is there such thing as mild autism?

[lozza1985]

hi i was wondering if some can give me some advice please ? over the weekend we was at a bbq i got chatting to a lady there and she was saying her daughter has mild autism me and my husband have thought for a while now she has a lot of signs of this ie: terrible tantrums , hurting herself,very very shy, not good with change,cant stand labels in clothing,avoids eye contact,very sesitive to smell and noise,she flys off the handle at the smallest thing the whole house has to walk on eggshells around in fear of her going crazy , she is seeing a speech therapist next month as she talks quite baby like also if we are doing something ie the dentist we have to keep reminding her whats happenening becuase she will go nuts she is our middle dd we have a ds whos 8 and a dd whos 2 we are at the end of our tether with what to do for her we love her dearly buts shes such hard work, has anyone got any advice the can share with my or there opinions pls xx

'Mild autism' isn't really a diagnosis, but autism does run along a spectrum.

At one end you may have children with severe, classic autism (often non-verbal or with severe developmental delays in many areas), at the other end is high functioning autism (HFA - generally have less severe delays and can appear 'normal' for want of a better word) or Asperger's (children with autistic traits but no speech delay and average or above average intelligence).

No two autistic children are the same, although they may share characteristics from a list of recognised 'autistic traits'.

If you have niggling feelings about your child, definitely ask your GP to refer on to a Paediatrician, who can start the ball rolling with diagnosis if this is appropriate. Keep an open mind and good luck!

How old is your daughter? It would be worth chatting your school Special Ed. Needs Co-ordinator to see if they can arrange for an assessment from an Educational Psychologist. Or you could discuss this with your GP and get a referral that way.
If your daughter is very young, they might want to hold off assessing till she's a bit older.
There are very few girls diagnosed with autism compared to boys, but this may have something to do with the signs appearing more obvious with boys. See this article: www.yourlittleprofessor.com/girls.htmlhere
If you google 'aspergers girls' or 'autism girls' you should come up with lots of useful info.
From your description of your daughter, I would suggest this is possibly something you'd want to investigate further.

hi thanks for your replies my daughter is 4 in 3 weeks i think ill get her in with gp and see what he says x

Do not be fobbed off re the GP. Ask at that time for a referral to a developmental paediatrician.

The link doesn't work. Please could you try again.

The link should be: www.yourlittleprofessor.com/girls.html

www.yourlittleprofessor.com/girls.html