Life has been extremely hectic for me lately and among the possibility of job changes, school changes for my son with autism, an upcoming move, and the heartbreaking news of Alex S's murder (many in the autism community know what I mean), I have not been in the mood to write lately. So, now I have something good to write about, and I want to do it while it is fresh.
As a quick follow-up from my last post on the SSI Fail, we did end up getting SSI for the time period we were on the waiting list (and maybe for a few months more, who knows?), so it is a nice bit of funding to pay for some therapies for my son that I have not had the money to invest in of late.
Now that I have some money for him and my son is on summer break, I decided to try Thermal Imaging, in an effort to see what was going on in my son's body in a non-invasive way, preferably before and after we do HBOT (Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy) again (if we get the funding for that) to see if there are any changes in his brain. I learned about Thermal Imaging from a friend who runs a healing center that we frequent. Typically, Thermograms are the modern alternative to mammograms. I never understood why anyone would choose to do a mammogram (radiation), which cause cancer, in an effort to detect breast cancer. Radiation causes cancer! Another story of "Doctor Knows Best." I'm being sarcastic.
Anyway, Medical Thermal Imaging is the use of highly sensitive infrared imaging in a temperature controlled environment that reproduces images of the body without x-rays, pain or contact with the patient's skin. It is basically like taking pictures of the person and being able to see areas of inflammation, healing responses, low circulation, among other things. Before I took my son in, my husband went to have this procedure done while the rest of us were visiting my brother in Southern California for a long weekend. My husband was on pet/plant duty at home. While we were gone, his wrist, which had been troubling him on and off for a while, became immobile, and his hand swelled up like a balloon and he was extreme pain. Instead of going to Urgent Care, he went for Thermal Imaging instead, and was able to see that his wrist had two compression fractures as a result of an injury he sustained a year prior while pushing his motorcycle. I was impressed and asked my husband to ask the owner if he would be open to doing the before/after HBOT imaging I was seeking. He said yes!
We had done HBOT for my son last year (70 sessions total), and saw big results. Now, for those of you who read my book, The Other Side of Autism: Famous Spirits Unveil Regressive Autism's Causes and Remedies HBOT was a recommended therapy via the spirit world for my son, and I chronicle his progress from it in the book. During my research on HBOT, I had seen SPECT scans from before and after HBOT and you could see visible differences in the brain afterwards. I guess I was looking for a non-invasive and less expensive alternative so I could have some "proof" of its benefits.
We went in for the session and I filled out the paperwork, got my son in his gown and they changed the temperature in the room for optimal imaging. I was cold, but that's nothing new for me. The owner and his assistant came in (I'm not using his name to protect the innocent) and took thermal images of my son's body and head from various angles. He was very compliant and played along. At one point, they put his hands in ice water to induce a nervous system response, and took additional photos. When we were done, I got my son dressed and went into his office to look at the photos on the computer and analyze the results. I will post them in a follow-up blog.
I'm just going to give a teaser here, because I'm still trying to grasp it all, and because I don't have all the info yet. I will say that it was very validating from an autism mom's standpoint and also from some of the things that had been channeled from spirit in the sessions for the book about my son's issues. Basically, the images showed that he had a pattern of "Thermo-irregularity" in his whole body, meaning he was hot when he shouldn't be, like a fever state. I told him that he had an unusually high tolerance to hot and cold. He loved cold water and couldn't tell when the water in the tub was too hot. We could also visibly see on the pictures areas of inflammation (which show up white) in the brain (particularly in the temporal lobes, above the temples, and in the base of the head) which control speech and motor skills among other things. The right side was more inflamed than the left. You could actually point the curser to areas on the thermal image on the computer and see what the temperature in that area was. Fascinating!
Surrounding these areas of inflammation in his brain were areas (which show up in red) where the body was trying to heal it. The following pattern was true in his entire GI tract, particularly his stomach, liver, and intestines. Inflammation in the brain and the entire GI tract. No, autism is genetic, isn't it? (more sarcasm). We talked about parasites, other pathogens including Lyme, bio warfare, radiation, GMO, auto-immune reactions, vaccines, food allergies, teeth, etc.... His assistant even joined the conversation when I brought up vaccines. She has twins under a year old which she stopped vaccinating after learning the truth about what she was injecting into her babies. I commended her on her realization. I was so happy that he completely got it and wanted to help my son! He was one of the rare medical people who was into the science and the human element of healing. My son was the first person with "autism" that he has worked with and wanted to learn more. He was very impressed with all that I knew, and his assistant said that my son was lucky to have me for a mom. Sniff. He could see in the Thermal Imaging that there was a problem that could be fixed, and offered some immediate solutions that I'm going to follow up on, and together we will find other answers.
We also exchanged some spiritual conversations, including things from my book, and things he shared with me, which let me know we were on the same page. He suggested that in lieu of payment, we use this as a test case to help my son and see what therapies help him, (using Thermal Imaging as a testing modality), in an effort to also help others with similar issues in the future. What??? Are you kidding me??? I'm in!!! I would have stayed there all day if I didn't have to rush home for an ABA session for my son. I felt so blessed, as if a door just opened up for my son. To be continued...
