I am not really a big Oprah fan so I don’t watch her show very much. But in my blog hopping this morning I heard a mention of today’s show topic….autism. Well, that still wasn’t enough to draw me in but I did decide to tune in when I saw that Jenny McCarthy (a gal I like) would be talking about her son’s recovery from autism and also the controversial reason she feels her son developed autism in the first place. After those details I had to watch. I have two very controversial beliefs about autism. I believe that autistic children can recover and I believe that vaccines play a part in the cause of this horrible epidemic. On the Oprah show today, Jenny McCarthy shared the same beliefs.
I think she was very brave to share what she did and it notably caused her some discomfort to say things she knew would anger some people…but she did it anyway.. a gal after my own heart. According to many medical professionals and many affected families, there is no recovery for the autistic but Jenny’s son did recover (his Doctors have even confirmed this) and so have hundreds of other kids…it is time that we start to make this information more widely known. One of the things she mentioned was putting her son on a gluten free, dairy free diet. She also said her son had a serious Candida build-up in his body. Changes like these, along with intense therapy, have brought him out of his autistic state.
And of course thousands upon thousands of moms have always suspected a vaccine/autism connection and been ridiculed. To hear this connection brought to light on a show with as many viewers as Oprah was refreshing. It also brought back some bad memories for me with my first child who was also damaged by a vaccine. Although he never received an autism diagnosis I always wondered if I hadn’t just gotten lucky because he certainly did have some strange mannerisms and behaviors that are typical of autistic children. I could relate to the feelings of helplessness and even shame when confronted with this bizarre behavior. My favorite part of the show was when Jenny told about she received the autism diagnosis and her immediate reaction to it. She said she felt like she had died and upon seeing her face the Doctor told her “Don’t worry, your son is still here. That is same boy you walked in here with.” Her response was priceless. “No that isn’t my son. My son is trapped in that body and I am going to get him out.”
There was also a great deal of discussion about Jenny McCarthy’s new book. It is the story of her journey from diagnosis to recovery and all that came in between. I think I am going to have to pick it up because it sounded great. It is called Louder Than Words: A Mother’s Journey in Healing Autism.
