Special diet used to help treat autism

Her mother, Anna Letaw of Mount Airy, credits Sawyer’s transformation to a change in her diet.

Sawyer was diagnosed with multiple autism spectrum disorders at 4 years old, and her mother helps treat her condition with a gluten free⁄casein free diet.

‘‘She never sat in the corner and banged her head,” Anna Letaw said. ‘‘When you think of autism, that’s the scene people think of.”

To help other parents of children who have autism and spread the word about the diet, Anna Letaw started a support group, Free Mealers Gluten-Free⁄Casein-Free Diet Support Group, in January.

The group is sponsoring a presentation, ‘‘What, How, and Why of the GFCF Diet,” by nutritionist Lisa Coleman, at 7 p.m. Tuesday at St. James’ Episcopal Church.

‘‘It’s going to be a very basic overview of how to do the diet,” Coleman said. ‘‘What is gluten? What is casein? How do you find it on labels? What are some substitutes, and what are some kid friendly substitutes?”

Coleman, an in-store nutritionist at Martin’s Food Market in Eldersburg, said there aren’t many resources on the diet yet.

‘‘No one really knows how to do it,” she said. ‘‘I’m not in the business of saying who should be on the diet, but there are a lot of people interested in following it.”

The diet is part of DAN, Defeat Autism Now, an organization under the Autism Research Institute in San Diego. The protocol uses an alternative medical approach to the diagnosis and treatment of autism.

‘‘It was so discouraging to me before diagnosis. It was so isolating and defeating for me as a parent,” Letaw said.

Her husband Jim researched as they went through multiple rounds of testing. ‘‘He’s the one that discovered the DAN protocol,” she said.

Letaw heard of the diet in her research, but initially dismissed it because Sawyer did not have the gastrointestinal difficulties other autistic children have.

‘‘I already had a healthy, holistic view of food and health, so it wasn’t clicking with me that there would be a problem there,” she said.

Letaw first considered the diet after seeing her 3-year-old niece, who has a sensory processing disorder, at a family event. ‘‘I hadn’t seen her for 18 months, and she was a transformed child,” she said. ‘‘She was crawling on me in a field, she was wanting to engage, she was speaking. I was floored.”

Her parents attributed the changes to a restrictive diet.

Letaw soon learned the sources of gluten, started reading labels, and slowly switched food. She pulled gluten, casein, soy, egg, and yeast from Sawyer’s diet, and chose to follow the same regimen herself, although her husband does not.

At a presentation put on by Speech Pathways in Westminster, Letaw saw a desire for people to learn more about the diet. ‘‘People were commenting they wish there was a support group,” she said. ‘‘So I started one.”

The group, which began during the holidays, has had a shaky start with low attendance and canceled meetings, but Letaw hopes it will pick up. It’s hard for parents with kids who have special needs to have the time, but they need to say, ‘‘I need this meeting for me,” she said.

A lot of people don’t know how to start the diet. ‘‘They say ‘No way. All my kid eats are fries and yogurt.’ That makes me want to say ‘You are the perfect candidate for the diet,’” Letaw said.

‘‘It’s hard in the beginning because you have to figure everything out,” said Tori Tuncan, a Vienna, Va., resident who has attended the meeting and has followed the diet since October.

‘‘Now it’s not a problem at all,” Tuncan said. ‘‘I just do it.”

Letaw said other reasons to not try the diet are people think it’s too restrictive, don’t have the time, say they have already tried to some degree, or that it’s not relevant to their child because the child doesn’t have gastrointestinal difficulties.

‘‘It can be more expensive to maintain this diet, but it doesn’t have to be,” she said. Letaw hopes parents come to the meeting to get an idea of what a restrictive diet might be like or how it might help their child.

‘‘I love the diet, and I’m very passionate about biomedical. But people need to make their own decision, and the diet is as good as the parent who follows it. I can’t guarantee results.”