aspergers under 3 years

[star]

my son is being assessed as the preschool is concerned and they mentioned eye contact, being very active and not sharing toys very well.

 

just wondered what you noticed about your AS children at a young age. did they like routine/not like new places? did they play imaginatively? what was there eye contact like? were they aggressive at all or have bad tantrums?

 

thanks for any thoughts? i know all are different but it would help me to learn any common traits.

 

thank you.

Edited October 26, 2005 by star

[denise2]

Our son stood out as different from a very early age, he knew his alphabet from 18 months, was reading at 2 and slept for only a short time. He was constantly on the go and loved playing on the computer at 3. However the playgroup, HV etc all thought we were teaching him to be like that and his behaviour was bad because we spoiled him and always let him win. Even in reception another parent came out with the comment that after helping in the classroom they were all convinced he was a spoilt only child as he cried during games. He eventually got his diagnosis just after his 9th birthday and things changed for him over night. Initially I was very angry at what we had put up with over the years but we decided to put our energy in the future and the past behind us. We were told by the paediatrician that not many children are diagnosed before the age of 9 as it is very difficult to recognise. I don't know if this is true but at our social group the children with autism were diagnosed quite young but the ones with AS were not diagnosed until they were 8 or 9.

 

There are a wide range of behaviours on the autistic spectruma dn each person has their own personality to go with them, so you may see some behaviours and not others.

 

Good Luck with the future, it sounds like your son is at a good pre-school and hopefully they will pick up anything early.

 

Denise 2

[Klou]

Hi

 

My boy is four and in the assessment process. It is being suggested to us that they probably won't say AS. We have had one admittance that he has autistic tendencies.

 

He is regarded as too young. I have known there is something different about him even as a baby. My feelings about this came and went but each time have come back stronger.

 

Play has been the biggest thing for us. Several people remarked that he played for ages compared to other children with train set or cars/garage with great concentration. The thing is it hasn't moved on from that. His attention/interest in other things is low.

 

The social side of his play isn't really developing. Although he can act out a story (usually invented by me) he does the same one over and over.

 

The other thing is routine. We have had many stressful holidays, bedtime has to be the same everynight so those special times like christmas etc when everyone expects us to let the routine slip we just can't. If we do we regret it!

 

I agree it is difficult to know what is and isn't normal three year old behaviour but I wish the professionals would listen to the parents more about there instinct that something is not right.

[nightingales]

Hello Star,

We had no suspicions that there was anything 'wrong' at an early age, but a family friend who first saw him when he was two and a half immediately asked if we'd considered having him tested for autism. She was going mostly on his lack of eye contact and general 'style'. We dismissed the idea at the time, thinking that she was unfairly contrasting his rather reserved, professorial, pedantic manner with the exuberantly friendly style of her own two boys.

 

C at this age hated Playgroup, finding it hard to settle in and hard to leave (hated change). He couldn't bear the scratchy crinkly feel of the painting aprons, or the squelchiness of finger paint or playdough. He never played with the other children, though he would sometimes chat to the adults. He would fiercely resist being part of 'circle time' or doing things when other children did. he wasn't aggressive, just upset and immovable in his dislikes (still is!).

 

Does any of that help? As you say, they're all different, and I'm sure more people will be along in a minute with other experiences.

All the best,

L.

[nightingales]

Hello Star,

 

Forgot to say, at age 4 he had a new playgroup leader who has since told me that she knew he was autistic from the first day she met him (maybe she should have told us, but she was generally brilliant with him, so I'll forgive her).

Edited October 26, 2005 by nightingales

[Lynden]

My son is only 2 and a bit but we've already been told that he is most likely autistic with additional learning difficulties and we're going in for a weeks full assessment at the end of November.

 

Logan has always had global developmental delay - at 2 he still doesn't walk yet, has no speech at all etc. He shows fairly obvious autistic traits though, no speech, no gesturing, poor eye contact, rocking/flapping/spinning, playing with toys repetitively and for ages and showing no interest in other toys etc, poor social skills...the list goes on!

 

He's not at playgroup etc yet, but will start developmental nursery when he's three. He is at toddler group, but it took him around 4-5 months of going for him to get used to it and now he's familiar there he'll potter around with toys etc but still has his moments of clingieness. He doesn't like unfamiliar situations or new faces much. He's not got rigid routines as such appart from bedtime - thats pretty strict, although we generally follow the same pattern to our days as its easier for him.

 

Lynne x

[big mamma]

Hello Star,

 

My daughter was diagnosed last year at aged 2 1/2 as having an Autistic spectrum disorder. She fits the definition of Aspergers Syndrome but I think they prefer to be more general with their diagnosis when they are young becuase they can and do change a lot !

 

I always thought she was different but it only really became noticeable at probably around the 15 month mark when she developed various obssessions and rituals and still couldn't sleep throught the night ( and unfortunately still can't !! )

[LizK]

We've not got a diagnosis yet though likely to be ASD. Not sure whether my son (4) will technically fit the AS criteria as he has a 1 year speech delay (see threaad about 100s years for more chat on this) but he appears to be at the milder/higher functioning end of the autistic spectrum.

 

First thing we noticed was that his development slowed down after he was 3mths and he became irritable. Never had richness of eye contact. His speech development was slow, didn't babble until 12mths, 22mths before first word and his speech development has been disordered. He coud recognise half the alphabet when he was 2.5yrs but could barely put a 2 word sentence together. His other main issue was social anxiety and crippling shyness in new situations or with new people. it is only recently at nursery that he has started to play more with the other children and make friends. Very noisy loud places (like a new soft play centre) would scare the wits out of him. Recently his social anxiety has improved but has been replaced by social overfamiliarity and inappropriateness

 

His imaginative play is poor comapred to his peers. He's recently started doing some symbolic play that he models on things, he will join in some basic imaginative games with other children but can't initiate it on his own. He developed a door obsession when he was 10mths and still loves all things mechanical and door related, he's jsut swapped cupboard doors for electronic shop doors or opening and closing the CD player. He has a few other obsessions but these can change. He gets into fixed routines easily but is surprisingly easy to get out of. He strops for 10 minutes and then moves on. He's not really a tantrummy child mainly cos he can be fairly laid back and flaky! Many of my friends with NT children have had far worse times with tantrums. He's not overtly aggressive either though when he gets overexcitable or overfamiliar he can be very physical and often ends up hurting someone

 

HTH

 

 

Liz

[hollymg]

Our son was followed after age 1 for speech (or lack of LOL). I *knew* he was at least close to the autie spectrum all along (no eye contact or cooing as a baby was an early sign to me) but he wasn't tested until age 4 and then the official red flag that got them to do the evaluation was his continued obsessions (started at 9 months) with electricity and appliances. They said he had them fooled for those early years because he made good eye contact and was "connected" (some of the things they watched for in our evaluations was how he asked for help, pointed out things to me, etc).

[kirstie]

It just shows you how different they all are.

My son has relativley good eye contact, and a good sense of humour (although can be very literal too) and he has a dx of Aspergers.

When he started nursery i had been trying desperatley in vain to tell my Health visitor and anyone else who would listen that he was 'different' but i got the "It's just his age dear," followed by a condescending smile! It wasn't untill he did go to Nursery that they rather tentativley came to me and asked would i mind if they referred Lewis to the community paed! Mind??! I could've kissed them! He was showing signs of poor interaction with his peers and having the most horrendous temper tantrums where he'd lash out or he would have to be first in line to leave and get out the gate. He would lie on the floor and watch the motion of the car/trains wheels endlessley, and would never entertain the arts and crafts area. Altogether a challenging and complex little boy, but thanks to the staff there we were on to a diagnosis pretty quickly and from there all of the relevant supports were put into place.

Good luck, i hope this was helpful to you!

Take care,

love Kirstie.

[sarahjane]

Hi, H is now 7 with as diagnosed last year. At 3 I thought he was different from other children but did not think there was anything wrong, now having a second child who is now3 I can see he was very different. I never noticed any prblems with eye conact then. He had excellent language and the vocabularly of an adult and seemed v intelligent. He was obsessed with thunderbirds and could tell you every little detail about them, he only really set his toys up but not play with them. He was very difficult in retrospect if anything changed, we moved at that time and he found that v hard, and if we suddenly deceided to go out, even if it was where he likes he would get upset.

We put him in a playgroup in france when he was 3 put he was so panicky they thought he was having an asthma attack, so took him out after 2 days. He then started nursery at 4 and we did not know there was a problem until the end of the year when they suggested he was not ready for school as he had basically played superheroes on his own for the last year but not joined in at all. Then from school we went forward to get diagnosis. it can be hard at the time to know what is normal and what is not.

[Noetic]

I was diagnosed as an adult.

 

I do not know precisely when these things happened, but they were pre-kindergarten, i.e. I must have been 4 at the latest:

 

- Was delayed in walking

- Parroted words and phrases early (echolalia?), with unusual pronounciation BUT

- Did not use complex language (more than 2 or 3 word phrases) until kindergarten

- Constantly swapped words over when talking (even in 3 word phrases)

- Tip-toe walked

- Hummed and sang to myself constantly

- Showed distress when change happened, reacted with distress to noises

- Was 'gravitationally insecure'

- Taught myself to read and write when I was 3 or 4 (before Kindergarten, which I started aged 4)

 

Yet guess what? My parents are to this day adamant that 'there is nothing wrong with you'

 

(There isn't anything wrong with me, but that doesn't mean they have to deny that I was always different, right?)

Edited October 27, 2005 by Noetic

[smallworld]

Kirstie,

Your story is almost identical to mine !

In the end i gave up trying to convince our HV all was not well, and ended up thinking 'just wait till he starts nursery !!' it only took a week before I was asked by the headmistress what action was in place !!!!!

Four months later we had a dx of moderate autism.

We lost at least 18 months of possible early intervention....

 

wac

[mum22boys]

Hi Star,

 

My husband has been saying since our son M was two he has autistic traits. He hates change of routine or anything new. He makes eye contact with us but as i am looking at him more now (he is now 5) I realise his eye contact with strangers is poor. His speech and language therapist mentioned this last week. He had obsessions since two and obviously still has. He doesn't mix well and when i used to take him to toddler groups etc he would sit at my side and scream if I moved. My health visitor said obsessions were normal and his poor short term memory she had never come across such a thing.

My other son R is two and we are concerned. He has times when he lacks eye contact. I have to be in constant view of him even indoors or he screams. He has little routines he has to do. Needless to say the healthvisitor is listening this time

[CarerQuie]

In our area,no-one is diagnosed with AS until they are 7.They can be diagnosed with autism from an earlier age.I have a friend whose daughter has autism and they think her 6yo has AS but won't assess until he is 7.xx

[Klou]

Can I ask where you are CarerQuie?

 

I have a feeling we are up against this in my area. We are on the Surrey/Hants border. I am certain ds would fit in the category AS active but odd. But I feel like I am banging my head against a brick wall. The letter from the consultant paed this morning indicating that I should liase with my HV because not all MDA cases warrant a consultant appointment has got me fuming.

 

I really feel no one is listening. I am fed up with everyone saying he is normal/fine with them and other children are just the same.

 

I just don't know what I am going to do about it. Any ideas? Nursery are still backing me up saying he is different and agree that he has an 'extreme version of life'. When I read that in Jacqui Jackson's book Multicoloured Mayhem I thought that's him!

[littlenemo]

our experience with Com was almost identical to Nightingale's, including the laughing off the idea of autism when his grandad suggested it at about 3, for very much the same reasons.

he was unusual but his differences were mostly things we were proud of, like his obvious command of language and number.

 

there is a problem with diagnosing AS early in that the first signs are things that can be considered personality traits rather than difficulties and most AS kids mask the problems until around 5 years but it takes a while from first spotting that they are not coping to confirming AS as the reason.

 

the better your child is at developing their own coping strategies the longer it takes to see the cracks appear and this usually happens when their peers move up a level in their social development and they find they can't adapt.

 

the average age for diagnosis across the country for AS is 7-9 years but some kids find that they can cope for even longer and that it isn't till they meet the complexities of high school (with it's pretty hostile social environment) that they have obvious difficulties so many are still being diagnosed in their teens.

 

Zemanski

[elaine1]

my son was about 12 months when i thought all was not well, but i was a nursery nurse and knew what to look for, he would make a bee line for the same toy at playgroup everytime and wouldnt play with ahything else.

Hie eye contact was really bad and he wouldnt aknowledge my mom at all, he wouldnt even look at her and to this day has never sat on her lap.

 

also, he would walk round the edge of the room at story time he hated sitting with the other children.