Healing the New Childhood Epidemics by Dr. Kenneth Bock details the approach he has developed when treating children with autism, ADHD, asthma and allergies. All four of these syndromes or conditions have been on the rise at a frightening rate for the last 20 years especially. It is not just a matter of better diagnosis either. Dr. Bock thinks there is a complicated interplay between genetic vulnerability, nutritional issues due to our industrialized food system and environmental toxins such as heavy metals accumulating in the body. The book is very detailed and systematic. I didn't feel like he was trying to sell me anything, but really just wanted to get information out there to help parents and their children who are struggling so with these conditions.
The book begins with several cases that Dr. Bock has worked with over the years that illustrate how children respond so positively to his very sensitive and practical approach. The cases are pretty extreme and heartbreaking. One thing that made me trust Dr. Bock is that while many of the patients were healed, not all were completely. Not all the issues went away, but were so reduced that life, instead of being a living hell, became quite manageable and full of hope. I didn't feel Dr. Bock was trying to sell me a magic cure at all.
Dr. Bock takes a four prong approach to dealing with healing or improving these epidemic illnesses. The first is diet. He has several diets listed going from fairly restrictive to extremely restrictive. And the fairly restrictive is actually pretty restrictive by any normal point of view. The diet is to go gluten and casein free. Many children with these disorders respond positively to this diet. He explains the whole chemistry behind why this is so. Gluten is found in bread and in all sorts of processed foods. So many, many people are going gluten free nowadays because celiac disease is on the rise. But even if you don't have celiac's the gluten and casein (a protein found in dairy foods) can still mess up those neurotransmitters in your brain. Between 50 and 60% of kids struggling with the 4-A disorders, as Dr. Bock refers to them, respond positively to taking gluten and casein out of their diets. That's a pretty big percentage!
We just had our first gluten free/casein free day yesterday. Sean and I are going whole hog with it. Becky tried but towards the end of the day had a bagel, some cheese crackers and then some tortilla with cheese melted on them. It's gonna take a while for her. I do think she is truly addicted to cheese! But Seano was a trooper. Even though he is struggling so much with depression right now, or maybe because of it, he really wants to feel better, so if this diet can clear the fog and get those transmitters firing more normally, it could really help the depression, I'm thinking. Everything is so interrelated for him. Beyond the gluten/casein free diet are other more restrictive diets which I can't even handle really thinking about right now. I am sure you would need a nutritionist to help you figure the 4 or 5 foods that are eventually left! I'm exaggerating a bit there! A lot of it though is kind of a modified Paleo diet, so it is doable. Not easy, but then if you are desperate, you'll do what it takes!
The second prong, which I have not really started on, is supplementation. Kids suffering from these conditions are often very nutritionally depleted in certain minerals, fats, vitamins and enzymes. I feel I need to get Sean tested and I am not sure who to turn to for this. I am afraid of quackery! I need to talk to my pediatrician. Anyway, kids are given certain supplements to restore balance to their chemistry. The book outlines a very detailed list of every kind of thing they may need and spells out everything very clearly. But it gets rather over my head at this point. I just found all the information a bit too much to take in, so I kind of skimmed and then decided I would focus on diet first and once I felt I had a handle on that, I'd move on. I can only process so much at a time.
The 3rd prong is detoxification. I have heard for years about the connection between autism and vaccines. I know someone who is convinced that's what triggered her daughter's epilepsy and developmental delays. I know this is controversial, but Dr. Bock's explanation made sense to me. So many of the children do seem to change after having their vaccinations. This has happened too many times and is evidenced by videos even, before and after the vaccinations, to be always chalked up to the idea that the parents simply want to find something to blame and noticed the problems after the vaccinations. There are heavy metals in these vaccines and if the child is genetically vulnerable, there can be some kind of complex chemical reaction that makes the immune system or the brain (all interrelated) go haywire. We get metals from other sources too like medication and environmental exposure. I couldn't read the portion of the book closely either, as again, I was suffering from information overload. And again this is a process where a doctor is needed to first test to see if there is an excess of metals present and if so which ones. The detoxification treatment depends on each individual child's needs. We haven't reached that step yet.
The final and 4th prong is medication. Dr. Bock thinks that in some cases medication really does help. He lays out a thorough analysis of when drugs are appropriate, which types to use and all their various pros and cons.
I have a feeling this book is going to get dog-eared after I'm through with it. It lays out a very sensible systematic, but complicated path. Dr. Bock seems very caring and his observations and advice is very hopeful. I like how thorough he is (even though for me, a beginner in all this, it was overwhelming) and I like that he doesn't veer off into things that make me a little nervous, like some New Age practices that promise to cure everything. I don't think, truly, that there is a cure out there. I do think though things can be improved. That's what I am hoping for.
For more reviews go to 52 Books.
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