Hand leading toddler

[MumSH99]

I didn’t know it was a huge red flag for ASD until I googled it , my little girl is will be 17m on Friday
She’ll drag me by the hand to the kitchen and point to what she wants or to the bathroom for her toothbrush and say that or if she wants to FaceTime my mum she’ll put my hand on my phone and say nana or if she can’t do a toy she’ll put my hand on it , take her shoes off if she can’t get them off she’ll get my hand put my hand on shoe or put my hand on buckle of car seat to undo it I’m just wondering is it normal for this age or is it worth mentioning to a HV is anyone else’s little one doing this? Or done this at this age She can say around 30/40 words no sentences as of yet only like not that or bye bye dad so is it lack of words being able to tell me what she wants?

I feel like it’s quite normal to be honest. My son is 20 months and used to do it a lot more but now he’s better able to communicate he will try to use words instead. Like he used to grab our hand to make a toy do something, but now he can do it himself or verbally ask us he doesn’t do the hand leading thing as much. He still grabs our hands or trouser leg to pull us to the kitchen to ask for snacks!
I think it’s just a way of communicating before they can verbalise their needs.
Keep an eye on it, and if you don’t notice any difference in a few months time then mention to your HV.

Like a lot of autism 'red flags', hand leading like this is age-appropriate behaviour at this stage – it only becomes a red flag if it becomes the dominant form of communication and/or persists past when other methods of communication should be taking over.

From your description, your daughter is using a range of communication methods – hand leading is only part of it. She can't say 'Mummy, come to the bathroom', so she leads you there, but then she points at what she wants. She can't say 'want FaceTime Nana', so she puts your hand on your phone and says 'Nana'.

I would say it's very likely this is just age-appropriate development and the hand-leading will fade away as she gets more words and more able to put them together.

W when she does these things are you then saying and repeating the sentence so that's she can learn.
My DS was verbal at 10months saying 10 works BUT regressed at 13months and I thought ASD also. He remained none verbal for 8 months! So he would make noises and pointing hand leading. Inattended some Speech language therapynseasions 6 in total and had 1 -1 time with specialists and they cinfirned it was hot ASD as he is meeting all milestones and still being social. They said when he hand leads and points to verbalise it at his level, and in sentences as short as possible. Repeat several times.
I focussed on that. They also said to back off from too much talking and questions. Ratyer then asking questions talk about things in am open way.
Do you like the red ball? Instead say it as The red Ball is nice I like it.
It was hard at the start. I just forced mysekf to go to toddler groups and by 20/21 months he started to talk and how at 3 he doesn't ahut up 😂 from when he wakes up until he falls asleep literally!

Ring the national Speech Language organization they offer free calls and consultations. I called when DS was 15months.

It's totally normal behaviour of a child who can't yet speak well enough to explain what they want you to do. (Which is totally normal at her age.) Don't worry.

It becomes a red flag for autism if it continues past the point that they could just ask you - because it suggests that they find nonverbal gestures easier than forming a verbal sentence. But even this wouldn't be something in isolation. It would only be looked at as part of a wider picture.

IME this is a very cute stage and I loved it when they could "tell" me what they wanted before being able to speak :)