“And then the guilt starts again because I have brain-eating blood that attacked Hayden.”
So says Dee Cogdill of Benton, Ohio in the April 21st Cleveland Banner; Hayden is 11 years old and autistic. Cogdill and her husband, Ed, took Hayden to Johns Hopkins University to participate in a research study about maternal antibodies (more about this here). In the study that the Cogdills participated in, “an antibody in all mothers of autistic children was found in their blood that was not present in mothers with typical children.” It’s from this finding that Dee Cogdill’s comment about “guilt” comes in, …read more

Genetic and environmental factors are frequently cited as causes for autism (and, just to be upfront about it, the genetic studies best explain why my son is autistic). Three recent studies suggest that immunological factors ought also to be considered.
Earlier this month, two studies conducted by researchers at the University of California-Davis M.I.N.D. Institute suggested links between autism and mothers’ immune systems. According to one study, some cases of “regressive autism” (in which a child seems to be developing normally and then loses skills and becomes autistic, in contrast to “early onset autism”) may be connected to the immune systems …read more