DS1 (age 7) was diagnosed in January. I just this week got the report through from his neurodevelopmental assessment. Reading the recommendations for him, it made me come on here for something and a couple of threads made me think. One was asking what signs ASD children had at about age 3, the other (about DLA) talked about how the gap between their child with ASD and a NT child of the same age increased as the child gets older.
Going through my son's assessment, reflecting on what made me realise we needed to have answers/get him assessed, a year ago when his struggles, in year 2, and the gap between him and his NT peers, were becoming much more starkly apparent... well, he has changed a lot. At 3, at school nursery, they raised concerns early on, which I see now were gigantic red ASD flags but at the time I put down to his age (newly 3) and his lack of experience in a childcare setting. I didn't pursue anything then even though behaviourally he was very hard work, and his grandmother (who has an older gransdon with ASD and was an experienced childminder) was vocally concerned. But - whatever his issues, it never seemed severe enough... ha. Oh well, hindsight and all.
In reception and year 1, though he didn't progress academically in the way his intelligence would indicate, he stayed below the radar so far as his teachers were concerned; his behaviour was probably on the edge of "normal". And for a variety of reasons - not least the fact his dad and I were splitting up and divorcing - we didn't pursue our own concerns for him.
By year 2, he was off the edge of the "passing as normal enough" scale at school, socially, and he was still nowhere near doing as well as they expected him to academically, and hence we sought a referral with the 100% support of his teachers.
He's now halfway through year 3, and in some ways doing pretty well; he's in intervention groups for maths and literacy, where he's thriving because he isn't as "lost" as in the main class.
But I am after experiences - how has your child changed over the years? What's harder? Is anything easier? What have you tried, in order to support them/yourself? What worked? A year ago my son didn't have (or I didn't perceive it) an area of special interest/obsession; now his whole life is centred round Minecraft and YouTube. He didn't really have any repetitive mannerism/noises (he was generally active/fidgetty), now he does (occasional hand flapping, almost constant noises with his mouth, finger pulling). But he can be much more reasonable, and he's definitely much more open and affectionate with me (though about the same in terms of other people - lack of eye contact, won't talk unless it's about his special interest in which case he'll bang on till the cows come home, a sense that he just has nothing other than that to say and no idea what it's all about anyway).
Thanks, I appreciate anyone's input - I know I can't possible have an idea what to expect when he's 9, 11, a teenager - which is scary actually but there you go. :)
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Child with ASD and how things change
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MrsMartinRohde · 29/03/2017 13:14
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