The oil of hope

When Hope Lewis was a year old, her mother, Kate, would put her exhausted daughter to bed each night and pray she’d sleep. Instead, Hope would sit bolt upright in the dark, wailing incessantly, banging her head against the bars of her cot for hours on end. When Kate replaced the cot with a bed, Hope banged her head against the wall. When the bed was pulled into the middle of the room, Hope targeted her knees, knocking against them repeatedly until bruises and sores covered her face and head.

Her behaviour was even more distressing because she had been such a calm, quiet baby. "Until eight months she hardly cried at all and always slept through the night. I thought I had an exceptionally wonderful child," says Kate, whose two other daughters, Jennifer and Tanya, are 13 and nine. "But in retrospect I realise she was too calm and quiet. She didn’t do anything spontaneously or respond to us at all."

Within a year of Hope’s birth, Kate and her husband separated, in part because he found it hard to accept his daughter’s problems.

"To see your child in such a state is just devastating," says Kate, 38, a teaching assistant from Kent. "She was so evidently disturbed but I had no idea why, and for a long time no one could tell me. It was soul-destroying to stand in the dark with her, trying to get her to stop. I felt totally alone."

As Hope got older, things became worse. "She had very little concept of what was going on around her," Kate says. "I’d kiss and hug her but get no response. It was as if she wasn’t there. I’d have to explain things three or four times for them to sink in and she was in a constant state of confusion. She’d say things like, ‘I fell down the stairs and broke my heart.’"

What had been a shyly burgeoning vocabulary disappeared, seemingly overnight. While Hope’s GP was concerned at her loss of language, he was vague about a diagnosis. "He just predicted that she would deteriorate and end up in an institution, but couldn’t say what was wrong," says Kate.

"Another doctor told me that it was my fault for comparing her to my other children. A third said that Hope was having an emotionally disturbed reaction to the break-up of my marriage."

It wasn’t until she was five that Hope received a proper diagnosis of autism, as part of a school assessment. By then her learning difficulties were so severe that her comprehension of language was gauged at only 8 per cent.

Unable to communicate, Hope became frustrated and violent, lashing out at her two elder sisters. She was hyperactive, racing around, unable to sit still. Constantly exhausted, she spent night after night in a wakeful trance. While her classmates were starting to read whole books, she could barely count to 10, and reading or writing even simple sentences was beyond her. Out of her depth at school, she fell foul of bullies. Pale and sickly-looking, she became hunched, hiding her face behind her shoulder-length hair.

"All I ever wanted was for Hope to settle down and have a family, possibly a job," Kate says. "My biggest fear was that she would end up alone, needing constant care, and that as I got older I wouldn’t be able to help her. I thought she’d get in with the wrong crowd and be used and abused. I was sure she’d end up institutionalised."

When Kate was at her wits’ end, a friend told her about fish oil. Kate was prepared to try anything, so in November 2001, Hope started a high daily dose of fish oil supplement containing omega 3 and omega 6, long chain fatty acids. Within ten weeks there were some remarkable changes.

One day Hope asked Kate’s new partner, Vaughan, how old he was, then counted up to 42 without stopping. In a turn-around that astonished Kate and the rest of the family, her understanding of language accelerated and her vocabulary increased overnight. She began reading at school, and delighted in reading aloud at home.

"Now she’ll read a book from cover to cover, with a bit of help, and she can write sentences," Kate says. "She’s still behind, but she’s catching up. She’s even started to become sarcastic and argue a point. Suddenly she has very strong opinions, which I couldn’t be more delighted about."

The supplement, Eye Q, combines a fish oil particularly high in essential fatty acids with vitamin E. Research has shown that it can help modify the behaviour of children with various learning and behavioural disorders, including dyslexia, dyspraxia and attention deficit disorder, as well as the autism spectrum.

Dr Carolyn Adcock is a consultant paediatrician who assessed Hope before and after the child took Eye Q. Although she was pleased at the improvements in Hope’s behaviour, she is quick to point out that more trials need to be done on Eye Q before it can be seen as a "cure" for autism.

"Essential fatty acids are important for normal brain function and there is a school of thought that says children with autism and other related developmental problems may be deficient in them," she says.

"Some reports claim that dietary supplementation causes an improvement in some of the features of autism, but it is important to remember that this has not been observed in all children with the condition. I was very pleased at how well Hope seemed to respond to the supplement, but more large trials are required to establish whether fatty acid supplements do have a definite role in the management of children with autistic features."

None the less, these days, Hope’s violent behaviour is a thing of the past. She is charismatic and engaging, and eager to please. She no longer hides behind her hair and stands up straight and tall. Playful, with a mischievous sense of humour, the little girl has made new friends at school and is a picture of health.

"She takes pride in choosing her own clothes now," Kate says. "She’s become her own little person. She’s incredibly sharp. I can give her a shopping list and send her off to get milk and bread, or ask her to remind me about things, and she’ll never forget."

In short, Hope is like any other outgoing seven-year old. A bit of a tomboy, she spends her weekends riding horses and swimming. She’s fanatical about animals and loves listening to pop music with her big sisters.

"For a long time, talk about Hope’s future was taboo," says Kate. "But now we talk about it all the time. I would be very surprised if she didn’t go out and get a job and, hopefully, she’ll find herself a partner and settle down. You wouldn’t know there had ever been anything wrong with her. It’s miraculous. It seems incredible that this kind of transformation could be down to something as simple as fish oil. But it has given me my child back.

"I’m so proud of Hope. I chose her name because I’ve always liked it, but maybe I knew subconsciously that it was the perfect name for her. It sums her up totally."

• Eye Q costs £7.99 for 60 capsules and is available from most major pharmacies and health food stores. Stockist details, 023 9222 2500.

• National Autistic Society, 020 7833 2299.