Worried about ASD - hand flapping, lack of engagement in my toddler

[Allosaur]

Hi, I'm a first time mum and worried about my little girl. She is 25 months and has a speech day. She is able to say some words - was very quick to grasp numbers, shapes and colours and "mummy" but a lot of her words are just songs or repeating a phrase she has heard out of context. 99% of the day she just babbles. She also does not respond to her name and is very difficult to get any back and forth dialogue. She also hand flaps when happy/excited very frequently.

She has moments of good eye contact and enjoys playing with me (throwing ball, drawing together etc). She won't respond to questions but will pick up a book, open it and say "pig", "cow", "sheep" etc and point to the animals of her own volition. She sometimes will point to my body parts and name them "nose", "eyes", "hands" etc. If I ask where something is, she points to it so her comprehension seems to be good but not able to express herself. Her fine motor skills are very good. She struggles to play with other toddlers but does play with toys correctly and does engage in pretend play very well - for example, she will pretend feed her animal toys.

She has been referred for assessment and speech therapy but I know that will take a while.

Has anyone dealt with this and how did it turn out for your toddler? Any tips?

Are you the poster who frequently posts about this?

She sounds like she’s doing well for her age so I wouldn’t be stressing at the moment.

Hi, no this is my first post.

My health visitor thinks her lack of social motivation and self-regulating stimming are 'strong indicators of ASD' which is why she got a referral. I'm not sure myself.

Thought the same.

OP just wait for the assessment.

I should add, it was my health visitor that initially suspected ASD due to her lack of response and hand flapping - GP agreed and sent for referral. I did have concerns about her lack of engagement and gestures until that point, though.

She's still very young but there are definitely some possible signs there. It's great that she's been picked up so early especially as wait times are so long for everything.

I had no idea at this age, mine wasn't diagnosed until nearly 11 but my tip would be just to enjoy her - and talk to her, read to her and play with her as much as you can. I would also think quite carefully when the times comes about what nursery of preschool will be best for her - smaller and quieter may well work better for her.

Unless details have been changed it’s a different OP, the woman who posts regularly usually posts every month and her DD would have just turned 3 now.

I hope she can get some help and stop posting the same concerns over and over.
She has been told by everyone (including professionals) that her daughter is develop long normally, now every time someone posts with genuine concerns now people assume it’s the same person and don’t take the post seriously.