What is Underneath the Behaviors?
A child on the autism spectrum can have a range of emotions every day, ranging from positive to negative in a matter of minutes. Sometimes these displayed behaviors carry tantrums, tears, and much more!
I'm often asked to give some insight into what is underneath some specific behaviors:
- Tantrums/aggression
- Crying for apparently no reason
- Fears and anxiety for no apparent reason
- Stimming/hand flapping/rocking
Below is my answer plus some additional support from two of the amazing autism specialist doctors featured in my past Autism Recovery Summits.
“I see constipation, or the recirculation of toxins from the gut, as contributing to many behaviors. Autoimmunity is a big one, too, creating inflammation in the brain, as well as other body organs. It creates discomfort, irritability, and dysfunction of organs and systems. And kids just won't feel good when all that happens.
Parasites can be at play, which tends to accumulate to help to contain the toxins and heavy metals within the body. I believe the body is full of pathogens, but the immune system is very dysregulated – it tends to allow the pathogens to thrive while at the same time attacking the body or other benign chemicals that we call allergens.”
– Luminara Serdar, BS, MBA, NMT
The expert doctors below are amazing, each having their perspectives and tips. Doctors are required to see their patients in person. If you cannot get to one of the doctors below due to physical distance or a long waiting list, feel free to reach out. I'll do my best to help guide you to shift your child's behaviors!
While I am not a medical doctor, I do look holistically at why the behaviors are there and help shift behaviors with nutrition, opening up the body's systems so built-up stressors, like toxicity, flows out.
“Sometimes parents come to me at the initial visit and they'll say, “My child is just really aggressive and stimming a lot or, my child has inappropriate laughter a lot, very emotional and very skinny.” The problem is yeast! I will definitely recommend the Candida diet. So it's very important for these kids to be on a sugar-free diet! If the yeast treatment that I've provided is not helping with the aggression, it'll definitely help with the inappropriate laughter, being overly emotional/sensitive, the child looking down, depression, or crying for no reason. Sometimes the aggression could be because of another infection or another gut bug that we want to be thinking about…”
– Dr. Karima Hirani, Los Angeles, California, USA
“If you're backed up, if you have too much poop in there it's going to make things a whole lot worse. We want to basically get rid of that extra sewage in their system so that they feel better! Constipation can cause intermittent colicky pain, and cramps inside and can cause chronic diarrhea. It can hurt inside. It's not their knees that are bothering them, it's not their hips or their elbows it's gonna be either their gut or their brain. I'm gonna be right about 95% of the time.
The next behavior was crying for apparently no reason, you know my son would do that… Sometimes these kids have something inflammatory that you cannot see … it could be something as simple as a headache or migraine, irritation from the therapist that bothered them or they got a headache from the perfume the therapist was wearing. I mean it could be any one of those things… I guess the next question would be: well, what if you give them Motrin? Does it make them better? If so, then you're gonna need a doctor or somebody who's been working with these kids to help you figure out what we're treating with that…”
– Dr. Jerry Kartzinel, Irvine, California, USA
Next Steps
Every behavior is a message from the body, and the right foods and supplements can help quiet it.
If you need help with energy testing supplements or want some guidance on supplements, diet and nutrition, please reach out to schedule a Functional Nutrition Consult with us. We're always happy to help!
Read the 5th blog post in this series: Help! My child is stuck in a behavior.
