Should I be concerned?

[MrsOwl]

Please advise me as I am unsure what to do. I have a 2.5 yo daughter who goes to nursery once a week. One day when picking her up from nursery, one of the new workers said that they were amazed by how her speech and development was for her age. She is our first child so we have nothing to really compare her to in terms of development so we thought that she was developing normally.

She has always spoke from a very early age, you can hold a full conversation with her and more importantly she understands everything. She can count up to 60 but then gets bored so doesnt try any further and has always been able to complete complex tasks/puzzels, but she was very slow to start walking.

When mentioning this to a friend she said that behaviour like that could be a sign of autism. As you can imagine this got me very concerned. I have gone from thinking my daughter was developing normally to suddenly thinking that she may have a form of autism.

She shows no signs that I know of but I'm no expert. I keep telling myself that it is stupid to think such a thing but I cant shake the thought that she may be.

Am I just being paranoid?

Sorry not sure what advice to give...
Bump...

What's your friend's area of expertise?

chances are your daughter is just a very smart cookie! precocious language would only be a sign of possible autism in combination with several other factors - eg. sensory/social/behaviour difficulties, lack of awareness of danger, compulsions/obsessive routine, repetitive play etc. so I wouldn't worry on the basis of your DD being so good with language.

Does your friend have any experience of Autism?

She is probably just a bright spark who enjoys to learn, and that could explain the late walking, it was perhaps less interesting to learn than puzzles and counting

With friends like that, who needs enemies, eh? You have an articulate, intelligent daughter and she sounds perfectly normal to me. If you and your husband are the type of people that spend time talking to your daughter intelligently, playing counting games, doing puzzles and so forth, she's going to respond in kind and soak it up like a sponge. And the age at which babies walk varies hugely... some seem to exit the womb running!

I think your friend is rather jealous and trying to worry you..... Rather than 'autism' think 'gifted'

Thanks everyone!!

I was starting to get really worried about it to the point of watching her to try and figure out if she looked like she was doing repetitive things, and other than wanting to watch the same episode of 'The Fairies' over and over, she seems ok. I mean I like Harmony and Rapsody but there is only so many times I can watch them sing the same song.

My friend (as far as I know) doesnt know anything about autism (she works in a bank). She said that she saw it on one of the Discovery channels once - not a basis for a diagnosis I know, but once the seed has been planted it's hard to get rid.

My DD saw me watching her once and asked why I was looking at her funny. I said I didnt realise I was, to which she said "it's probably tummy ache, I'll get you some milk". Bless. I then ran after her when I heard her trying to open the fridge.

Thanks again, you have made me feel better. I wanted to shake this stupid thought but it was eating at me.

My brother was counting u to 200 when he was only 2, and he is not autistic. he is 26 y.o. now and has a very good carrer ahead of him in the bank. So I would not worry too much

You could hold a full conversation with dd at that age too- in two languages- and you could ask her to translate into the other language and she would do it happily. By age 6 she was discussing plot development in Tolkien. She has no autistic traits whatsoever, and in fact as a teen does not come across as scarily gifted either: just bright and interested and keen to enjoy life.

I think you need to ignore your friend! Your daughter's clearly a bright one, and presumably there have been no problems with her socialising at nursery or anything? Repetitious behaviour by itself isn't an indicator of anything (how many toddlers do you know who will drop something on the floor, watch you pick it up, drop it on the floor etc etc). Don't worry- just enjoy!