Many parents ask me,
‘’My child is improving, but now has regressed. Is all that improvement lost forever?’’
No. There are two types of regression commonly seen when healing your child from autism, and each one actually has a great benefit.
The first type of regression is from when you introduce a new aspect of healing, like:
- diet change
- diet tweak
- some type of functional medicine treatment
- a new educational approach
It actually is quite common if you implement any of these changes to see a regression. Regression doesn’t always happen, but often it does, especially in the first year or so of healing.
You can think of it as your child’s body clearing things out. There are many scientific ways to explain it, depending on what new aspect of healing you introduced.
Another way of thinking about it is when you sweep a dirty floor, lots of dirt gets stirred up and kicked around, but if you keep sweeping the floor, you will eventually have a clean floor.
It’s definitely something to monitor, because regression is different than say, an adverse reaction to a new aspect of healing. Regression lessens, as time goes on. The benefit to these types of regressions is usually a quantum leap forward in healing, and you start to see your child do more amazing things.
The second type of regression is a reaction to stress. Stress can be a wide variety of things, like:
- deviating from their special diet/eating foods that cause inflammation
- moving to a new place
- a new school/a new teacher/substitute teacher
- a different power of eight or shadow
- ingredients change in a supplement
So with this cup of regression, you’re moving forward, you’re healing your child nicely, many times you think, ‘’I’ve got this,’’ and then something happens.
The best thing to do with this regression is to figure out what is causing your child’s stress and injury. Start analyzing,
- Did yeast increase?
- Did anxiety increase?
- Did sleep issues come back?
Since you’ve been healing for a while, you know a few tricks. You know what do to get your child back on track. Talking to your child about all this, even if they’re nonverbal, they’re listening to you, they’ll communicate in other ways.
Let them know that you’re working on fixing the problem. The benefits of this type of regression are you and your child bond, you become closer, trust increases.
Then, once you solve the issue again, you’re going to gain so much confidence. You need that confidence to keep healing. Regressions don’t need to be permanent. So much goodness can come out of a regression, but you have to have faith to keep going.
‘’Faith is taking the first step, even when you don’t see the whole staircase.’’
Martin Luther King Jr.
Now I know it’s hard to see the whole staircase during regression, but it’s there. Have the faith to keep going.
