Merry Christmas! Even if you're not Christian!

I vowed not to get stressed out this Christmas, and yet here I am two nights before Christmas and I am stressed out about all the things I haven't gotten to do yet, because my kids are at each other's throats and so worked up about getting presents soon, that they are just a wee bit hyper...I mean more than the usual ADHD craziness that goes on around here. The Dutch have it figured out pretty nicely actually. For Christmas here there are no presents. They do the whole getting presents from Santa Clause on December 5th. Except they call him Sinterklaas, and instead of living at the North Pole, relying on airborne reindeer hitched up to a magic sleigh for transportation and a magical bag of toys that some wormhole connects to a large stash of toys back at the pole, Sinterklaas rides a white stallion. He lives in the balmy climate of Spain, and takes a steamboat up to the Netherlands, which is commandeered by his slave boys, called black Petes (they all have the same name), who also carry the presents and stuff them in the shoes the kids leave out over night in front of their door. That way the Dutch get all the gift giving out of the way early in December and are free to celebrate Christmas as the birth of Christ.

So here I am, writing a post instead of wrapping presents, baking special cookies that I know I should probably not be baking anyway, to do a bit of stress relief and clear my mind of the thoughts that have been churning in it ever since I walked my youngest son to his class and saw the Christmas tree and the four advent candles out.
As you may or may not know the Netherlands is a fairly secular country. However, my youngest son goes to a protestant school. They pray every morning. They learn stories from the bible. We are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of latter Day Saints. I agree with a lot the Protestants do, but think that there is more they could know about. However, I am grateful that M can learn bible stories in school. I'm thrilled that the teachers and the whole school gets into the Christmas spirit by making cards and cookies for a Christmas sale, the proceeds of which went to a local charity. The kids help decorate the tree, they learn songs about the birth of Christ, the angels and shepherds, they give each other presents and cards, and the teachers show them how to properly shake someone's hand, and wish them merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. I was further impressed by the Christmas programs they put on in their respective churches. I first attended M's and then this morning E's. Both were well attended by the parents, and everyone was enjoying their kids sing about Jesus, reenact the nativity, and randomly enough, doing choreographed dances to Jingle Bell Rock while wearing a Santa hat.
Yes, I said everyone was enjoying and participating, including the Muslims. About a third of M's school friends are Muslim and for E's school I think there are perhaps a quarter. In fact the population demographic predicts that by 2020 there will be more Muslims in the Netherlands than Dutch. Yet here they are celebrating Christmas along with their children in a Christian church. I couldn't help but think of America and what has happened to our Christian country. We have let the Scrooges take over! 

Every 24th of December, whenever it was possible I watch A Christmas Carol. If you are familiar with this timeless classic you might notice that Dickens' story isn't about religion really. Sure, he closes with "God bless us everyone"! That includes every congregation, regardless of which God you believe in (or don't). Scrooge (the main character) was unhappy, selfish, and only concerned about profit and wealth. The Christmas spirits open his eyes to what he has been missing. He sees that early in his childhood he was left to study, instead of spending Christmas with his parents. He became bitter and angry. He was so concerned about what others thought of him and gaining recognition and status that he ended up thinking only about himself. The Spirits of Christmas teach him about the joy of giving to others, happiness in embracing merriment, and kindness to those in need. They teach him to open up the curtain he's been hiding behind and embrace the cheer around him. And he does and not only is he happier for it, but so is everyone else.

I feel like America has been subjected to mass-Scrooge-ing. Why do people in the US choose to be so offended by different beliefs and traditions? How come the Dutch can all gather together and have a great time celebrating a Christian tradition (technically a pagan tradition, and lets face it, in America at times a consumer tradition). Happy Kwanzaa, happy Hanukkah, happy Santa Clause day? Who cares. A party is a party. It doesn't matter whether you believe in it or not. In fact, I think that under close examination you'll find that a lot of Christians don't believe in Christ being literally the Son of God, and some celebrate Santa Clause more than Christ, and a lot of Jews keep their tradition because they are, well...Tradition (humm tune to Fiddler on the Roof opening song). Christmas is a tradition of coming together and thinking more of others. Charles Dickens got that when he wrote A Christmas Carol. If I'm invited to a Muslim Holiday, I will happily join and learn about their holiday. In fact, if I ever move to a Muslim country, I will respect and enjoy their holidays with them, and continue our own Thanksgiving and Christmas in my house. This doesn't threaten my belief. I stand firm in my faith. I have several Jewish friends from High school. I was thrilled to go to a Synagogue with my friend once, and I would still love to experience a genuine passover. So I invite you all who do celebrate Christmas: don't be afraid of offending people by saying merry Christmas. The US is a Christian country and it's their choice to take offense. We don't need to let them take over congress, hold protest marches, get people fired because of their non-belief. Don't back down because of Scrooges. Remember, in the end he changed and became the best merry-maker of all. And to you who feel the need to shoot down or glare at anyone who wishes you merry Christmas, feel the need to sue a school, county, or harass someone for not thinking as you do, I invite you to stop looking for offense where only kindness was meant. After all, people are wishing you merriness. They could instead be saying "have a lonely and miserable day off." Just because you don't want to be merry doesn't mean everyone else has to stop having parties. Take offense or take part, that's your choice! A party is a party! And if you want to be a party pooper and go around saying Bah Humbug to everything you don't believe in, I invite you to watch A Christmas Carol this year. My favorite is the Muppet Christmas Carol. Tomorrow morning I will get to watch it with the kids. And with that I leave you, to go wrap presents and practice for our caroling tomorrow night and wish you all a very merry Christmas.

Diet a religious dilemma?

I think at this point I could write an opera script about diets. Or a soap opera. It probably wouldn't get very good ratings, although there would be a fair amount of drama associated. Hm, perhaps reality TV is the way to go on that.

OK, if you follow my blog at all since my passionate post about the GAPS diet and how every parent of an autistic child should immediately do it, you know that although the diet has helped us get our kids eating a greater variety of food and we have healthier options, this diet has not been working for us. Ezra's behavior is getting more and more difficult. I read through all the FAQ on the gaps diet website to find answers, I contacted the clinic of the author to schedule an appointment, and they told me that she's no longer taking patients, and to read the book and the FAQ on the website. GREAT! That was helpful...NOT.

Anyway, I still think the theory about the gut flora being out of balance is a good one, and research definitely shows that the intestinal tracts of autistic children are severely compromised. So clearly something must be done to heal and seal the gut. But I'm starting to doubt, and always have that consuming massive amounts of meat, eggs, and animal fat are really the solution. To be fair, of course Dr. Campbell-Mcbride doesn't recommend "massive" amounts, but still, that's pretty much all the kids will eat. It makes sense that the bad bacteria needs to be starved of it's nutrition source (i.e. complex carbs). But on the other hand if the body is fighting chronic inflammation, how can consuming meat and fat, which are supposedly inflammatory going to make that any better, even if they are organically raised and grass fed?

I guess my real dilemma comes from my religious conviction. I'm a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of latter day Saints. I believe God reveals truths to prophets today just like he did in times of old. In 1833 a prophet called Joseph Smith received a revelation regarding the health and well-being of members. It's a code by which I live, called the word of wisdom. It counsels people to abstain from tobacco, alcohol, coffee, tea (black tea) and drugs (by the way one of the reasons we are counseled to abstain from them is not only because they can cause addiction and are bad for the body, but because of evil conspiring men. How true is that considering drug cartels, tobacco industry etc?) It also counsels people to eat liberally of plants and grains (wheat being especially good for man), use moderation on fruits, and eat meat of animals and fowls sparingly, only in winter and times of famine. This revelation isn't entirely new. The same kind of dietary suggestions can be found throughout the Old and New Testament. Now if you know LDS people at all, you know that they stick pretty well to the "don't" part, but do whatever they like with the "do". In fact, it's fair to say that sugar is the Mormon drug of choice. There is practically no social gathering that doesn't involve food. Anyway, getting off track here. 

SOO, my issue has been, if wheat is supposed to be good for us, then why is my kid allergic to gluten? Or what about all the other allergy sufferers, celiacs, etc? Of course, this revelation was given in 1833 and back then wheat was still soaked, fermented, and ground in a way to make it easily digestible, not like the highly processed stuff they have today. Our environment has changed a lot since then and we have so many more pollutants and toxins our body has to deal with. And who knows that the amount of exercise and fresh air they got back then didn't fortify their immune system in a way to never bring up digestive issues. I do believe God wants us to use common sense, and our brains to figure out what is right for ourselves. After all, the word of wisdom is a guideline. But now I'm really at the point where I just can't get any further. 

There are so many diets out there and they all claim to help, and often they advocate the exact opposite of each other. In fact, I think the one thing they all agree on is that all the chemical additives, food dyes, pesticides, and so on should be avoided at all costs. Which one is the right one? Feingold, GFCF, TCM, HDN, anti-histamine, GAPS, SCD, Body Ecology, Paleo, South Beach, Atkins, Vegan, Vegetarian, Macrobiotics? 

I need a revelation!

Food Fights and Autism

So here is a video of Ezra tonight having a hard time choosing Option number 2 (see below for explanation). Granny made dinner. When you watch the video, just consider that Ezra has eaten and liked beef in all sorts of shapes and preparation methods before, and he likes it...usually.
As most of you know we use the Son-Rise program at our house. Or at least we pretend to. Really, if you do Son-Rise it's like a life philosophy. Anyway, there is one area where I use more ABA and that is in the area of food. Sometimes I regret going this route, because as is the problem with ABA it doesn't really build relationship or teach them how to love and want to do something (i.e. eat food that is good for them).
Ezra was such a picky eater that he wouldn't accept anything at all unless he got some kind of reward or treat for it. One of the tricky things about doing a GAPS diet for both kids is that I can't use different standards for the kids. Not really. And at first it was actually my younger typically developing son who had a harder time and would throw tantrums before trying a new food. Now he pretty much will try a little bit of everything, but it still takes a while. I started using a dry erase board every time they had a tantrum. I drew a line down the middle and explained to them they had two options.

Option 1:
Cry, scream, hit, throw food, yell, not eat! -->Result: hungry, cranky, nothing else to eat, and eat whatever they didn't eat for breakfast, lunch. And they will also have wasted a lot of my time and energy, which means I won't have much left to play with them after dinner.
Option 2:
Just try a bit of everything, eat most of your food, get more yummy food. -->Result: feel full, happy, and we'll have more time to play together afterwards.


For Micah and Ezra writing things down really helps them understand better what they need to do, to arrive at the result they want. I have started applying the practice of drawing up their options into other areas of our life. I want them to learn that our actions determine our results. If I was the ideal mom I would be able to stay calm and supportive during every break down they have, sadly, I fall short of that ideal  multiple times a day. I'm working on it though.

GAPS...so far no luck!

We have been following the full GAPS diet for almost three months now. It seems like my life is all about food these days. I'm not even following the diet anymore myself. It is so much effort and so expensive, that I would rather have my kids eat the special food, than waste it on myself. After all I am a functioning adult, and other than obesity and mood swings, my health is fine. There is always the little mommy fear My-kids-are-going-to-starve in the back of my mind, and so when they ask me for food after finishing theirs, and my serving is all I have, I would rather give it to them, knowing that I can also survive on something else, if I need to (which is what I have been doing, and the scale is showing it). On the other hand I'm also trying to teach them that they can't just throw a tantrum and get what they want. I make it clear that what I put on the table is what they can eat, and otherwise they will be hungry. So often times, they actually end up a bit hungry, because they refuse to eat. They ask me for food non-stop. It's really aggravating. Ezra is especially obsessed with food. There seems to be no off-switch in his brain, when it comes to eating. He craves fruit like a drug addict craves heroine.

I am in the kitchen so much. I get up in the morning and spend about 1.5 hours in the kitchen. The night before I also spend about an hour after dinner making lunches and preparing breakfasts. That's not including the hour I spend in the kitchen making dinner. What on earth takes so long, you might wonder? Well, if you have to warm up the broth in the pan not the microwave, make fresh juice in the juicer, grind the nuts, and the pancake batter in the food processor, you end up having a lot of dishes to clean. Besides all the ingredients have to be homemade, so there is also a fair amount of prep work that goes into having the ingredients for the foods I make. For example nuts need to be soaked for 8-12 hours in salt water, then drained using a sieve, dried for several hours (ideally overnight) in the dehydrator, and ground into flour in the food processor. It takes organization and time to do GAPS. I'm not very organized. Still, all this work would be worth it if it could heal Ezra's stomach, his ADHD and his autism. IF...Sadly, it's not actually working. All the symptoms that should go away with GAPS are still there, and possibly worse than before. In the last two months we have seen in Ezra

• increase in skin rashes
• hyperactivity increase and decrease in focus and attention span
• aggression and decrease in use of language
• painful stomach and undigested food in poop
• increased obsession with food
  

It is sadly possible that we just aren't doing the GAPS diet right. We are on the what is called Full GAPS diet. There is an intro-phase, and technically you shouldn't move past the intro phase until your patient has been symptom free for 6 months. I suspect that if consulted a GAPS practitioner they would point out that Ezra is getting way too much fruit and honey, possibly can't tolerate a lot of eggs, nuts, coconut, and ghee, and that we need to put him on the intro, give him meat broth before every meal, soup once a day, and highly boiled vegetables and meat, until he has sufficiently detoxed, and only then move into full GAPS. I'm also fairly certain they would point out that the non-organic veggies and fruit we feed him are high in pesticides. Dr.Campbell even mentions in her book that GAPS patients can be so sensitive to those pesticides that they really don't improve until it is all out of their diet. And my friend who also has an autistic child would point out that the foods we are giving him are high in salicylates and phenols and can cause all the above reactions. But what can I do? Micah thrives on a high carbohydrate diet. His challenges are helped with more carbs. How can I give him a banana and tell Ezra he may have boiled carrots instead? And how can I watch my child weep, when all the other kids get to have things he can't? It sucks!

Nonetheless I have to admit that in some ways GAPS is simpler than gluten free, casein free, and much healthier. I wouldn't want to go back to GFCF. At least now I know that my kids are getting a wide variety of healthy foods, versus all highly processed carbs. And once you learn about what evil corporations put into food to make it cheap and maximize profit I really don't want to feed my kids that garbage. Ideally my kids could just eat anything. Still, life is more complicated this way. Making nut butter and honey sandwiches for the kids school lunch takes over an hour (with baking the special bread, or 24 hours if you count the time it takes to prepare the nut butter), whereas I can make a sandwich with normal bread and spread in 20 seconds. I don't know what to do, honestly. The science and research behind GAPS makes total sense. It would be so helpful though if we could actually have things confirmed with true practitioners and blood tests or whatever, instead of me having to figure out everything by myself.

England Trip: Longleat and Glastonbury

Longleat is very impressive. Lord Bath still lives in the palace with his family, but you can visit a section of it. It is very opulent. Lord Bath turned a great deal of his property into a massive theme park with adventure playground, train ride, boat ride, drive through safari, animal shows, and some rides. 

The new meerkat walk through enclosure. I wish we could have picked one up and petted them. They're so cute.

 The kids loved the train ride through Longleat.

The teacup ride.

The kids love mazes so of course we went in. We liked it for the first 20 minutes. After 40 minutes of being lost in the massive maze it was less fun. 

I have an irrational fear of all things that fly around my head. I think my depth perception is a bit off and so often I duck when things are actually not all that close (much to Aaron's annoyance when we're driving in the car). During the bird show the team had the raptors fly close over our head. It cured me of my flying-bird-phobia which is probably thanks to watching Hitchcock's The Birds at a much too early age. These vultures are really massive and we did in fact have to duck to avoid getting hit. 

Cute little Peter the Postman village. 

 One of the funnest thing was seeing the tractor with reinforced frontal steel plate ramming the rhino to keep him off the street. 

 LOVE, LOVE, LOVE, Tigers. Lions are OK too, but love tigers more.

Glastonbury Tor. It is the highest point in the area and was used as a beacon tower. 

 All the way up the view was magnificent. 

 Never could get Ezra to look into the camera. Micah does this funny face when I say smile. 

 Can you see the heart shape in the field behind me?

 So I asked a lady if she would take a picture of us. She was just walking up the hill. She flat out refused, and said she was too emotionally overcome by the spirit of the place and didn't want to ruin it with taking a picture. Okkk. Found someone else to take the pic.

 Micah was such a trooper. He climbed the hill with his recovering leg. I was very impressed. 

 Glastonbury is a very quirky little town. It is rumored to be the birthplace of the potentially fictional King Arthur. All sorts of legends about Avalon and Joseph of Aramthea are told, who was supposed to have visited this place with Jesus as a little boy. Well...the jury is out on that one, but honestly, why not? I can't prove or disprove either. But I did find all the little trinkets very amusing. 

 Fairy wands, and elf crowns. 

EWE! Just EWWWW. The nastiest thing I've ever endured.

I have just experienced the absolute grossest thing in my entire life. SERIOUSLY! My stomach is still churning, and I'm feeling totally queasy. This smell is worse than my brother's size 16 athletic shoes he would wear all day with socks that probably were worn twice. In fact if an entire football team worked out and didn't shower for a week, and spent a night in the locker room with no windows open, I think you still couldn't match the stench of this. So why write about it, when all I really want to do is delete it from my memory? I guess I'm a writing paradox. What is it that makes us want to share and participate in horrible experiences. Yes, I'm talking to you writers, producers and viewers of all these gruesome murder shows like CSI, The Mentalist, Castle, Profiler, 24, or those wretched reality TV shows etc.  Yes, it's interesting and entertaining but let's not pretend it isn't a bit weird that we would want to spend our evenings watching people figure out just how exactly someone killed another human being. (And just so you know I love The Mentalist and Castle).

Anyway, remember that GAPS diet thing that I'm doing, and how I'm not allowed to give the kids anything that isn't home made? Well, soy is off the plate too. It's pretty hard to make anything Asian tasting without the use of soy, but instead you can use fish sauce. Now, I've used fish sauce before in Thai dishes, and I love the little kick in the flavor a teaspoon of that stuff will add. I didn't think it would be too bad to make it myself. The recipe was straightforward. Buy 1 pound of small, whole fish, chop them up, cover with water, add a tablespoon of salt, ferment in warm place for 5 days, and then store in the fridge for several weeks. OK, done.
So today, I thought, I'll strain it just in case there is a bit of a fish smell, which doesn't sit well with my ultra-sensitive-to-smell husband. BOY, was that inspired. In fact, I'm a little worried that I won't get the smell out in time for his return. Have you ever had the urge to throw up just from a smell? Well, let me tell you, that's one experience you needn't put on your bucket list. At first, I thought, this is rather stronger than expected, but after just five seconds I realize there was no way I was EVER going to put this on my food. The smell was so bad, that me, the ultra conscious tree-hugging recyclist, miss-I-don't-let-my-kids-waste-paper-they-can-color-on-the-backside-and-I'm-sorry-we-just-killed-a-tree-for-a-scribble actually threw out the glass jar. No, it wasn't broken. It was just so awful that I couldn't imagine ever putting anything in there again. But just rinsing it down the drain didn't seem to get rid of the smell. I wiped down the granite counter top, but still the smell remained. I threw out the trash (and I really should make those guys some cookies for picking it up tomorrow), sterilized everything, but the smell kept lingering. Even the sweet sulfurous smell of lighted matchsticks wouldn't disperse it. After five matches I pulled out the heavy guns, and lighted some incense, and essential oils. AND IT LINGERED ON. To my dismay I found that the scent cloud migrated to the living room. I would have immediately opened doors and windows, but I actually had left a door open, and 50 mosquitos had invaded my kitchen, I decided that I would take care of venting the house tomorrow. I felt so sick, that I couldn't even prepare the lunches and breakfast for the kids tomorrow.
I don't care what anyone says about my kids not getting preservatives, I will never make home made fish sauce again. EVER. For the teaspoon it takes to spike meals, they'll just have to put up with preservatives.

England Pictures:

On the day it rained we decided to go to the Cheddar Caves. This is where the original Cheddar cheese comes from, and believe me, it takes nothing like the stuff you buy at Walmart. Real cheddar is ripened in the caves, and tastes absolutely fantastic. 

 YUM, YUM, YUM!

 The following pictures were taken in the city I liked the most while visiting England. This is the Cathedral of Wells. 

 So, personally Wells wasn't my favorite cathedral. It was beautiful, but doesn't that arch look like a big monster with a wide open mouth and an exposed brain? 

 I loved the assembly room. The acoustic was totally amazing.

 Even the organ looked kind of like an evil bat. 

 Ezra was so cute in the cathedrals. He always wanted to kneel and pray. Then he took the hymnbooks to the pulpit and pretended to give talks. For the remainder of the trip he wanted to become a preacher in the cathedrals "so I can tell people what to do."

 Below are pictures of the very beautiful garden adjacent to the Bishop's residence. It was very lovely.