When I say that True Hope changed our lives, I mean it quite literally did just that.
Over the course of about a year, our 7-year-old’s mental health had inexplicably begun to rapidly deteriorate, from the development of panic attacks to the occurrence of what could be described as short psychotic episodes.
We went from emergency room visits to consults with pediatric neurologists, integrative doctors, and psychiatrists. He underwent an MRI, blood testing, neuropsych evals, psychotherapy, and neurofeedback.
He became depressed, talking about wishing to be dead, would have intermittent rages that came seemingly out of nowhere and suffered hour-long panic attacks. He missed weeks at a time of school.
My husband and I were at our breaking points. While various providers all seem poised to offer their treatment recommendations, no one could explain to us why our little boy was morphing into someone we didn’t recognize. We were terrified that he wouldn’t live a normal life.
After exhausting many avenues, we made the difficult decision to try him on an antidepressant. Unfortunately, even at what the doctor called a “homeopathic dose,” our son developed severe side effects to several of the medications he tried. He could no longer sleep, seemed agitated most of the time, and cried constantly.
After several months, and a particularly scary indecent in which he became violent, his psychiatrist recommended we try a low dose of an antipsychotic. This was an unbearable decision for my husband and me—to put our 7-year-old son on an antipsychotic seemed unimaginable, but our lives had ceased to hold any peace and it seemed we had exhausted our options.
Our son was trailed on an extremely low dose of the medicine and at first, things seemed to go great. He began to sleep again and seemed calm and happier. The rages disappeared. While we were still uncomfortable with the decision, it was the first time in so long we saw hints of our child re-emerge.
Unfortunately, the peace did not last.
After a few weeks on the medicine, we began to notice our son making strange grimaces, and he began to experience muscle contractions in his limbs. It was clear he was suffering from tardive dyskinesia, a side effect of antipsychotics.
It was at this time that the psychiatrist mentioned that some of her clients had found success with a company out of Canada called True Hope. While she was not affiliated with the company in any way, she passed the information along to us. We will be forever grateful.
Upon calling True Hope, we had the good fortune to be connected to a rep, our fairy godmother, who became our lifeline as we slowly tapered our son off his medication and began to supplement him with EMPowerplus Advanced.
This was no easy feat, as the antipsychotic had impacted our son’s brain receptors so that he had withdrawal symptoms. She used various nutritional supplements to ease his withdrawal symptoms, while slowly increasing his EMPowerplus Advanced dose.
After 3 weeks on EMPowerplus Advanced, our son’s psychiatric symptoms began to evaporate. He began smiling and laughing. His energy and vitality increased. He could attend school regularly, and his teachers remarked on the change in him.
It has now been 4 months that he has been on the EMPowerplus Advanced, and he is the happiest, silliest, most resilient 8-year-old that you can imagine. He plays baseball, does taekwondo, acts in plays, and has multiple playdates each week. He has shot ahead 4 reading levels in his second grade class. He sleeps soundly for 10 hours a night. He no longer has rages or panic attacks.
All of his psychiatric symptoms are a thing of the past.
I truly believe our son may have faced a life of agony and that our family may have had no quality of life had we not contacted True Hope. In fact, we all now take EMPowerplus Advanced each day, and my husband and I have never felt better.
Thanks to the medical knowledge and unwavering support of staff, we can breath easily knowing we have found a solution to our son’s issues. I now tell everyone about True Hope and our experience in the hope that another family may avoid the suffering and struggle to find answers and help that we experienced.
—Donna Gilman, Psy.D.