DS2 is 2 and a half. He has been referred to OT and speech therapy for assessment and now been to both. The OT said that what really stood out in the forms I filled out and what she saw in his assessment is sensory problems.
He rocks against things with his back and head and twiddles his hair until its full of knots, scratches objects and licks things/people and she says that is him seeking stimulation. I feel bad as I have been telling him off for the licking - pretty gross to lick the dog, right? He also flaps his hands in an odd way - he keeps his arms down and swivels his wrists with his fingers extended.
He knows letters and numbers very well and is obsessed with them and books - he will spend ages looking through a grown up book with no pictures so he can look at the letters and feel the paper as he flips through it, he knows the whole alphabet song but sometimes chants "WXY and Z" by itself over and over and always seeks out the W X and Z letters in his foam bath shapes etc like they're his favourite ones.
DS2 is fearless, I keep him in the buggy more than I'd like because he fights so hard to run free even on reins and will throw himself face down on tarmac or try to lunge into the road and I have DS1 who is only 3 and a half to keep safe too. He doesn't worry about losing me or DH in a shop and will just run and run whereas DS1 would get alarmed if he can't see us in similar circumstances.
Sometimes noises upset him. I took the lads to a livestock show as some of the friendlier animals were tied up at posts to be stroked by children but we had to leave as the cows mooing sent DS2 hysterical, people were looking round in alarm to see the "hurt" child. He was also hysterical when he came in with me to fetch DS1 from playschool and the children were dancing to music on a fairly quiet CD boombox. Yet he doesn't mind the neighbour's parties or our music at home? Maybe because it's on home turf? In fact he loves some songs and has been singing tunes before he could talk? OT recommends ear defenders when out and about in noisy places.
The OT said on an arousal scale, low arousal is Eeyore, high arousal is Tigger and Pooh is a happy medium and while we all go between them most people stick at Pooh for most of the time but people like DS2 flip between Tigger and Eeyore and find it hard to stay at Pooh.
No one will say "autism" to me, but its all I can think of. Speech delay + sensory stuff = autism or something similar, right? I'm going to have to ring his playschool he starts in September, right? I feel so weird. I hated filling out forms about him like I was grassing him up or listing all his "defects" or something, I know its silly.