How We Reversed Jessica’s Tic Disorder

A LETTER FROM JESSICA’S MOM

Hi Sheila,

Even as a former special education teacher for ten years, I was not prepared for what I witnessed happen to my daughter. I have since learned so much about gut health and how there is a strong gut/brain connection. In addition, dietary changes and supplements are key components in affecting behavior, the nervous system, and general cognitive functioning.

Although Jessica was shy and anxious in new situations and when meeting new people, she was otherwise a very happy, calm and well-liked child. She thrived in preschool, made many friends and developed her love for the arts, fashion, and dance. Around the age of 3, after a move from a relatively new condo to a newly renovated old house, we noticed that Jessica started coughing. It was for the most part mild, but lasted for a long time, about two years. During those two years we brought her to a few pediatricians several times, but they kept dismissing the cough as a possible allergy or dryness from the renovated house that would soon go away. Strep tests were done at each visit and turned up negative. Various mold, air quality, and asbestos testing were also done on our house but no red flags were found.

The summer before beginning kindergarten (Jessica was just about 5 years old), various motor tics appeared. Jessica displayed shoulder-shrugging and would lift one of her legs. We were highly concerned and brought her to a psychologist who specializes in Tourette’s.

The psychologist told us that Jessica had some tics and to just ignore them and hope she would grow out of them. Medication was not recommended due to Jessica’s young age and mild symptoms. We consulted two other neurologists who said pretty much the same thing. So, we did what the “experts” advised us to do and tried to ignore them—but this was the worst advice.

We feel that if we had addressed the tics earlier, they would not have spread to other parts of her body. Because, in the next several months, the tics steadily increased and changed. We saw a lot more coughing and shoulder shrugging, and although the leg lifts stopped, Jessica started showing frequent eye blinking, head-nodding and pauses as she walked. Obsessive compulsive tendencies such as counting and organizing things were also observed although these died down on their own with minimal interventions (we simply told her it was a waste of time to count things and explained that we only count during math class etc.).

Tics every few seconds

We were very concerned, as the tics had now become very frequent—about every few seconds. Jessica was also feeling the brunt of it, crying and asking us why she couldn’t stop blinking, and concerned that her teacher and friends would ask her to stop (they never did) but she knew she couldn’t. It was extremely heartbreaking as parents, to feel helpless while our daughter suffered.

Jessica had been doing well in school, and the tics apparently were not impacting her schoolwork.  However, we continued to be devastated by what we saw and our family members, who didn’t really notice the tics too much before, also became concerned. We then decided that we could not just sit back and wait for our daughter to outgrow this condition, so we tried reaching out to psychiatrists to consider medication. But no one at their offices answered our calls…we realize now that this was a blessing in disguise!

We started researching natural remedies and stumbled upon Sheila Roger DeMare’s book and Latitudes.org. We read the book in three days, scoured the website in two weeks and implemented immediate changes. We switched to a gluten, dairy, corn, soy, and preservative and artificial coloring free diet.  About an 80% improvement was noted within three days. We knew we were onto something. We started Jessica on a few magnesium supplements recommended by some members on Latitudes.org, which included: Natural Vitality’s CALM drink, magnesium lotion at night and a magnesium threonate supplement. We saw a definite additional improvement with these supplements; however, we later learned with the help of a nutritionist, that the CALM drink and magnesium threonate we were using contained flavoring and were high in salicylates, so we eventually stopped giving them.

All household products (hand soap, laundry detergent, dish soap, toothpaste) were also changed to all natural products that were Feingold approved.

In the meantime, we sought the help of an environmental physician, Dr. Morton Teich, in New York City. He did food and environmental allergy testing and Jessica came out intolerant to bananas, casein and oatmeal and had elevated reactions to ragweed, certain trees and dust. Dr. Teich started our daughter on sublingual drops for the inhalant allergies and advised us to have her refrain from eating bananas, casein-containing foods, and oatmeal as well as incorporate his specifically designed yeast and allergy diet into our already restrictive diet. It was difficult but well worth the outcome.

The candida connection