Gluten Free/Casein Free Diet?

Sorry I'm bombarding this board with so many questions! DH sent me some information on the Gluten Free/Casein Free diet for children with ASD and just wanted to see if anyone on here has had any success with it? How did you get started? Did you eliminate both at the same time or separately? Any good food/dairy substitutions you can share would be helpful, too. Which online resource did you find most helpful?

TIA

Re: Gluten Free/Casein Free Diet?

My son has ASD. We have never done this diet, but I have read so much. It seems like it has helped a lot of kids. I bought the cookbook special diets for special kids which is all about this, but never used it.

The only thing I know is it's all or nothing. Which is why I never did it. My son (3) also has 5 year old twin brothers so the whole family would have needed to do it because the thought is you can't introduce it at all or you'll never know if it's working.

I did try just dairy free for a month or two for him. I read in one of the books for parents who going gluten free seems overwhelming this was a good way to start. Especially since my son is addicted to milk (and funny how many ASD kids are picky eaters yet usually are addicted to milk and carbs). Anyway, in the time we did it, I didn't notice a change in him, so we just stopped.

If you decide to do it, please post how it goes. I am so curious to see if a difference is noted.

Gluten Free/Casein Free Diet?

We have not done it but I have a few friends that have. Each child is different so it's really hard to compare if it would be good for someone else. Only one of my friends have stuck with it and claim they see a difference. Their child also had alot of gut problems, which many of ASD children have, and it is helping him.

As the previous poster said, it is all or nothing and it is hard. You whole family needs to change they way they eat and it started getting tricky for my friends when the kids would go to parties or have classroom activities because they could not eat what their friends were.

We try to limit the amount of processed foods our DD eats and try to avoid things with dyes. We are not vigilant though and just hope that it leads to healthier eating, which is good for everyone!

Re: Gluten Free/Casein Free Diet?

We try to keep our son gluten free since we ran blood work and found that he has a gluten intolerance (and possible Celiac Disease but we did not want to do the endoscopy to confirm). It was hard at first but got better as time went on. They do make a lot of GF products that we use, such as GF waffles, bread, and pretzels. I can't say that it helped at all (because we did not exclude dairy) but you never know, give it a shot to see how it goes...