Leaving the Difficult Path of PANS Behind,
Caleb (Boy age 7)
A typical east coast family, Robin and Jeff Meek, have beautiful, healthy twins – one girl, one boy. In the beginning of their kindergarten year, the family took a trip to “The Happiest Place on Earth, Disneyland.” While on this much anticipated trip, son Caleb (age 5), had a sudden onset of behavioral changes. Mom says, “I can remember our first day at Disney and he began having repetitive motions, jumping and flapping his arms, and having meltdowns we had NEVER seen before this day. At our first meal he started eating his mashed potatoes with his hands! None of this behavior was normal to our family. Also, he began to talk in baby talk and doing odd motions with his mouth.” As the day wore on, mom continued to see her son meltdown and have behaviors that were nothing she was familiar with.
Mom considered that maybe there was another child with disruptive behavior in the kinder class that he was copying. She disciplined her son and told him to stop – but he couldn’t stop.