Fragster

I have found the post - thank you both again. It did help a little, although I always thought L speech was delayed but he was talking at age 2 but was under observation until he was 3 and a half I think. He never did actually have a SALT involved early on. I suppose it doesn't really matter as long as he gets the support he needs, they could call it anything x

Thank you x

Hi all, L recieved his dx in feb at a mam, when the minutes came through I didn't really pay that much attention to what she had dx him with as she had said that she felt he fit with a dx of Aspergers syndrome and did everyone agree, to which everyone said yes. However, since then I have paid attention and she has diagnosed him with Aspergers AND high functioning autism. Now my understanding when I read this what they are so similar that there is still disagreement between healthcare proffesionals as to if they are different and if they are which dx fits which individual. So the "consultant paediatric physcologist" had put them both down. My step mum however is adamant that there is a great difference between the two and that he has two dx for two different sets of issues which may in places overlap. Please could anybody give me their thoughts on this and if anyone else has or knows someone with these two dx together. Thanks x

I have found this topic extremely interesting particularly as there are things people have mentioned that I had never thought of before. DS was only diagnosed in Feb and the catalyst to me admitting that L was not NT was when his year 2 teacher told us that he had self harmed at school because he was worried that he had been naughty at play time. With hindsight there was a lot that really should have clued me in earlier....especially when a colleague who has a son with autism was describing things his ds did and I was going on L does this too..he kept saying to me yes but not the same way as a nt boy and I said yes exactly the same as you have described L used to rock and hit his head or scratch at himself and bite himself a lot as a toddler He has cyclic obsessions the first of which was thomas and he also ussed to "play" by lining them all up and could tell you exactly who was who just from the face, he could recognise numbers from 14 months without fail because of his obsession. L has no understanding of personal space and never gives any, he also can not give eye contact very well, especially if he is upset or frustrated. He is very sensitive to noise and smells. He would often be in his own world and was a late talker although we were lead to believe that this was because he had glue ear and although he could hear even very low volume noises he wouldnt hear it as a clear sound but a noise. Incidentally it was a swooshing noise that got him sent to ENT and revealed the glue ear not him in any other way not seeming to be able to hear. Even before the grommits he could hear the smallest of noises! I would say another experience that should have shouted it from the roof tops and also which still makes me angry was an incident at the pre-school. A little boy had been hurt but when he told the teacher who it was they said it couldnt have been him he wasnt near you L is was it him - the little boy (2 and a half) said yes. When L was questioned he said no - when I came to get him from the cm's she said that he had only stopped crying and banging his head 15 mins before I arrived and had been crying since about 2 - this meant he had been crying for over 3 hours. I confronted the play school who told me that ever since his "fav teacher left in april L has been unresponsive or reactive to all efforts by teachers even in a 1:1 situation, he just didnt want to be friendly and was a loner who sat in the book corner on his own or played with the trains. They knew that it was L who hit the child in question becuase he was nearhim when he cried and because he wouldnt look them in the eye when they were talking to him about hitting children." she then went on to say that I just have to come to terms with the fact that he wasn't as intellegent as I thought (he had regressed in development since starting the pre-school so I was always asking what he was doing) was a loner and a naughty spiteful child", needless to say he wasnt in school that day and he never went back. As a pre-school based in a primary school with an autism unit you would have thought that someone would have thought about all the signs (as there were others not related to that incident). The primary school luckily is absolutely excellent and as it was our local school and he was there anyway we have really landed on our feet with help and support Reading through L also suffered with reflux and intolerances. My brother who is 10 (dx with aspergers at 7) didn't though. x edited as I put the wrong word

I just wanted to add that my DS is in yr1 and the not achieving his full near his full potential. After 3 years of having issues with him trying, I discovered quite by accident that the reason was because "if you can do something good then teachers point you out saying well done or showing other children, I dont want people to look or know". DS does require a lot of positive reinforcement and absolutely adores be praised and told he is doing well, but not when this brings attention in from other people. I spoke to his teacher about it and we have been able to push him forward in some areas like reading because the praise is hidden in a going up a level or spellings the teachers dont talk about the marks, but we are struggling with his mind set about the class work.

Thank you for the warm welcome and replying so quickly. We have not had a connors report done. What is one of these? We have completed an SDQ and so did his teachers. The pead appt consisted of asking us a lot of q's about DS1 now and what he was like growing up. She had him do hopping accross the room, copy some basic shapes that she had drawn, she also observed him playing and had a talk with him. When we originally spoke to the SENCO she was really good, but since then has really taken a back seat and she never sees my son now. She told us she has placed him on the SEN register, but she never appears to do any work with him. Initally I had some confusion over the SALT report and asked if she could ring me to talk to me about it - that was 3 weeks ago and I still haven't heard anything grrrr..... This all started after he self harmed at school because he had lost control and couldn't calm down. So other than the SDQ, SALT, the pead and school reports nothing else has been done with him. I was under the impression that they would be discussing whether or not to give him a formal diagnosis at the MAM but after speaking to my step mum I am not so sure now. She seems to think that we will be faced with more appointments first. The school have been quite good though, his new teacher initally said that she had not really seen any traits in him that made him stand out when he first started her class, but he had a bad day with his making noises to himself and other bits and she said she understood more now. Since that day she has worked quite hard with him, understanding that verbal instructions seem to take a lot longer for him to process and long lists of instructions get lost, so where possible they are writing it down for him now. He has been doing a lot better academically since they have started to understand him a bit better. In fact she now talks about him as if he already had a formal diagnosis When we first started the journey I naively wanted to try and get as much help as possible for him without giving him a "label", but the more this goes on the more I realise that actually it will be having this that gains access to the help for him. ADHD hasnt been discussed with us before, but the more that I have read about this the more I do believe that this could be possible; it is so hard to know what is what - how do you all manage to keep things straight in your mind? I am really scared by the mam and dont know what to ecpect, what happens at these meetings? Thank you ever so much Steph

Good Afternoon, I am new to all this and feel very much in limbo and unsure about what is going on for us and our son who is 7. We spoke to his school and then the school SENCO about our sons quirky behaviour and how some things he seems to just not get. This was Oct 08. Since then we have seen a child development pead who has told us from her meeting with him and the answers we gave to her qs she believes that he has aspergers, like my half brother, she said that she would not diagnose offically herslef until he has had a multi agency meeting. This is scheduled for Feb 8th. DS1 was also referred to a SALT to assess his communication and language skills. In the meantime she advised us to look at the NAS website at help and advise to support DS1 while all this went on. I have been led to believe that a great deal of weight be placed on the outcome of her report, so I am slightly worried what this means for him. The SALT report noted some of the things we answered such as litteral take on sayings and not really understanding jokes. The SALT did a n inference test on DS1 which involved a picture of a burgularly which she said DS1 scored correctly for his age, the only areas that she herself mentioned as an issue were that he is behind on his Linguistic concepts understanding, that he looked at small details before seeing a large picture meaning that his verbal descriptions dont make sense and the fact that he could not stay on task. Do you feel that this latest report doesn't support a diagnosis of an ASD or actually point away from one? Also Leon has issues with body language and understanding concepts such as personal space and appropriate conversation which is not inmproving in fact I believe this is actually getting worse. I thought things such as this would be covered by SALT as well, for non verbal communication etc, but it was never touched on or discussed. Your thoughts and opinions would be very much appreciated. Many Thanks Steph