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Age of diagnosis

At what was your child diagnosed as being on the spectrum?  

247 members have voted

  1. 1. At what was your child diagnosed as being on the spectrum?

    • 18 months
      0
    • 2 years
      11
    • 2.5 years
      15
    • 3 years
      18
    • 3.5 years
      11
    • 4 years
      10
    • 4.5 years
      16
    • 5 years
      25
    • 6 years
      12
    • Greater than 6 years
      129


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Dummie from MSE? I've followed your thread on there, nice to see you on here(nikki on mse).

 

Hello nikki (waving like mad). It's great to 'see' you here too. A 'familiar' face :thumbs:

 

Thank you for the link to this forum. The information here has been extremely helpful.

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well I was diagnosed aged 9.

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By the time my son was diagnosed, I discovered that we were unable to access help which I believe was critical - just finished nursery/about to start school (4.5 years). My son could have went to a summer type of camp for kids on the spectrum to prepare them for school - we didn't know of it's existence because no one told us, despite looking/asking lots of questions. The organisation that should have been involved were reluctant because they didn't see it ass their remit. Makes me mad. That saying 'can't teach an old dog new tricks', whilst isn't strictly true (kids can still learn a lot later on), but I'm of the belief that early intervention is invaluable in terms of teaching and support.

 

Caroline.

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my son thomas got diagnosed at the age of 10 years old december 2005 just before thomas's 11th birthday . thomas is middle to severe autisitc with speech and laungage delay and complex needs and poor cognitive skills , thomas is very immature for his age as well thomas is like a 6 to 7 year old.

 

 

thomas is at a special needs highschool now for children with moderate to severe special needs there is just 112 children in the school , thomas is having trouble settling.

 

thomas has been in special needs since june 2001 , when thomas got his 1st statement of special needs when he was just 6 years old i think was very late for a 1st statement of special needs . thomas has his statement of special needs reviewed every year.

 

when thomas was 6 years old he was almost non-verbal thomas hardly spoke. thomas showed signs that there was something wrong back when he was only a baby.. and it took almost 11 years for a diagnosis since his birth back in feb 1995..

 

thomas has had a hard life and he still continues to struddle we get no help or support even since thomas's diagnosis. we neen help with his behaviour we keep asking and we get no answers.

 

see you from kerry..

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Hi

 

Daniel was officially diagnosed with Aspergers syndrome - high anxiety levels on 12th July this year age 12.

 

He was also seen by a specialist when he was 4 years old but was then just told he was immature and that he would grow out of it and that was that, then it had take years to get this far (8 yrs on) !!

 

cheers Di :thumbs: xx

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El was 3 and a half, it was finally dx'd after a two year fight with HV, GP and other proffessionals. I was told he was just lazy, a typical boy, blah!

 

It was apparent there were problems,. El was super quick to do everything, hit all his milestones way too early, almost precociuos, then he reached 15/months and overnight reverted to a screaming, non communicative, unhappy child.

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Hi

 

My son was diagnosed at 5 1/2 years. He developed a stammer at the age of 3, hv referred him to speech and language and the same time the language and development dept of the local hospital.... His stammer stopped as quickly as it started (just as they predicted) however the hospital appointments cont every 6 months. At each appointment i was asked what kind of pregnancy i had, what he was like as a baby, when he reached certain milestones ect. By 4 1/2 the area senco went into his pre-school to observe and really kicked some a**!!

 

However i was let down by the system because his notes were not handed over to his new primary school and everything went back to square 1....arggghh. Finally 8 months after starting school the docotr finally mentioned a possibility of As, told me to go away and read up on it and come back 4 wks later. I mentioned to sons teacher we had a prognosis and her reply was ' its what i thought but could not say anything as i am not a dr, however i have been teaching him as though he did have it and the results in his work was of a better standard'.

 

Finally the app came and i had to admit that i thought he had it and she said he had.....well i broke down, but that took 2 years from a 1st innitial appointment with regular meetings to finally dx.

 

Personally i think that is bad, coz once i read up on it i realsied y the behaviour was there at nursery and had i known....well no point going on what ifs, but thats my story of how we 'finally' came to a dx.

 

Hope this helps with your reaserch/poll??

 

tmf

x

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My daughter was diagnosed with aspergers just before she turned 13 and bipolar at 13 and a half. but looking back there were signs of aspergers for a long time that nobody picked up on.

Loobylou2

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Had my concerns from birth as he just did not seem to react to anything was shooed away by doctors etc until he was 5 and me and his father split up and I moved him school, the senco was fantastic and helped me get a diagnosis he was in year 1 at the time so would have been...6

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I was diagnosed with AS when i was 23, about a year and a half ago, even though my mom had always known something was different with me. My youngest daughter is 3 in May and we are waiting for her dx, she was reffered to a paed and speech therapist when she was 18 months( i noticed before that but the hv just said nothing is wrong with her), and then about 6 months ago she went to see a different paed(who said its more than likely autism but wanted to check everything else first), and since seeing her its been going alot quicker, she has had an initial assessment( which they said she has significant speech and language delay, limited social interaction and other learning difficulties) and is now going to ongoing assessments which are once a week, she sees a pre school teacher who comes to the house to play with her, and is being reffered to an educational psychologist, and she has to see the paed again at the end of this month, so we should, fingers crossed, have a more defiante dx

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Diagnosed at 5 with HFA, but only after insisting he be assessed and refusing to accept anything else. We'd been seeing the paediatrician and specialist SLT for 2 years and looking back they KNEW he was on the spectrum. We recently discovered the SLT was an autism specialist (but weren't told any of this). We had concerns at 2 when he'd only just started walking and did not 'do' imaginative play. Speech was also odd -loads of vocab but he did not put the words together and lots of Gestalt speech. Things got worse when he entered preschool and problems were much more apparent with social communication. Looking back the HV also knew as she dismissed us by saying it was much too complicated for her to handle, so referred us to paed then refused to help in any way. Reception class was a nightmare and teaching staff were treating him like a naughty boy, refused to believe probable HFA (he's generally very passive), so we demanded a firm diagnosis. We now have a statement in place. Guess it's helped that I've worked with children on the spectrum and I'm also a teacher (secondary), so know the education system and how it works (or not).

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our daughter was finally dignosed at 10yrs after fighting for at least 9 yrs as we knew something was wrong.... she was seen by everyone from psychiatrists to psychologists and lots in between but no one picked up on it until a mum of an autistic child told me she thought that was the problem... it was only when I brought it up, that we started to get anywhere at all!!!!!

Now with my youngest daughter all the help in diagnosis is goign toward younger children so I can't access help for a second time!!! Luckily as she has mobility problems I have the physios onside who have seen her difficulties first hand!

 

Anne

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Tom is 5 and his paed seems to not have any interest in seeking a Dx.

 

I asked hv at 18 moths for a referral she did nothing! I asked GP at 23 moths - he sent us for hearing tests. We were told that Tom had glue ear - under anaesthetic the surgeon realised there was nothing wrong with his ears!! I put my baby through surgery for nothing! :angry:

 

We then had to go back to the gp for a referral to a cdc - we have been there for 3 years & haven't moved on as the paed doesn't believe in Dx before 8! We have an appointment in March where I will insist we see another Dr!!!

 

I Know Tom is on the spectrum. He has had an ADOs assesment and scored 17. If we had a Dx sooner we could have had more support without fighting for it!

 

Kel

 

xxx

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My little man was diagnosed at 2 and 9 months. TBH I have been very impressed with everyone I have encountered in our area (Wirral). The HV referred him at his 2 and 6 month check for a hearing test, speech therapy, physio and to the paed. His hearing teat came back fine, his speech therapy is progressing (although he has to have it from underneath a table as he hides!) his physio said he is double jointed hence the 'funny' walk and the paed dx him as Autistic after a 3 hour appt. We are now having a meeting with the paed, his nursery and speech therapist in the next 2 weeks for his IEP and he is being assessed next week. Big thumbs up to the Wirral NHS so far! x x x

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J was diagnosed at age almost 5yrs with PDA, (had diagnosis confirmed at age 7) - he was referred just under his 3rd birthday to CDC - confusing and complex behaviour was puzzling! and C has just been diagnosed at age 2yrs 10mths (he was referred at about 2yrs 4mths and assessment started in October last yr.

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My eldest ds was dx aged 3yrs, the process started when he was 2 1/2 yrs.

He went through the CDC, attended 2 hourly sessions alongside 2 other children for 10 weeks and was monitered and seen by various proffesionals, after a team meeting he got his dx.

whereas my other ds was diagnosed aged 3 1/2 yrs, but only ever saw the pead, his dx took 6 months but that was more to do with both me and pead waiting to see if it could have been copied behaviour.

 

We have a great pead though. He has also gone on to dx my neice aged 5yrs and my nephew aged 13 yrs, both only ever seeing pead too.

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I confess to being totally confused over it all, my son developed normally, was exceptionally able for his age at numbers and memory retention, and knew the basics of ABC via sign language too, he had the MMR and shut down in 14 - 17 days, we were told and still are he was born autistic and that's how it works, it doesn't manifest itself until about 3 or 4, I didn't believe that. Frankly I still don't. I love my son regardless, but I feel the MMR made a major contribution to what happened after, because there was no signs of anything, not even niggles, we were very happy at his development, you don't get autism in 2 weeks do you ? The sudden shut down is something I have never had explained to any satisfaction, the only thing different was the MMR, we watched our son shut down in days.... we were never told the truth it seems to me..

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I put above 6 for very obvious reasons.

 

Basically it's like this.

 

As a child was born deaf - and was also sickly as a baby and a young child. Had Pneumonia, Whooping Cough, collapsed lung as a baby - was also failure to thrive.

 

Had operation to correct/give hearing at age of 2.

 

Was diagnosed with "Clumsy Child Syndrome" at age of 5 or 6.

 

Still was quite a sickly child and also had hearing problems and operation until teenage years.

 

Some obvious signs of autism/asperger's were overlooked - it was just assumed it was down to not quite catching up due to being ill/off school, combined with hearing problems.

 

Having 3 brothers and their various friends to hang around with probably didn't help the way it looked socially.

 

Still at 11 went to a local private grammar school in Manchester (I'm from Stockport) on a Government Assisted Place.

 

Apparently there were problems and they sent for the Educational Psychologist - Ed psychologist did tests and intelligence was okay - apparently the reading test I went off the scale - so they put it at 17 (that was as high as it went) !! - Diagnosed with Dyspraxia and mild Dysgraphia at age 12.

 

Started using Laptop at school and for homework and got extra time in exams etc... got good set of GCSE's (9 A-C's) followed by good a-levels (4 b-c'S) - then went to university in Sheffield - didn't settle in either really on the course, but the bigger problem was living skills and socialising - spent half the time (weekends/holidays etc..) at home - moved back to Stockport after 1 year - went straight into the second year of a BA at Manchester Met Univ. Completed degree - then things started to fall apart - did postgrad certificate -

 

then work - and it's been 12 months here, 15 months there, 2 years here in jobs I don't like and often get really stressed about - leading to sleep problems, drinking a bit more than I should etc...

 

Things came to a head when I lost my last job, last September, 6 months after the sudden death of my father.

 

So, we got the ball rolling with the GP asking about a referral - my mother had thought for some time I showed signs of autism/Aspergers as had my aunt (her sister) in fact my aunt had suggested it years and years ago.

 

Got referred from GP to local psychiatric services - they referred me over to Sheffield Aspergers Service.

 

Where I was diagnosed as having Aspergers last Tuesday 18 March 2008 -

 

I am going to be 27 in July.

 

:)

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Our son was 2 when diagosed but we only went to the diagnostic centre because my wife had had some lectures concerning autism at university. The two of us are (still) undiagnosed although both of us are well over 6 ;) .

 

I've got my dx by now :lol:

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I started bugging my HV when Charlie was 13 months old ... normal thing, got labelled paranoid mother ... kept on and on and we finally got our first referral when Charlie was 2 years 10 months, straight away he was put on the spectrum, first assessment was at 3 years 1 month where he was labelled HFA and his next assessments start on 25th April for six weeks ...

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My son was not DX until he was 12 although when he was 6 I was told he had delays emotionally/socially but was given no support at all. I have had to fight all the way and always knew it was ASD, as I work with children with SEN including ASD.

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I was tentatively diagnosed around age 40, but I wouldn't accept any labels so it was all worked around by talking about it and not actually saying it directly.

 

It was about eighteen months ago that someone finally said it to me. It took me a year of all kinds of feelings and upset to come to terms with it but now I am at peace with it and everything has settle down.

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I knew something was wrong age 3 but only now age 8 have they finally admitted he has probs n he is currently being diagnosed. They have told me what he has but not had the 'official' diagnosis yet-back to see them next Monday.

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My Daughter was diagnosed with HFA at just over 4 years old, i think it helped that i had a really understanding HV who did the referal for me.

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Mine was at 16 years of age after 18 months of pestering the doctor.

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I confess to being totally confused over it all, my son developed normally, was exceptionally able for his age at numbers and memory retention, and knew the basics of ABC via sign language too, he had the MMR and shut down in 14 - 17 days, we were told and still are he was born autistic and that's how it works, it doesn't manifest itself until about 3 or 4, I didn't believe that. Frankly I still don't. I love my son regardless, but I feel the MMR made a major contribution to what happened after, because there was no signs of anything, not even niggles, we were very happy at his development, you don't get autism in 2 weeks do you ? The sudden shut down is something I have never had explained to any satisfaction, the only thing different was the MMR, we watched our son shut down in days.... we were never told the truth it seems to me..

 

i didnt have IBS until after the MMR as a booster shot at age 23.

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