The Way Family Story

by Rhonda Way

Olan and Rhonda met during college. They married, having the typical American dream of having successful careers, a couple of healthy children, and having the middlle-class home. A year later, they were blessed with the first son, Alex. Alex was born screaming, and remained extremely colicy for almost an entire year. He had difficulties latching on for nursing, so Rhonda had to pump for a few months then switched to formula feeding. Within that first year, Alex was diagnosed with five different disorders of the eyes. He has only required 5-6 hours of sleep a day, even as a newborn. As he turned a year old, he stopped screaming to becoming very serious in nature. His language development was different in that he waited until he could say an entire sentence before speaking. He would hear a new word, and would repeat it a few weeks later, as if he was still processing it. He developed repetitive actions such as pushing his toy lawn mower up and down the sidewalk for hours. He was late in toilet training (age 4), and had a hard time being weaned from the bottle. At age three, he developed extreme constipation and eating disorders. OCD symptoms came in strong about this time. For example he would only drink from a certain cup, or eat only unbroken cookies. He had ear tubes placed 3 times by the time he was five years old. At age five, he was diagnosed as having auditory processing disorders and visual processing disorders. He lasted in his Kindergarten class for one month due to emotional reactions to the other children and "nap times." As he got older, his IQ test results increased dramatically as did his OCD symptoms and eating disorders. At age 10, he had a large PANDAS-like attack following strep. At this time, he became so germ phobic that he would not swallow his own spit during waking hours and developed anorexic thinking that his 50lbs body was too fat. He stayed in his bedroom, secluded for several months, while losing weight.

When Alex was 20 months, Olan and Rhonda were blessed with the arrival of Tyler. Tyler's first year was progressing well, with Tyler on track with walking and speech (5 words by 11 months.) At 11 months old, Tyler was diagnosed with Kawazaki's disease and developed a high fever. At this time his pediatrician suggested that we immunize early so he would not have any more childhood diseases. So Tyler received his MMR shot early. At this time he regressed to nonverbal and non-mobile. He stopped responding to noise, and was thought to have had gone deaf. However, he would not respond to sign language at first, which was strange to Rhonda who was trained to be a teacher for the Deaf. He had to relearn how to walk at about 1 1/2 years old. After ear tubes were placed at age 2 1/2, he slowly started to respond to noise. His family sang "itsy, bitsy spider" with hand motions over and over. After months of this repetition, he started to use appropriate hand motions while others sang the song. Somewhere around four years old, he said his brother's name. After that, language started to develop quickly. He would vomit if people talked to us when we went into public places due to having extreme stranger anxiety. During his early years, he was quick to get emotional when things did not go his way. Around age 6 years, he had gained several years' worth of language, but continued not to talk to many people outside the home.

We did not have any valuable help from professionals until we met a woman who introduced us to neurodevelopmental exercises. Within a couple of months of this meeting, we met our special doctor who uses information she has learned from Autism Research Institute. At first, we started the GF/CF diet with high amounts of probiotics and EFAs. This cleared up Alex' constipation, and saved his life! Tyler started becoming hyper-verbal rather than hypo-verbal in the public. We then added mineral and vitamin supplementation, followed by light chelation (we went slow, and used mostly natural chelators and IV glutathione.) Alex was diagnosed with Asperger's during this time, and Tyler lost his autism title and gained Tourette's with learning disabilities. More recently, Ammonia and anti-viral protocols were added to the boys' biomed programs.

Currently, Alex, age 14, still has the title of Asperger's with OCD. However, many of the professionals say they feel that he is just eccentrically smart. He has made the book of "Who's Who in Middle School" three years in a row. He is working on earning his brown belt in tae kwon do, and is learning how to play the violin. Tyler, age 12, has lost his educational title of autism. He has minor motor and verbal tics, and a writing-specific learning disability. Tyler enjoys building Lego sets, playing computer games, and playing with the neighbor boy.

In the last year, the Way family developed the educational "Autism: Rebuilding with Builder Dan" game. This game may help children with autism, and their family and friends, understand biomedical programs their doctors may request them to undergo. The Ways hope to serve others by supporting education.