AIBU? Baby Boy- Autism.

[MumofHennHals]

Please do not judge me, I suffer with health anxiety ever since I gave birth to my boy prematurely, I worry about him hugely. I'm seeking medical advice / treatment for this so I don't need to be told to 'seek help' - it's just some advice / reassurance is nice sometimes- so thank you in advance to anyone who helps.

He was born at 34 weeks, 10 months ago. However for his milestones and other things we have to go by his 'corrected due date age' which makes him 8.5 months..

He is a happy little boy which is all that matters to me, but as a mummy I want the best support & best life for my son as I can possibly give him.

My husband thinks I'm being unreasonable worrying about him because he is so young still and I do get that, but as a mum I just want to be aware.

The things I'm worried about are that he cannot yet:

• Imitate sounds or actions- for example, he won't say Dadadadada back to me even though he makes that sound already by himself & he won't copy me when I clap although he can clap and locate both hands together - instead both of these things will engage him, he will make eye contact and he will smile and laugh at me instead.

• He doesn't yet point. (but I'm not sure if that's expected at 8.5 months- Google is very much contradicting depending on where you live )

• He doesn't yet wave. ( but in all honesty, I don't think he has been waved at by many people regularly enough - I'll start doing this in and around the house more when I enter and leave rooms )

• Put arms up to be carried. ( again, not sure when this usually comes into play- but if he's crying I'll put my arms out to him and he will put his arms out wide which I've taken as a 'yes please' )

• Respond to his name, which is very hit and miss- sometimes he will look directly at me and sometimes he won't; I've noticed the won't comes more with the fact he is playing or something else has hold of his attention.

• won't hold his own milk bottle, prefers to be cuddles and being fed.

• Hates baby led weaning food, will play all day long with the textures in his hands happily but struggles to chew it- but is great with any flavour puree, his favourite is a rather strong garlic cheesy spread on his melty sticks ( which he feeds himself )

Things he does do;

• If we are in eye contact he will smile back to me if I smile or giggle at him.

• He crawls, climbs & walks along the furniture - the stair gates are already firmly up.

• he babbles, lots of Dadadadada, Dodododo, BAbabababa, and raspberries- albeit less than what my 4 year old daughter did at his age; but she is a major chatterbox.

• He will crawl over and climb up to me.

• He will follow you around the room with his eyes if you have his attention.

• He crawls over to the end of the cot when my daughter comes in the room every morning and will stand up and babble away to her.

• He will play peekaboo, if I'm covering my eyes he will remove my hands for my eyes and really giggle at me.

• he will make and maintain eye contact during a bottle feed.

• He sleeps really well, never has an issue self settling and sleeps through the night and has naps!

• He loves someone in the same room as him, if we leave he notices and gets upset and he will always notice if you enter the room if you've not been in it.

There's so many factors where he is sociable and loves social interaction, but a few of the 'Hit and misses' with the name responding, the not copying his words or clapping etc... it's making me worry, or is it still quite young? - he had an ear infection recently, he's got a follow up tomorrow- but it seems to have definitely improved and his hearing has been fine besides that 5 days 2 weeks ago.

Am I being unreasonable to the situation and myself for worrying so early on? Is there a chance he is still on track to being neurotypical?

What do you mean banking xxx thanks for your reply x

Sorry that’s supposed to say babbling. No banking yet, although she does seem to like money!

As a parent of a todder currently going through evaluation/diagnosis, I think that the spectrum is exactly that, a spectrum. There are so many "signs" that can go both ways. Toddlers typically play with walking on toes, autistic children tend to do it for much longer for example. Most toddlers therefore do it and grow out of it, but if you are on high alert, you are going to see signs everywhere you look and could incorrectly interpret this. I'm gently saying this, but you should (if you aren't already) get help for your anxiety regarding this. Our child has a speech/developmental delay, is 2.5 and if our daycare weren't pushing the evaluation, our doctor would tell us to wait longer as he is still catching up and functioning well. If you google it, you will see parents whose children were as you are describing above, who are autistic. I have gone down this rabbit hole, and it doesn't really provide any solutions at this age. I will say that I recently reached out to a mums group locally and said what our experiences were and did anyone have any experience with similar, and some were really just "speech delay, got therapy, child now completely fine". Yes there is a chance it is autism, there is always a chance, but you are very unlikely to find out at this age. Obviously raise concerns to the nurse/doctor, but also, please try to enjoy your baby and let them develop.

DS1 was behind on every milestone until he was 3/4, all of a sudden everything clicked and he's about to do GCSE's with predicted grades of 8/9 across the board. He's NT.

Ds2 was miles ahead of his peers in everything since being tiny, academically at 14 he still is. Which is the reason I was ignored for years with my concerns. He has inattentive adhd and is severely dyslexic.

It's way too soon to know with the things you've listed. Children diagnosed before school age have pretty concrete reasons to have been assessed, none of the things you mentioned are concerning at this stage.

As a mum of an autistic child (diagnosed, two years on the autism pathway, diagnosed via a plethora of MDT assessments, I can safely say this is a myth.

Hi OP -

Likely far far far too early to tell.

Just focus on being a mum and having fun with your little guy.

Mine was 6 before it really became apparent and a further 4 years before being diagnosed.

Bollocks, DD1 is diagnosed and makes eye contact to a fairly normal degree. DS1 does too and he's been referred for assessment and DD2 is a baby but makes eye contact but I assume she's ND like the rest of us.

He sounds like a baby. 10 months is way too early to be seeing autism “signs”.

Not true and there's no such thing as something ever single autistic person does.

@MumofHennHals I understand your worry but there isn't any way to know at this age and there is nothing youd need to do differently right now if he is. All 3 of my DC are autistic, one had significant developmental delays across the board the other hit every single milestone and was way ahead on those around speech and communication. It doesn’t mesn anything at this age. From someone who's overwhelming anxiety massively effected my first year with my eldest I'd say gently that what you need right now is support and help with your anxiety not a diagnosis for your DS. It's not as well known as PND but some mothers suffer with PNA, post natal anxiety, if I had my time again I'd have sought help sooner and not spent the first 12 months of my DC life overwhelmed by anxiety.

This.

It doesn't sound like he's autistic from what you've said, but whether he is or isn't, your anxiety will affect him (and your daughter), in their formative years.

Are you taking any medication for your anxiety? This will be the best thing you can do for yourself and your family. I know, because I've been there x

He’s 10 months old not 10 years old. Jesus Christ this is scary. You’re neurotic, get help.

This is incorrect and rather offensive to people with autism.

Maybe he’s autistic, maybe he isn’t. You won’t know for a while yet. Just focus on being the best parent you can to him. Mine was only just saying mama at 8 months and certainly not when prompted.

My son is 16 months and wasn’t doing any of those things at your sons age. He still cannot imitate the word dadada although he can say it (not in context) He can imitate others things though such as clapping, waving etc. I think that started near 12 months. I have no concerns on my son whatsoever.

Your baby sounds perfectly normal. In a few months they will start doing this things you have mentioned, however you will find new milestones that he hasn’t met yet to worry about instead. You will say to yourself when he starts doing xx I will stop worrying but that won’t happen you will carry on worrying as it’s you that needs help.

This message will have helped your anxiety this evening, but by tomorrow your anxiety will come back once you find something new to worry about.

You need to see a doctor. This will not go away on its own, it will just find new things to worry about. Please get help for you and your family x

My DS is 9 months and only started babbling last week. He was a very early crawler (6 months) and is much more mobile than other babies his age when crawling, cruising and climbing. Could it be he’s just been focusing on that instead?

My DS literally went from no babbling to dada and mama and all sorts overnight, it surprised me so much. We sat at a table in a cafe and he just started chatting back.

You are feeding your anxiety by posting about this.

Please get help before your anxiety affects your baby x

@MumCanIHaveASnackPlease

He’s 10 months old not 10 years old. Jesus Christ this is scary. You’re neurotic, get help.

Calm the bloody hell down

Hi OP,

I work in an ASD assessment team for under 5’s and before I even say anything else you need to know that any child developmentally 18 months would score as being ‘on the spectrum’ simply because we do not expect them to have developed those skills yet. It is against guidelines to complete an assessment on any child under 18 months (age adjusted) and also just to add, it’s generally pretty glaringly obvious if we diagnose anyone from 18 m to about 3, and there have usually been long conversations with multiple professionals to the family already.

All of the things you have listed are absolutely fine and nothing to worry about. In fact, for the little ones really I would be focusing on how socially motivated they are rather than whether they are acquiring ‘skills’ in line with then the developmental questionnaires say they should, as each child really is completely different. It’s completely normal for any child to meet some milestones and not others. But also lots of the things you’re describing would actually be quite advanced for an 8.5 month old anyway. From your description your child is a smoky happy baby who is motivated to be in your prescience and very interested in reciprocity with you and other people (playing peekaboo/ notices when you are gone/ seeks out you for comfort when upset/ wants to interact with sibling). Those are really what I look for when assessing younger children. I don’t expect to see pointing until about 12 m and even then it wouldn’t worry me at all. We tend to see reduced use of gesture in ASD children, but honestly that’s quite a bit further down the line than at this stage. And it’s more about descriptive gesture, we generally still see some gesture being used. We expect responses to name to be inconsistent at your babies age (particularly if they are busy), sounds like your baby is weaning as expected too and currently in the stage of exploring texture. You have described very normal babbling for your LO. They don’t need to copy you, it’s not part of a diagnostic criteria when considering ASD, and even if it was it wouldn’t mean you’d reach threshold for a diagnosis just from having a few things that some might consider to be ‘features’.

Also, as a fellow Mum with a toddler I can still remember those early days when I read into and interpreted everything. I’ve been doing these assessments for years and I still spent lots of time worrying about some of the things my child was doing, despite him being socially motivated. It took me ages to realise that I was just looking too closely and zooming in on anything that wasn’t completely in line with when I expected him to do things. FYI- every milestone I worried about he met eventually, some early and some late, and he also had some little extra quirks which I could have interpreted in whichever way, but now that I’m no longer worried I don’t even notice those little things any more.

Based on your description you have nothing to worry about. Even if things were exactly the same as they are now in a years time I still don’t think we would be considering Autism just yet, but at that stage we might be beginning to take notice.

He's a little baby - just enjoy him.

Most of the things he hadn't done yet, would be things I'd expect an older baby to do.

My DD is 15 months and only just imitates the noises we're making purposefully. Before this she'd make them when she pleased, but looked at is blankly if we wanted her to copy!

She started pointing with a finger a couple of months ago.

Try to relax, your baby is still very young.

They tend to develop in spurts. You'll likely find he's doing all of the things your worrying about very soon.

He is not even one year old
By all means take him for a development check with h v but please see a therapist for your anxiety

You cannot change whatever his genetic make up is but he sounds just fine so far

My 10 month old was born at full term and is doing less than yours does. Please don't worry. I know it's hard when they're your first one especially, but it's too young to spot signs of autism yet and nothing you've mentioned sounds out of the ordinary.

he sounds like he’s doing incredibly well, I also have a 34 weeker who is now two. He too had lots of check ups and none of the professionals were concerned they understood that a prem baby might not do things quite as quickly. My son clapped at 12 months, babbled at 18, walked at 19 and said his first word at 2 years 2 months. I do understand the anxiety of having a prem baby but you must get yourself some help for it or it will eat you up, sending you love xx

Not necessarily

My granddaughter was well over 2.5 years old before she pointed at anything. I must admit that I'd been worried and when she pointed at a Peppa pig on the wall at the library, I almost wept with relief.

She's now five and no signs at all of any autism.

Fretting because your ten month old isn't pointing just sounds nuts to me.