Increased inflammation occurring in the womb is the primary cause of ASD, while other health conditions often happen because of chronic inflammation later in life. Chronic inflammation develops when the body has excess reactive oxygen species and does not have enough defensive resources to control the situation. Nutritional, environmental, and various other lifestyle factors deplete these resources and increase inflammation. 

If the inflammation is strong enough, then this can cause cells to enter a survival mode known as the Cell Danger Response (CDR). When inflammation and the CDR occur in the brain, neurons retract, creating fewer connections between neurons.

Because of inflammation and the CDR there are also more excitatory neurotransmitters, such as glutamate, and fewer inhibitory neurotransmitters, such as GABA, acetylcholine, and serotonin. 

Depending on various epigenetic factors and the timing of inflammation, this altered neurotransmitter content and higher electrical activity raises the risk of epilepsy, anxiety, bipolar disorder, and other health conditions.

Critically, nutrition has a large impact on inflammation. A big problem in modern society are the processed high glycemic load carbohydrates. Many chemical ingredients in most processed foods are hard to even pronounce and may cause many health problems.

In addition, food processing often removes a lot of helpful nutrients. For example, pasteurizing milk decreases its sulfate. Brown rice loses some of its important natural vitamins when processed into white rice. Many processed foods are also unnaturally fortified with artificial vitamins and minerals that may have negative long-term side effects.

Also, many processed foods rapidly increase blood glucose levels, raising inflammation. In addition, the number of chemicals in processed foods stresses the liver, disrupts intestinal bacteria balance, and contributes to multiple health issues. 

Shockingly, many chemicals in processed foods are not adequately tested for long-term health effects, especially when chemicals are combined with other chemicals. This may cause negative synergistic effects, where 2 + 2 = 7 in terms of damaging the body.

As previously discussed, eating high glycemic load foods, and not eating enough healthy fat, is one of the primary causes of inflammation. Glucose metabolism generates a higher ratio of NADH/FADH2 than fat metabolism. This is critical because complex I in mitochondria processes NADH and creates more reactive oxygen species.

Another health problem is pollution, which has negative health effects. For example, heavy metals, such as lead, mercury, and cadmium, weaken the natural antioxidant defense systems of the body. 

Pesticides and glyphosate-based herbicides are another important source of pollution. Critically, safety tests for glyphosate herbicides with co-formulants are inadequate. This is because most pollutants have synergistic effects, which safety tests often underestimate.

Another inflammation source is most industry meats at the grocery store, which often have an excessive amount of omega-6 and pollutants. The pollutants could further overwhelm an already weakened detoxification system in some people. Also, many industry meats have hormones and antibiotics that may create health problems, such as intestinal bacteria imbalance and cancer.

One more reason to avoid most industry meats is that the treatment of animals is often terrible. The industry may confine animals to small cages, feed them other animal parts, and not allow them to go outside. This treatment is one of the worst parts of the modern world. The future will look back at this with disbelief, shame, and shock.

A way to limit exposure to the meat industry, is to eat more plant-based meals. Have a good food plan based around phytochemical-rich plants also reduces reactive oxygen species. When occasionally purchasing meat for two to three meals a week, then buying from a source that treats animals well leads to a much better meat quality. Frequently, a quality source is a local farmer, but some options are available at the supermarket. However, these options tend to be more expensive. The higher price for more naturally raised meat is another reason to eat more plants.

Eating a lot of healthy fat is helpful when eating plant-based foods. Healthy fat provides an alternative fuel for metabolism and creates less inflammation than glucose metabolism. For this reason, low glycemic load food plans are not as beneficial for health if there is not enough fat because cells will have to mainly metabolize glucose. But if a lot of fat is in the low glycemic load food plan, then metabolism will be both more efficient and long-lasting. This is how many hunter-gatherers eat, with a lot of daily calories coming from healthy animal fats.

When increasing fat intake, eating more animal fats is better than consuming more refined vegetable oils, which have easily damaged polyunsaturated fatty acids. These damaged oils cause many health problems when eaten. 

When purchasing fat, make sure it does not come from an animal with a lot of pollution. This is because many types of pollutants accumulate in fat. High-quality organically raised grass-fed fat from a local supplier or good online source is a much healthier purchase.

Another factor that indirectly increases inflammation is modern farming practices, which deplete soil minerals and reduce nutrition provided by crops. Reduced intake of minerals, such as magnesium, zinc, and sulfur, impairs the function of multiple enzymes in the body, including critical antioxidant enzymes. This increases the chance of reactive oxygen species overwhelming the antioxidant defense systems. 

Considering all these health concerns, it is important to note how many changes around the early 1980s increased the rate of various health conditions. 

For example, the depletion of sulfur and other minerals in the soil worsened health and increased inflammation beginning around this time. Also, authorities incorrectly recommended avoiding animal fats and increasing intake of refined vegetable oils. These recommendations also led to a higher intake of high glycemic load carbohydrates.

Therefore, starting in the 1980s, there were less minerals in the soil and increased intake of refined carbohydrates and processed vegetable oils. The combination of these factors increased inflammation. This devastating shift from healthy animal fats to refined carbohydrates and easily damaged vegetable oils cannot be overemphasized. This shift destroys health. Considering these factors, the sudden rise of the ASD rate, especially regressive ASD, starting in the 1980s is better understood.

Overall, there are many different factors discussed in this book that increase inflammation, which slows down the methylation cycle and multiple detoxification pathways. With slow detoxification and antioxidant systems, many mitochondria become damaged and inefficient because of excess reactive oxygen species. 

This increases inflammation even further, causing cells to release ATP into the space outside of the cells. This extracellular ATP, a classic sign of cell stress, can trigger a large release of inflammatory chemicals and even more reactive oxygen species. 

This increased inflammation can lead to the Cell Danger Response (CDR), which causes neurons to reduce their connections with other neurons by retracting dendrites. The CDR causes this retraction because the cells want to protect themselves in the inflammatory environment.

Also, too much inflammation increases excitatory neurotransmitters and reduces inhibitory neurotransmitters. This shift further decreases neural connectivity.

Inflammation combined with the many effects of the CDR causes and increases ASD symptoms, such as communication difficulty, anxiety, repetitive behavior, sensory overstimulation, and reduced eye contact.

One goal of this book is to help people better understa¬nd that controllable factors, such as nutrition, lifestyle, and environment, affect inflammation and the risk of many health conditions, including ASD. Therefore, using the ideas in this book may strongly reduce inflammation and improve different health conditions. 

When combined with diminished inflammation, sensory enrichment activities can further strengthen connections between neurons. Improvements in neuron connectivity from nutrition and lifestyle modifications will not be as effective without including sensory enrichment. 

Sensory enrichment activities, such as one-on-one time, games, music, and social interaction, lead to increased connections between neurons and a better brain network. Importantly, sensory enrichment activities have already shown some benefits, even without first reducing inflammation and the CDR. Imagine what is possible once the excessive inflammation is no longer getting in the way. 

Unfortunately, when trying to improve inflammation and ASD symptoms with nutrition, some people only go as far as using a gluten-free and casein-free food plan. Others might try a limited diet with a few supplements. People use these diets because of stories they hear about some positive results, but there is no unifying concept in the plan.

However, seeing ASD from the viewpoint of inflammation and understanding the factors influencing inflammation will lead to more effective action and increase the chance of symptom improvements.

There are many sources of inflammation, and each needs attention. Some people struggle more with psychological stress, whereas others eat incorrectly. Other people have too much pollution. Some people have all those problems.

In any case, look at inflammation from many angles and balance the inflammation. In addition, use a few natural anti-inflammatories in moderation. Once inflammation and the CDR are reduced, then many sensory enriching activities may greatly improve neuron connections. Less inflammation and better neuron connections will reduce multiple symptoms for most ASD people.

Also, reducing inflammation improves the overall health of the body and massively benefits many different health conditions. As previously discussed, and restated because of importance, ideas in this book apply to a lot of health conditions.

Hopefully, reading this book leads to the realization that chronic inflammation is main underlying connection between many health conditions that appear unrelated. 

For example, if significant inflammation happens during pregnancy, then ASD risk increases because the neuron network is first organizing and connecting. The growth of a new brain is incredibly sensitive and easy to disorder. 

If chronic inflammation happens later in life, then one of the conditions that can appear is ADHD. This condition likely happens because the neuron network is organized, but still experiences the increased excitation and reduced inhibition caused by the CDR and excess inflammation. This creates excess electrical activity in the brain and an inability to easily maintain attention.

Excess excitatory neurotransmitters also create anxiety if combined with a lack of inhibitory neurotransmitters, such as serotonin and GABA, which excess inflammation depletes. Depending on factors, such as epigenetics, too much inflammation can also cause depression because of neuron retraction and purposeful serotonin reduction.

As discussed in Chapter 3, inflammation also reversibly and purposefully slows down the methylation cycle. If the methylation cycle is slow for too long, then there will be hypomethylation of many genes. This hypomethylation, combined with chronic inflammation, affects the development of cancer and many other health conditions.

As revealed, the most common types of cancer may serve a temporarily beneficial function, which is why the body has unmutated cancer promoting-genes in DNA usually kept silent by a well-functional methylation cycle. Refer to Chapter 6 for further discussion of this concept. 

Inflammation also influences blood glucose levels. When there are too many reactive oxygen species in cells, then the cells purposefully become resistant to glucose uptake. This situation, of increased inflammation and too much glucose in the blood, associates with an increased risk of stroke, heart attack, cancer, obesity, and Alzheimer’s.

Differences in epigenetics, genetics, stress, timing, and environmental inputs cause chronic inflammation to lead to a massive variety of health conditions. I could describe how inflammation may be the main cause of many more health conditions, but for the sake of space, I will discuss these ideas in future blog posts.

The ideas discussed in this book will be helpful for many health conditions. However, effectiveness depends on the overall current state of health. How comprehensively the inflammation is dealt with is also vital. For example, not healing the psychological stress part of inflammation will limit the benefits of having a good food plan. In general, there are multiple factors that powerfully affect health, and none should be ignored.

Patience is also important when on a healing journey. As mentioned, too many changes at once can overwhelm the body and cause negative side effects. For example, the first phase, mentioned in Chapter 7, considers the need to first establish protection and remove the many sources of inflammation. 

The second phase focuses on strengthening health, while the third phase focuses on purifying the body and reclaiming a vital life. The phases are meant to gradually ease the body into better health.

Problems can occur if impatiently attempting to improve health. For example, there can be problems in trying to increase liver detoxification, while chronic inflammation is still severe. There may also not be enough minerals in the body to adequately support liver function.

If future medical researchers want to apply the ideas in this book, then they should make sure to include most of the ideas in the same study since balancing inflammation requires improving many different lifestyle factors.

Currently, there is no research that attempts to reduce inflammation with such a comprehensive approach. This absence of research is because of overspecialization and a lack of awareness. In addition, research is increasingly designed to study single variables. This style of research rarely solves complex problems.

Unfortunately, current research is too simplistic, even when only researching nutrition. There are many factors such as fiber, omega-3/omega-6 balance, monounsaturated to saturated fat ratio, micronutrients, phytochemical-rich vegetables, circadian rhythms, intermittent fasting, quality of meat, and the type of fat source.

For example, simplistic research may label meat as bad for health. However, the researchers do not distinguish between industry animals and naturally raised animals. Doing research studies with such a broad categorization is foolish because there are so many differences between these conditions that affect meat quality.

As another example, some research studies saturated fat for health problems but fail to consider how many people are also eating high glycemic load food as part of the same food plan. Many researchers also do not think about how the source and quality of fat affects its health impact. If fat is from a polluted source, then pollution gathers in the fat and creates many health problems natural fat would not cause.

Research also often overlooks if meat is from a naturally grass-fed animal. When some types of animals eat too many grains, then the omega-6/omega-3 ratio gets out of balance, which is more likely to cause health problems. 

In general, a better understanding of many factors, such as the ones mentioned, will improve future research. In research, as well as shopping at the grocery store, always consider the source and quality of the food.

After reading this book, people may want to start to apply some of these ideas. I recommend starting with Chapter 7 first because nutrition has a strong effect on health. This food plan features large amounts of phytochemical-rich vegetables and fruits, low glycemic carbohydrates, and enough fat. The healthy fat intake should eventually be in the range between 30 to 40 percent of daily calories. 

Because many people are already insulin resistant from poor nutrition, increasing fat intake should be gradual since an insulin resistant body is also more resistant to metabolizing fat. Listen to your body. Some people might need to start with eating only low glycemic whole foods for a while until health improves. A measurement of this healing process is a fasting insulin blood test.

The other features of the food plan are to get meat from local suppliers, consume beans for fiber and protein, eat whole grains, and eventually take supplements such as turmeric and MSM. The plan also involves tracking food to fulfill nutrient requirements. Intermittent fasting and circadian rhythm timing are also important. In addition, drinking electrolyzed water may further help to improve overall health by reducing inflammation. 

Of course, for ASD people the nutrition plan needs to be slower, with some food introduced gradually. Foods high in salicylates can cause negative health effects for some ASD people. Also, because of pathogenic bacteria in the intestines, stopping refined carbohydrate intake may be difficult. Reducing refined carbohydrates may need to be done slowly over time depending on individual health.

This brings up the fact that any personal or research use of the ideas in this book needs to maintain a long-term mindset because big health improvements can take many months to appear. Although improvements do sometimes happen earlier, impatience and a short-term mentality will limit future benefits.

Overall, most people in modern society have forgotten the natural way of living. They sleep with lights on at night and do not get adequate sunlight during the day, which interrupts circadian rhythms, reduces vitamin D, and lowers melatonin activity. In addition, many people only eat a few natural foods. Instead, they eat many processed high glycemic load carbohydrates and drink beverages sweetened with sugar. Many of these carbohydrates also contain refined vegetable oils, which have high amounts of easily oxidized omega-6 fat harmful to health. 

It is easy to feel overwhelmed and confused, considering the many pollutants, refined sugars, and processed foods on the nearby grocery shelf. A simple technique I use for decisions is to think if the choice agrees with Nature. If today happened thousands of years ago, then I would not eat some foods and make certain lifestyle choices. Eating unprocessed, low glycemic load, whole foods, and getting enough sunlight and sleep are just a few of the natural techniques I use for daily health.

Moving away from the pill addiction of simplistic genetic determinism and to a future of complex environmentally influenced epigenetics is where effective medical care will be found for complicated health conditions. Taking care of health by managing many environmental and lifestyle factors may heal multiple health conditions. 

Hopefully, this natural way of living and seeing the body as a functional whole transforms the overspecialization that stagnates current medicine. This overspecialization leads to the excessive use of medical scans, rather than understanding the natural biochemical causes of disease. Just because technology is advanced enough to scan each grain of sand on the beach, does not mean the horizon should be forgotten.

ASD is a unique manifestation of humanity, which, when functional, can significantly benefit society. Using the ideas in this book will create improvements in the neuron connectivity for many ASD people. When this improved connectivity occurs in some ASD people with an already higher neuron density, then the result may be amazing accomplishments and ideas that will benefit society. 

I hope some use their gifts to transform the materialism of society and show how limited materialistic viewpoints truly are. It is quite foolish to assume five senses can fully capture the nature of reality.

Hopefully, someone may also figure out how to reduce the current pollution of Earth. Maybe others will discover the answers to some of the most challenging issues that face the modern world. I cannot wait to see the brilliance that gets a chance to shine.

Although to be clear, there are different manifestations of ASD, with some people severely disabled and others high-functional. Likely, less than 10% of ASD people will have the big improvements that might affect the world.

Because of multiple variables, some ASD people may not improve much with any treatment. There may be genetic alterations or a severely disordered neuron network that cannot be improved.

In general, it is important to remember the function of an individual does not determine value. Everyone matters. 

This book may solve the ASD mystery and the mysteries of other health conditions. My own experience as a high-functioning ASD man gave me an insider perspective of ASD and empowered this book. I am grateful for a chance to help many people with this information.

There may be questions you want to ask. Questions can be submitted on www.AutismHealthCoaching.com or my other website www.AcupunctureTransformation.com.

This book is too important to put behind a paywall. For this reason, the entire book is free to read on my website. Of course, the option to buy the book still exists. Follow the link on the website to purchase the book.

Thank you for spending valuable time with this book. I hope the future is bright.

With Love, 

Max Glennon