Influence Of The Feingold Diet List On Babies With Non Organic Failure To Thrive Syndrome
There are a series of diets which have been distributed many times for a baby with developmental difficulties such as Non Organic Failure To Thrive Syndrome. The Gluten Free and Feingold Diets are among the favorites for this context.
Breaking The Paradigm
I want to applaud the developers of these diets for shifting the paradigm about what might be causing the world-wide explosion in the incidence of developmental diagnoses for babies. For decades our modern medical practitioners could not understand that what a person consumed could affect that person’s developmental health. These diets are understandably popular in the groups affected by Non Organic Failure To Thrive Syndrome, as well as other developmental diagnoses and these diets are showing that they are positively improving the futures of many of these children.
These diets succeed for some children with important reductions in a range of measurable symptoms. For other children there is less improvements. And, for others there is no improvement at all from these diets. One of the unanswered questions is why are some children dramatically helped by these diets and others are not?
We have been working with children with developmental problems for decades. We are now concentrating in this area of re-engaging the developmental process. One of our breakthroughs has been an realization of the relationship between sensitivities and intolerances and developmental difficulties.
Sensitivities and Intolerances
Each of us has some things around us to which we are sensitive, or of which we have an intolerance. This is not like an allergy where we have a forceful and fast immunological response to some thing. This is much more a subtle defensive response we have to something in our environment over time.
If a person is allergic to bee stings, they have an forceful and fast response to being stung by a bee. They can have swelling or even enter life-threatening anaphylactic shock. But, consider the possibility that a person has a sensitivity to, or an intolerance of, a deodorant soap bar. They might not have a reaction to it until they use it for many days, and then they may develop a minor rash as the reaction because of that sensitivity or intolerance. If you discover that this rash is related to the deodorant soap bar, you can stop the use of it and the rash will go away.
Developmental Problems
We discovered that a baby with developmental issues, such as Non Organic Failure To Thrive Syndrome, have collections environmental factors to which they have these defensive reactions. And, it is the collections of these multiple reactions which seems to be at the root of these developmental diagnoses. The stacking of these defensive reactions results in the body shutting down functions which are not necessary for survival today.
This defensive reaction process was developed in a less contaminated era and the body only needed this defensive reaction to sustain itself for a few minutes or hours while the person walked or was carried away from the things to which the body was reacting. A few minutes of a conservative, defensive response was usually enough for offending thing to be out of range. So, if the body shuts down some functions not needed while getting away from the offending environmental factor, it would not affect the long-term survival of the person.
Shutting Down The Developmental Process
The difficulty is that our world is much more contaminated now and children with developmental problems are much more sensitive to contaminants than when we evolved these reaction processes. If the babies have these kinds of piling on top of each other defensive reactions to something which is eaten at every meal, the defensive responses will never end. If the child has these compounding defensive responses to the laundry detergent or fabric softener used in the house, the child always has residue of those chemicals against the skin, so the reactions can never end. Imagine if the child has an ongoing series of these kinds of sensitivities and responses and the child’s body never has a chance to stop having these reactions.
One of the functions commonly shut down in these stacked defensive responses is the developmental process. If a child’s defensive response includes shutting down the developmental process, and the defensive reaction never stops, the developmental process never gets to move the child forward toward maturation. In this case, the child does not get to develop.
Feingold and Casein Free Diet Lists
Here is where the Feingold and Gluten Free Casein Free Diets come in to play. These diets provide a list of restrictions of things to which many children with developmental problems are responding defensively. So, the children with developmental diagnoses who have a sensitivity to the items restricted by the diet will show some amazing results. The children who have an individual menu of sensitivities which is aligned with the diet will benefit from it. For those children who try the diet, but whose set of intolerances are not aligned well with the restrictions of the diet, there will be little help.
For this reason we recognize the significant contributions the Gluten Free and Feingold Diets have made in our understanding of developmental issues. They help us all understand that the children with developmental issues are reacting to some list of things in the environment and we can help these children re-engage their developmental process, if we eliminate those things from the child’s environment on their list.
These diets are on the right track, but there is an assumption that some particular environmental factors are causing the developmental issues. The problem in this assumption is that the defensive responses these children have is about their own personal list of offending factors (not a generic list). Their own list may not include the restricted items of the generic diet. Each child needs to be using a diet which is specifically tailored to their own individual menu of sensitivities.
Intolerance Evaluations Is The Key To Success
What we have developed is an approach for testing each of our client children for their own specific menu of sensitivities. This gives the parents a precise list of factors to eliminate from the child’s environment. So, instead of a generic diet plan which might (or might not) have the items a specific child needs to restrict, we give each parent a precise list of things their child needs to eliminate.
Much More Than A Diet Program
Our testing technique involves anything that the child eats, breathes, and touches. This involves more than the child’s foods and drinks. It includes testing the child’s reactions to meds, household cleaning chemicals, and everything in the child’s environment. Our thorough testing approach will help you design an appropriate plan to clear all of the offending environmental factors from your child’s environment.
What Happens When The Child Stops Having These Defensive Reactions?
There are many different types of developmental issues in children. Each of them have their own set of symptoms which are recognized as the set of signals of that specific diagnosis. Many children have so many symptoms that they have many diagnoses, because their own set of symptoms cross boundaries from one diagnosis to another.
Because of this symptomatic and diagnostic complexity, we would not be able to identify which symptoms a child will develop out of first as a result of being in an environment where their offending factors have been eliminated. But, our experience is clear that when children enter and stay in an environment free of their offending environmental factors, their developmental process kicks in and their developmental process begins to move them through their missed or next developmental stages. You know this approach is being successful when you see your child start progressing through developmental stages.
We encourage our clients to establish a developmental baseline of their child with our free Developmental Checklist before they start working with us. We encourage them to use this same checklist, monthly, to keep track of their child’s progress as they continue working with us.
By tracking the child’s developmental forward movement, parents can see that their child has restarted the developmental process. This forward progress means that the child is developing past the symptoms which were the basis of the child’s diagnosis in the first place.
Sensitivity and Intolerance Re-Testing For The Long Term
After some time of developmental movement using our program, we encourage parents to re-test their child’s sensitivities. Many of the offending things will produce defensive responses, and the child can slowly bring those things back into the environment. Many other things will still produce those defensive responses and they will need to stay on the restricted list for this child. Which items can be brought back and which items need to stay restricted is individual for each child.
Is It Time For Your Child To Get Back On Track?
If your child has developmental diagnoses such as Non Organic Failure To Thrive Syndrome, come by our free, private social network for parents. Talk with us and each other about your child’s situation.