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Next week I will take my adult daughter with FAS to have a biopsy on her thyroid because it is in very bad, questionable condition. So far, she has liver damage, lost her gall bladder and now her thyroid shows damage--all filtering systems for the body to get rid of toxic materials, which leads me to what I have thought so many times before. OMG! These are the long term effects of the psychotropics, anti-depressants and ADHD medications she was prescribed by the so called professionals who used her as a guinea pig to gauge the effects of the medications on a child. None of the medications worked! I'm so angry!!!!
While I trusted these professionals with my daughter’s life, little did I know nor was I given the information that they had no idea what these drugs would do to a child, or what the long term effects might be. The more they prescribed the more the payment from the pharmaceutical company.
Little has been done for FASD in the last 10-15 years--a few manipulated old studies with the same results. We can’t even get a diagnosis for FASD because we are still using the facial features for diagnosis. Funny how Autism can be diagnosed with no facial features?
My daughter still has meltdowns, mood swings and depression, so to deal with what she must live with for the rest of her life I needed an alternative: Medical Marijuana. For some, this will seem preposterous, for others sensible. For me, it is the answer for her,safe with no side effects! It is legal in Washington and Colorado and luckily we live in one of these states. I bake it for her in cookies, monitor her usage, and she has no desire to have it all the time. In fact I have to remind her when I see the meltdown gearing up to eat a cookie and in 15-20 minutes she is calm and sometimes giggly. I’m not proposing this for everyone with FASD as the co-existing conditions that are prevalent are different for everyone and results will vary. I just want people to know that alternatives exist.