Glittery I'm not sure what I want (ha!), but I'm expecting a diagnosis of autism but perhaps something more to it as well. They have taken the process really gently to this point, so they had seen DS1 about 3 times before they started bringing the word autism into the conversation - obviously it is a shock to some people so they raise the concept gently. In his last assessment they felt confident enough to tell me they expect a diagnosis of autism, it is just a case of observing him in more contexts to give a more detailed diagnosis. I say that he is autistic as I think that's fairly certain at this stage.
The 'something more' is because he has coordination issues that aren't obvious at first but are obvious once you spend time with him, eg he is quite clumsy (tripping, falling over, bumping into walls) but most of all he struggles with coordination. Physically he has developed fine and has met all of his milestones, very capable, very athletic!, and has gross/fine motor skills, but if he has to draw or scribble, put shapes into a sorter, drag a piece of a puzzle on an app and put in place, he struggles a lot, he gets frustrated and asks you to do it for him.
I know the worry as I had that too for some time. But now I'm not worried. Life isn't difficult as such, just different. He is gorgeous, funny, very intelligent, and affectionate. We sit and watch films together and he will ask to be hugged, or play with my hair, we play chasing games and hiding games, he is a lot of fun. He is very observant and very good with mechanical things - which is amazing given his usual poor coordination - and has a great imagination, role plays looking after his teddy, loves fantasy and action. He loves having DS2 with him in the bath, they splash each other. He enjoys water play and story time, and playing with toy cars.
The differences? He is sensitive to noises, particularly acapella singing (ie no happy birthday song), he is overwhelmed in crowds so needs to be carried or in buggy in public, but best to go early when it's least busy, can't go on the Underground as he hates pretty much everything about it (escalators, tunnels, people too close to him, noise of train) which leads to meltdown. Sometimes he needs his own space, he will take himself away - sitting up higher on a cupboard in the living room for instance - and he won't want us or DS2 interfering with him. He has a routine that is not too strict but has to be largely followed otherwise he gets overwhelmed and upset. As he was our first we developed as parents with him so this was also just how we parent, rather than accommodating his autism as we knew no different, it is only now we know more about other families that we realise we do not have the same set up. Other examples are things like we can't take him shopping for more than a few minutes as he gets very irritable, so we get most stuff including groceries online, he can't walk with us in public as he has no real sense of danger and will run off for fun. Certain foods he gets very messy eating and will need to be washed up and new clothes so that adds time to a relatively simple task.
I'm sorry this is very long! I was trying to capture all different things. The key thing is we have to be quite organised and know to recognise when he is unsettled, but we are so used to that by now as that's just how it has always been. We don't take him to big events like weddings as it just won't work, too many people, too much noise, too long a day usually.
As for where on the spectrum, I don't know where DS1 is but spotting autism early on doesn't mean the autism is severe. DS1 we had concerns from 16-18mo, looking back there were signs earlier than that, so far professionals involved with him consider him to show typical signs of autism but to also be very well developed, not just physically but personally/intellectually, so I guess that likelihood is he would be considered 'high functioning' if that is the term. Plenty of autistic adults are out in the world of work and socialising every day, it doesn't mean definitely one thing or another and there are autistic MNers who share their experiences as well.
If there's a next time I'll attempt to be concise... 