How did you know if your autistic child had LD?

[NameIsBryceQuinlan]

There have been lots of threads lately about autism, seems to be a lot of parents on MN.

Those of you who have an autistic child with a learning difficult or development delay - when did this become clear?

My son is nearly 4 diagnosed autistic at 2. It's so hard to know what he understands, he seems to mostly not know what we are saying but then he is very effective on his ipad, he can navigate really well and do quite clever things.

When will we know if there's more to his autism? Sorry if I'm not phrasing that right, hopefully you understand what I'm asking.

Hard to say. At 4 my son was non verbal and just happily lining up crayons, so at that point he was described as having a developmental delay .
By 8 he was verbal, although not easy to understand. By 12 he was extremely chatty, and in many ways quite able (for his special school) He learned to read and write but of course compared to his actual peers was very behind...classed has having moderate learning disability.

Now he's 25. He has no exam passes, and he needs help with many aspects of daily life (can't make his own food, can't shave himself couldn't travel independently..will always live with us) BUT he has had a job in the local supermarket since he was 19, and he can hold a very sensible comversation on some topics! His profile is very spikey... he understands things DIFFERENTLY.. we can watch a film and at the end I realise he completely misunderstood most of it! BUT he is also very functional at some things, and more to the point, even at 25 he is still gaining skills and understanding.
It's a never ending journey.
I also work in Special Ed with children who have autism, and you can never predict how much they will change. Some don't. What you see at 5, is what you will see at 15, but most surprise us! When my son was little I thought he understood next to nothing... when he learned to talk we realised he had been taking a LOT in...!

My personal view (so purely my thoughts) is that Autism IS a learning disability because it sways how our children learn... it's never quite the standard journey, and even able people with autism often struggle with some things, however they can also be amazing!

Interesting question.
I think for a lot of autistic people, performance depends on environment.
My son was badly behind in school and appeared more noticeably "autistic" in his behaviour because he was so overwhelmed.
After a year of Home Ed you wouldn't notice much difference between him and a neurotypical child.
But, in order to maintain that level of functioning we have to severely limit the level of demand we place on him.
For example: He can only do one organised activity per day. And he does educational tasks for short bursts, interspersed with unstructured "quiet time" to decompress.

Thank you for such a thoughtful reply. It's really helpful hearing from others.

I find the lack of control or understanding how the future could look so difficult.

Today all day my son has tipped marbles between containers and selected his favourite movie scenes on repeat

Lining up crayons (then blunt ended pencils... we weren't allowed to USE them) was my DS2's thing.
And his obsession with Shania Twain started aged 2. It hasn't waned yet He couldn't talk, couldn't even walk, but he'd press his face against the TV and watch her sing 'Man I feel like a Woman' on repeat.

I finally managed to take him to see her live 4 years ago and I thought he was going to combust with excitement!! Hang in there....

Oh that's amazing!! What a great story.

I was told when DS was 4 that he would be severe. We had an ed psych assessment when he was 8 that said no LD but he would need residential care as teen.
He's now 18 and at a special school but has achieved a gcse. He has no LD and is working towards independence. He didn't need residential care and will be able to work and live independently with some support.

Basically it was a case of waiting and seeing how he grew and developed.

My son was diagnosed with global developmental delay at 3 (before ASD, ADHD) so I kind of gathered he had a learning disability.

Was diagnosed correctly with a moderate learning disability at the age of ten as he had to have a IQ test for one of his assessments.

So much waiting... Am I the only one who finds that so difficult?

Forgot to add it's not all doom and gloom since being in a specialist school (been there 4 months) his reading has shot up from 7 years to about 10 years.

They are very clever kids just struggle with mainstream circulumn.

Almost a year on and I’m there worrying 😞