Almost 2 year old showing some signs of autism..

[silverpetals]

I'm wondering if I'm being a bit ott or whether my concerns are valid.

I'm really stuck with what to do from here to be honest as my local health visitor is pretty useless and the gp said he's not concerned yet.

However, I'm just worried that something doesn't feel right with my little ones development. Lots of things I've read indicate that he could be showing signs of autism but other things suggest that he isn't.

If you have experience of this I'd be really grateful to know if you were aware of this at such a young age and how you went about getting help. Everything I've read about suggests that early intervention is key but I'm not sure if some of the things he does is just standard toddler behaviour along with a slight speech delay or if he is showing signs and how I can go about getting him the support he needs if the gp isn't concerned yet.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Would help if you listed some one the signs you have seen??

Saying only approximately 15 words. Each time it's very promoted by us, he never just says the words.

Often in a complete bubble when he's playing to the point I'm repeating his name over and over and he won't look at me. I have even tried making a very loud noise to get his attention and often still nothing.

Extremely hyper and still bouncing off the walls after a couple of hours of outdoor exercise, never calm unless sitting down watching tv and even then he's jumping all over the furniture.

At classes of similar aged children he's the only one who never takes instruction from the class leaders. Always running off and doing his own thing. His behaviour really stands out compared to the other children.

Hitting his head on the high chair (occasionally)

Is obsessed with opening and closing the lounge door constantly whenever we're at home. Or if we go out the door and leave it open he has to close it.

He does however always make eye contact and smiles directly at us and strangers all the time.

Prompted*

Have you had his hearing checked? Hearing difficulties can also cause language delay.

Your child sounds a lot like my 2 year old and I don’t have and have never had worries about autism. I think there’s a readon they wait until 7 to make any kind of diagnoses

Your description of his issues sound a lot like he may have difficulty in hearing too.

I was going to say getting hearing checked too.

Thanks for the reply, yes we are in the process of getting his hearing checked. Waiting for the referral to come through as I had lots of problems with my ears as a young child. However I really don't think it is his hearing because he's very selective with it. When we have his attention you can whisper something to him and he'll repeat back some baby babble whispering himself.

It's very selective. It comes across as he's very engrossed in play and 9 times out of 10 we can't get his attention at all.

I had no idea these were signs of autism.....I thought all these were just normal 2 year old stuff! X

That's reassuring a couple of you think it's normal 2 year old stuff. He's my first so I have nothing to compare his behaviour against and a few of the "you have your hands full" comments were starting to make me worried.

It's when he's around lots of other 2 year olds his behaviour is noticeably different.

He also does a lot of tip toe walking indoors but he always stops it when we go out.

Sounds pretty normal to me OP but I'm not an expert. Have you looked at this link? Might help to reassure you? www.nhs.uk/conditions/autism/symptoms/

My nearly 2yo is obsessed with closing doors too and always shuts the doors before we go out.

He also hits his head on things - as in he will do it accidently (usually walking backwards) and tjen will repeat it a couple of times. My mum is a senior HV and says it's completely normal - it's a new "sensation" so he's figuring it out (I.e. if I walk backwards into this thing, my head hits this thing, I feel it on my head). Just working out sequencing.

I will be the first to admit I am not an expert, but none of that sounds like autism to me, just boisterous 2yo-ness.

It's really hard to know, because the range of what's 'normal' is huge. I was reassured at just 2 or turning 2 that ds's speech was acceptable, like yours I think he had 15 or so (maybe less) words. I too was worried sick as I seemed to be surrounded by 18m-2.5 year olds having full blown conversations. It turns out that DS did in fact have a language delay and many speech issues, that became apparent later and were diagnosed at 3. I know it's normal to worry, and usually it's nothing to worry about, but at the same time I think a mothers intuition should never be ignored.

I'm no expert, but the behaviour you've described doesn't seem alarming. I know too many 2 year olds like that, but again, if you're worried, you need to contact the HV and get the ball rolling

*assured

Some of what you describe sounds like DS2 who does have suspected ASD (they’ll get round to assessing him one day) and certainly has some sort of SN. And DS2 does also make good eye contact. Of course that doesn’t necessarily mean your lad’s got the same thing as mine, there can be smoke without fire so to speak.

I’m surprised your HV hasn’t picked up on it, after one visit for 2 1/2 check my HV suddenly got us a lot of referrals for hearing check, OT, speech therapy, etc and DS2 is now under the Child Development team.

Hi - how has he been scoring on the HV assessments?
My son was diagnosed with global developmental delay at 2 and ASD at 3 (contrary to previous poster saying diagnosis doesn’t happen until 7).
I knew from a very young age that ds was different. He was a very very unhappy baby and was consistently late in meeting all his milestones. His method of play was different to peers. Lots of lining up and repetitive behaviours. Significant speech delay, echolalia and difficulty in pronouncing sounds. He went through an obsession with switching lights on and off and is very distracted by lights, automatic closing/opening doors. He has no real sense of danger and if he sees pigeons will run after them even if that means running into the road. He is obsessed with letters and numbers.
He does however show empathy and makes eye contact (on his terms!), smiles and cuddles (again on his terms).

My DS1 at 24 months did the following:

Toe-walking
Lining things up in rows, cars, crayons
Rarely responded to being called
Little eye contact
Poor sleep

We were referred to a paediatrician who wanted to reassess him in 6 months, saying he had 'concerns'.

FFW to 19 years. He's completely 'normal', not great at friendships but otherwise doesn't demonstrate any spectrum behaviours!

And I think he’s AMAZING!

Oh yes, and echolalia.

My almost two year old is obsessed with doors too. He also doesn’t have that many words but shows he understands a lot more; can go get things he is asked for, points at body parts. When I queried his speech with the health visitor that was something she asked. Is that something your son does?

I had similar concerns with my dd. She is 28 months and behind with speech and very selective when following instructions. I still don't know but I got the ball rolling early as there are some red flags and I know help is a lengthy process. Have you tried doing the online questionnaire ? I can't remember the name of it but it's about 20ish questions. I would try not to worry too much and please don't spend hours looking up symptoms as it made me Ill.

Ok so. My 2 year old is autistic. At around 12 months old he severely regressed from saying around 10/15 words to absolutley nothing. He spends the day stacking toys and spinning things. He walks on his tiptoes. Very clumsy. He cannot feed himself. He still can only drink from a baby bottle. He doesn't understand commands. He flaps and jumps a lot. He has very repetitive behavior. Very clingy. He is very difficult to settle when hes upset. He's aggressive and bites and punches a lot. Likes to hurt himself and bangs his head a lot. Puts his fingers in his ears and gets distressed at loud noises.
Just so you can get an idea of the things to look out for

Oh and hates to be cuddled etc