Truth Is Stranger Than Fiction ...

THIS is fictional, tongue in cheek, with a large dollop of sarcasm..

But it unfortunately is EXACTLY what happened to so many of us when we started taking our seriously ill children (who also happened to have an autism diagnosis) to mainstream practitioners....

Picture elderly pediatric GI specialist, whom I visited when Salamander was 18 months old and had completely stopped growing after his so maniest double viral pneumonia, condescendingly patting my arm, after I relayed in tears that every single time Salamander ate even a minuscule amount, he would start projectile vomiting; "My dearest mommy, your child is just trying to manipulate you, he is unhappy because you work long hours. You need to be firm with him. And I recommend that you go visit our excellent psychiatric counseling group on floor XYZ."

The gent did run the basic Celiac panel, which came back negative, and as far as he was concerned, he had done all he could do. I now know that negative Celiac panels at 18 months of age, while a child IS developing Celiac disease, are not that uncommon. The really sad part? Visiting this gent was just one of many medical avenues I pursued to help my very distressed child where I came up empty, as I could not get the medical specialists to think 'out of the box'. And Salamander wouldn't even HAVE his autism spectrum diagnosis for many more years to come AFTER this particular incident..