The Snow.

The white flakes fall and the excitement begins. They start buzzing as soon as they wake up, so excited to go outside. Some kids just prefer to be outside, mine are a perfect example. Irregardless of temperature or weather, they'd rather be outside. Sometimes I wonder how they are my kids! I would rather be inside with a book and a cup of tea, but instead we worked on building our own ice arena in the backyard yesterday. I finally bribed them into the house on the promise we'd make cookies, while the little ones napped the bigger boys were out again. This time they were trying to build a snow pile big enough to climb over or fence in the back yard. I herded them in once again to warm up when I notice Liam's lips turning blue. They somewhat reluctantly came into the house and tried to amuse themselves like other kids, video games and movies... I found them staring out the window at the snow falling at least a dozen times as it got darker. Finally as bedtime approached we watched the Grinch and then Home Alone with popcorn. I asked them to go put on their PJ's and Liam said to me with complete shock that he wasn't going to bed, he was going outside to play! Today I am at work, I left all of them in the driveway after helping shovel out my car and the excited voices of them telling Jonathan their plans for the biggest snowman EVER! I am happily typing away with a warm cup of tea...

The Obsession.

I have become an obsessed over achiever. I never seem to be able to find the balance between being good at something and becoming obsessed with it. I have an addictive personality, not in regards to smoking, drinking, getting high, but in the socially acceptable world of organized, clean and now...Food. I am determined that not only will I change my kid's diet but they will not miss out on anything. This has me pouring over textbooks and food journals, looking online at every available site looking for recipe after recipe that the kids will love and look forward to eating. My success has been limited. They love all the fresh fruits, vegetables, soy milk and organic chocolate soy milk, they also love all the soy ice cream and the natural peanut butter and fruit leathers. They love eating the warm eggs with organic sausage and gluten-free pancake mix with all natural maple syrup or an even yummier natural sugar-free raspberry syrup. They have had no issues switching to rice chips with sea salt and animal cracker cookies with honey and rice flower. The issues have all revolved around one thing. Gluten. They want cookies, cake, they want bread, they want toast. Issue. Gluten-free products are usually substituted with rice flour, rice flour has a very fine texture which falls apart easily. So instead of sending a cookie to school you end up with a bag of crumbs. There is also the issue of fats. Kids get a lot of important fats from dairy, mine are now going without that so I have had to substitute it with protein fats like what is in nuts. We are not so into the nuts, I then thought of avocado! Made some guacamole dip to go with corn tortillas chips flavored with sea salt and thumbs down. The best comment was "It isn't the worst thing I have ever eaten." So on I search for a fulfilling cookie recipe and a fat source that does not come from an animal. This diet is not for people who don't like to plan I tell ya'! It is very tough to make sure that every meal that goes in their mouth is appropriate. I am pushing on, if there are any suggestions out there let me know!

The Day to Day.

I am amazed daily at the changes in my life. There is such satisfaction in finding answers and solutions, putting them into play and seeing the results flourish in front of you. Diet is the key to the mystery of autism. Plain and simple and I will tell it to anyone who will listen. Liam is a completely normal kid. I never thought I would be able to say that without adding an "except for". Yet here I am today typing it with pride. Normal. Liam has always been exceptionally smart. He is a genius, but along with the genius came a lot of eccentric behaviors. Removing the toxins floating through his body has changed him dramatically. This is only phase 1. The next phase is to introduce supplements into his diet. I am excited to see the change. Here is what we have done to date. I removed all dairy products from our home. This includes ice cream, sour cream, butter, and margarine. I removed all processed foods this includes lunch meats, hot dogs, anything that comes in an individually wrapped package, and slim-fast (that was me!) I removed all gluten products this includes bread, buns, pancakes, cereals, and pasta. I removed all foods with ANY forms of processed sugar like fruit snacks, granola bars, fruit juices from concentrate. Finally the tough one for my kids I removed all baking products. No cookies, cake, pie, brownies. All gone. They lived on lean proteins, rice, vegetables and fruits for 2 weeks. This is the cleansing stage. After the 2 weeks I introduced eggs, then we introduced soy including soy milk and soy cheese, then we introduced healthy baking including rice flour and honey and demura sugar, which is like a brown sugar that isn't processed. Huge success! They are eating better, feeling better, their tummies aren't bloated. They are learning, focus has improved and so has their energy! Liam, due to being autistic, was the most symptomatic. He struggled with the other kids in his class, rarely smiled and seemed to always have a black cloud following him around. He is beaming! He sings to me, crawls into my lap to cuddle, reads books to me. When asked to do something he is quick to jump to it. I am no longer reminding him several times to complete something he seems to be able to grasp it immediately. The best part is he is playing with the other kids. Never much of a joiner, I hear him now instructing Avery on how to be a better elephant or asking Jake to chase him. He is craving their attention. After dinner last night he walked into the family room and asked who wanted to play dinosaurs, the kid's mouths dropped as Liam NEVER shares his dinosaurs! They played on the floor for hours. The success is easy to talk about, implementing the changes is far more difficult. I used the band-aid approach. I explained to them that their life is different now and that the food choices would be changing. Tore away the old food clean. Some parents prefer small baby steps but in my case I only wanted to battle with Liam once. I knew if I won that it would be a permanent win. Rather than the 2 bowls of cereal that they used top eat in the morning I now scramble 8 eggs and bake 10 organic turkey sausages. They have a glass of organic sugar-free apple juice with some tasteless supplements , mixed in. I invested in 2 thermos' for the boys and they take chicken and rice or shepherd's pie or chili to school with them. It stays nice and warm in the thermos and they love it! I also include celery with organic peanut butter, carrot sticks, apples, bananas, Mandarin oranges, rice chips, banana chips, dried fruits, home made granola bars, sugar-free organic fruit snacks, anything that I can get my hands on that is different, healthy and delicious! Dinner includes a bowl of salad with loads of veggies in it including spinach,avocado, almonds, walnuts, soy cheese, and home made salad dressing. They gobble this up and love it when I try different things in their salad, although the radishes last night were not a huge hit! After salad they we eat lean meats with steamed veggies, rice or potato. The most difficult part has been trying to replace gravies and sauces to make their food interesting without having any of the creams, sugars and additives. Spices and lemon-pepper are good, but they wear pretty thin after awhile. I have introduced lamb into their diet, it is very high in calcium and is leaner than hamburger. I am hoping to find a fish that they will like to eat, nothing has worked so far! I am also feeling amazing, never one to not practice what I preach I am following the same diet. I have found my energy levels dramatically higher, it is easier to get up in the morning and I am more focused. The junk in our food is killing us. We no longer seem to care that the food we eat has NO nutritional value. We wonder why we are tired all the time and seem to lack focus. How can we eat 200-300 calories and not receive any nutrition in return? Food is our fuel, it is social, enjoyable, and can be delicious but it fuels our bodies first and foremost. The changes in my family are amazing and I hope others will try this way of life.

The Walk.

There are few things that scare me. I am not afraid of bugs, spiders, rats or mice. I have no issues with heights, small places, or elevators. I use to think that there would never be something I couldn't conquer. I stand corrected. In this life there is a perfect plan for each of us, we are taught that our entire childhood. Things happen for a reason, there is a reason for everything. Then we are thrown a senseless, reasonless curve ball and we crumble. How do you justify the unjustifiable? How do you learn to see the good in things that are so unfair? How do you crawl while those around you run? The answer... You just do. What other choice is there but to continue? The walk is alone, there are few who can understand the emotional toll that is can take on you. The physical exhaustion. The endless guilt. The effort involved in even taking a breath. The soul crushing disappointment. When the waves of these emotions crash in there is only one thing that keeps you afloat, moving and pushing forward and that is the love of your child. No one can love them like you do. No one know them like you do. No one can take that from you. They are the reason that you walk. Alone or not. They are the journey. Finding him is the reason.

The Guilt.

It can literally consume you. It encapsulates you, swallows you whole, spits you out and convinces you that you are the worst Mother ever. It berates you, reminds you with every birthday party and every family event that your child is not normal and therefore is unwanted. It eats away at your self esteem, your self control, and your soul until you are desperate for answers and so physically exhausted you cannot take another step but when you lay your head to your pillow you dream of the time before. The moments that you cling to before the change, when your family made sense. Before the introduction of words you cannot understand.It starts with the public in general, as you lose control of your child and the world watches. There are stares, there are comments, there are excuses to why your child isn't invited. They are slowly deprived of the childhoods we remember, the good times we recall, the fun we had and we despair. What did I do? Resounds loud and clear in our heads, almost in time with our heartbeats. It beats louder and stronger with every friend that stops calling, every play date that is cancelled, every family member that asks that you don't bring your child along. What did I do... What did I do...What did I do...

The Impotence

There is a feeling of impotence when you share your children. The resounding change of gears they go through as they move into their other family, the one that you are not apart of. You can have the grandest endeavours or the best laid plans, once they leave your custody all of those intentions are no longer your call. They are the call of the other parent, the weekend parent. You cannot force your will for your children on the other parent. You walk a fine line with this person,this former partner turned enemy. Irregardless of who left, the children remain and for them you remain silent. I have no idea why I expect things after marriage that I didn't get during it. Yet I find myself hoping against hope that he will want to try and make things consistent and fair, try and find a balance we can both live with. The reality of the situation is being the hero is more important than doing what is right. Pancakes and Chinese food more important than the reality that these kids need more than that. They need more than someone who would teach them to lie to their mother and sneak things behind her back, damage their already strained systems and plummet them straight back into the frustrating life that I daily struggle to keep them from. It is as simple as the phrase you are what you eat. I watch them come home dizzy, with headaches, sore tummies and the frenzies, all of which are directly caused by them straying from the only thing that links all their behaviors. Their diet. I would love to their hero, I would love to lavish them with all the good things the other kids eat, I would love to bake a cake everyday. Instead I bear the brunt of their anger, talk them through their cravings and try to remember that I cannot be their hero because I am their Mother.

The Reason.

The Ex.

We had nothing to say to each other. It was that bad. We lived in the same house, slept in the same bed, shared 3 people who had our DNA floating around inside of them. Yet here we were away from all that and we didn't have a thing to say to each other. I remember the feeling of resentment, it bubbled in my chest like acid reflux disease, choking me and burning the inside of my throat, restricting any possible conversation we could have had. I should have said the things that needed to be said, I should have given that to him. I should have told him how unfair it was that he had a career and I was still working at a dead end job, I should have told him I resented all the meeting he missed for Liam, the time he was gone for soccer, the time he was gone for coaching. I should have told him that I was tired of him still being allowed to be himself while I was sacrificed for the kids, for Liam. I should have told him about the phone call, the call I received during Liam's diagnosis telling me that he was seeing another girl and she was convincing him to leave me. I should have told him all of these things, but instead I sat in the same numbing pain I had shrouded myself in since my daughter was born a year before. I stopped fighting him, stopped begging him, stopped wanting him and inevitably stopped loving him. We split, he left, I was already gone. I continued to live in the home we had shared and changed it daily to remind myself that I was on my own. I went to counselling to deal with some depression. Some guilt issues I had with having a child with special needs and continued on fighting for Liam. I started jogging and eating better, I lost 30 pounds in 2 months. I went to my 10 year reunion alone, and had a great time. I read a lot, I cried a lot, I thought a lot. It was a great summer. I emerged better and stronger and continued the journey to the recovery. My recovery from Autism. My ex will always be my kid's Dad. I will be my kid's Mom. They know we both love them and that they are forever the tie that binds their parents.

The Juicer.

One of the things that really hits my kids hard is sugar. It is like a hit of Coke for my boys and they are unable to process it properly, this results in the immediate crazies followed closely by a sugar-coma. They experience repetitive behaviors like tapping or drumming and speak extra loudly. They fight and bug each other and someone ends up crying. You cannot negotiate with them or make them see reason. They are just too high to figure it out. During their cleanse I cut out all fruit juice, although the labels may say sugar free this is not always correct. The kid's were receiving a nice glass of ice water with their breakfast and this resulted in some protest. Jake was elected by the group to talk to me about the tierney of this decision and the compromise was reached that I would purchase them a juicer so I could keep track of what was in the juice. Patting myself on the back for such quick thinking I began the task of locating a juicer that would not bankrupt us! What the hell! Is there a shortage of these things or something! I will not spend 100 bux on a juicer! During a chat with my Mom she produced a juicer that had been living on a shelf in the laundry room of their house for some time and I jumped at the chance! Home I went, picked up kids from various day cares and we went home to juice. Interesting that the juice companies would have us believe that they add nothing to their product, but I have to tell you fresh juice is NOTHING like the juice you buy. The juicer is pulp free and works well, but the juice is different, watery and lighter tasting. I made an orange-pineapple blend for breakfast and they drank it and loved it, which is what happens when you deprive someone of something for long enough! It took 8 oranges and 1 pineapple to make a pitcher of juice, those are the big oranges not the little one either! I was impressed by how easy it was, although messy, and I liked the juice too. So I will continue to juice for the kids and monitor the natural sugars in the fruit. Another round goes to Mom!

The Stats.

I am 29 years old with 3 kids. Jake, 9, Liam, 6, and Avery ,3. The interesting thing about this little group is I cannot imagine my life without each of them. They bring to my life such immense contentment and a love I have yet to find again. Each time they lifted the slimy, gooey baby onto my belly I fell in love. Hopelessly and spell blindingly in love. I would lift this tiny creature, who had resided inside of my very body, to my face and gaze at the wonder of their perfection. They had all of their toes and fingers and they had little lungs and little parts. I couldn't help it, they were mine and at my young ages of 20,22 and 26 I still remember thinking that this was a love like none other. I am first and foremost my kid's Mom and I fight I knew, even then, I would fight like hell if someone tried to harm them.

Years later I recalled the scene in the hospital room as I sat on the floor of parking garage and listened to my 2 year old son scream inside the car. I had just received Liam's diagnosis of moderate to severe Autism and I didn't have the strength to fight him into his car seat. I had left the clinic and made my way back to the car, tears streaming down my face . I put him inside and closed the door and sunk to the ground and sobbed. Autism is a life sentence, it is incurable and untreatable, this is what I was told, you can do your best to help him cope with it but it is unknown how well he will do, if he has any success at all. I drove home and told Liam's father, then my husband, and we cried together. This was the beginning of the end of our marriage and although I didn't know it yet it was the beginning of the end of me.

8 years later at a parent-teacher conference for my oldest son Jake, the teacher asked how I would feel about medicating my son. I looked up quickly, unable to fully process the question. " I think he may have ADHD and it is affecting his school work, he will not pass this grade if this continues." The discussion continued around me, I said I would look into it and left. The whole drive home I was confused. How could I have done this so wrong! How could I have 2 out of 3 kids with issues! How was this fair! I went home and googled ADHD. Thousands of hits. I tried all of the natural web sites, everything pointed to diet. I stared off into space and googled Autism diet. They were almost the same thing! This began a new phase of an 8 year journey. A journey to heal my kids and have them live their best life! Without the intervention of drugs! I immediately stared them both on the diet. Gluten-free, casein-free, dairy-free diet with immediate results! I began to blog the days out on my blog but it wasn't enough, I wanted to log each and every success, each and every thing that worked for our family and each and every mistake. The one thing that these kid's do not have on their side is time, you have to intervene now! So continues our journey...

The Introduction.

I have started this blog in addition to my other blog, so I have a place to talk about the issues and struggles that come along with parenting a child with special needs. I feel the Time Is Now is a place for Steph to be Steph and this blog is a place to be just that, My Kid's Mom.

At my house the job of "Mom" can also be described and nutritionist, dietitian, food-police, chauffeur, baker, inventor, investigator, therapist, interventionist, doctor, lawyer, nurse, counsellor mediator... Should I go on or are you tired? I have a son with Autism and a son with mild ADHD, the latter undiagnosed and the former diagnosed. I also have a typical child, a daughter. I work full time plus, I have my children on a gluten-free, casein free, dairy-free, sugar- free diet which means I make a lot of my own foods. I just stared the diet so I am just beginning to see the amazing results. I have a full plate with my children but I own each and every decision that I have made. I brought them into the world, I choose to work, I choose the diet and I choose our lifestyle. This is not a Woe-is-me Blog! I love the life I lead and I love the experiences that I have, this blog is simply to share them with you in a way that describes my life and how different it is from yours. Perhaps it isn't all that different at all, perhaps it will enable you to feel appreciation for your own life and healthy kids, or just a better understanding at what a Mom, such as myself has to deal with. I don't know, what I do know is I need a place to detail it out so I can look back later. This is my life.