Some of you may know that Scott chose to go Gluten Free (GF) in his diet. He read a book written by another child with Asperger's Syndrome and that the kid was GF and casein free. Alex talked to his aunts about it (all of John's sister's are GF) and then asked me if he could. Once I told him that casein was yogurt and cheese, he was not having that but he still wanted to try GF. It has worked wonders for him, his attitude is so much better, he controls his mood swings better and his eczema has cleared up a lot. It has been completely worth the change in the way I cook. Now I cook a lot more potatoes instead of noodles, however when I do cook noodles WinCo has bulk GF noodles so Scott gets his own. And did you know cans of chili include wheat as a filler? Well I have gotten pretty adept at making homemade chili. :)
So how can I be sure it is really working for him? Every month we give him a cheat day. A day where he can eat gluten. Yesterday was his cheat day in addition to his birthday. He gorged himself on gluten, toast for breakfast, all you can eat Chinese for lunch, pizza for dinner, and that doesn't even count the candy, and doughnuts and what not that he ate in between. At the end of the day he puked. He told me that it was a sucky way to end a birthday. I believe it is a good object lesson on how his body doesn't like gluten that much. In addition I want to ground the boy to his room for the next week, he has major attitude problems and getting frustrated over the smallest things and he has been snappy with me.
What does this all add up to? Scott remains GF and next cheat day we will enforce moderation. Thankfully that's not for another month.
Footnote: We do normally moderate cheat days, just not on his birthday, after all you only turn 15 once.