Moira wrote:

[..]

> How much of him can come back?  can the brain at this age regenerate
> some of what it has lost? I figure his body has basically been
> starving due to dysbiosis. the yeast and bad bacteria are getting
> nothing to eat and are dying a slow death. They can no longer steal
> his food and give off their noxious toxins.

Linguists are thoroughly convinced that most people can learn any
number of L1 languages if presented as environments ie: pretty much
total immersion before the end of the 'critical period for language
learning' which they've determined ends age ~13.  I note that this is
suspiciously close to puberty.  After this age most people learn
languages as L2: second languages.  L1 learning is characterized by
'perfect' acquisition of skills in the language.  The form might not
reflect 'standard' prescriptive dialect but will be a good reflection
of the person's actual language environment.  There are exceptions
in both L1 and L2 learning.

I see some encouraging possibility.  A person with autism
manifestations might not fit the model well but I suspect there's
good hope particularly if there's several years before the end of his
critical period and the causes of the autism are relieved.  I believe
there has been some success with other autistic kids through diet.
You might look through internet newsgroups and web searches.

I suspect there may be several causes for autism so I doubt all kids
will respond the same.  I suspect there's a range of professional
opinion, some contradictory to others.

Dick
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http://smith.syr.edu/~ddawson
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