is there such thing as mild autism?

[lozza1985]

hi not sure if anyone can answer some questions that i have please ? i have a wonderful dd who is 3 nearly 4 . over the weekend we were at a bbq and there was a child there and i got talking to her mum and she said she has mild autism she mentioned most of the things that im experiencing with my daughter ie : terrible tantrums, in ability to make new friends ,not good with change, cant stand labels in clothing , not good with eye contact , seeing speech therapist soon , also very sensitive to smells and noise , she also flies of the handle at the smallest thing we feel as if the whole house treads on eggshells around her so we dont start her of , if we are doing something ie the dentist we have to give her lots of warning we are going because she will go crazy . she is our middle child we have a ds who is 8 and a dd who is 2 , we are at the end of our tether we really dont know how to cope with her xx

I think it is well recognised that there is a spectrum of autism on which children, and adults can fall, ranging from extreme to much less of an issue. Yes the way you describe your dd behaviour there are some elements that could be seen in an autistic child, on the other hand my four year old dd can do most of them too and she is not autistic, just stroppy! If you are worried then I would go and speak to your dd nursery/teacher if she has one, and get their opinion on how she is interacting with others outside the home, you could ask the opinion of the speech therapist, but it is outside their field of expertise. If she is still just at home with you, then I would speak to your gp and health visitor and ask for a referral to someone who can make a diagnosis for you, or put your mind at rest. Hope that helps.

You might be better to post in the Special Needs section with this question as well (if you havent already!!)