Nursery hinting my 3 year old has autism.

[LostandFounded]

I have two DC. DC1 10, DC2 3.

My youngest child’s nursery have recently hinted they think they might be autistic. The reasons they have given is that my child doesn’t listen, doesn’t do what the other kids are doing, is always on their own agenda and doesn’t answer or turn to their name. One example they gave is when everyone else is sat doing circle time my child won’t join in and wants to carry on doing their own thing. My child does also have some speech issues which can make it difficult to understand what they are saying (not massively difficult though). They also asked about hearing tests which have come back with no issues. This is my second child and with my first they also had some speech issues but now at 10 they are fine with no diagnosis and nobody has ever said anything about them having autism. I am quite frustrated as this is my second child and I know my children better than anyone, I am sure my second child will grow up to be similar to my first one who definitely doesn’t have autism and as I said in their life (even though there were speech issues very early on) no autism was ever mentioned. I’m not sure what to do going forward as I feel nursery doesn’t understand my child and will treat them differently as they have hinted at these autistic traits. I also think my child is only 3 how can you possibly suggest that, I’m sure there are many children who were similar and did not go on to have autism, not sure how that can be suggested at only 3.

Nursery pointing this out to you doesn't mean that they don't like your child.

My son was a bit behind in speech and has autism. I also have relatives who were behind, not autistic, and have gone on to do well for themselves.

Sorry what does schema to their play mean

It's not an insult. Its how he's presenting at the nursery. Try to work with them a bit here.

Many autistic children can and do point. Especially if they don't speak much, it's a way to show what they want.

I was in an identical situation OP. Yes those behaviours could be ASD, they could also be as a result of speech delay or part of normal development. We weren’t convinced either about ASD but when we looked into the diagnosis process it looked quite thorough and decided we wanted to know either way. They didn’t meet the criteria for a diagnosis of ASD and it was put down to speech delay which now has caught up. I don’t regret getting them assessed. I am glad we know otherwise it would have always been an unanswered question.

I work in early years and we have children who have been diagnosed and are on the spectrum who point, talk, are non verbal, knows all their alphabet, doesn’t know any letters, knows all their numbers to 100, join in group time, don’t participate in group times. It’s called a spectrum because autism comes in all shapes and sizes.

we have had parents work with us, we’ve also had parents who have declined any help , that is your choice. If a nursery worker didn’t raise their concerns then we wouldn’t be doing our job properly. However I’d you decline any help it doesn’t go any further.

for the nursery to have raised it with you there would have been numerous incidents witnessed by all staff including management before any discussion would have been had with you.

did your child have similar traits?

Push aside the autism part for a moment, your DC has some speech delay which I imagine you'd be happy for them to benefit from support with. The support you can get through early years (before they enrol is school) is 100 times anything you will get once they are in the education system.

My point is it will do no harm for you to engage with nursery about getting your DC speech support and perhaps focus on some social skills (like joining carpet time).

OP, I mean this kindly, but I think it might be worth reading a bit more about what autism actually looks like in different people. Some of the things you've mentioned, like pointing don't rule autism out.

I started school at four and was top of my class. I could speak clearly and was reading and writing before I even started school. I was moved into classes above my year group for reading, writing and maths.

I went on to achieve some of the highest exam results in my high school and have a degree, a master's, a PGDE and other qualifications. Every one of my school reports were glowing.

I'm autistic. Nobody suspected it. I was diagnosed in my 40s!

My son is autistic too, and people are often surprised when they find out. He's academically very bright (he won three awards this year), sporty and sociable.

Autism isn't defined by whether someone can point, talk, make eye contact or achieve academically. It presents very differently from one person to another, which is why so many autistic people, especially those without more obvious support needs, go unrecognised for years.

Hi OP, just thought I’d offer some personal context.
You mentioned that your other child doesn’t have autism — but that doesn’t necessarily mean your 3-year-old won’t. Autism isn’t something that automatically affects all siblings.
I have a brother who was diagnosed with autism at 3 years old. At the time, his nursery were very proactive, and my parents worked closely with them, took on board all the advice and guidance, and put the right support in place. If I’m being completely honest, if they hadn’t engaged with the process or accepted the diagnosis, his life could have looked very different — and not in a positive way.
Because they did engage and access the support available, he really thrived. He has just finished his first year of university, which he moved to another country for. He is now a strong, intelligent, social, kind and independent young man, while still very much being autistic. We couldn’t be prouder of him.
So rather than pulling him from nursery or dismissing their concerns, it might be worth working with them to explore what they’re noticing and what support could be put in place. Ultimately, if concerns are ignored, the person most likely to be impacted is your child.
No one is saying your child is “naughty” or “bad” (I think you may have mentioned that in a previous post), but as a mum myself, I would personally rather someone raise concerns early so we can explore them together.
It doesn’t mean your child definitely has autism — but it may be worth taking the concerns seriously enough to ensure that if he does need support, it’s there for him.

The traits they’ve pointed out in your son sound very similar to nursery and school reports I’ve recently read for a 15 year old I’m working with. This young person also had involvement with the speech and language service. The reports I’ve read make it very clear that other professionals have raised concerns about autism in the past. The parents have completely ignored these, sought out alternative therapies, and are repeatedly pursuing a diagnosis they find more palatable despite being told no each time they do. This young person still has no formal recognition of anything, is fed up of all the testing, and knows they are different to peers so is using poor coping strategies that could have been avoided if they were better helped to understand their differences.

Professionals don’t tell parents they think a child has autism because they dislike the child or think them badly behaved. They do it because they see things that might make the child’s life more difficult in the future and recognise that for some a diagnosis is helpful.

People on the internet can’t tell if your son has autism from the information you have provided. But it might be worth working with the nursery to understand what they have noticed rather than dismissing them completely.

My DD began the diagnostic ‘pathway’ at 18 months and was diagnosed age 4. She’s what used to be known as high functioning or ‘mildly autistic’ (though it’s frowned upon to word it as that, but how else can I describe her Autism!?). My point is, it’s not just very autistic (ie. Non verbal) autistic kids who are diagnosed early. I promise you it’s nothing to be ashamed of! Even Elon Musk is autistic, Charles Darwin was believed to be autistic, along with Albert Einstein, Mozart & Sir Isaac Newton! I tell my DD it’s a superpower. You’re reacting to this as though it’s some kind of accusation

My autistic 12 year old was incredibly far advanced with speech. Great eye contact, ahead on every since physical milestone e.g. pointing early, waving early etc. But was clearly not quite the same as other kids from an early age. For example at a kids gym class he'd wander off and do his own thing. At parties would sit and watch for ages before joining in.

The gap.between him.and his peers slowly widened and he was diagnosed age 7. He's still great with eye contact and a very advanced vocabulary. Social skills and friendships are very problematic. Struggles hugely with school. All autistic children are different.

I don't know why you wouldn't want to accept the help that's on offer. If he does get diagnosed with autism, then that's great it's been detected early. If they monitor over time and realise it's not then no harm done.
Surely it's better for early detection and support than to get a few years down the line with teachers also wondering and being further back the queue for help.

For me, the traits you’ve mentioned don’t seem hugely typical of a three year old. But I don’t work with children all day. Your nursery workers do.

They aren’t blindly labelling your child, dismissing him as naughty or not worth their attention. They’re trying to help flag some behaviours they don’t usually see in the other kids so you can get the support he might need, if it’s necessary. That’s really good of them.

If it was my daughter, I’d at least get her assessed if the nursery kept hinting at it. Maybe your child is autistic, maybe they’re just a bit delayed but by not at least exploring it…you’d be doing your child a huge disservice. Listen to this thread, even if you don’t listen to the professionals.

Op this happened to me and I moved my child. Actually I really wish I had listened as early intervention and more support would have made a really big difference to my child. I would ask GP for a referral to developmental paediatrics. It will likely take two years to come through and in the meantime
at least you have them on the waitlist. My child is now a diagnosed teen.

More than Words from the Hansen speech therapy charity available on the Wilmslow Press is really good for this age. Will support children who turn out to be NT as well but will really help with language and skills acquisition for autistic dc.

I've literally been in your shoes. I'm about a year from where you are now. We started a new nursery at age 2 which had a lot of children, and very overworked nursery staff. The more grumpy one more or less tried to manage us out after 3 months there as my son wouldn't stay sitting for circle time, struggled to sit for the whole of meal time, had a speech delay and really didn't fit. She told me multiple times she had seen many children like him and thought he was autistic. The "sympathetic" chats and the one time she hugged me make my skin crawl, it was the tone of "oh no, poor you, you should go to a special school, he will fit better there". We moved to a different but absolutely normal nursery and it was night and day, and now our son is thriving. He is now the only one who DOES circle time according to his teachers. Using the original worker's suggestion we did get our son evaluated and as he was barely talking at 2.5 they immediately diagnosed him autistic which shocked everyone. They told us to mark yes to any question on the scale we had seen a behaviour of, even if we had only seen it once as it would qualify him for free services and I don't think this is the right thing to tell people in retrospect. He got speech which was great and has come on lightyears, though i'm not sure he wouldn't do that by himself with time. For what is it worth, we had him reassessed a year later at age 3.5 and they have said he is not autistic. My advice, tread carefully, watch your son's development, maybe get a speech therapist, definitely change nursery if you can and see if they raise anything.

Editing to add that I see a prior poster saying "get the assessment, speech services, and give it time" which is essentially what we did. It worked for us in this situation. I'll see what my kid is like in 5 years I guess.

What comes across here is that you don't understand autism and why they would flag these things. I have a highly sociable autistic 15yr old, lots of friends all over the place and he is very aware of his two sisters. He however has always been in and out of trouble all of his school life, mostly compliant but also for example hates homework so refuses to do it, get in fights, won't always engage in things. He had also speech therapy at 6yrs and it was made clear he had done well and got over it. At 15yrs we sat the Dr who diagnosed his autism and she explained clearly that a lot of evidence was in his SLT report.
Anyway if you don't want here advice fine, but you could thank and say you will bare it in mind.

Is your older child a girl and youngest a boy by any chance?

Re pointing, my son was pointing right on time. In fact, lots of autistic kids point or will bring you over to what they want

@LostandFounded what are you doing about their speech issues?

What would you do if nursery said your DC had hearing issues would you ignore them because you don’t want them labelled, have a potential life long disability?

Or is it just autism you have a problem with?

I received similar hints about my 3rd dc when he was nearly 3. I was very upset and defensive like you but then i educated myself about autism. Turns out he does. To my surprise my two older dc were also both diagnosed in their mid-teens. Both bright and no issies raised prior to about 13 (one was very difficult at home).

I’m really curious about why you think the nursery don’t know your child at all.

You both agree on his personality just differ on the reasons yourself, it’s just their personality and nursery it’s ND behaviour.

What I’m more interested in is why you think they don’t like your child and are using autism. What a bizzare thing to say. If your child is autistic why would this benefit this nursery or justify them not like your child.

@LostandFounded That was my son when he was 3- exactly as yours. I wasn't sure he was autistic though because he was so contact seeking and sociable but he was. Nobody can tell you that your son is autistic. But suspicions warrants a referral to make sure.

Those are literally the only traits though, nothing else points to autism at all.