In ARRI 16-2 (The American Journal for Autism Research) we published a letter from a mother in Florida whose very large autistic son changed from a sweet, loving boy to a teenager who flew into unpredictable rages which “were usually associated with self injury, aggression and property damage.” She went on, “At times I had to lock myself in the bathroom; otherwise he would attack me. We gave him many medications, but nothing worked.” A friend suggested a solution: a brownie with marijuana baked into it. “Soon after he ate the brownie,” she said, “my son’s anxiety disappeared, and his sweet, loving behavior returned. He shows no signs of being under the influence of a drug. He now receives one marijuana brownie and several doses of Marinol, which contains the active ingredient in marijuana, each day. This has clearly saved my child’s life and my family’s life.”

On page 7 of this issue of the ARRI you will find a letter from Ray Gallup, a well-known autism activist in New Jersey whose teenage son has become extremely assaultive, sending members of his family to the hospital and requiring police intervention on a number of occasions. Like Ray, thousands of parents are dealing with children who are so out-of-control, and so violent to themselves and others, that they can make their own lives and that of their families hellish.

In ARRI 16-1 we published an editorial on various means of dealing with such severely self-injurious and assaultive behavior, but marijuana use was not an approach that we mentioned. Many drugs are used to control these kinds of behaviors in autistic individuals, including risperidone (Risperdal), which has a large range of highly toxic effects (ARRI 16-4). It seems to me if one is going to need to use drugs, one ought to consider a relatively safe drug, like marijuana, if research bears out the good results that a number of parents have reported.

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