One Mom's Discovery

Two years ago my son started to display tics, worries, and obsessive compulsive behaviors. I felt as though a switch had been turned on overnight and my life along with my son's life changed in an instant.

My son disappeared slowly while these behaviors took over his waking hours. Being controlled by his thoughts, his worries and his rituals, I wondered how could he possibly live a normal life?

I cried for days, overwhelming feelings of helplessness haunted me. As a mother you want to fix this, make it go away and make everything alright for your child.

After days of crying and being consoled by a good friend the well ran dry and then I got angry. I had to do something. Crying was not the answer and wasn't going to help my son.

I had to take a moment to breathe, regroup, and reflect. I'm a firm believer that our experiences prepare you for your life's purpose. When I reflected on the choices I have made in my life I realized I could handle this.

Most of my working career I have been in the holistic health care field. I have witnessed miracles of healing through natural and alternative means for 15 years. I realized that I had the tools to help my son, I just needed to roll up my sleeves and start the work.

We immediately started a food elimination program. We took out everything artificial and only worked with whole foods. Within 3 days 75% of his tics, worries and rituals were gone. On day 7 everything was gone. I now knew that foods were effecting my son.

One by one we brought items back into his diet. We had to know the culprits, so we would know what his body did not want.

This is what we found. Dairy was the main culprit behind his Obsessive Compulsive behavior. Table salt created tics, because of the additives in the salt, cereal created tics due to all the sugars and artificial ingredients, and salicylates which are naturally occuring preservatives found in some fruits and vegetables, created tics.

For two years I had a hard time believing that food chemicals, dairy, sugars, and salicylates could change my son's behavior the way it did. It was only through my own mistakes with food that confirmed over and over what we had learned.

It has taken me two years to trust that this does work. Today you would not know my son struggles with anything.

Today I help educate parents on how they can make a difference in their child's life. When we create small changes a rippling effect will take place. Not only did my child benefit from the changes but my whole family is making healthier choices and seeing results of their own.

By Erin Bridger