Several of those 8 signs you listed are also very common with children who are ADHD, and also children with Sensory Processing Disorder. My 10yr old son had a lot of those, he does not have ADHD, but has SPD and suffers from a TBI and was born with a birth defect.
LVDHURK
Posts: 3083
9/21/09 12:05 P
I didn't read all the replies thoroughly, but i don't think i see that any of you mentioned having your son's hearing checked. Also have his eyes checked as well.
I have a boy who is 6.5 years and we have or he has gone through tonnes. It has and will continue to be a long road. I have 4 children and they all have some sort of difficulty either speaking, reading, comprehending....i think we all have something that needs attention. It just happens that autism or the spectrum has a label.
I think we mothers read a lot and want everything for our children. Not that dads don't, it is just that we are more aggressive.
I have gone to many seminars about communication and behaviour management regarding children (I am NOT an expert by any means), but if any of this gives anyone ideas than it was worth the time to share. Communication delays are very common in children especially younger children with older sibblings. It is my experience that girls are very verbose and don't let their younger brothers get a word in edge wise...my guy is third out of four with one older sister who does not shut up. (I love her to pieces, but my second child, a boy was delayed speaking and now has pronunciation problems, but he is as smart as a whip). he didn't start speaking until he was 2 and at that time he had maybe a handful of words. when he was three he had as many words as he should have for 20months.....so the developmental guidelines are not for every child. It is for this reason that my autistic son was always put on the wait and see list by docs. they were not too quick to give diagnosis where we live and he is globally developmentally delayed and at the age of 6.5 years he is about 2 years.
I believe he will catch up and i believe there is a smart boy trapped in there. Sorry i digress.
We don't do speech, ABA, IBI or any type of therapy with him. the therapists always come back and say he won't listen and can't do much. So we paid tonnes of money and didn't see any results. This lead us to work with him on our own and work on his confidence. My little man has the greatest sense of humour. He recognizes things that are funny even when they are subtle. Well, when he was little we played people games to work on his eye contact and socialization. People games are those that don't involve a lot of toys. Games that are fun and are centred around what you child's interests are. We would work on taking turns and asking (no words, but words if they have them). One of the games we did was a snack game. I would always try to include the other children where i could. I would sit them in a circle and put a snack in the container. we would go around the circle and pass the container. Each child had to give it back to me and then they could take out a piece of apple or a piece of special yummy crackers (whatever motivated the game to go on). then the child would take it and close the container and pass it on. Seems too simple, but he learned eye contact because he had to look at me to give me the container and it was fun because we were eating yummy stuff.
Then we played games with music....simple ones. My son loves music. i would turn the music on and sit on the floor. He would run or walk around me. I would try to grab him to tickle him. I would either do this with him or the other kids. I would get up and chase him if he didn't want to go around me. But the key is that i wouldn't be involved unless he was looking at me. so if he stopped i would put my head down and he would come over and pull my head up and i would look into his beautiful eyes.
We never forced eye contact by grabbing his head, we would just put ourselves in the position to look at his eyes. we were always down at his level and never made him look up. Hard on the knees and back, but as long as it was fun we played the games.
There are soooo many more games we played. We played in front of a mirror. we would take a toy he liked and we had a mirror bolted to our wall at floor level. We would sit with our son between our legs and play in front of the mirror. Sometimes it is less stressful to see the eyes from the mirror than looking directly at someone.
We played games with the other kids sitting on the floor, legs apart and just rolling a ball. If you get the children to say a word before they catch the ball, then the child's brain is working twice as hard....and they can say any sound, any word, just as long as it is one and when they are catching...or at first when they are throwing.
I have a lot more games and ideas, but i won't make you read all this. My point is that there is a lot you CAN do on your own. You are the best person to work with your son. You love him and you know EVERYTHING about what he likes and doesn't like. you can use your other children to help you out as well. Copying is so much fun...instead of Simon says use Mommy says and just say mommy says each time, no tricks and keep it simple.
For noise, it is very common for kids to not like loud noises, we have never had that problem, my son is undersensitive and we have a problem with not recognizing pain or sense of touch. We do work with him at home using his senses. We do touch, taste, and smell games (hearing games - we do with music, all types especially classical and music with no words...very calming). I have so many ideas with all this if you are interested.
And to combine all this together we stay away from STRESS. A child who is stressed is not going to learn and grow. I believe this to be true. I don't know if they are any studies about this, but logical tells us how we behave and function when we are stressed.
Lastly, you can get your child evaluated but in the end no matter what the label is, you are going to be the one working with him. We waited so long for a diagnose and thought help was on its way.....nope didn't happen. All those years we wasted waiting for help and guidance.
I don't know what country you live in, but here in Ontario, if you have a diagnosis other than severe autism, you won't get much help. PDD-NOS is the diagnosis we received and we were told with that we get nothing. He was informally diagnosed 6 months earlier, by the same doc with severe and she just kept seeing him until she could justify PDD-NOS.
If you have any questions please feel free to write here or IM.
My post is not intended to offend anyone. I am sorry, i saw this post and i was in a hurry and have not had time to reread this. I tend to be matter of fact and i apologize in advance if my post is just that.
My Best Girl Friend's Ticker....my best friend is my husband.
AMIRA-HARB
Posts: 238
9/6/09 2:18 A
I know that u don't outgrow autism but my ped said that DS might only be having autistic traits and not autism in that case we might teach him how to outgrow these weird behavor of him. such as spinning wheels and following pattern on the flour. What I'm trying to say is that some kids can be taught to stop ""stimming". as he could be engaging in stimming and spinning coz his still not communicate with us and as soon as he learns to express himself better he'll behave like normal kids.
Mommy to 2 adorable kids
****AMIRA***
CANDAMOMMY
Posts: 17347
9/5/09 2:19 P
There is such a wide spectrum of Autism that some people have some traits and not all. That comes the diagnosis of PDD-NOS and not classic Autism, which is what my son is diagnosed with. You don't grow out of Autism or the Autism spectrum, you go through therapy and learn how to do things functionally. If you have that many red flags, I would take them to a different doctor to get checked again and get as many services as you can as Early intervention is very important.
CANDAMOMMY
Posts: 17347
4/5/09 8:31 A
Just checking to see if you have had him evaluated yet?
My DS has Autism and we are still messing around with insurance claims. We are now getting bills from his neurologist last July because the insurance hasn't paid for it. Makes me so angry.
LARKLYNN
Posts: 9
2/11/09 1:04 P
I would check your state and make sure of the laws in effect regarding insurance and autism. I know there is some problems getting services paid for is certain states like the one I live in with the diagnosis of autism.
JAKE_ADAMSMOMMY
Posts: 6931
1/29/09 8:55 P
It definitely sounds like enough red flags to get him checked out - if he is autistic, early intervention can do wonderful things, and the sooner a child is evaluated, the sooner they can access therapies, etc.
Some of those things can be attributed to toddler behaviour but when you put them together, they are a bit more concerning - I would definitely look more into it. Feel free to MM me if I can help at all
*Diane*
Mommy to
Abbigail -my chatty monkey
Adam, my mischievious monkey
Jacob, my autistic snuggle monkey
ALLIHURLEY BabyPoints:474
Posts: 13
1/26/09 5:08 P
I sure would love for that to be the case, and I'm not ruling it out entirely just yet. However, he does have an awful lot of symptoms of autism. 1. Responsiveness-He oes not respond when spoken to or if his name is called. We thought at first he had a hearing problem, but testintg indicated normal hearing. 2. Self stimulation-He gags himself to induce vomiting 3. Repetitive motions-He likes spinning tires, ect. 4. Sensitivity to sound-He often covers his ears like noise is hurting them, even when things are at a normal decibel. 5. Pain desensitivity- I am pro spanking, and it doesn't seem to work for him, like he doesn't even feel it. Sometimes he even giggles at me whenever I spank. (Obviously, I am working on a new method of discipline with him.) 6. Lack of eye contact-He'll barely ever hold a gaze for long. 7. Self-seclusion-He rarely plays with his sister or other children. 8. Hyperactivity-My boy doesn't stop moving!
With all those symptoms, it's kinda hard to think it's NOT autism. However, like I said in my OP, I don't know if that could just be normal behavior for a 2 and a half year old boy or not.
Do have Seth evaluated. Around here, the wait to see a developmental pediatrician can be very long - 12 - 18 months. The sooner you find out the whole story of why he is delayed, the sooner Seth can get the right treatment for his needs.
Sometimes the frustration that comes with a speech delay can make a kid do strange things. Only a professional can make the call.
LOVE24
Posts: 468
1/17/09 8:09 A
Hello- my son who is 3 has PDD-NOS which is on the autism spectrum. Besides the speech delay, what other things is your son doing (or not doing) that concern you? Usually if a child is on the autism spectrum certain things would stand out that would not be the case with just a delay. For example, lack of appropriate play with toys or odd play with toys, lack of sharing attention/pointing, possible self stimulatory behaviors like hand flapping and other body movements, toe walking, etc. Of course there is a huge spectrum of symptoms and some may be very mild where a child might just look a little "quirky" for lack of a better word.
The benefit to having a diagnosis of autism could possibly be better services or services uniquely designed to meet your child's needs (like ABA). Kids with autism can make really good progress with a variety of interventions.
If it is autism you need to know now so that your son can have every benefit from early intervention. Your insurance should cover a visit to a developmental pediatrician or another highly qualified professional that can make a diagnosis.
Please feel free to MM me for more info and I hope this helps!!!
The Voice of Truth tells me a different story and The Voice of Truth says do not be afraid...
ALLIHURLEY BabyPoints:474
Posts: 13
1/16/09 2:53 P
Autism? I have a two and a half year old son, who doesn't really talk yet. He can say little words: mommy, daddy, num-num, ect. But has yet to string together words at all. He was evaluated by Early Steps program and found to be cognitively and speech delayed, but would not give a "diagnosis" to his condition. I have a friend whose son is autistic, and after researching the markers for the condition, I found my son to have met the criteria for most of them. So, I guess my question is, could he just be a little behind? Have any of you had experience with your children just being behind in their development (and seemingly to have the symptoms of Autism) but actually not have the condition? Is there any benefit or pitfalls to having the condition diagnosed rather than just labeling him "delayed"? Any and all advice would be most welcome. TIA!
BabyFit, BabyPoints, BabyPages and other marks are trademarks of SparkPeople, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
BABYFIT is a registered trademark of SparkPeople, Inc. in the United States, European Union, Canada, and Australia. All rights reserved.
