Hi all,
I’m not sure if something like this already exists but after feeling like rubbish most of today I thought I’d start a support thread for the parents of children with neurodiversity.
My DD who is 2.5 isn’t officially diagnosed yet but her dad has AuDHD and so does my sister as well as other members in both of our families.
DD has always been a high needs child, initially I put it down to her dairy intolerance but after that got sorted when she was around 6 months old it quickly became apparent to me that away from her allergy she was still a high needs child. She would often head bang as a baby as a soothing mechanism before falling asleep and would struggle to be soothed. She also pointed quite late which is a big red flag.
She’s extremely chatty and strong willed (which I’m sure will do her good in the future) but it is CONSTANT. She shows signs of echolailia whereby she constantly repeats her words. She has a deep attachment to toothpaste and her toothbrush and all day she’ll pester me for toothpaste and toothbrush but I’ll have to keep reminding her that it’s for morning and before bed. She used to play independently as well as with me about a year ago but now she doesn’t want to play independent and required me to join in, in almost everything.
She uses hair to self soothe (whether it’s mine or hers) and is extremely cling. She has melt downs when we move from one part of the house to the next and during transitions. She really reallt struggles with transitions. Nursery have noticed this too and will be doing an emotional regulation assessment on her.
She puts everything in her mouth and is ver hyperactive, doesn’t have any danger awareness at all if I’m honest (although I wouldn’t expect her to be super safe at this age) she is constantly climbing things and even tried to put cords from my laptop charger around her neck (have to hide everything now).
She is ver clingy towards me and she wasn’t like this around a year ago, she’d be a healthy level of clingy but recently it’s been a lot.
I understand some of the above may be normal toddler behaviour and the health visitor does say it’s too early for her to receive a diagnosis which I understand but i feel like her meltdowns during transitions, her self soothing behaviours, the clingyness etc is more than what you’d see in a typical toddler.
It’s very tiring and lonely and it feels like I’m a way off of getting any support for her as she’s still so young but I just feel awful as most of the time I’m counting the hours down until bedtime.