9.5 month old son twists/flaps hands

[purewater]

Hi all

My son has since a young age turned his little hands when excited or upset. He still does it, mainly when he's in his high chair and can see dinner coming his way. Or when he's upset and wants to be picked up.

Apart from crawling, he's bang on with his milestones. Has terrific eye contact, very smiley and lovely around people, and babbles continuously.

I guess I'm asking if it's normal for him to be hand turning/flapping at this age or should I be worried?

I don't think it is a sign of autism at a general level no. It was a sign in my ds' specific case.

1 in 80 people have autism. Most, in this country have life long difficulties, some of which could have been prevented had they had early intervention. Usually, their parents have a hunch long long before they are diagnosed.

Flapping and 'running' does not mean your child has autism, but nor does it mean they don't.

I wonder why this OP has asked and yet none of the others that have assumed it was normal have asked this same question.

Smiling, babbling and eye contact does not mean your child doesn't have autism either. MN has told people from the SN community that they must educate MNers, so I'm just making sure the facts are clear.

OP, from what you have written alone it does not sound as if there are any concerns, but why are you raising it?

I'm raising it because I, like so many other new parents, are on 'alert' in some way about ASD - and it was a question I wanted to raise.

I realise their is ambiguity with all ASD signs as they are all specific to each case. But, the slight problem I had with your post - Starlight - is that you didn't contextualise it. I think it's much much more likely that a baby who has no other signs than flapping at this age, is not showing ASD signs but expressing excitement. Your post suggested that - without any reference to your DS other signs - that it was quite possibly not. That's going to worry other posters.

I hope that makes sense.

And I say this because you posted on another thread about ASD red flags a link to a site which has signs to look out for. Flapping is not one of them. That's a recognised site, that you recommended, and therefore one that presumably can be trusted.

Don't forget ASD is a spectrum. My DS who has mild AS showed no particular signs of AS when he was a baby. He had good eye contact, babbled etc. He also hand flapped but so did DS2 so I didn't see that as a sign. I had warning of the dyspraxia from when he was a few days old (no monkey grip to speak of - I would never in a million years done that thing where they grip you and you let go - his grip was never that strong) but the AS nothing until he was 2 but very obvious to me by the time he was 3.

A less mild cases you would probably pick up sooner because there would be something other than hand flapping going on.

What I think Starlight is suggesting (apologies if I am wrong) is that just because it isn't a symptom now, doesn't mean it won't be a symptom later when hand flapping stops being age approrpriate and starts being ususual. Similarly reaching other milestones doesn't necessarily mean that there won't be a problem when the child is older.

It is good to be alert but you can't read too much into it yet. I don't think if you took your child to a doctor at this stage, given everything you have said, that they would take your concerns seriously because it is just too soon to say but if he is still doing the same a year down the line then maybe they would look for other clues.

purewater, the video links show flapping.

But I take your point about not contextualising and I am sorry if I raised concern. For me Autism is normal. It isn't concerning.

But what IS concerning is the dire system that parents have to navigate in order to have their worries taken seriously and further to get help, if they do have any niggles. Pushing though those niggles can make the difference between a child growing up into an independent adult, with a job, family etc. or to be institutionalised.

For that reason I would urge everyone to keep an eye out for red flags. 1 in 80 is not a small minority.

I also want to ensure that people understand that babbling, eye contact and even sociability does not rule out autism, or other developmental conditions. This 'myth' has prevented a good number of parents from getting the early help that is so essential.

The video links show flapping in older children except for one video where the baby is 12 months; I'd imagine that this child has other indicators to lead them to be concerned.

I take all of your points but for a lot of people ASD is concerning

Just want a update? Is it all good here, my son is 9 months and flaps his hands as he kicks his legs.

same here flapping baby any update if the other mums?