17 months old with some odd behavior, please help! Hand Flaps, Finger Movements

[Worriedfistimemum]

Hello,

I have a 17 month old toddler, who is showing what appears to me as odd behavior and a delay in gross motor skills. Please consider the notes below:
1- DS is a social and happy kid with medium-good interest in other children.
2- He can point to what he wants, wave bye bye (his waving is not perfect as he uses his fingers to wave not whole hand). He can give a Hi-5 and says 10-15 words so far. He can name 5-6 animals and mimic a lot of sounds, in addition, he can name 2-3 body parts (not accurate as he might point to his head when we say eyes).
3- He started crawling at 12.5 months and just now (17 months) he started to take his first unstable steps.
4- He gets angry and bored often (30% of the time).
5- sleeps through the night but wakes up 3-6 times a night even if he is not sick.
6- He flaps his hands a lot and some times make some unusual finger and hand postures when stressed or engaged in drinking milk. Sometimes he even stands on his tip toes! THIS IS A BIG CONCERN for me.
7- He makes a lot of noises and repeat sounds (50% of the time).
8- he enjoys peek a boo and hide and seek games. he plays with some toys functionally but also likes to only throw some other toys!
9- responds to his name 50% of the time

Do you think, I should be worried? I literally can not sleep and very concerned all the time.. His pediatrician says we should not be concerned but I can not stop thinking about autism, ADHD, ADD and all other possible disorders especially when I remember the hand flaps and finger movements DS does! I would highly appreciate any experience-based advice or instructions.

hey, I know this is an older post but how is your son doing now? Xx

It has been almost 6 months since I made this post( DS is 23+ months now). Since then:

1. Ds started walking and mastered expected motor skills for his age (average).
2. Regarding language he developed rapidly and can now say 100s of words and few two words sentences. ( slightly above average). Speaks both English and Arabic.
3. He improved socially and plays with other toddlers and loves to dance at the daycare- still needs some improvements to meet the average.
4. Hand flapping and finger movement: declined after he started walking but still doing them whenever excited or very angry.
5. Noises: still makes alot of noises including growling and shouting when ever angry- this is very annoying and irritating do not know why he likes growling!
6. Sleep: at 23 months still bad ! wakes up 3-6 times in a 12 hours sleeping cycle.Tried everything but still could not get him to sleep through the night.

The only thing we did on our side is stimulation: language, social skills and comprehension. We did it for 2 months until we observed first signs of improvement.
I hope that this update help other moms...

@Worriedfistimemum Hi! Glad to hear your LO is doing well! Can I ask what type of stimulation you done with them? Thanks!

@Juhw Thanks for asking.. we mainly did thr following:
1- language stimulation: by creating sotuation where DS needs to use the rihht words to ask for a favorite toy or food ..etc.
2- sensory stimulation: by helping him out exploring different senses: smills, feels, cold hot ..etc
3-taking him out alot to mix with other toddlers with similar age( this was a bit hard on us for the first 3 months as he was clearly behind and we felt sorry for him :(
4- there was a language stimulation Youtube channel that helped alot " Songs for littles" .. he loved the lady therein and learned alot from her.
5- we gave him alot of care and love, I almost lost my job dedicating focus and time with him for almost 6 months.

Now he is 31 months old and he is a head of his class in nursery in terms of language and social skills .. still working on his focus with cognitive games as he is slightly below average here.

Hi how’s your little one doing ? Was he diagnosed with Asd / adhd ? Very worried mum here so any help would be massively appreciated

Hello there 👋,
My DS will be 4 soon. He was never diagnosed with any special need and he did great in FS1 .. so far the only thing I noticed about him is being emotionally extra sensitive ..

Thank you so much for taking the time to answer . My dd (17 months ) can say approximately 50 words point clap wave and understand things such as no , stop . Sleeps well and eats well . But can only understand one command like “ get “ happy “ her favorite toy and when watches tv doesn’t respond to her name . She always follows my gaze and look where I point . I tried the HV , gp and ped no one is concerned 😟

Started walking at 12 months and bring us toys and books all the time but the fact that when she is “ busy “ with other things she doesn’t respond to her name makes me so anxious

I would not be concerned too.. my son did not walk until 17 months old and did not respond to his name properly until after 20 months .. at 18 months he was saying around 50 words and was responding to single commands only ..
Every individual is different .. so I would suggest you give her time and encourage her to learn through functional playing, spending time with her, getting her to observe other toddlers ..etc ..