medicine (neurology publications, studies, meetings, etc.). So I set about trying to invent some ways to circumvent the medical community and go straight to the families that thirsted for this information. Today, it is not at all uncommon to hear the same reaction that we had fourteen years ago with Charlie from a family who sees the miraculous effect of the diet with its child. (Today, Charlie has been seizure, drug, and diet free for over nine years). First, a grateful euphoria, followed by a kind of mixture of outrage for not being told, guilt for not finding it earlier ourselves (or worse, buying into the medical bias), and finally a passion to put a silver lining on the horror we’ve experienced by helping others avoid this same toxic trap. Many families who see success with the diet have done the same--going to their local media to help spread the word, helping establish keto departments at hospitals, forming support groups among keto families, publishing keto newsletters. Then, two years ago, from across the Atlantic, I met Maria –Fotini and her mom, Antigoni. With equal fervor, Antigoni has vowed to bring the diet to its rightful place in the treatment of pediatric epilepsy in her native Cyprus. The Charlie Foundation and Maria Fotini’s family have been ignited and united by the identical fuel. We simply cannot and will not rest until we’ve done all we can to right this terrible wrong--and better health is made available to all those children, and others, with difficult to control seizures. Jim Abrahams The Charlie Foundation To Help Cure Pediatric Epilepsy
121