After 5 years of flat-out, non-stop autism therapies including full time home programmes, biomed and diet my son

was still very much at the severe end of the spectrum. My son was a responder. Everything had looked so promising early on but many of his gains faded away over time or we'd gain in one area and lose in another. It was as though no matter what we did, something (the autism?) was fighting back and was stronger than us. Furthermore, although he had learnt from his ABA, VB and RDI therapies he remained distant, stressed, unreachable and, worst of all, unhappy. He was verbal, could read and write and was obviously clever but couldn't use any of these skills to communicate socially, had severe mood swings, terrible sleep, terrible bowel problems and wasn't social at all. He didn't refer to himself or other people at all, didn't seek us out for comfort, didn't attention seek, show or share. He preferred to be on his own and was very very obsessive and stimmy. He spent his days watching or repeatedly writing out film credits. When he was around 7 we decided to change direction again. He was already on the GAPS diet and we were extremely happy with this and what it had done for him. We were also pleased with it as a family as it seemed to help with our own medical/ physical problems. GAPS food is also delicious and a vast improvement on GF/ CF in our opinion! Luckily for me at around this time we made two great discoveries. Firstly the NIDS protocol by Dr Michael Goldberg and secondly a wonderful, child-friendly therapy called Intensive Interaction . Together these two treatments have turned my son's life around (and as a result the whole family's quality of life has vastly improved). My son's sleep is now fine. I feel like writing that twice I wouldn't have any kind of life and nor would he if we couldn't make that statement. My son's sleep is now fine. His bowels are vastly improved. He's sociable, attention seeking, playful, refers to himself, calls me, tells me he loves me, writes stories, role-plays and above all he's a happy boy, still making progress and with a promising future.