Hey everyone. This is the first time I'm writing in a forum because I have no one to ask. A very worried first time mom here. I have a 23 month old son who doesn't say any word. He doesn't point. Instead he hand leads if he wants anything. He doesn't dance to music. He's very very affectionate, loves cuddling or kisses me without even asking sometimes. Good eye contact most of the time. He grew up in lockdown so he didn't have much opportunity to socialize with others. Been going to nursery for few hours for past two months.
He can imitate some of my facial expressions like blowing raspberries, playing with tongue. He repeats if I papa and dada but couldn't repeat anything else. He's keen to learn words. Keeps bringing me stuffs and raises it over his head and I tell him what it is. He does this quite often. Loves playing with car lying on the floor. He doesn't play alone much. He likes to involve me or my husband in his activities. Like if we are drawing, he gives me his crayon and asks me to draw by hand leading. His babbling changes once a while. Sometimes mama nana and sometimes papa dada !
He also imitates actions like rubbing Vicks, turning on dishwasher. If he watches me do something for a while then he tries to do it by himself. He loves reading books a lot. Keeps bringing it and makes us read.
He understands lot of my commands like bring me your water cup, close the door, bring me your ball, turn the lights off, eat, come here, bring me your shoes. If I ask him to point a color or an animal on his book, he can do it. But he points with thumb. He can point to body parts with index finger.
He can do some gestures like clapping, high five, blow a kiss, giving, reaching, he learned to wave bye bye recently but it's more like shaking his entire arm. He communicates with me in a way he knows how to. Like hand leading, eye contact, grunting. When I don't understand him he gets frustrated.
When I'm angry or when I'm crying he comes and makes me kiss him or he kisses me. R smiles when I smile. His dad coffees home only during weekends and when he sees him he runs and hugs him. But he doesn't do that with strangers. It will take a while for him to warm up with a stranger. Eventually he does warm up. His gross motor skills and fine motor skills are fairly good. Can climb, kick, eat with spoon, build blocks.
My main concern is he doesn't point at all. If I say, what do you want? Touch and show me. He will touch the object sometimes. Sometimes follows point. Mostly no. No single words yet. Responds to name as long as he's not busy doing something. Sometimes he doesn't care. He loves spinning wheels and playing with cars lying on floor. He sometimes walks on toes but stops when I say no. Loves watching TV but didn't imitate anything from TV. Could he be autistic? I'm so worried. His nursery people are concerned about his language delay but not concerned he's autistic because they feel he doesn't have any autistic traits. They said he's playing beside other kids but he's not interacting with them.
He was born 3 weeks early. Could that be the reason for language delay? I'm going crazy reading stuffs on internet. Thanks a lot for reading such a long post.