Does this sound like neurodivergence or a sensitive temperament?

[kvazzy]

Hi everyone,

Posting on AIBU for traffic.

I’m trying to make sense of my DD’s profile and would really appreciate balanced perspectives, especially from parents of neurodivergent children or people who know this area well.

My DD has just turned 5 and is in Reception. Overall she is doing well. School are happy with her progress, she is developing well academically and teachers say she is on track. She also does well in structured activities such as tennis, ballet and singing. Teachers/coaches generally give positive feedback. She has a lot of energy, but can also concentrate.

What makes me wonder about neurodivergence:

• She is very emotionally intense and can get very upset over things that may seem small.
• She finds losing, being second, or another child being “first” very hard. For example, if another child overtakes her on a bike or runs ahead of her, she can become very upset and say she doesn’t want to be friends with that child anymore, although this does not last.
• She can take refusal very personally. If another child doesn’t want to play her game or do something together, she can experience it almost as rejection of the whole friendship.
• She can be quite controlling in play. She loves children and wants to play, but sometimes wants very intense, close interaction and struggles when the other child wants space or wants to do things differently.
• She has some sensory sensitivities: hair brushing, hair washing, nail cutting. We have to put a cartoon on while doing all these things.
• She can be perfectionistic. She has said things like “I am not good enough” and can become very upset if her writing or numbers don’t look right.
• She is very sensitive to criticism or correction and can become upset if we point out mistakes.
• She can resist everyday demands such as dressing, handwashing and stopping play. We often have to make these tasks playful or interesting for her.
• She can be very shy around other people at first, especially adults.

What makes me less sure it is neurodivergence:

• She is very socially motivated and has always loved being around children.
• She has rich imaginative play and creates lots of different scenarios and games.
• Her play is flexible in the sense that she invents new games all the time, rather than repeating one rigid script.
• She generally does well at school and in structured classes.
• She can follow instructions and wait her turn in after-school clubs.
• She has good language and can often explain her feelings afterwards. For example, after one big upset with friends and craft materials, she later told me she was scared the other children would take her things without asking.
• She usually recovers after meltdowns and can go back to playing happily.
• She seems very empathic and relationship-focused, sometimes almost too much so.

I suppose what confuses me is that she is not withdrawn or socially uninterested at all. If anything, she is intensely social, very imaginative, bright, energetic and sensitive. But she struggles a lot with rejection, losing, sharing control, and feeling that her things or her place in the group are at risk.

Does this sound more like possible neurodivergence, or more like a highly sensitive / intense / strong-willed child who needs support with emotional regulation and social flexibility?

I think you are right to keep an eye on things, girls do present differently. It is very early days and as other have said things can go either way. If her rigidity, sensory issues and anxiety increase and the school raises concerns, it would be worth exploring. It sounds like you are doing all the right things to help DD progress.

Itemising a child's characteristics and organising them into bullet points is a sure way to lose sight of the distinction between (evolving) personality and diagnosis.

Step back! Step right back.

Obviously it doesn't mean anything in terms of your DD and its just anecdotal, but this is exactly how my autistic DD was at that age. Although mine is extremely shy with adults and has been since she was a baby

Normal 5 year old, sounds a bit spoilt, possibly due to being an only child.
Some firmer boundaries perhaps.
Less of the 'gentle parenting' - or what we call, getting their own way all the time...
You obviously adore your daughter. But try not to worry so much.
No 5 year old needs a label.

Hi op, do any family members have autism or adhd? It’s hard, many children can have traits, but it may not come close to a formal diagnosis.
I have two dc, autism runs in our family so I felt it was much easier for me to spot the signs, I was looking out for them! So my eldest struggles with noises and sensory! Gets very anxious around socialising, and will go mute at times! Shes doing so well at noticing her feelings, and how she feels after a social event. She talks a lot about her feelings which is great. She’s extremely empathetic!
When with her younger sibling at home she gets very rigid on the games, and has to take charge, she finds it hard to listen to other ideas. She was diagnosed with autism at 3. She also shows pda traits.
My youngest has traits of autism but it’s not as obvious! So for example will talk to one of two friends but gets very anxious, is particular with toys, always in the same order, he likes them to be immaculate or it would cause him a lot of distress. He likes them lined up in the same way each time!
He has some sensory needs, but much less than my eldest. I know he too is autistic, even though he’s waiting for an assessment I’m not sure if they would see enough to diagnose him. Although I do think they would agree there are traits.
So from your post about your dd, there could be afew traits, but it doesn’t mean that a diagnosis would come from that. She’s still very young I’d really advise waiting it out, if she is then it will certainly become more apparent as time goes on, and if it does then get a referral. Right now based on what you’ve said I wouldn't be too concerned!

What do you mean by "too empathetic"? Do you actually mean very sensitive?

of your list many just seem like a typical 5 year old, perhaps some indicate she’s used to always getting her own way. She may or may not have other issues but either way she needs to learn the skill sets including loosing, not getting her own way, sharing, give and take etc - not all dc are at the same level at 5 and this is not down to anything medical. The self care things are again something you need to teach, tell her she’s a big girl now and needs to have these things down, this is exactly the approach I took with my nd dd and typical dd.

Thanks for your reply @Lili23

It made me a bit sad to read about your childhood - I am sure your parents did their best but it sounds it was a bit tough for you sometimes.

DD's teachers did not raise any issues at school apart from shyness with authority figures (sometimes) but they think they can work with it.

It does not sound that DD is much like your sister, although I am aware that autism can present differently.

Thank you for sharing.

Thanks @Wearealldoingourbest
Yes, it could be that she is just a strong willed child. Thanks for putting things in perspective

Thanks @Overthebow

If possible, would you mind listing the things that made you consider she could be ND?

I think this is really difficult - your list could be read either way. There are lots of things on this list that could apply to my children. There are also other things not on your list. I was never sure with my two - I just always had this feeling that things seemed 'harder' for them, or just a bit off kilter, they were both quite anxious children too. A lot of the time I put it down to me, I wasn't as good as the other mums, they could manage the behaviours that I couldn't. I read and read and read but still found everything hard. Eventually we adapted and accepted things, life was hard, we had to do things in certain ways, but you just manage, others have it harder. I never mentioned anything to school but both kids were flagged at school, one in year 1 and one in year 2. Both are now on a pathway and have decent support from school.

When I used to read threads like this, I took the comments to heart where people said it was all parenting. It was only when other adults started to notice (and there were others, not just school) that I realised perhaps there was something more.

You may be the same, or your daughter may be absolutely fine - time will tell I think. I would just carry on supporting her for now and see how things develop. I suspect over the next year or two you will start to see her become closer to her peers, or you will start to notice more differences.

For me, the key thing is not a diagnosis or anything like that - it's knowing they have what they need to be happy and to learn and I suppose when this isn't in place, that's when you need to consider what might be going on.

Thanks @Happyhappyday

Yes, we are a bit like this - do validation of her feelings, go a bit with what she wants (unless it's dangerous or inappropriate). I kind of thought it is a good approach as both DH and I don't mind.

I do, now, see that it actually could cause some of the issues I described...

Thanks @dizzydizzydizzy

With your DC2, did you see any other ADHD signs - i.e. inattentiveness, lack of focus, hyperactivity? Or were they mainly the signs I described?

If you don't mind me asking when was the DC2 diagnosed and what led to it?

Do you mean like stimming? I have not noticed any stimming, no

Sounds like a 5 year old

Thanks @BadgerFace

If you don't mind me asking, what do you mean by your DD being "quirky"? What signs did you notice when she was younger? What happened, that eventually lead to her being diagnosed?

Ok @PeopleLikeColdplayYouCantTrustPeopleJez I might have the wrong idea of social struggles of the ND kids...

Thanks @littlehorsesthatrun !

Could I ask if there were any other signs of ND in your kids or just mainly the signs that I described?

I ihave one child with ADHD and SPD, and one child who is NT (or at least, if she does have some ND, which I suspect she does, it' snot particularly negatively impacting her life and therefore there's no need to do anything abuot it. I will be monitoring her as she goes into High School in case it does start to impact her).

Your dd sounds like my DD at that age (the NT one). I saw it as a lack of resilience. In our case, she is younger, so not an only child, but she was a child who tended to find a lot of htings very easy, particularly in comparison to her older brother who had had a much tougher time - which was obvious to everyone, including her. As a result, quite frankly, she had no idea how to cope when things didn't go her way, or weren't easy.

We have worked on this extremely hard over the last 6-7 years and she is much much more resilient now. Sometimes, I think she's faking it, but I take that as a good first step eg Fake it till you make it.

Re the friendship stuff we did a lot of repitition, "No, it doesn't mean they don't like you if they don't want ot play the game exactly the way you do" etc etc etc.
Also, I worked very hard NOT to play into the drama. I wasn't dismissive, but I wasn't going to get overly involved either. I wanted her to realise this was just normal life.

With other things, it was constant encourage to try again when it wasn't easy the first time. Sometimes, she'd be having a mini tantrum about how she couldnt do it or whatever and I'd get firm, "DD, just because you can't do it perfectly first time doesn't mean you can't do it. You need to keep practicing." Never ever buy into the drama, never agree she's terrible, but also I didn't spend hours and hours reassuring her either. (To be honest, this is the most ADHD thing she has - I had to learn with DS that when he was in an ADHD spiral, reassuring him and going on and on made it worse. I needed to make one, firm, clear statement then refuse to engage further.)

She joined an amazing dance school with an incredibly supportive and inclusive atmosphere. It's been a huge help to her. I thik any kind of extra curricular with the right CULTURE can be hugely powerful for children like this. They get the support of coaches/teachers, they meet different people and tif the culture is right in these groups, the entire vibe is about doing your best and working to improve, rather than absolute success. I want her to start doing more traditional team sports now but I think she would have struggled with those when she was younger. So dance, martial arts, swimming, art classes, gymnastics, cycling etc might be better choices.

Thanks @Manghi6 that's a lot of useful information.

The school (and previously nursery) did not raise any concerns. However, I will make an appointment with her teacher and go through all these things 1 by 1 just in case. I don't get an impression that they struggle with her behaviour but will double check this

Hi @Wolfpa yes, she often wins at home. We have not played many games recently but I might start doing it now more often to see if that helps to improve or leads to an even bigger issue.

She sounds like a young child!

I’ve had three and they are all different, but a lot of traits that tick the neurodivergent box are just what small children are often like.

Honestly op, this could be totally 'normal' and it could be that she is ND. Many of the behaviours you describe do chime with the female presentation of ND. But equally, at 5, she could be just figuring out the world and group dynamics - particularly as she is an only child. If it has escalated since starting reception then you're right to keep an eye on things. Many girls will just about cope in reception but may fall apart later on as academic and social demands increase.

Definitely don't put too much faith in her imaginative play and that she's socially motivated. My dd was/ is exactly the same but was recently diagnosed with autism. Looking back, her imaginative play was always based on real world scenarios (school/ teachers) and didn't involve magic, fantasy creatures or the supernatural and her writing is exceptionally well structured, but the story lines are very 'rules based'. She is also exceptionally close to one or two others, but finds group dynamics near-impossible at 9.

I would watch closely how things progress, but not jump to assessment just yet.

Just to say that stimming can look quite different in girls. My dd constantly adjusts and fiddles with her hair. She also does dance routines. It can look a lot more 'socially acceptable' in girls.

Sounds very like DS at that age, he wasn't diagnosed until nearly Secondary school age when things became a bit more obvious. One of the first things that was picked up was that he put his hands over his ears in assembly, sensory issues are definitely relevant even though people often play them down. We put other minor things when he was young down to his age or being an only child. Don't expect nursery/school to pick up on ASD though unless her behaviour is very difficult. No one suspected DS at all until 10 and then his teacher happened to have just been on a course.

If she's doing well then I'd make a note of everything you've noticed and see how she goes for now. Also stop letting her win at home, you are not helping her at all there.