Worried my four month old may be showing early autism signs

[Mumlife26]

My baby is 4 months old. Let me start by saying, if I had read one of these posts before I had my baby then I would have rolled my eyes and said that a 4 month old isn’t showing signs of autism.

However, I don’t understand how my baby can show these developmental signs and not receive a diagnosis in the future?

I am a teacher and my previous role was in an SEN base. Everyone in my family is saying I’m just focussing on things that every baby does but I am seeing them as signs of autism because of my experience.

Signs I’m seeing:

• Lack of eye contact. This is the biggest one. From about 10 weeks old, she will actively avoid eye contact when being held. Everyone told me that my baby would stare into my soul. Sometimes she will but only from a distance - on the changing table, from the play mat, in the pram but as soon as she is held she will actively avoid looking at me or whoever is holding her. She will move her head to the side to look away. She will not make eye contact when feeding at all really - she will very rarely. This is the hardest one for me because I am finding it quite difficult to bond as she would rather look anywhere else than at me. This hurts my child development brain as it’s really hard to engage/sing/chat to a baby who will not look at me.
• Her toes are constantly scrunched/curled. It’s not all the time but majority of the day, she will be keeping her toes scrunched and curled. She is able to flatten them however a lot of the time she keeps them in this position. I am worried this is sensory and is this the start of tiptoe walking? She also keeps her thumbs tucked when reaching or grabbing things.
• She stiffens her body when excited or angry. She will make fists with her hands and hold them out in front of her and shake slightly and straighten her legs. At first I thought she is so excited, she doesn’t know what to do with her body. But I watched a TikTok video and the first sign a lady noticed in her baby was stiffening. So obviously now I’m hyper alert to this and it’s just added to the signs.
• She is happy to entertain herself. She doesn’t seek attention and will happily lay on her playmat for a while without looking for me or wanting attention. When she wakes in the morning she will just lay in the next to me looking around or making noises to herself until I go in to get her. Shes happy looking at the light fitting or the curtains.
• In general, only cries if she is very hungry or very tired. I’ve heard this is a sign.
• She is an extremely fussy feeder. It is a struggle to get her to finish a bottle. She turns her head away. Spits the bottle out. Wriggles around.
• Extreme reactions to loud sounds e.g hair dryer / someone sneezing / most recently the hand dryer.
• Now I feel like I’m noticing stimming such as rubbing her feet together and her hands seem quite twirly.
• She also arches her back away when being held. Is quite stiff in general.
• She rolled front to back at 3.5 months for 2 days and she hasn’t done it again. Is this a regression of skills? She isn’t rolling back to front although I know this is up to 6 month skill.
• Shes not laughing or giggling.

Things I’m not worried about.

• She is a very smiley happy baby.
• She can be very engaged when not being held - when she is laying down, she will look and give lovely smiles and chat to you.
• great eye tracking. Will follow you around the room, up the stairs. We call her nosy rosy because she is always watching when someone is walking around the room.
• She sleeps 12 hrs at night with 1 or 2 wake ups.
• Holds her head up
• Grabs toys, bats at toys. Will reach for toys when doing tummy time. Brings hands to mouth. Able to put toys in mouth.
• Can be chatty - although it feels like this has got less the past few weeks and she can be quiet.

Im actually not sure what the point of this post is. If it was one or two signs then I wouldn’t be as worried but having so many signs (there are more but those are the most concerning) I’m a concerned mum who wants to support my baby in the best way. Does anyone have any experience of these developments in a baby? How can I support my baby? Thank you for reading.

What you are describing could well be the bog standard behaviour of a NT baby. No one could possibly know at this stage. Please don’t borrow trouble.

Just enjoy and be grateful for the good things. I think relaxing is the best thing you can do for her because if you're stressed she'll sense it. She sounds absolutely delightful and a real dream baby!

Maybe she is on the spectrum, maybe she isn't. There's nothing you can do to change that. If she prefers interacting when not being held then follow that lead. You can bond with her by looking at her when she's lying on the mat or singing to her when you're changing her nappy, maybe give her a bottle while she is in a bouncy chair and chat to her.

Babies often don’t like long periods of eye contact. It’s over-stimulating for them. Babies are also forever ‘stimming’. It’s normal baby behaviour. So is everything on your list.

Whether she is or isn’t autistic, at four months old there’s nothing you can do anyway, so just enjoy your baby.

My autistic dd didn’t scrunch her toes, wouldn’t be left alone for a minute, cried continuously, breast fed happily, didn’t eye track, slow on gross and fine motor too, no babbling.

in other words you can’t tell so young

It’s far too soon and all of that is also nt behaviour. I do get it though as I was like this with dd1. I would say she does have some nd traits but nothing that would lead to a diagnosis. She was very black and white about stuff - now has learned grey areas. She’s very science focused (about to go to uni) and her personality, whether nd or not, is very suited to her career choice. I have zero concerns.

enjoy your baby and learn their individual needs so you can meet them, whether they turn out to be Nd or nt.

I understand your concerns and I felt the same way about my DGS from a very early age. He's almost 4 years old now and the speech and language therapist recently referred him for an autism assessment. Having said that, as other posters note, there is absolutely nothing you can do about it now. Just enjoy your baby - she is who she is and stressing about it won't change anything. DGS is a delight btw, but challenging sometimes, and has a very spiky developmental profile (e.g. he can read quite a bit, but is nowhere near potty trained). We all love him just as he is.

@Mumlife26 honestly, who knows at this stage?
The way that babies and young children develop varies so much.
Yes, when a child is diagnosed with autism there are things looking back that might have been signs in a young baby but that makes no difference later.
She sounds adorable. Enjoy this very precious and very short time, keep an eye on general milestones and talk to her health visitor about any emerging concerns.
One thing I can say is that classicslly autistic children very rarely sleep 12 hours ever! Green with envy! 😀

I have an autistic adult child and my DIL has an autistic sibling and I had the same concerns with one of my dgc. The toe scrunching stopped at around 10 months, he's now 18 months and seems fairly typical although very little interest in trying to speak. Points and grunts constantly, but no effort to talk. Bum shuffled rather than crawled, took a few steps at 16 months and nothing since. Is very cautious and risk averse, but understands everything. I was sorting of relaxing recently until a friend of mine saw him and said he's very "solemn" which I think she meant doesn't smile or change facial expression much.
Try to relax OP, even if your baby is autistic there is nothing you can do for now, except do what you are doing. Just wanted to share, sorry it's not helpful but just wanted to share solidarity in the worry!

Too young to know, babies vary so much. That's why they don't diagnose until older

I understand your anxiety. My autistic child has very high needs and I had some suspicions because he was avoiding eye contact at 4 months, and noticed some head shaking and vocal stimming around 6 months. At 1y his stimming was very obvious and he had a regression of language skills at 2y which is common as they become overwhelmed by sensory.

So I think of the things you listed some sound familiar, others don’t. I do feel like 4 months is very early and I wouldn’t attribute anything to autism just now, but a chat with the health visitor visitor or GP might be a good idea
to discuss concerns.

As a parent of 2 autistic kids I do understand your concerns. As you know it’s too early to know if she’s autistic or not. I noticed what I was convinced were signs in my son at a similar age, but of course no one took it seriously until his 2yr check up. I would say try and just enjoy your baby for now, there’s nothing you can do differently, just love her and engage with her. You could keep a note somewhere of things you are noticing, just in case you want to refer back to it in future, either if more signs develop, or maybe it’ll just reassure you of progress she’s making. Just remember if she is autistic you’ll be in a great position to give her everything she needs from your knowledge at work.

She my might be she might not be, too early to tell! My youngest is autistic and didn’t show hardly any of the ‘signs’ you mentioned. Enjoy your baby now and what will be will be.

Echoing others, children who are autistic (like mine) are all different. My ASD DS had no sensory issues or eye contact issues, but a huge speech delay and then asymmetric development (could read before he could talk at a very young age). Re. your baby, muscles are just developing at this age, including in their eyes. Look out for developmental delays, when they crawl/walk/talk/clap if you're worried make a note of the date so you can track (I didn't and it would have been useful to know down the road vs guessing). If speech is delayed past 18 months get it flagged for intervention. Hopefully you're overthinking it, if not, you'll be prepared.

Not entirely related to your question, I wouldn't try to make her finish bottles, especially if she's clearly signalling she's had enough by turning her head away.
Have you seen any advice on paced bottle feeding?

She might be autistic, she might not. Theres nothing you can do about it, so there’s no point worrying about it now!

Some of these things fit my almost 4 month old as well. The stifness, toes and hands could be due to tongue tie. My advice would be to get her checked for this by a certified lactation consultant.

I can't believe this is even something you're thinking about at this age. Especially given your list contains literally nothing at all of concern.

Unless you're going to drip feed that this is your fourth child and the other 3 all have autism I think you need to give this all a rest.

Far too young to tell. Sounds much more like your baby might have reflux than autism at this stage though. It’s pointless worrying about autism at this age. Enjoy your baby and stop comparing her, if she seems uncomfortable or doesn’t feed properly seek medical advice for that

I’m really surprised that someone with Sen experience is writing this, about a 4 months old baby. It’s normal and sounds like the baby has reflux! Nothing really tends to show right now. Please kindly stop over thinking all these normal baby things and trying to see something there that isn’t. When trained to look for certain patterns of behaviour we tend to lend that to else where in life. This sounds like a perfectly normal thing.the looking at you will happen soon as she gets proper vision. Look at baby sensory cards. They see in black and white and can follow them. Stop looking for an older child’s behaviour and enjoy baby congratulations on baby

I have one child with autism one without and there was absolutely no difference in them at this stage. The signs of autism developed much later. Your daughter may have autism she may not nothing you can do will change that but it’s too early to tell, just enjoy your baby and take it as it comes.

Thanks everyone for your comments. Like I said, I’m not sure what I am hoping to achieve from this post. I guess I’ve just spiralled from the lack of eye contact from baby and obviously this is one of the signs of autism.

It’s one of the signs in autism in toddlers and older children. At 4 months old it’s pretty normal - this is right when their vision is at peak development so everything suddenly looks different and overwhelming. Does she track motion with her eyes if you move a toy in front of her?

@HesterLeggatt Yes, her tracking has always been really good.

Hmm. I don’t know if this is helpful or not as it’s definitely not a definitive answer but I was also worried about my daughter about this age. The eye contact thing was MASSIVE for me - she just wouldn’t do it. Would turn her head away just as you’ve described. She also didn’t cry much, very rarely and entertained herself in her crib/on the floor for ages. I really worried about it. She was smiley and placid, slept through the night and most of the day - and in a lot of ways a dream baby but the eye contact and self sufficiency from me was noticeable.

And now she’s 7 and just fine. I do suspect she’s ND in some ways but also just a child with some quirks in behaviour - not the severe challenges I feared from her early ‘signs’.

I hope that might calm you a bit. I know what it’s like to be hyper vigilant to every little thing once you have noticed something and it’s exhausting.

Both my babies did exactly what you have described. Neither are autistic or show any signs of it. One may be ADHD but not enough for us to worry or do anything about it. Enjoy your baby, she sounds totally normal xx