To think this is just mums being competitive rather than a real issue?

[Username24680]

We (2 year old and I) attended a new playgroup this week. I usually work that day so haven’t been to that one before. In a neighbouring town so lots of mums and kids that we hadn’t met before.

Got chatting to a group of mums with toddlers roughly the same age. Maybe about 30 mins into the group they started questioning DSs speech. He’s definitely “advanced” (if that’s even a thing!) at speech compared to most others his age that we know. He is able to hold a fairly good conversation, speaks in sentences and his words are really quite clear (most other adults that we’ve come into contact with can have a conversation with him - it’s not just a case of “mum understands what he means”).

I’ve never really thought anything of it - kids all do things at their own pace 🤷🏻‍♀️ Talking just seems to be his ‘thing’ 🤷🏻‍♀️

The other mums were questioning if he’s being assessed for autism 🙄🙄 apparently they’d been told (no idea who by!) that “advanced” speech is usually a sign of “something being not quite right” (their words, not mine!).

Is this a thing?! It would never cross my mind to question someone else (especially someone I’d just met!) over their child’s abilities to be honest so I’m torn between it being a genuine concern or it being cliquey mums being a bit bitchy as their children weren’t talking as much!

EVERYTHING is a sign of autism nowadays.

I have an ASD nearly 3yo (officially diagnosed) who is non verbal and honestly my 21mo DD coughs and people are like ‘have you had her assessed? I read coughing can be a sign’

My best advice…no one thing alone is a sign. The indicators for ASD are multiple things at the same time. Good the ‘early signs of ASD’ list and see if others match your son. I did this with mine and almost everything on the list matched.

if one thing matches I wouldn’t worry at all

*google

You can huff and puff and roll your eyes if it makes you feel better 🤷🏻‍♀️. The apology is nevertheless appreciated. Sorry to hear you had a bad experience with your nursery.

Oh gosh, I didn’t expect this many replies! Haven’t had the chance to check back today. I’ll read all your replies soon 😊 thank you!

Thank you all so much for your replies. I didn’t really think anything of their questions at the time to be honest - other than that they were pretty rude! But it obviously bothered me more than I thought when it was on my mind during the night.
I doubt it’s a playgroup that we’ll be back to any time soon 😅 our usual ones in our town are lovely 😊

I’m not going to reply to everyone individually but your replies have been very reassuring 😊 it sounds like lots of you have far more experience and knowledge of Autism than I have.

Just to touch on a few points:
DS has just turned 27 months

• Hes a first child
• Having looked up other “early signs of autism” (no idea how much of a measure these things actually are!) - none of it sound like behaviours that he has at all
• I had read a bit about advanced speech and then regressing. So far he only seems to be gaining language and while it is “advanced”, I definitely think it’s still “toddler appropriate” language. He doesn’t use overly long/complex words (unless you count jerberrycoot 🙄 we can thank the Smeds and the smoos for that one 🤣), he’s just good at linking words to form sentences and using descriptive words eg, a friends daughter is the same age and where she might say something like “mummy, me want that ball!”, mine might say “His name/I want to play with that ball outside on the green grass mumma!” or something along that line.
• Not much in the way of echolaila (I’ll admit that I had to Google that one 😅) other than if he’s heard me say a new word and he finds it funny. Or if he’s asked what something is and I tell him then he’ll usually repeat it back to me. He will recite lines from his favourite books but only in response to something eg, I'll drop something and say “oh no!” and he’d sometimes come out with “oh help! Oh no! It’s a Gruffalo!” or something along that line. Then want me to read him the book or pretend to be the Gruffalo for him 😅
• He still seems to be following what I believe to be normal speech progression - he’s picking up new sounds all the time so his words are clear and pronunciation is constantly changing as he picks up new sounds & he’s gradually moving from referring to himself as his name and starting to use I/me/you/we etc and had gradually managed to string more and more words together.
• He gets a lot of parent time. I work PT and DHs job means he’s away for weeks working long hours but then home for weeks and off work.
• We definitely read to him a lot. He loves books. I’m not crazy on screen time. He has maybe 2hours a week on a typical week and had none until he was 2.

I literally have no concerns about his development at all. Obviously he’s mine so I think he’s the best wee guy around 😅 I’m a bit sad for those mums if it was jealousy based to be honest 😬 what a way to live! They’re welcome to come and deal with the opinions and arguments that come out of my DS if they want 🤣🤣 see how they feel after that!