kie

Good luck with getting someone to read your diary - not trying to be negative, but I kept a diary of my son's behaviour for over a year and even though CAMHS have documented the fact that I have kept a diary no one will actually look at it!

Having a formal diagnosis may be helpful should you encounter problems in the future - as he goes through different stages he may find things more difficult, and help will probably be easier to get if you have a diagnosis

My 9 year old son was diagnosed with Mixed Developmental Disorder just before Christmas. The psychaiatrist said that he 'clearly has aspects of mild (grrrr I hate the word mild - doesn't feel mild when he melts down or gets violent ) Autism and Dyspraxic traits' but that he doesn't feel that he has a diagnosis of an Autistic Spectrum Disorder. So now I'm a little confused... On a previous appointment he said that our son was just on the cut off point for where they would diagnose him with Aspergers, and he repeated this at the next appoinment - but then when we were sent the report if states that he has a Mixed Developmental Disorder - I've never heard of this and can't find anything if i Google it either - could anyone point me in the right direction to find some more information on this? Maybe I'm being cynical, but I'm beginning to wonder if its a sort of 'catch all' diagnosis for those who don't quite tick all the right boxes for Aspergers and AHAD etc... Has anyone else been recieved a diagnosis of this?

My son at the moment seems to be really hung up on 'wanting to be perfect'. He keeps going on about how he wishes he could 'start life all over again' - he'd rather be a baby than who he is now because he says that everything about him is wrong. If I try to get him to tell me what he percieves to be wrong he'll just either get angry with me (often because he can't explain what he feels) or start crying and saying that 'I'm just all wrong, all of me is wrong, and there's nothing that anyone can do to help, I just need to start my life all over again'. I've found quite a few lists that he's written (hidden away in various places) all saying that he wishes he was perfect, that everybody liked him, that he didn't get bullied, that he didn't do things wrong etc. He also gets very upset if he does anything wrong regarding his younger silblings and either shouts or crys that he wants to be 'a perfect big brother'. Basically, I'm quite concerned about this - I don't think that this is the way he should be feeling at only 9 years old. He's told me that he rarely feels happy for more than a few seconds, and he does seem very miserable most of the time. I've made CAMHS aware of this and they said that they will do a questionairre with him to see if he will tell them how he is feeling, which is something at least, but even they are aware to some extent that he is very good at saying what he thinks people want to hear rather than how he really feels (which was very frustrating when he saw the Psychiatrist, and in my mind is possibly partly why he has no definite diagnosis as yet) Has anyone else gone through this? And have you any advice as to how I can help him feel better? I try praising him everytime I catch him doing anything I can praise him for, but typically (as with most people) he always remembers the negative stuff, and I can't just ignore bad behaviour in the intrests of boosting his self esteem (can I?)

My son has picked at the skin on his thumbs until it turned into a large bleeding crack, has no nails as he's chewed them all off, has chewed on the inside of his mouth and his tongue until he given himself multiple ulcers (he usually looks like hes chewing gum) and has eaten the cuffs off his school jumpers hoping that one has stopped because I've just bought him two new jumpers for the start of term!! He's also a nose picker - or rather a 'dipper' as he just seems to like to dip his finger into his nostrils and then straight into his mouth - if you catch him doing it he will strenously deny it!!

Thanks for the replies You've all given me some things to think about. This forum is great and I'm glad I finally took the plunge and posted! Just wondering if any of you were told that your child/yourself had development difficulties or delays and/or showed 'mild autistic traits' and then went on to get a diagnosis of ASD/AS/HFA etc?

Hi ? I?ve been lurking reading stuff on the forums for about a year now, but have never posted before, so thought now was the time to say hello and to ask for a bit of advice? I have concerns about my 9 year old son, who has just undergone an assessment with a psychiatrist at CAMHS ? while he acknowledges that my son, ?despite being bright, finds some aspects of social interaction difficult, feels that he is different from his peer group, becomes easily frustrated, finds change difficult, likes routines, is somewhat literal and finds interactive play difficult?, the outcome of the assessment was that he has ?some relatively mild developmental difficulties?, and that he ?displays very mild autistic attributes that are at the moment not significant from a diagnostic point of view?. My problem is that I feel they haven?t taken a lot of his behaviours and more importantly what seems to be causing his behaviours into account. For example ? they seem to be under the impression that his frustration and aggression at home (yes ? typically he is one of those kids that behave perfectly at school ? all they have noted there have been anxieties) are all caused by him being told ?no? to things he wants ? while a lot of the time, things like his younger siblings looking at him when he is already a little wound up (and to be honest he seems wound up at least 60% of the time anyway ) will result in tantrums (ranging from just shouting and crying to punching, biting, kicking or throwing stair gates, glass bottles, skateboards or anything heavy he can get his hands on at people and walls etc). He finds it difficult to follow more than one instruction at a time, will scream ?mum, mum mum!? or whatever, when angry or worked up for over an hour, and if he doesn?t understand what he has been told, or can?t explain something to you he becomes very frustrated. Not being able to do things like tie his shoelaces, or understand certain turns of phrase that his 4 year old sister can understand make him frustrated to. And when he gets frustrated he gets down and/or angry. In the past he has self harmed (mainly by smacking his head into walls) and attempted to run away from home, and also on a couple of occasions threatened to commit suicide ? but I don?t know how seriously to take this (although I did make CAMHS aware of this at the time ? they did nothing ). He can become obsessed with the fear that he may wet himself or become desperate to use the toilet, to the point where it affects where we can go, and has given us some problems getting him to school, as he has been known to become totally hysterical over this. He also doesn?t seem to realise that a lot of the things that he says to people are rude, is useless at picking up on tones of voice (always thinks your shouting when your not) not good at moderating his own, doesn?t show an awful lot of empathy (e.g. he tried to smack me in the face last summer with a hard back book ? his book mark fell out and he then expected sympathy from me because he?d lost the page he was on!) only gets jokes that follow a certain formula, doesn?t really get sarcasm etc. I could go on, but I?ve written far too much as it is! Its so difficult to get an accurate picture of him across as there is so much that seems to be going on (I found this when I tried writing all the relevant details down for CAHMS) One last thing that doesn?t really seem to tie in with ASD, (which I suspect) is that he seems to have more difficulties in the summer and winter (during summer he is incredibly irritable and prone to violence although to be fair there has been less violence this year, but loads and loads of irritability, while during the winter he is again irritable but more tearful) Sorry this is so long ? just wanted some advice as to what I do now ? he is due to be reviewed again by the psychiatrist in December, and will be seeing a CAMHS worker again in September. Also wondered if anyone else has these seasonal issues? Thanks to anyone who actually managed to read all of this!