To think my baby has autism?

[CanStopWillStop]

I've asked DH and DM but they've shut me down pretty quickly, need a second (third,fourth etc) opinion.

DD (11mths) has been reaching milestones as far as I knew, early crawler, early walker, sitting up etc.

However I got my 1 year check survey and was surprised by a few of the questions, namely: does your child respond to your voice/when you call their name.

DD hardly does either. She also doesn't make great eye contact like other babies. I go to play groups, so I see how other babies look me in eye, DD doesn't really do that often. DH and DM don't see other babies, so they don't really get what i mean.

I'm going to the doctors check up next week but I've been doing research an apparently 'answering to name' should be an early milestone (6-8months) and now I'm worried I missed the red flags and feeling pretty shit about it tbh as I know early intervention helps with autism.

Anyones LOs similar to mine? AIBU to think it's probably autism?

You wouldn't need to go through the NHS pathway to give your dd some extra attention/awareness. If you are aware of the symptoms of autism, you can just look out for them and adopt parenting strategies for raising autistic children, tailored to your dc needs, whether that's routine, more quiet, extra preparation for any changes, not forcing eye contact or cuddles/kisses if she doesn't like it ... I am sure it will reduce much stress for everyone. You could always take her to a private child psychiatrist for a private diagnosis once she is older. It shouldn't be much more than 300 pounds for 2 meetings and it helps to have years of detailed observations documented in advance, so you could start a diary where you write down every observation of a-typical behaviour, and also add health visitors observations. If you have a private diagnosis when she starts school/early primary school age, it should be enough for the Senco to take note and for the school to make reasonable accommodations of her needs, if there is something she needs at all. If you feel she needs more help, having a private diagnosis and years of documented behaviour will make it easier to get a NHS diagnosis. The NHS will only start the process via your GP if they information from nursery or school.

A friend whose child has a diagnosis said she knew very early because her baby didn’t automatically recognize different emotions in others voices or faces

No one else could see this but as a mother, she knew. This lead to her obtaining very early intervention for her child and that’s been instrumental. This is a happy, healthy child who just needed extra support and educational services.

Trust yourself and don’t worry about what others say.

OP my 7 year old son is autistic and I just knew something was wrong (really not sure that's the right word to use) from before he was one. He met all milestones but there was just something different about him. You do notice it if you attend parent and baby groups or are around other child of the same age.

For some buts lets not minimise the fact its a huge spectrum ,shall we?
For some people like my child its massivly disabling ,
Op elevan months 7s very young ,its something to consider ,my son was diagnosed with autism and learning disabillities at three and a half ,but i didnt reallly notice anything untill he wss around 18 months.

It is worth remembering that not all autistics can speak, feed themselves, wash or live independently. The “visible to the public” autistics are the tip of the iceberg.

Absolutely this. I remember going to an information night held locally for parents run by one of the early intervention services and my god some of the poor parents were under so much stress. Some of the stories were heartbreaking.

I started noticing things when my son was about 10/11 months. I didn’t think autism but knew something was going on. He was very advanced with gross motor skills. He never crawled but just got up one day and walked when he was 10 months, he wasn’t even wobbly. He then started jumping about a month later and spent the next few months jumping everywhere. The hv pointed out that he shouldn’t yet be able to jump with both feet off the ground. He was very “good”, rarely cried, ate everything that was put in front of him, never demanded our attention., he was content ALL the time. Everyone said how lucky we were 🙄 By 14 months I just knew. I don’t remember if he responded to his name or not but he never ever made eye contact. He started assessments at 18 months starting with a hearing test, then he saw a SALT and a consultant paediatrician. The wait between each appointment was hell! Lastly he attended an assessment centre for 11 weeks. He was observed by a team including EP, OT, SALT etc then we had A multi disciplinary meeting after the 11 weeks and he was diagnosed just before his 3rd birthday. He’s an adult now and has severe autism and severe learning disabilities.

thats very narrow minded. Its not all part of normal. My son has autism severe and requires 1:1 support at all times and at least 2:1 support to access the community. He can’t wash or dress himself. He is non verbal and has very little understanding. He regularly harms himself and has challenging behaviour and can be a danger to others. He developed grand mal epilepsy at puberty which is very common with autism. Watching him have seizures and the after affects is absolutely heartbreaking. It’s a lifelong profound disability for some. I’d give absolutely anything to make his life easier. You should know it’s a huge spectrum if indeed you do have autism in your family.

We had a very quick diagnosis too, with my son he was diagnosed a three and a half but he also has severe autism and learning disabillities ,hes 12 now and completley ,non verbal.

It's possible but imo it's just too early to tell.
It's never too early to identify areas to work on though!

My elder son was clearly (looking back) stereotypically autistic from birth. No eye contact, not interested in me, went rigid when I cuddled him, all sorts of stuff. Diagnosed at 2.5

my younger son couldn't have been more different. Eye contact, great snuggler, interactive...

he was DX at 3 after a classic 'regression'.

It is never the right thing to do to ignore concerns. i think there are always things that you will want to take a look at and areas that you realise you need to put extra effort in but I don't think you can get anywhere close to DX level with a 1 year old unless they have the most severe presentation.

If she's not making eye contact have you got her eyes tested? I've got a condition which makes eye contact difficult partly because I can't look ahead.

She speads and wiggles her toes and twirls her ankles at the same time. It's one if those things if I tried to move my feet like that it would be impossible.

Is she hyper mobile? Several of my children have orthotics to support their feet (it’s just a made to measure insole) and eases the tired need to stretch feeling a bit for them.

She rolled at 3.5 months and sat up without support at around 6.5 months but she was a late crawler (11 months) and does seem to be later with the motor skills, she's only attempting to pull up now at 11.5 months but hasn't quite got there yet, no crusing furniture yet and definitely nowhere near walking.

Is there anything else I should be looking out for re hyper mobility?

Lifting both feet up for a few seconds like a startle can be spasm which it doesn’t sound like she’s doing. It sounds more like enjoying the stretchy feeling. I would imagine at 11 months it will be hard to tell as teenies are so flexible anyway.

My older daughter didn’t answer to her name or give much eye contact as a baby. I don’t really remember much pointing until she was a toddler either. I am 95% certain she’s autistic and always found it strange she wouldn’t answer her name as a baby before I even suspected autism. I am autistic too and so is my brother.

I have a son now also and is very different. Lots of eye contact, pointing since about 12m (possibly earlier), follows my point and has always responded to his name. He also plays with toys properly which my daughter never really did.

My daughter failed all newborn hearing tests and suffered multiple ear infections in her younger years so every professional put her problems down to that! She's now being assessed for autism but she does have a severely autistic sibling so I can see her issues clearer than others

Definitely not unreasonable to question it and keep an eye out for signs.

But definitely get another hearing test- my DS could hear whispers but he also had quite severe hearing loss from glue ear. The consultant was shocked how bad it was.

I also had suspicions that DS1 was autistic when he was a toddler- struggled with eye contact, took no comfort from cuddles (used to go and sit in the corner to cry when he hurt himself and scream if we tried to hug him), very repetitive play and not good interaction with peers. But everyone assured me he was fine, just a bit quirky.

At 8 he was diagnosed with adhd and the doctor said he probably does have autism but the adhd is more dominant.

Hey @U2HasTheEdge how is your grandson now? I have similar concerns x

Hey OP @CanStopWillStop how is your baby now? Would love to hear from you x

@CanStopWillStop just tagging you incase you didn't see the above message please!! X

My sister's son had hearing problems so they put in tubes in his ears . she dropped a pan and he didn't even startle or cry so she had his hearing checked . Turns out he did have ASD but she said it was after his MMR vaccine. he walked early , sat crawled said mama tracked a toy ect... but here in the states they automatically do these assessments at 18 months and its basically a questinare

Give it a rest! This thread is from 2022 and you’ve messaged op 3 times over 3 days. She may not even be active at this point or log on all the time.

And I don’t think you’ll gain anything from the op reply thst you wouldnt get from starting your own thread if you have concerns. Whether the op child turned out to be autistic won’t mean that yours is or not even if the early behaviours are similar

Speak to the health visitor nobody on here can tell you if your baby is autistic and no reputable paediatrician would diagnose at such a young age and tbh there is no point in comparing your child to any other child even if they are diagnosed with autism ,as its such a broad spectrum.