Have special diets helped you?

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Hi,
I've been reading about how gluten-casein free diets help some individuals on the spectrum and I am curious if any of you have tried eliminating milk or gluten and if it's helped you? If you've noticed a difference, what was the difference regarding? Meltdowns? Anxiety? Clarity of mind? Gastric issues? Communication? Was it worth going on a special diet to you?
Thanks!!

Reducing milk has helped me, but gluten?
Not really, maybe a bit, but nothing that was really worth it.

Less sugar, this had actually the most effect.

Going off sugar, caffeine, and reducing my dairy to nearly 0 when I'm taking really tough math/science based classes helps a lot.
If nothing else it makes you pay attention to your natural cycles and stop jacking up your brain with chemicals. You learn to work within your limits and try to not burn so hot all the time.

Exercise is paramount to my brain functioning well.

Pairing a good workout routine with a good diet makes me feel like I'm on top of the world.

My Ma has had me on the GF/CF diet since I was diagnosed, and I think it improves my alertness and processing times. That would correspond with me having an intolerance to either gluten or casein, we tested both with the doctor, and both were positive, and we had never known before that. Anyway, it HAS helped me, and I think it's worth trying. Now it's just how I am, and it's got easy to be this way with food and drink. =]

Gluten and milk don't agree with my body in general, but I don't think they affect my mental state much.

Sugar and caffeine are the main ones for me. They are both great on the ride up, but the ride down is depressing and seems to last much longer than the fun part. Additionally, my body can't really handle caffeine and can only sort of handle sugar.

If you're currently regularly consuming caffeine and decide to stop, don't be surprised if you feel depressed for a few days.. Caffeine is very potent in general. Sugar has this same basic effect but the withdrawal is much shorter.

I was on a GF/CF diet as a child. It did nothing to help me; I believe I might have been somewhat malnourished, in fact, because I stopped growing at around age 14 at five feet even. As a kid I remember scrounging for food a lot. When I left home at 17, I started growing again and am now 5'4"... you don't expect to grow four inches as an adult; maybe one, but not four. The lack of calcium wasn't good for me. I just hope I don't have osteoporosis problems when I get to be older.

As far as any effects on my autism--none noted. Those were some of the worst years of my life, actually; but I don't think that was due to the diet.

If you're allergic or if you can't digest something, it makes sense to eliminate it. But if you don't have any of that sort of trouble, don't expect it to have any effect on your brain if you stop eating them. Many people, both autistic and non-autistic, have problems with various sorts of food, and benefit from improving their diet. But what you get is an increase in well-being, in general. It might give you more energy to learn with, to deal with things in your life; but it would do that for an NT too. There's nothing about autism in particular that responds to what you eat--only an indirect effect that comes from better health in general. Other things you can do to improve your health will probably be as effective--reducing stress, getting more sun, finding exercise you enjoy, interacting with pets or friends.

I'm finding the palaeolithic or caveman diet to be very good. I'm not following it 100% but roughly orientating my eating to ancestral patterns.... has proved to be the best diet for me

Also I have dewormed and parasite cleansed recently. We have 1000's of virus's, bacteria, fungi, worms and bugs, living on us, even when we are healthy! there are 1000's of them! its normal!

1/3 of your poop is not your poop, but parasite poop.....

An ideal diet should include parasite limiting/controlling foods, like garlic, onions, chillies, limes etc etc

Normally, a healthy body will control parasites, normally. But due to industrialisation, few people now have normal health....

Most of those bacteria are symbiotes, not parasites... don't go killing them off; we benefit from having them around. That's why antibiotics tend to give you the runs. They kill off all kinds of bacteria, including the ones that are living in your intestine. You don't function near as well until they start recolonizing.

Yes. Take a pro biotic or yoghurt or sauerkraut after the cleanse.

Muslims have Ramadan. Indians fast monthly with no grains, every month! Thai's, Indians and Mexicans have hot spicy foods. Koreans who eat SOOOOOOOOOOO much chilli, have the lowest incidence or toxoplasmosis (cat worm infestation)

We worm our pets, but not ourselves or our children!!
Natural resistance has gone out the window!!

Crazy cat lady syndrome is possibly a product of parasitic infection!

Schizophrenia has recently been implicated as a by product from cat ownership!! !! !! !

Many African and Amazonian tribes with the big bloated stomach's are parasite riddled. As are CONSTANTLY coughing children and those with abdominal distension

Not gluten-casein free, but, to echo the other posters, cutting way down on sugar (also on starchy foods) meant I have fewer sensory issues and am emotionally more stable.

I've been considering diet as well. I've been dairy / casein free for a while now, since it came up on my allergy panel.

I can probably do gluten free without much trouble, but giving up my coffee and tea would be really hard. Especially come winter-time in Seattle.

My understanding is that the largest instances of toxoplasmosis comes from eating undercooked meat, not really conducive to a 'caveman' diet

Your clever but not that clever.

Cavemen had fire, and no pet cats.

Undercooked meat containing Toxo is evident by The French who have a sky rocket toxo incidence, and eat rare meats...

Cavemens meat was wild, cats were rare [excpet cougars, sabretooths, lions and tigers]

though yes other parasites from rare meats would have found there way into early humans bodies

I imagine sickness and death due to parasitic infection was common, back then.

Hence, 'warding off evil spirits' (and vampires) was assigned to garlic, and the Germanic word 'kaffir' was assigned to that special variety of lime, which works extremely well against parasites

Kaffir= bug in germanic

Modern humans in their race toward the future have forgotten to eliminate parasites.

I'm on a gluten-free diet because gluten makes me sick. I don't know if it has really made any difference mentally or emotionally. The noticeable difference is just in physical well-being.

Bear in mind that turning the box around to read the ingredients can help people trying to quit sugar. Spotting all the High Fructose Corn Syrup included foods is a pretty tough game sometimes.
HFCS is not just a sweetener, but is also an additive/preservative for many foods. That's part of why it's in there.

Also bear in mind that a big part of your nervous system's gray matter is also in your gut. So, keeping one part of your nervous system happy can have a direct effect on the rest.

Reading: http://www.health.harvard.edu/healthbea ... connection

Thanks for the link, I'm interested in how microbes in the gut affect our minds. Parasites, fungi, virus and bacteria seem to be specific in the mental disorders they create.... its complimentary to your reading.

Its like a 'well being' love triangle:

Feelings and thoughts
Parasites
Foods

Aint it dull brained that current psyche methodologies view only the thoughts and feelings as important.