Vacation All I Ever Wanted

I met the girls for lunch today at California Pizza Kitchen to plan our big beach house extravaganza. I have to tell you how nice it was to not sweat Stink’s lunch choice: pepperoni pizza and chocolate milk. Had he not been on the Intuniv – which are still keeping his tics to a minimum – I’d never let him eat that stuff. Not only did gluten and dairy make him hyper, but it increased twitches ten fold.

Some out there might say that it would be better to just stick with diet if the diet work. Why bother with meds? Instead of messing with a kid’s brain chemistry, just keep the bad stuff 100% out of his system!

I can’t disagree with this opinion, which is why I held off on the Intuniv for so long.  I firmly believe there are alternative ways of healing tics and providing kids with better focus. The GAPS diet is just one example of that. (I will cut and paste parts of an email I received from my pen pal on this diet on my next post.)

The problem I have with doing everything via diet and supplements (acupuncture or cranial sacral massage or Brain Balance and on and on…) is expense. I just can’t sink the kind of cash I’d like to into alternative stuff right now that may work, but may not.

I never thought I’d type the above statement. NEVER. But as a parent, I’ve tried really hard to be open to new things. I have tried to balance not just what is best for Stink and my family in a perfect world, but what is going to work for them in the real world. For now, that means meds is our sweet spot. We still eat super healthy, but some days we cheat. The tics are down by 80%. He can play computers without suffering vocal tics afterwards. It’s not like we’re going hog wild on electronics or junk food, but I feel like he can be a kid now and I’m not always saying no. “Yes, everyone else is eating pizza and coke. You can eat the gluten free noodles with water and here, have some organic grilled chicken I brought from home to spruce it up a bit. Dessert? Here’s some garbanzo beans. Smush ’em up. Just like ice-cream!”

As a mom who doesn’t want my kid to jump off a cliff just because the rest of the world is doing so, I am still relieved with our decision to mainline him a bit more. It feels right.

I’d love to continue this conversation with you all. Who is doing meds? Who is doing natural approaches? Who is doing nothing and figuring it all out still?

In closing, here is Stink and his sister, giving their thoughts on the Intuniv. Enjoy!