Healing finally!

[laure]

I hesitate to post this...I know how badly some folks are struggling just to get through the day. We have been there. One year ago today I spent almost all days crying at least some of the time. My daughter spent all days crying at least a half a dozen times a day. From PANDAS diagnosis in July '10 to Lyme and coinfections in November, we jumped from doc to more reputable/expensive doc, with some ups and more downs, until we dead-ended at an IVIG/PEX conclusion from two respected docs. Enter a few smart ladies from this forum who convinced me to fly out West to check out an ART doc there before going the Ivig/PEX route. In June '11 my 10 year old was leaving all of her belongings in the garage each day after school, which she was usually late to, and sometimes couldn't attend at all, showering 8 times a day or more, crying almost all of the time, couldn't hug or kiss us, touch the dog, bring homework or books home, look at "fat' people, shop, even eating was becoming an issue, etc. etc. Many, many contamination fears interfering with her life. What a difference 3 months makes!

 

Here is a post I sent out to a few friends this morning:

 

OK, holding my breath now. Since we've returned home from our summer camp, Sophie just seems to be mentally shedding her OCD one thing at a time...almost like she no longer feels the contamination fears, just the fear of the fear...so bit by bit she is trying and achieving new things which were impossible when we left here in June.

Last week she traveled to Syracuse an hour away to try out for an elite soccer league, only to panic at the last minute because she was afraid to touch her cleats, which she last used in the spring for softball (overweight coach contaminated them). She was so disappointed on the ride home, and so returned the next day, threw all of her gear including cleats on, and ran around with a bunch of kids she never met before playing soccer for the next hour and a half, made the cut no problem. She loves her new soccer team, and even thanked me for driving her the hour to play on it yesterday. This week she offered to clean out the car (for $5), which was absolutely disgusting! She vaccuumed out dog hair, scoured the floor mats, scrubbed seats, etc. I was in shock. Yesterday she pointed out that she had braided her American Girl doll's hair, which she hasn't touched since last December. She also asked me to wash her once "contaminated" backpack, which has been housed in the garage for 3 months because it was too infected to come into the house, and today she sharpened up pencils, packed it up, and trotted off to the first day of school. She takes one shower a day, brushes her hair and puts it in a pony tail, uses deoderant (sometimes) and dresses up occasionally. The change is unbelievable. She is so happy. We are enjoying her company again!

The only symptom she is really obvious about is a sneeze-like tic, exactly like Lauren Johnson on the video... it is more apparent when she is tired. Hoping that will resolve with time and continued treatment. I continue to follow Dr. treatment to a T...and only add probiotics to the mix. Doctor says 6 more months until we are done! She tested positive for borrelia, babesia, bartonella, ehrlichiosis, ricketsia, XMRV, fungus. Now she is down to the first three, and kicking them fast! I know there will be bumps, but no crying here anymore! Prayers of thanks is more like it!

 

Just wanted to thank you all for your encouragement when we were so so low. It's impossible to believe this is the same child. Hope you are all making wonderful progress too!

Edited September 9, 2011 by laure

[writergal]

Yeah! This is wonderful! We're in the early stages of just diagnosing PANDAS- so wonderful to hear of your success!

 

Julie

[eljomom]

What is ART?

[MomWithOCDSon]

Terrific news! Loud applause ! ! ! ! !

[laure]

What is ART?

 

Eljomom,

Here is the best explanation I have found:

Laura

 

Autonomic Response Testing: ART

 

 

Autonomic Response Testing is a sophisticated form of testing using muscle biofeedback developed by the renowned German physician pioneer Detrich Klinghardt. MD PhD.

 

 

It has some of its origins in the Unites States’ version commonly known as Applied Kinesiology developed by George Goodhardt DC, (or simply referred to as “muscle testing”).*

 

 

Detrich Klinghardt recognized the potential of this form of diagnosis and took it to another unbelievable level of sophistication. Using this technique, we have been able to make a diagnosis that otherwise would be extremely difficult with standard methods. We have been able to diagnose and treat numerous patients that have failed to be diagnosed by some of the best renowned medical centers such as the Mayo Clinic, CHOP, Univ. of Pennsylvania, Jefferson, Cleveland Clinic etc.

 

 

So how does it work? The answer to this question is extremely difficult to explain because it requires a new understanding of the human body that is not presently available.

 

 

Here is a simplified explanation:

 

 

To be able to explain ART, we must view the world and the human body more like how a quantum physicist might view them. If a physicist were to look and describe the human body, he/she would see a body composed of mostly space and many atomic particles flying around and interacting with each other.

 

Every substance generates and emits electromagnetic energy that has a certain frequency. Of our 5 senses, conventional medicine mainly recognizes our vision as the main organ that senses electromagnetic (light) energy. Hearing recognizes auditory frequencies. Unbeknownst to most of us, our bodies also crudely recognizes the frequencies through the skin via the autonomic nervous system. This system appears to only recognize substances by three categories “good”, “bad” and “neutral”.

 

When something is harmful, the body’s sympathetic nerves begin to fire and cause a change in the muscle strength to “block” or tighten. When something is beneficial or healing, the parasympathetic nerves fire and cause a muscle relaxation we call a healing or “yin” response. When the substance is neutral, the muscles strength doesn’t change.

 

 

This information is even transmitted to another person that is touching the patient. That is to say, we can actually test the muscle strength of the assistant touching the patient. When we use the muscle testing with an assistant’s arm, we call it surrogate muscle testing. Those who have used direct muscle testing versus surrogate muscle testing uniformly find the surrogate testing more consistent and more accurate.

 

 

When we combine this technique using the phenomena of bioresonance, we can even tell whether someone has a harmful substance within the body as well such as an infection or toxin.

 

 

Bioresonance:

 

 

ART takes advantage of a consistent physiologic response of the human body involving the physical phenomena of “bioresonance”

 

 

Resonance: most individuals have heard of the ability of some talented opera singers to break a crystal glass by singing the same resonant frequency of the glass. For example, a good quality glass will have a certain frequency pitch such as the tonal pitch “C”. When the opera singer sings the same pitch “C”, the mere fact that she is singing the same resonant frequency will make the glass vibrate. Since the glass is brittle, if it vibrates hard enough, it will shatter.

 

 

This resonance phenomena can be demonstrated with two guitars. If one plucks the “A” string of one of the guitars, the “A” string on the other guitar will also vibrate.

 

 

In both examples the vibrations of one entity by being the same frequency will cause another entity that has the same entity to vibrate as well.

 

 

Bioresonance refers to the resonance that occurs in living beings:

 

 

For example, if a patient has significant mercury toxins in the head, and we present a vial of mercury near the patient’s head that has the accumulated toxin, that mercury vial will resonate with the mercury in that part of the body and cause the mercury in the body to vibrate. Since the mercury is already harming the body, the additional mercury will cause the body to react with a sympathetic stress response. This stress response will then be transmitted to the assistant’s body and change her/his muscle response.

[T_Mom]

Hi Laura,

We, admittedly, have chosen a much more "mainstream" (!!!) approach to treating PANDAS symptoms for our daughters, based on the fact that they had obvious reactions to STREP or other illnesses in their environment.

 

I have heard of the type of "treatments" you mention and if I am correct it is actually said to be done by a "treating person" holding their hands over the person and supposedly sensing the ? vibrations, from supposed toxins...am I correct that is how ART is done??? -if I am thinking of something else, please forgive me.

 

This is going to sound like a true nay-sayer, but that seems rather dubious to me.

 

Having had IVIG done for our d who was ENTIRELY non-functional last year, and having seen a MIRACULOUS reaction--180 turn-around, I must question the validity of any seer-like 'treatment-diagnosis' reminds me more then a little of snake-oil.

 

I am sorry to be rude, and I know you have seen a change in your child, for which I am thrilled for you.

 

I guess I would want to offer that evidence-based medicine is finally addressing the Ps dilemma -- finally, and if IVIG/PEX is necessary in your child's future (I pray it is not!) but if it is, I hope it is available to you and paid in full by insurance as a treatment that has been validated and shown to be reliable in effectiveness--through evidence based testing.

Edited September 9, 2011 by T.Mom

[laure]

Hi Laura,

We, admittedly, have chosen a much more "mainstream" (!!!) approach to treating PANDAS symptoms for our daughters, based on the fact that they had obvious reactions to STREP or other illnesses in their environment.

 

I have heard of the type of "treatments" you mention and if I am correct it is actually said to be done by a "treating person" holding their hands over the person and supposedly sensing the ? vibrations, from supposed toxins...am I correct that is how ART is done??? -if I am thinking of something else, please forgive me.

 

This is going to sound like a true nay-sayer, but that seems rather dubious to me.

 

Having had IVIG done for our d who was ENTIRELY non-functional last year, and having seen a MIRACULOUS reaction--180 turn-around, I must question the validity of any seer-like 'treatment-diagnosis' reminds me more then a little of snake-oil.

 

I am sorry to be rude, and I know you have seen a change in your child, for which I am thrilled for you.

 

I guess I would want to offer that evidence-based medicine is finally addressing the Ps dilemma -- finally, and if IVIG/PEX is necessary in your child's future (I pray it is not!) but if it is, I hope it is available to you and paid in full by insurance as a treatment that has been validated and shown to be reliable in effectiveness--through evidence based testing.

[laure]

Hi T Mom,

The particular doctor we see is an MD who also practices ART. He also will use conventional blood work and treats aggressively with antibiotics as well as supplements and herbs. So my daughter is on Omnicef, Zithromax, and Mepron in addition to a variety of herbal things which he changes up every 2 months or so, and probiotics. I don't think I could have gone the route of rejecting Western medicine, as we saw our first results as soon as she began antibiotics a little over a year ago. At that time she had anti dNase B titers of 780, and last fall they were up to 975. So pretty classic PANDAS symptoms, but Igenex revealed lyme in December 2010. That was the true turning point for us, finding out that lyme was underlying everything. Dr. B made that prediciton, incidentally. So I am very grateful to him!

Glad your girls are doing better, that's all any of us wants, health for our kids and those of others.

Laura

[sf_mom]

ART is often used as a supportive means of testing. For example, our son was put on Biaxin and his eyes started to yellow slightly. We did test him via ART and his Dr. said his liver was giving him troubles and that his body didn't like the Biaxin. We stopped the Biaxin immediately, ran blood work for liver enzymes and sure enough the liver enzymes were high. He came up positive for Babesia via ART. Because our son has congenital lyme, he remains serologically negative via antibody testing for most everything. Our only choice for this particular chld is to do other means of testing to support clinical diagnoses. We found Lyme DNA is his urine which is actually a very accurate test when positive. Unknown parasite in blood that also indicated Babesia, looked at other family members results for an indication of infections, noted the climbing liver enzymes, used blood smears, CBC panels looking at RBC and WBC, etc. I too thought the ART process voodoo initially but it seemed to work for others so we gave it a shot. Ultimately, treatment response is paramount. We ended up treating for Babesia 7 weeks ago and had a dynamic shift in symptoms almost over night 'herxheimer's response'. Just a week ago he broke out in a petechial rash down his spine indicating the infection was probably in his spinal fluid. Very scary to say the least... We got the confirmation we needed to absolutely support all the other testing we had done to know he is dealing with Babesia. He is also responding to treatment and closing the gap to full recovery with treatment.

 

It should be noted that not all ART professional are created equal. Some are limited by their experience, the infections they harbor and their potentially toxic environment. I highly recommend the process as long as you are working with an ART professional with a proven track record. For the record, Laure DD is dealing with chronic infection and not purely auto-immune 'PANDAS'.

Edited September 9, 2011 by SF Mom

[laure]

ART is often used as a supportive means of testing. For example, our son was put on Biaxin and his eyes started to yellow slightly. We did test him via ART and his Dr. said his liver was giving him troubles and that his body didn't like the Biaxin. We stopped the Biaxin immediately, ran blood work for liver enzymes and sure enough the liver enzymes were high. He came up positive for Babesia via ART. Because our son has congenital lyme, he remains serologically negative via antibody testing for most everything. Our only choice for this particular chld is to do other means of testing to support clinical diagnoses. We found Lyme DNA is his urine which is actually a very accurate test when positive. Unknown parasite in blood that also indicated Babesia, looked at other family members results for an indication of infections, noted the climbing liver enzymes, used blood smears, CBC panels looking at RBC and WBC, etc. I too thought the ART process voodoo initially but it seemed to work for others so we gave it a shot. Ultimately, treatment response is paramount. We ended up treating for Babesia 7 weeks ago and had a dynamic shift in symptoms almost over night 'herxheimer's response'. Just a week ago he broke out in a petechial rash down his spine indicating the infection was probably in his spinal fluid. Very scary to say the least... We got the confirmation we needed to absolutely support all the other testing we had done to know he is dealing with Babesia. He is also responding to treatment and closing the gap to full recovery with treatment.

 

It should be noted that not all ART professional are created equal. Some are limited by their experience, the infections they harbor and their potentially toxic environment. I highly recommend the process as long as you are working with an ART professional with a proven track record. For the record, Laure DD is dealing with chronic infection and not purely auto-immune 'PANDAS'.

 

 

Thanks for clarifying SFMom, yes, my daughter's Igenex tests indicated lyme for upwards of 2 years, and we suspect more like 3-4 based on behavior changes that occurred gradually.