Nutritional counselling -good option?

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Hello, everyone. My son has been diagnosed with Asperger syndrome.
We are giving all kinds of treatments possible .But the problem is ..for the past two weeks he is hesitant to have food properly and therefore he is loosing his weight. I am really afraid on this. I tried hard in making him eat. But it's not happening. I fear something bad could befall him if this is the condition.
On losing hope in my efforts, I have planned for a nutrition and weight management treatment for him at AESM ,Toronto. But Idk whether it is good for him as he got AS. So please give your genuine suggestions on this.

how old is he?

my main concern would be if they had any experience with folks on the spectrum. I would find out about that straightaway before anything else.

In the past has he had favourite or preferred foods, and if so, do they indicate that he had a preference for a particular food texture ? Some AS children are very picky about what food they will eat, though will still eat their top preferences (and are often happy to eat them day after day, without much variety). Your child may be hypersensory to factors like taste, smell and texture of foods, and if he is, bland foods may be more appealing to him.

Another possibility is that there is a physical reason for his lack of appetite. Some AS children are prone to digestive upsets, stomach ache and vomiting (I was once one of them), and are more likely to have food sensitivities and food allergies. It might be worth taking him for some tests if he has showed any allergic signs (these can show up in many subtle ways, including as skin issues, sudden loss of energy, sneezing, itchy ears, extreme fatigue, out of character crankiness and so on). Dairy, eggs, wheat, grains and peanuts are the most common culprits although there are many children who develop allergies to other things.

One of my grandchildren was horrendously difficult to tempt with food from an early age. However she loved to do things with me, so at age 2, I made her a special little apron (which she loved putting on), propped her up on a stool and we made gingerbread men together. She was so proud of having helped make these that she ate them without any encouragement at all, and asked for more Pikelets (I don't know what you call these in the USA, they are a kind of small thicker pancake with sultanas) are another easy-to-make thing that children can easily help make and cook.

The only vegetables she would eat were cauliflower and beetroot, because she liked their taste, and she would eat plenty of them, yet refuse all other vegetables. It took a lengthy trial and error process to discover these two exceptions, and curiously, they were also my favourite vegetables as a child.

Coeliac disease affects some children on the spectrum, at a greater incidence rate than other children, so it may be worth having him tested for this. The tests are not foolproof though - they don't work well for children who are immune deficient or who have not eaten gluten containing foods in the weeks before the test takes place. However they will work for most children.

And sometimes, as you probably know, children just go through phases like this, there is no underlying reason and they come out of them in their own time. (It may be worthwhile serving his meals away from the strong smells of cooking, to see if this makes any difference also. I could not stand the smell nor taste of beef as a child, it revolted me and if I was around it I had no desire to eat anything at all).

If you can't induce him to eat no matter what you do, then consulting your doctor and a nutritionist might be useful. Try not to show him that you are anxious and tense about his food intake at meal times, as children pick up on tension and become tense themselves around it, which will diminish his incentive to eat in a physiological way. Conversely doing something you both enjoy immediately prior to meals may have a positive effect (eg colouring in together or something he finds relaxing and interesting).

If it works, then do it!

I was also very easy to sicken around food when I was your son's age, and a hopeful note is that I survived, and outgrew it eventually. let your son find food that he likes, or perhaps disguise food like my mother did. my mom got me to eat peaches by fooling me into believing they were "yellow apples" as I didn't like their texture but did like apples. sometimes you have to be a bit sneaky.