Two years ago she adopted Santiago, a pound, indoor, shedding black Lab whose presence brings joy to her life every day. She also teaches two classes at the Whole Foods Culinary Center. Meagan and Katie McGovern are two sisters who have always been there for each other.
When Katie struggled with being a single mother, Meagan stepped in to help her raise her son Matthew. Years later, when Meagan started her own family and became overwhelmed by her toddler Sander's ceaseless tantrums, screaming, and sleeplessness, Katie gave up her lucrative job in hotel administration and relocated to Austin to help Meagan cope.
They decided to start up an organic dessert company, combining Meagan's love of baking with Katie's catering experience and business acumen. The business took off, and they were doing well, when it became apparent that Sander was not just going through a difficult phase: He was beginning to show signs of autism.
Two strange and inspiring stories of the healing power of food – or how terribly it can hurt us
At 22 months, he still wasn't talking. He refused to play and didn't respond to his name. He spent much of his time moaning aloud. Never one to take things lying down, Meagan researched Sander's symptoms on the Internet and found that many children his age with similar behavior patterns were diagnosed as having ASD: In the middle is Asperger's syndrome.
Your Healing Diet
They are all thought to be related," Meagan explains. She also discovered in her research that many children showing these symptoms especially very young ones like Sander have benefited greatly from following a gluten-free, casein-free diet. Casein is another very small protein, one found in all animal milk. Because these proteins are so small, they are able to travel through inflamed intestinal walls into the bloodstream.
Once in the bloodstream, they are suspected of wreaking havoc on the central nervous system. Unlike in celiac disease, where the removal of gluten from the diet always leads to a lessening of symptoms, not all Autism Spectrum Disorder children respond to a gluten-free, casein-free diet. However, enough do to merit giving it a try, and Meagan wasted no time. He began responding to his name; he started playing with his toys. But, because I was breast-feeding him, I had to go gluten- and casein-free, too. These proteins are so small they are carried in breast milk.
Your Healing Diet Austin by Deirdre Earls (2009, Paperback)
And the more I talked to other parents about Sander, it seemed no one knew where to get good gluten-free food. So, we switched our business to gluten- and casein-free only, and here we are. Many mothers of ASD children are so exhausted and sleep-deprived that asking them to learn how to cook gluten- and casein-free food is close to asking the impossible.
Functioning like personal chefs, Katie and Meagan take the pressure off. They cook a week's worth of tasty, satisfying meals and deliver them on Fridays. We also sell a lot of cupcakes, cookies, birthday cakes, and bread.
Your Healing Diet: A Quick Guide to Reversing Psoriasis and Chronic Diseases with Healing Foods
Baked goods are very hard to make without gluten, and no child wants to go without treats they see the other kids having. It is one thing to say your gluten- and casein-free baked goods are fantastic, and it is another to prove it. After sampling several of the McGovern sisters' muffins, cookies, and cupcakes, I have to proclaim that these women are geniuses. I cannot say this emphatically enough. Their baked goods are completely and totally indistinguishable from regular, fancy-bakery products.
Most gluten-free baked goods simply never have a normal texture or mouthfeel; and if they have a decent texture, they have no flavor. The sisters' website, www.
It's made to order. Peoples Pharmacy at and are so excited about what we are offering that they have bought a freezer unit solely to enable them to carry our products. Peoples Pharmacy in Westlake is planning to do the same. You can tell us, 'I can't have gluten or dairy or potatoes or mushrooms or pineapple.
What can I have? They are so happy and so grateful. I mean, we are already halfway there. We are willing to work with whatever dietary needs a client has. For those who can't afford to order meals premade, the McGoverns offer cooking classes about once a month. Refresh and try again. Open Preview See a Problem? Thanks for telling us about the problem.
Return to Book Page. A short guidebook which was designed to be very user-friendly, it also explains how food can create and reverse disease. In essense, the book dist 'Your Healing Diet: Then it demonstrates how you can easily incorporate healing habits into your busy lifestyle. Special segments discuss healing principles and what to expect when healing naturally.
- Care and Feeding of Your New Pet: Clam Dragon - Illustrated.
- See a Problem?.
- Secret Under the Caribbean: Under the Sea book 3.
- The Power of Stones?
Whether or not you're an Austinite, you'll also find lists of foods, grocery stores and restaurants to make it easier to shop, cook and travel while experiencing the incredible healing power of food. Paperback , 82 pages. To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up. To ask other readers questions about Your Healing Diet , please sign up.
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This book is not yet featured on Listopia. Dec 23, Tatiana Nicholls rated it liked it. A complete guide of what to eat, very focused on healing psoriasis but at the end it can help in any health issue. Really nice if you live in NYC since Deirdre gives a complete list of grocery stores and even restaurants to visit, not very useful if your are not in that place. Everything I do is a consequence of the perspective and responsibility gained from years of work in teaching hospitals and research facilities which serve those most ill.
My goal is to optimize your long-term health through practical food, relevant expertise, and science. This is done within the accountability of my Registered Dietitian license, the only license which qualifies for the practice of nutrition and dietetics in accredited hospitals of the United States. After sixteen years of using food instead of chemotherapy to reverse my own disease, and decades as a Registered Dietitian, one thing is clear.
Your Healing Diet Austin
Even if the perfect diet exists, it's useless if it's not yours. Decades of work with patients of every diagnosis taught much about disease and diet along with what does and doesn't make education effective. But no classroom, teacher, or job teaches what is learned only through daily practice. I've used an imperfect diet every day for almost 15 years, across the USA and around the world, to reverse my own disabling disease.