DS is number obsessed

[MaeveMabel]

He’s 4 years old and we’re looking at a possible ASD assessment, but currently he’s not meeting criteria as his language is very advanced, he smiles, makes eye contact, meets his milestones etc.

But he gets these obsessions/fixations that last a few weeks and he can’t talk about anything else.
Currently it’s numbers. I don’t just mean counting, but he’s taught himself the square numbers through numberblocks and DP (his dad) has been telling him the square root numbers when he’s asked him (he’s a maths brain and I’m not).

Tonight he wrote out all the square numbers and square roots next to them.
The morning he wrote the 100 times table and wanted me to look up on my phone a number with ninety zeros.

His grandparents and dad just think he’s clever! They scoff at any mention of autism or neurodiversity.
I think they just see him as a child genius. But it’s driving me insane and everything is about numbers, surely that’s not right?!

He sounds very high functioning autism. Hardly a bad thing.. u would be u happy if he was really behind so just help him flourish and enjoy him

He sounds like my DS. He is on the Autism pathway. Absolutely obsessed with numbers to the point that they infiltrate everything else. He wrote a Mother’s Day card to number 3 instead of me. He knew his times tables forwards and backwards by three. He has other traits as well though. Did you go through your GP for a referral?

He sounds EXACTLY like my son at that age, he also used to go on about googleplexs, octillions and other really big numbers I’d neverer heard of before, he was diagnosed asd age 6, he’s now 12

@MrsALambert yes, GP.
The Health Visitor saw no issues either as he met all the milestones as needed.

Can I ask what your DS is like in other ways?

Mine sleeps in his own bed all night, no problems in going to school, no issues with food. The only thing he isn’t keen on is hand dryers and the hairdryer.
He seems like he may have slight dyspraxia as he struggles with things like co-ordination when on a bike or scooter and dressing himself is a struggle. He’d rather use his hands to eat than a fork or spoon. But he smiled early, he walked and talked early, no regression with language.

@Morph22010

May I ask what your DS is like now at age 12?

He’s now in asd specialist school and the autism is a lot more obvious. He’s still very good at maths but not so obsessive. He struggles with emotions and keeping calm. Things for us went really wrong in year one and he couldn’t manage a mainstream classroom but he didn’t move to specialist till year 4 so those 4 years were really tough. As he’s got older the autism has become more obvious as the dif between him and peers becomes more apparent

So he struggles a bit socially. Gets anxious about new situations. His hypersensitive to pain. Fussy with food. Self driven. Finds comprehension hard despite being a very able reader. Doesn’t like loud noises. Struggles to join in large groups. Likes to hang back and watch so he knows what is happening before getting involved. Very literal.
he is 6 now but he also smiled early. Speaking was on the slow side though.

These points are all exactly like my son at that age as well

I’d also agree with PP, the older he gets the more obvious it becomes. I’m a primary senco so I’ve had my suspicions since he was 18 months old. The rest of my family told me I was seeing things that weren’t there until he was about 4.5 and suddenly they all agree

My son didn't have any regression either, always slept well and in his own bed, did do eye contact but far from perfect. He was diagnosed at age 3 and a half. At age 4 he could name every flag in the world. He has gone through so so many special interests over the years.

Pursue an assessment as you dont know what support he will need in the future and a diagnosis does help to get support. It won't cause him any harm, none of this 'labelling' nonsense, if he has a learning issue why wouldn't you pursue a diagnosis? Undoubtedly there will be hurdles along the way, start the process to get a diagnosis. It can be a long process

This is my thread from 10 years ago

www.mumsnet.com/talk/gifted_and_talented/1703859-What-was-your-gifted-child-like-when-they-were-2-3-years-old

@Morph22010
can i ask what he went to a special school? No judgement, just wondering as I’ve worked in schools with children who are non verbal, extreme challenging behaviour, global development delay and so on. And they all seemed to manage in mainstream with one to one support.

The things you mention are examples of rote learning. The genius aspect would be applying the 'knowledge' to sums.

Not just ND kids who have obsessions at that age. It's the same as ND learning to memorise phonics and form letters from Alphablocks. Unless they can apply that knowledge to unfamiliar setting or print its decoding, rather than reading as such.

Look into other ND markers, motor skills, sensory processing, social understanding, waiting, taking a turn...

i think I’d he’s had an ehcp and support earlier on things might have been different but it took us till year 3 to get the ehcp after being turned down by la and by the time he got it I think things had gone too far. He was having complete meltdowns in class, shouting, throwing things etc. he was in a very large and noisy school which wasn’t particularly Sen friendly but I didn’t know any better at the time just sent him to the local school. His specialist school is for children of mainstream academic ability with asd that can’t manage in mainstream

My DS at age of 2 could count and recognise numbers up to 100 and was doing simple addition. I know he was that age as NICU doctor remarked about it, youngest son was in NICU at that time and ds was seeing him for first time.
At age of 4 he was obsessed with flags and countries.
He has never been diagnosed as ASD but he is definitely on spectrum, DH is and my dd was diagnosed last year as having ASD. She as never been interested in numbers but could read at age of 3.

I had two number obsessed sons one diagnosed ASD at 2 and a half and the other profoundly gifted but not ASD. For ASD ds much like everything else it would be a craze that eventually waned and he moved on to something else. In secondary school he was unbeatable at the mental maths challenges most likely because when he was small he used to enjoy playing beat the calculator. He now likes F1 and football statistics so still numbers but he does enjoy the sport that the numbers pertain to.
My other ds just loves numbers and always has. He was working out his timetables when most children were learning to count In Primary he produced so much work that he exhausted all the resources the school held so they enlisted help from secondary school. He won the whole school Maths challenge in y7 of secondary. An adult now he works in financial systems so satisfies his number thing and is very successful.

Advanced language wouldn't mean he doesn't have ASD, advanced language, advanced reading, advanced with numbers, advanced at remembering details of things he's obsessed with could all be signs of ASD. I'd guess what they actually mean when they say advanced language is actually advanced vocabulary (always use that phrase in diagnosis if that is correct).Regressive speech and not meeting milestones could indicate classic autism but aren't relevant for Aspergers (which ds was diagnosed with). But now of course everyone's lumped into ASD and no doubt higher functioning kids will be even more likely to be passed over....bastards.

Please don't rely on a HV to have any idea, especially if they're suggesting that if he doesn't have speech regression and missed milestones that is can't be ASD. Good eye contact means nothing, ds has good eye contact - he still does at 17 unless he is made to feel very anxious and uncomfortable and then you see it drop away.

I wish only people who are very experienced at looking at individuals with ASD - because they are all very individual would make decisions about whether they have ASD or not. We were lucky and didn't have to go through CAMHS and saw someone who specialised in ASD and diagnosed ds in 30 minutes (he was 11 and I wrote pages and pages). What imbecile would say oh he's 4 and working out the square roots of numbers - nah not meeting the criteria sorry - it makes me so mad. As he gets a little older look out for him explaining jokes to you, that's fairly common - but don't believe that he won;t get sarcasm, ds is a right sarky one!

Unfortunately sometimes you have to be saying the right things for them to diagnose him. It sounds like all he talks about are numbers obsessively right now - you need to make that clear. That's a language issue right there - no other child is going to want to talk/hear about numbers all the time are they? Does he talk at you? ie he isn't aware that you're not really interested or he doesn't care that you're not interested because he just wants to talk about numbers (you might have to test this one because as parents you might always have shown an interest). Does he carry on talking if you look the other way, only ever say hhmmm, try to change the subject etc - this may not be so obvious at 4 but may become more obvious as he gets older.

Being obsessed with one thing to the exclusion of pretty much everything else - that's typical ASD. Sensory issues such as not liking the dryer, that could be an ASD thing. The coordination issues could well be dyspraxia - DS has a diagnosis of both.

He sounds a lot like my DS - not diagnosed till nearly secondary age, never any issues raised with school till a teacher went on a course and jsut had an inkling (she was doubting herself though), very clever, no social issues till Yr6 - still not sociable (but happily so) and just got mostly 9's in his GCSE's.

My dd was ‘different’ at 3 but it didn’t kick in properly until much later.

like you I was brushed off as everything that came with her (undiagnosed) ASD was a positive thing like an incredible vocabulary and reading level until she reached 10 and the hormones kicked in, the transition to secondary started and all of a sudden it was a HUGE problem. I won’t go into scaremongering details but her ‘symptoms’ were suddenly much more obvious and I was finally believed. She’s at high school now, has support in place and is just waiting for it all to be official.

she too has obsessions, they can last weeks or months and it’s all she can think or talk about. The newest is Dr Who and I’m completely over it already 😅

Good luck and make yourself be heard, don’t be brushed off. Get the ball rolling as early as possible because it’s a long wait to get anywhere!

OP, your DS sounds a lot like mine. He loved numbers and maths from a very early age - shape sorter was his favourite toy aged 9 months. Announced his intention to study maths at uni aged 7, and went ahead and did so. Multiple obsessions over the years, mostly relating to trains or other mechanical themes. He still loves trains and works as a software engineer. Don't be in too much of a hurry to get him assessed or label him. If he's happy, just run with it.

Very similar to my older son. He was talking in sentences by 2 and reading at 3 - self taught via YouTube.

He had ASD and is in mainstream. School can be tricky at times but academically he’s fine. He has trouble socially though so keep an eye out.

Has obviously. Not had.

Hi op. My son (7) is currently on the pathway to a possible/probably autism diagnosis. Like your ds, my son met milestones early: early smiles, early speech, very bright, good eating and sleeping. He has obsessions too, and where he seems to meet the criteria for autism, is his emotional regulation, social interaction etc. Many children with high functioning autism will also have no challenges with the areas you and I have both mentioned (smiling/eating/sleeping etc). It's a spectrum and every individual is just that: an individual with individual traits etc.

Both my DC have gone through obsessive phases around 3/4

DS1 could tell you everything about any type of train (including how the engines worked)

DS2 (just turned 3) knows the names of seemingly all the dinosaurs including random ones like troodons or paraceralophus (sp?) and some of their habitats.

I was really into the ancient Egyptians at the same age.

Sometimes I wonder if DS1 and I are NT (we both have sensory issues) but if we are not it's not held us back in life.

Thanks for all replies.

I’m not sure if he’s learning by rote or he is actually working things out. He sees the pattern of numbers really well. When he wrote out the 100 times table this morning, I started it off and eventually he saw the pattern and carried on to 100x20.

He can also read and again, has seemingly taught himself. He watched Alphablocks a lot as a toddler and he can sound out from watching that. We read to him a lot as a baby / toddler too and every night nowadays he asks for three story books.
He can sight read a lot of words.

Another thing he does is listen in to our conversations. Sometimes I think he’s not listening as he seems distracted watching TV or playing/writing or drawing and me and DP will be discussing something and he’ll say “who are you talking about?” Or mention the person or place we are discussing and start probing for more.

He could be a maths prodigy, a good candidate for gchq