Hi.
I have a 22 month old son who has speech delay. He has about three words and a lot of his own made up words. He still babbles at times Too. Obviously I am worried about autism. He has very good eye contact, laughs smiles responds to me and my husband well. Loves toys and plays with all parts of them. He will bring something to us that he is interested in to have a look. He appears to have good understanding and he is generally a very happy boy.
We took him to SALT and the therapist mentioned that she would like to see more joint attention and more one finger pointing. He tends to point with his hand if that makes sense.
I should probably also mention that he is extremely active and never stops climbing, running, chasing, so it makes it very difficult to sit and talk to him about what he playing with.
I'm not doing very well anxiety wise with all of this and I find speaking to my OH and family very upsetting. Trying to hold all my worries and fears together and inside Im aching.
I suppose I'm writing to ask anyone has experiences their child having mediocre joint attention and not being autistic. I have of course read screeds of journals articles and posts from parents and have completely freaked myself out. From my understand joint attention is a big early indicator of autism, I'm just a little confused as he does show it sometimes. I just want to help him communicate and not to struggle socially.
Thank you in advance