Replied by Debbie (Melbourne, Australia) on 04/18/2011
Apple224, I found this great article which speaks of vitamin, and mineral therapy for improving children with learning disabilities which may help your niece. I am also going to try it with my son.
Early in 1981, the medical and educational establishments were shaken to their socks. Ruth F. Harrell and colleagues, in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (1), showed that high doses of vitamins improved intelligence and educational performance in learning disabled children, including those with Down syndrome. Though to many observers this seemingly came straight out of left field, Dr. Harrell, who had been investigating vitamin effects on learning for forty years, was not inventing the idea of megavitamin therapy in one paper.
The start of the second World War was breaking news when Ruth Flinn Harrell conducted her first investigations into what she called "superfeeding." Dr. Harrell stated in a 1946 Journal of Nutrition article (4) that "a liberal thiamine intake improved a number of mental and physical skills of orphanage children."
"An experiment was conducted by Dr. Ruth Flinn Harrell which involved 104 children from nine to nineteen years of age. Half of the children were given a vitamin B1 (thiamine) pill each day, and the other half received a placebo. The test lasted 6 weeks. It was found by a series of tests that the group that was given the vitamin gained one-fourth more in learning ability than did the other group. " (6)
Carbohydrates, including sugar, increase the body's need for thiamine. Children eat a lot of sugar. An unmet increase is effectively the same as a deficiency. This may be part of the mechanism of ADHD and other children's learning and behavior disorders, as many so-called "food faddists" or "health nuts" have proclaimed for decades. Vitamin deficiency can become vitamin dependency.
Though it is a stretch to say that all learning and behavioral disabilities are due to inadequate vitamin intake, it is certain that some are. Behavioral deficiency tends to show up before nutritional deficiency is recognized.
"The story of one child is particularly poignant. This seven year old child was still wearing diapers, didn't recognize his parents, and had no speech. His motor skills were relatively unimpaired and he could walk and run fairly well. In forty days, after some of the supplements were increased, his mother telephoned. .. Saying, "He's turned on, just like an electric light. He's asking the name of everything. He points and says, 'What zis?' Finally he pointed to his father and said, 'zis?' I said, 'That's your father and you call him daddy, and he looked at him and said 'daddy. ' I'm your mother; can you call me mommy?" She went on to say, "I think he saw us for the first time. " This little boy went on to do very well in his learning, and eventually tested with an IQ of ninety, which an average IQ."(24) I have seen a beautiful photo in Medical Tribune (9) of Dr. Harrell being hugged by one of the study group children. The kids noticed their own improvement.
You need to click the link to read the whole article.
http://www.doctoryourself.com/downs.html
