an improvement in speech and attempts at social interaction. From this we determined that the pediatrician’s prognosis was wrong and we set out to find a new way, a better life for our son. With the help of an open-minded doctor, we started on a biomedical approach to Adam’s autism changing his diet and adding in certain vitamin, mineral, enzyme and amino acid supplements to the mangosteen juice. Also we instituted the more traditional approaches with enrolment at a special needs kindergarten, speech and occupational therapy interventions.
With great results . . .
May 30, 2005 - Adam wrote his own name today.
During the intervening 24 months to now, we’ve been on a steep learning curve – both about autism and about mangosteen. I’ve come to believe that autism is a symptom of a number of underlying issues, and that for each child the jigsaw of issues will be slightly different. For Adam, these seem to be based around gut flora imbalance with certain food intolerances, heavy metal toxicity and viral overload. Originally, I believed that the mangosteen juice helped primarily because of its influence on helping with the diarrhea, but nowadays, I believe its probably a lot more to do with mangosteen’s inflammation-controlling properties– both in the brain itself and in the gut - , its antioxidant effects, and its anti-viral / anti-fungal effects. Adam receives 30 mls mangosteen juice 2 – 3 times/day. If he misses a dose, I know it as his cognition / alertness lessens.
Our son these days makes great eye contact at home and has more in settings outside home. He is able to communicate in a pragmatic way – still uses mostly nouns but nowadays is including a lot more verbs and pronouns. He loves reading picture books and is able to recognize hundreds of words – way more than other children his age. Often he will then re-draw his favourite pictures and words from the book . . . without looking. He plays with toys though still not as much as his peers, but does love to play games with his older sister which they make up themselves. He watches the TV from a chair or sitting on a mat on the floor. He rarely gets any sort of infection. He still does have quite low muscle tone but he is vigorous and energetic, riding his bike tirelessly around our large back yard . . . even down the terrace steps and over the garden bed edges for a bit of extra excitement. His bowel movements are now pretty well normal most of the time and he is toilet trained. He started in normal preschool this year and, while his language is still not as good as his contemporaries, he’s the one that the teacher gets to show the others how to use the computer.
We believe Adam will recover – moving off the autism spectrum into the “normal” range. The mangosteen juice has been an integral part of his recovery to date and we believe it will continue to be the cornerstone of his recovery in the future.
The whole family drinks Mangosteen juice every day.
Cathy & Jason H.
Brisbane - AUSTRALIA
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Nov 28, 2005 - Adam got his Report Card from Music school today.
Our son these days makes great eye contact at home and has more in settings outside home. He is able to communicate in a pragmatic way – still uses mostly nouns but nowadays is including a lot more verbs and pronouns. He loves reading picture books and is able to recognize hundreds of words – way more than other children his age. Often he will then re-draw his favourite pictures and words from the book . . . without looking. He plays with toys though still not as much as his peers, but does love to play games with his older sister which they make up themselves. He watches the TV from a chair or sitting on a mat on the floor. He rarely gets any sort of infection. He still does have quite low muscle tone but he is vigorous and energetic, riding his bike tirelessly around our large back yard . . . even down the terrace steps and over the garden bed edges for a bit of extra excitement. His bowel movements are now pretty well normal most of the time and he is toilet trained. He started in normal preschool this year and, while his language is still not as good as his contemporaries, he’s the one that the teacher gets to show the others how to use the computer.
We believe Adam will recover – moving off the autism spectrum into the “normal” range. The mangosteen juice has been an integral part of his recovery to date and we believe it will continue to be the cornerstone of his recovery in the future.
The whole family drinks Mangosteen juice every day.
Cathy & Jason H.
Brisbane - AUSTRALIA
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Nov 28, 2005 - Adam got his Report Card from Music school today.
Adam's Story continued - July 2008 UPDATE
The Australian school year is the calendar year, so Adam started grade 1 in January 2008. And he loves it! See his report card for 1st semester below - we were so surprised that we even asked his teacher if it was true . . . to which she indignantly assured us that it was!
We had the opportunity for Adam to attend part time a placement at a specialist ASD school at the start of the year, which we decided to accept. However, we did not continue after one term – We felt they were focusing on his weaknesses rather than building on his strengths. We don’t think this is good for anyone let alone a child with some challenges. For Adam, he is much better surrounded by his “normal” peers, learning and doing the things that “normal” kids do.
His spoken language continues to improve though it is still lags significantly behind his peers. He uses a lot more verbs, pronouns and prepositions than at the time I last wrote. At times he will still use a phrase from a movie or computer game to express his emotion, (he told the speech therapist when she was asking him some tough questions this week “I want to kick your butt!” – where did he learn that!!!?) but generally he uses a sentence of his own construction to express himself or to make a comment about his world.
His writing and reading abilities have skyrocketed. His comprehension of the reading and of spoken stories is not yet at the same level though and we’re working hard on that. Visual cues and reminders are still useful tools, but we find they are not needed as much or for as long. Adam's teacher tells us he adapts to change very well, indeed better than many of the “normal” children in the class.
In regards to his supplementation, there has been further tweaking over time – his de-tox programme continues and this seems to entail a significant price. He has had a couple of few nasty flu-type illnesses – some say this is the viruses in his system coming out and others that his system is so busy getting rid of some things, it can’t fight the battle on both fronts. Either way, he was a sick boy for those periods. While in his earlier life diarrhea was a problem, now it is the opposite.
Adam is best if he gets those three 50ml (1½oz) doses in each day. Sometimes I give him a 'big hit', say 100mls (3½oz) especially if he’s not 100% well.
We’re moving in the right direction and we are so very proud of Adam's progress. We have many daily treatments and interventions but Mangosteen Juice has been, and will continue to be, a cornerstone of our Adam's recovery.
Cathy & Jason H.
Brisbane - AUSTRALIA
Grade 1 - First term report.
The Australian school year is the calendar year, so Adam started grade 1 in January 2008. And he loves it! See his report card for 1st semester below - we were so surprised that we even asked his teacher if it was true . . . to which she indignantly assured us that it was!
We had the opportunity for Adam to attend part time a placement at a specialist ASD school at the start of the year, which we decided to accept. However, we did not continue after one term – We felt they were focusing on his weaknesses rather than building on his strengths. We don’t think this is good for anyone let alone a child with some challenges. For Adam, he is much better surrounded by his “normal” peers, learning and doing the things that “normal” kids do.
His spoken language continues to improve though it is still lags significantly behind his peers. He uses a lot more verbs, pronouns and prepositions than at the time I last wrote. At times he will still use a phrase from a movie or computer game to express his emotion, (he told the speech therapist when she was asking him some tough questions this week “I want to kick your butt!” – where did he learn that!!!?) but generally he uses a sentence of his own construction to express himself or to make a comment about his world.
His writing and reading abilities have skyrocketed. His comprehension of the reading and of spoken stories is not yet at the same level though and we’re working hard on that. Visual cues and reminders are still useful tools, but we find they are not needed as much or for as long. Adam's teacher tells us he adapts to change very well, indeed better than many of the “normal” children in the class.
In regards to his supplementation, there has been further tweaking over time – his de-tox programme continues and this seems to entail a significant price. He has had a couple of few nasty flu-type illnesses – some say this is the viruses in his system coming out and others that his system is so busy getting rid of some things, it can’t fight the battle on both fronts. Either way, he was a sick boy for those periods. While in his earlier life diarrhea was a problem, now it is the opposite.
Adam is best if he gets those three 50ml (1½oz) doses in each day. Sometimes I give him a 'big hit', say 100mls (3½oz) especially if he’s not 100% well.
We’re moving in the right direction and we are so very proud of Adam's progress. We have many daily treatments and interventions but Mangosteen Juice has been, and will continue to be, a cornerstone of our Adam's recovery.
Cathy & Jason H.
Brisbane - AUSTRALIA
Grade 1 - First term report.