Is it normal for a 12 month old to flap their hands when excited?

[Shootingstar2289]

Ok. I feel silly asking this. I have two children. A 5 year old son and a 1 year old daughter.

Occasionally when excited my 12 month old daughter flaps her hands with excitement. I never really thought much of it, thinking it was normal.

Anyway, recently I met up with a friend with a daughter a similar age to mine and my one daughter was really excited to see this little one and flapped her hands. My friend said how cute it was so I asked if her daughter did it at all. She does not flap her hands.

Hand flapping is a sign of Autism but I thought it was relatively normal at this age.

Anyway, it seems silly asking this question as my five year old son actually does have mild Autism but he has never 'flapped'.

Is it normal? I was actually excited that my daughter shown interest in the other baby we met, as my son has never really been interested in other children.

Can 'hand flapping' be normal?

She seems to developing typically otherwise and seems more advanced than her brother did at the same age.

I don't k ow if it's normal but dd has just stopped doing it - she is nearly 2

My DD did it and she used to sort of rev an invisible motorbike (easiest way to describe it). My mum used to say it means she has autism and she was quite a late developer so I was really worried.

She stopped doing it and hasn't done it since and now is 2.8 and is now well above average

Yes. Not all children do it but many do.

My 15yr DS still does it. Bless.

Yes very normal.
Flapping (Stimming, I think is the official term) is common in children with ASD, however it is also perfectly normal until they're around 4 or 5. If they still do it after that then it can be used as one marker (but only one ie not on it's own)

Ds flapped until he was around 3yo, stopped and then restarted for a short time after big dsis kindly told him that he'd used to do it and didn't he miss doing it.

However I knew a girl year below me at primary who certainly did it all through primary and I'm as certain as you can be that she had no other markers for ASD.

Thank you for your kind replies. I think I'm just an over paranoid mother.

My five year old has Autism and has never flapped like I said earlier but as Autism seems to run in my fathers side of the family, I do worry about her!

I came across your post and wanted to see how things are with your DD now? My Dd is 12 month and has recently started flapping. Her brother is 4 and being tested for Autism so I watching her closely and worrying myself silly.

I would love to hear how things turned out?

Hi how is your little one now I’ve got a 15 month who stopped flapping months ago but flapping has emerged again