The beginning.

Our journey started with the birth of my son in the year 2000.  A beautiful, big boy with blue eyes.  Perfect in every way.

Tragedy struck when he was just a toddler - he was savaged by a dog.  Great surgeons saved his arm, but he was never the same carefree child again.  He developed a urination problem and was thoroughly checked out at great expense by private urologists - no problem was found.  Yet my child started to spend a long time at the toilet - unable to get away because of the desire to need to urinate, even though he just been and might have stood at the toilet already for 20 minutes trying to go.

This continued until the age of 4, when he started school and was shown how to wash his hands.  A handwashing habit then developed to go with the urination habit.

At the age of 9 my son was given steroids on holiday in Sweden after eating a chocolate-covered icecream that contained nuts - he is allergic to several types of nut.  Life went a little downhill after this - he had a terrible reaction to the steroids and didn't quite know what to do with himself - jumping up and down on the spot and screaming until he fell asleep.  I think that the air hostess on the journey home would have happily given us parachutes to complete our journey - luckily she did not have any.  Following this, Panda (I will call my son Panda), developed severe stomach aches.  The stomach aches interfered with school, where followed a year of bullying (he was always badly bullied at school because of his OCD - his OCD worsened this year, transition year at school with no appropriate support it became a game for other kids to touch his hands so that he had to go and wash them).  At this time, my son was diagnosed with Aspergers which surprised many as he was great with metaphors and had good eye contact.  In fact a double diagnosis of Aspergers and High Functioning Autism was slapped on him - though I am sure you cannot be both.  My son started to beg me not to take him to school - I wish I had listened and understood.

The next decline was at the age of 10 when my son was given an SSRI.  The result was tragic.  Full blown PANS wiped out his life.  It is only now, 2 years down the line that I have been informed that, if there is an underlying antibody problem, SSRI's can make it flare and flare it certainly did.  The SSRI was not, in my view, properly monitored and my son was badly harmed by that in its own right too.  The side-effects were numerous and severe.  He developed, overnight, severe anxiety and OCD with tics and Tourettes and could no longer eat a proper meal.  It was shocking.

My son has been out of education since this time, too unwell to go to school or relate to a tutor.