I’m Mike Carr, and my wife and I have been living this autism journey since 1990 with our son Michael. He has severe autism. Over these 35 years, we’ve heard every claim imaginable about what causes autism and what might help. Today I want to cut through the noise and share what we’ve actually learned about vaccines, Tylenol, and Leucovorin.
Key Takeaways:
- Vaccines do not cause autism—science is clear.
- Tylenol in pregnancy is safe when guided by your doctor.
- Leucovorin may help a few kids, but early therapy, structure, and support matter most.
Let’s Talk About What Autism Really Is
Something I wish more people understood: Autism is not something you can “catch.” It’s not contagious. It is a neurodevelopmental condition, which means it relates to how the brain develops. Typically, the signs of autism begin before birth and continue to emerge throughout early childhood.
The word “autism” itself can sound intimidating, but it actually encompasses a wide spectrum. Think of it like the word “cancer.” The impact varies enormously depending on the type and circumstances. For example, I’ve had basal cell skin cancers removed for years. While inconvenient — and not exactly great for my so-called “Hollywood looks” — they’ve been more of an annoyance than a life-threatening condition. By contrast, a relative of mine faced breast cancer, which meant surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation. For her and her family, it was devastating when the illness ultimately took her life.
Autism is similar in its range. Many autistic individuals can speak, work, and live independently with some support. Others, like our Michael, require one-on-one supervision every single day of the year. He is nonverbal, experiences seizures, engages in pica behaviors, and at times can be aggressive. Public outings are extremely difficult. Vacations are rare. For decades, my wife has essentially carried the equivalent of two full-time jobs. Severe autism reshapes life — permanently and profoundly.
The Truth About Vaccines and Autism
Vaccines do not cause autism. I understand why some people may be skeptical; it’s a concern that’s been repeated often. But the science is exceptionally clear. For decades, large-scale studies from leading institutions around the world have examined this question. The results, spanning 10 to 20 years of research, are consistent: vaccines are not linked to autism.
Just this week, MIT Technology Review highlighted the latest findings, noting that the data continues to confirm the same conclusion. Experts at Johns Hopkins also point out that the most recent evidence rules out vaccines as a cause.
If you’re considering delaying or refusing vaccinations out of fear of autism, it’s important to know that doing so will not reduce risk. Vaccines do not cause autism. What they do provide is protection against serious, preventable diseases. The evidence on this point isn’t mixed or uncertain, it’s unanimous.
What About Tylenol During Pregnancy?
This one’s a bit more nuanced – and I fully understand why parents feel uncertain.
There’s been ongoing debate about whether acetaminophen (the active ingredient in Tylenol) taken during pregnancy may increase the risk of autism. Some studies have shown a small association, but here’s the key detail: researchers aren’t sure if it’s the acetaminophen itself or the underlying reason you’re taking it, such as fever, infection, or inflammation, that might be responsible for any increased risk.
What is well established is that running a high fever during pregnancy can harm fetal development. That’s not speculation- that’s backed by decades of solid evidence. So when doctors recommend taking acetaminophen to bring down a fever, they’re weighing clear, known risks against more uncertain and still-debated associations.
Every major medical body, including the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) and the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine (SMFM), continues to support the use of acetaminophen during pregnancy when medically necessary. A recent Swedish study also found no evidence of a causal link between acetaminophen and autism.
The advice remains the same:
- Use it when you need it
- Use the lowest effective dose for the shortest time
- Always follow your doctor’s guidance
And just to be clear – I’m not a medical professional. I’m just a dad who’s been walking this road for 35 years. But the bottom line is this: managing fever and inflammation during pregnancy protects your baby. Suffering through an untreated fever won’t reduce autism risk – but it can increase other, very real risks.
Can Leucovorin or Folic Acid Help?
Leucovorin is basically folic acid. So is it a treatment for autism? Here’s what the research actually shows, and it’s pretty interesting.
There’s a very small subset of kids who have something called CFD (cerebral folate deficiency). It’s a problem where folate can’t get transported into the brain properly. Your brain needs folate to work right. These kids show autistic characteristics when they’re not getting enough folate in the brain. They don’t necessarily have autism, they just look like they do. In those cases, if a doctor prescribes Leucovorin, you might see a huge impact on their behavior.
But there aren’t many of these kids. For the vast majority of people with autism, the evidence shows Leucovorin doesn’t do much.
Now, what’s been our personal experience? We’ve tried folic acid in different forms for years. It definitely doesn’t cure autism. But it has helped Michael’s behavior in certain situations. When he’s really hyped up, aggressive, stressed out, full of anxiety and just won’t go to bed, sometimes if we give him some folic acid it really does calm him down. Not always, but sometimes. And there don’t seem to be major side effects.
So under your doctor’s guidance, I don’t think trying folic acid or Leucovorin is a high-risk thing. Maybe it won’t work all the time, but when your kid is really struggling with their behavior, it might be worth a shot.
Here’s What Actually Matters
After 35 years, here’s my biggest takeaway: stop looking for the silver bullet. We’ve tried so many magical therapies and miracle cures I can’t even count them. They just don’t work. I’m not saying don’t research them or stay informed, but don’t get your hopes up.
Instead, focus on the day-to-day stuff that actually makes a difference. Get your child into therapy as early as possible. I mean it. If your kid is one, two or two and a half years old and you’re seeing signs, get them into therapy while that brain is still developing. That’s where you can make the biggest difference. Some of the therapists and clinicians we know are most optimistic about early intervention, catching it quick and helping kids down the road end up with a less severe form.
Prioritize safety and health. If your kid has seizures like Michael, manage them. Seizures mess with the brain. Deal with GI issues, nutritional problems, digestive stuff and sleep problems. Better sleep equals better behavior for everyone in the house and not just your autistic child.
Give your child structure. I’ve talked before about how important visual schedules and routines are. Downtime causes problems, especially with severely autistic kids. Having some kind of schedule after school, on weekends, when support staff aren’t around makes a huge difference. Activities with breaks reduce anxiety and reduce incidents.
Figure out communication. I had a conversation with a BCBA recently about how lack of communication creates anxiety and stress. You don’t know what’s going on, so you freak out. Whatever way your child communicates, whether it’s an iPad with apps, signs, gestures, whatever, you’ve got to figure it out so they’re not blindsided by unexpected stuff. That’s why structure matters so much. When you can’t communicate well with them, having that structured routine day in and day out helps them know what’s coming.
Get respite care. You need rest. Your family needs rest. Regular trusted respite isn’t a luxury, it’s crucial. In Austin where we live, we started an R to R program (Respite to Residential) through our nonprofit John 13. You can check us out at J13.org. It’s been a game changer. The staff knows the kids. They can spend a night or two or three or a whole week, and mom and dad get to go on a date or take a vacation with the rest of the family.
Work as a team. Get your behavior analysts, neurologist, primary care doc, therapists, direct support staff, everybody lined up on the same plan. Make it a team sport.
The Bottom Line on These Claims
Let me just lay it out clear:
Vaccines do not cause autism. You can be skeptical all you want, but the science is solid. Using Tylenol when you need it, even during pregnancy, to bring down a high fever or control an infection is still the right move according to every medical body out there. There’s no real evidence that acetaminophen itself causes autism. Some associations exist, but most researchers think it’s the reason you’re taking it that matters, not the Tylenol.
Leucovorin might help a small group of kids with a specific folate issue. In our opinion, it’s fairly low risk. Why not give it a try? Or try folic acid supplements, which are cheaper. See if it helps with behavior when your kid is super stressed. It won’t cure autism and it won’t fix everything, but it might help you manage tough moments.
Finding Hope in the Small Stuff
I want to give you hope because that’s been the thing that’s kept us going. Our son is 35 now. His needs are profound, and they’re never going away. My wife is exhausted. She works 80, 90 hours a week between Michael and everything else. It’s natural to grab onto headlines and silver bullets, hoping for that one simple answer that fixes everything.
But we’ve been there. We’ve been there for 35 years. That magic fix isn’t coming, at least not overnight, and probably not without a massive body of science saying “yeah, this is legit.”
The real hope isn’t in some magic pill or big breakthrough. It’s in the little things. The small victories. A calm afternoon. A moment when Michael comes up and just gives you a hug without any words. That big smile when he’s happy. That’s huge.
Building a support system that gets your child, that finds their superpower and doesn’t judge, doesn’t try to change them but leans into what makes them incredible and uses that to give them more joy and fulfillment. That’s where the magic is.
You’re incredibly resilient. You’ll figure that out on this journey. Your child is too. This is a marathon, not a sprint. Take care of yourself. Give yourself credit for the progress you’ve made and the patience you’ve shown. Forgive yourself when you lose it because you will.
This whole thing is about profound, unconditional love. It reshapes your world and your kid’s world, and it’s a hope worth holding onto every single day.
Thanks for reading and besides taking care of your special needs child, be sure to take care of yourself.
Transcription:
Mike Carr (00:05):
This week I want to talk to you about the claims we’ve all heard tying autism to vaccines or to Tylenol. I also want to talk to you about Leucovorin as a treatment for autism. Now, if you’re a parent, especially of an adult with severe autism, it’s really hard to know what to believe. My wife and I have been on this journey since 1990 with our son, Michael, who does have severe autism, and we’re not doctors, but we stayed close to the research and to a community of clinicians and doctors and therapists and academics and other parents. So today, I thought it might be helpful if I share with you some of what we’ve learned. So first of all, you cannot catch autism. It is not contagious. It’s a neurodevelopment condition. It has to do with how your brain develops. It often begins before birth and continues on during early childhood.
(00:54):
But that single word autism, scary, right? But it covers a huge range of support needs. Think of the word cancer. The impact of cancer varies greatly depending upon the type of cancer you have and when you catch it. For example, I’ve had basal cell skin cancers removed for years. I know it’s ruined my Hollywood. Good luck. Not that I ever had any Hollywood good looks, but it’s really just more of an annoyance than anything else. I’ve got to go into my dermatologist every so often and have them scrape the basal cell off, and that’s pretty much it, not life altering. However, I had a relative who faced breast cancer, whole different ball game. She had surgery, chemo, radiation, and it was a devastating outcome in the long run for her and her family when she ultimately passed away, the type of cancer and how advanced or severe it was really mattered. And autism is similar. Many autistic people can speak, they can work, and they can live independently with only some support. Others, like our son need one OnOne supervision all day, every day, 365 days a year. Michael’s nonverbal. He has seizures, Pika behavior. Sometimes he can be aggressive. Public outings can be hard. Vacations are rare. My wife has had two full-time jobs for decades, really? So severe autism reshapes your life forever.
(02:20):
So let’s talk about vaccines and autism. Let’s start with vaccines. There have been studies for decades, 10, 20 years, that show vaccines do not cause autism. Leading institutions. Reiterate this every year. Earlier this week, there was an article in the MIT technology review where they went through all the data, and I’ll include a link in the show notes. So you can see that Johns Hopkins said that the most recent evidence rules out vaccines as a cause. So folks, it’s just not going to help to not vaccinate your kids if you’re worried about increasing the likelihood of them getting autism. There’s no data to support that. Zero. Okay? Now let’s talk about Tylenol and acetaminophen, which is that active ingredient, especially during pregnancy. Does acetaminophen increase the risk of autism if you’re a mom and you’re pregnant? So some studies do show a small association. Oh, however, if you’re a scientist, if you’re a researcher, the discussions around, well, was it really this Eden?
(03:22):
Was it really the taking of the Tylenol that caused the problem or was it why you were taking it? That probably increased the likelihood of having an autistic child. If you have a high fever mom and you let that high fever go on for a while and you’re pregnant, that can actually impact the health of your kiddo. That’s proven. That’s fact or an infection, or if you have some autoimmune condition. So the body of research is that if you have a high fever, every doctor, every clinician is still saying, get that fever down. And Tylenol is known to do that. You don’t take more than you need to. You don’t take it for too long, but you’re actually going to provide a much better environment for your infant in your womb by getting that fever down than any risk at increasing the likelihood of them getting autism.
(04:07):
So there’ve been other studies, and I’ll put these in the show notes. There’s a Swedish study where they didn’t show any causal effect. Medical bodies like A COG and SM fm continue to advise that you take acetaminophen. If you do have that fever or an infection during pregnancy, just use it under the advice of your doctor. We wouldn’t suggest you go out and we can’t give you medical advice. So none of this, please don’t view anything that I’m telling you is medical advice. We’re not doctors, we’re just speaking from our own experience. But bottom line, don’t suffer that fever. Don’t run the risk for your kid. Okay? Now, let’s talk about lorrin. Leucovorin is really folic acid or folic acid? Is it a treatment for autism? So here’s what the research shows. Pretty darn interesting. There’s a very small subset of kids. There are a few kids out there that have something called CFD, which stands for cerebral folate deficiency.
(04:57):
And that is a problem transporting folate into the brain. Your brain does need folate to operate properly. They exhibit autistic characteristics. When they don’t get enough folate in the brain, you don’t necessarily have autism. They just exhibit those characteristics. In those cases, if you do, if a physician does prescribe lorrin, you may see a big impact on their behavior and everything else, but there aren’t very many of those kiddos. So the evidence, the research overall shows that it doesn’t have a whole lot of impact on the vast majority of folks that are autistic. Now, what’s our personal experience? We haven’t tried. We have tried the active ingredient, which is folate acid or folic acid, and we’ve tried different varieties, and we’ve done this for years. It certainly doesn’t cure autism, but it has improved Michael’s behavior in certain situations, like when he’s really hyped up, when he’s really aggressive, when he’s stressed, when he has lots of anxiety and he just won’t go to bed if we give him some, sometimes, not always, but sometimes it really does calm him down, and there doesn’t seem to be much of a side effect.
(05:56):
So under the guidance of your doctor, again, I don’t think that’s a very high risk proposition to try folic acid or lorrin just to see if it does make an impact. Maybe not all the time, but when your kiddos are really having some problems with their behavior. So that’s been our own personal experience. But here’s, I think the key takeaway that we’ve learned. Again, 35 years of doing this, don’t focus on the silver bullet. We have tried. I can’t tell you how many silver bullets and magical therapies and this is, and they just don’t work. I’m not saying you shouldn’t research ’em. You shouldn’t be aware of them, but don’t get your hopes up. Instead, focus on what really matters day to day, especially if you have a child that’s been diagnosed as autistic. Number one, immediate intervention and therapy. The sooner you can get your child, especially if they’re like a year or two, two and a half years old into therapy, while that brain is still developing and you can impact that abnormal development and maybe refocus it or correct it, man, that’s where you can make the biggest difference.
(06:49):
And that’s where some of the research, and I think where a lot of the therapists and clinicians are most optimistic, catch it quick, get the kiddos right into therapy and help them down the road with perhaps a less severe form of autism as a result. Or maybe it almost totally goes away, right? Don’t know again, but that’s just what some people that we know have said. Another thing, number two, safety and health first. So if your kid has seizures, like our son does, manage the seizures, right? Seizures can cause all kinds of brain problems. Gi, nutritional, digestive issues and sleep issues. Try to get those managed too enough. Sleep makes a big difference. And just better behavior supports all the way around. Those make for better days for everybody, not just your son or daughter, but the whole family. And then provide structure. I had a podcast just in the last episode or two where I’ve talked about how important visual schedules are routines.
(07:35):
Downtime tends to cause problems, especially with this population, especially with our son, folks like him that are severely autistic. So having some kind of a schedule after school on the weekends when his colleague or others aren’t around can really make a difference. Activity with breaks reduce anxiety. They reduce incidents. Communications is huge. I did a podcast just the other day with an ABA mom, and she was talking about she was a BCBA and she was talking about how communications can be. The lack of communications can be the source of anxiety, stress. You don’t know what’s going on. So whatever way your child communicates, if they’re nonverbal, use an iPad and some of the apps I talked about on the other episode or signs or gestures, but you’ve got to figure out a way to communicate with them. So hopefully they’re not unaware of what’s about to happen.
(08:20):
They get all freaked out because something that’s unexpected all of a sudden occurs. That’s why structure is so important. You have trouble communicating with them, having that structured day in and day out. So there’s this routine that they can sort of get used to and aren’t those big surprises that maybe freak ’em out seems to be a good alternative as well. And then community and respite, you need rest, families need rest. Regular trusted respite is not a luxury. It’s really crucially important. In Austin, Texas, where we’re located, we started an R to R program, which stands for Respite to Residential through our nonprofit, John 13 or J13. You can go to j thirteen.org and check us out. It’s made a huge difference. The staff knows the kids. They can spend a night or two or three or a whole week, and mom and dad get to go out on a date.
(09:02):
They get to take a vacation maybe with the rest of the family. Game changer, big deal. And also have a team sport mindset. Bring everybody on their team together and work with them. Behavior analysts, neurologist, your primary care doc, your therapist, the direct support staff, everybody get ’em lined up on that same plan. So quick fact, check on the things that I’ve covered. Vaccines number one, do not cause autism. This is irrefutable. You can be skeptical, but the science just shows you vaccines do not cause autism. Using Tylenol when indicated, even if you’re pregnant, to reduce a high fever to control an infection or some autoimmune issue is probably a pretty good thing to do, right? There’s no evidence that says acetaminophen, the active ingredient in Tylenol is the cause of higher incidence of autism. There are some associations, but when you look at the data, many folks feel it’s the reason you’re taking it.
(09:54):
It’s that infection, that disease that’s causing a higher incidence of autism, not the Tylenol itself. And then let’s talk about lorrin. It may help a subset, and in our opinion, it’s fairly low risk. Again, check with your doctor. So why not give it a try? Or why not give an alternative that’s less expensive than lorrin, like just folic acid or supplement like that? Give it a try and see if it works for behavior control. It’s not going to cure autism. It will not treat everything about autism, but it might help you mitigate or manage behavior, especially when your kiddos super stressed out. So in conclusion, I think we want to try to give you guys hope. I think that’s been the biggest thing in our journey that’s been so important. Our kids, as I said, 35 years old, he has profound needs. Those needs are never going to go away, and it’s easy to feel exhausted, especially my wife who’s working 80, 90 hours a week between taking care of Michael and everything else that she’s got on her plate.
(10:43):
And it’s natural to grasp at headlines and those silver bullets hoping for that simple answer, right? It’ll fix everything. But man, we’ve been there. We’ve been there for 30 years, 35 years. I don’t think it’s going to happen, at least not overnight, and not with a body of scientists behind it saying, yeah, this probably is going to move the needle. So the journey of severe autism or complex special needs, even if we’re not talking about autism, here is a landscape of lots of crazy theories, lots of bogus claims, and every now and then a little glimmer, just a little glimmer of hope for a few folks that have autism or have other needs. But the real hope, the thing I think to really get excited about isn’t in a magic pill or that big breakthrough. It’s this optimism that we found just in the little incidents, the small victories, day to day, a calm afternoon, a moment of connection with your son without any words, it comes up and just gives you that hug, that big smile when he’s happy.
(11:34):
That is huge, right? And then you build that support system that understands him and finds his or her superpower and doesn’t, judge doesn’t try to change, but trying to lean into what makes them so incredible and leverage that to give them more joy and more fulfillment in their life. You are an incredibly resilient, and I think you’ll discover that on this journey. And your child is too, and it’s a marathon man. This is not a sprint. So what you have to do is take care of yourself, and you have to be aware of and give yourself kudos for the progress you’ve made, the patience you’ve shown, and forgive yourself when you’ve gotten a little stressed out. This is what it’s all about, profound, unconditional love. It’ll reshape your world, reshape your kid’s world, and it’s a hope worth holding onto every single day. Thanks for listening in and besides taking care of your special needs child, be sure and take care of yourself. Do see you. Until next week.
