I think my daughter may be autistic.

[mummy2424]

For sometime now my 8 year old daughter has been very distant, she is extremely clever but seems to have trouble with maths and she finds it very hard to concentrate on the same thing for over 30 mins, she gets up alot and wonders around annoying everyone has aggresive out bursts then calms down again, it is like she cant control her behaviour and can sometimes act like her 4 year old brother, she constantly repeats herself asking odd questions like "how much did that cost" i dont know any child that cares how much anything costs. she sniffs and examines her food before she eats and shouts very hurtful comments to me and although i try so hard nothing helps. at the moment she loves animals and keeps asking for a dog, i am torn because i know she would it and care for it but would she get bored of it? many people say animals help in situations like this and can help with teaching responsibility and keep kids focused, does this seem like autistic behaviour?

I don't think you'd find anyone on this board who will say 'yes' or 'no'. Clearly there are some traits there and clearly you are worried.

Get her off to the GP for a referral to the community paediatrician who look at her and give you an informed opinion to as what seems to be going on.

Thanks I do intend to do that, I didnt want to come straight out with it infront of her and GP and just wanted to know if anyone had any similar issues with their child and if anyone knew if these portrayed any symptoms.

Hi

You say 'for a long time' how long? In order to get a diagnosis of ASD there must have been traits before she turned three.

But if the difficulties are more recent than that, I would get checked with a GP as tehre are a myriad of different causes, some serious but some curable.

Whichever, I would definitely see a gp; only a Paewd can gice you a yes or no (or sometimes at 8 a Psych) and that's the answer you need.

If there are "traits" before the age of three can you tell us, please, why health services fail to identify vast numbres of children.

Huh sorry? I didn;t understand that.

My kids had as hard a fight for a dx as anyones I can assure you!

It's simple diagnostic criteria: to get a DX of asd there has to be evidence of it existing before the age of three.

Whya re there such delays? Oh I don;t know. Underinformed specialists for a start who beleive in things like if your child smiles or makes eye contact then it cannot be ASD. Stupid waiitng lists to see specialists that the PCT insists are (usually rightly) part of an assessment- here we don;t ahev an ed psych, we borrow one when needed, takes ages to get to the top of that list.

GPs not referring.

All sorts I guess.

(When I say 'we' I don;t actually work for any of these bodies! Am a carer with 2 asd kids who is studying it)

And let's not forget it is a 'spectrum' and some kids will be clearer to diagnose than others. Tagging a kid with the ASD label is a major major diagnosis and so, quite rightly, plenty of observations have to be undertaken.

Who says that there has to be evidence of it existing BEFORE the age of three? Who told you that?

DSM Criteria http://www.autreat.com/dsm4-autism.html here

OOps sorry

poor linjk here

I could go and find the DSM proper rather than a link which shows the criteria, do I need to do that?

Thank you. But why do so many children and adults not get diagnosed? Has the Internet and easier access to information made it easier for parents to identify these conditions?

Lucindacarlisle - seriously?
The cynic in me says that it takes.so long to diagnose because once a dx is there, then provision should be available too.

Same for Statement once at school too. If that can he delayed, then the provision/money foes not need to be found.

I started raising questions with my BH when dd1 was about 10 months old. There was clearly something not right about her development.

It took us 10 more months to even be taken seriously (i was continually told she was beautiful and good.. Since when did these things exclude an ASD dx?).

Once referred, it took another 8 months to be seen.

Dd1 was dx at 2.8 ish, and that is really quite early, but I had been shouting to be seen for nearly 2 years.

If I had taken any one of the yg/docs/paed advice, and waited to see what happened, we could still he stuck in that nightmare now. It takes a lot of guts to repeatedly push and tell people there is something wrong with your child, when you are being robbed off, patronize as a new mother, told that every worries, it is only natural to do so (FWIW, dd1 is very severely ASD, not a borderline case)

The whole system is a joke.

Sorry, typing on phone. BH and yg should be "hv"

Oh so very many reasons!

OK a basic one first: Aspergers as a diagnosis didn;t begin to be used ehre until the 1990's. Some areas don;t offer adult diagnostic services: hence some adults will never get a dx. I think I remember Devon is one of those though I may be wrong.

Girls sometimes present differently to boys and a great many professionals simply are unaware of how it can be displayed across the genders: that leads to a suspected 1 in 4 being picked up.

I do vaguely remember a similar figure for ASD in the black community being missed but can't recall the exact reasons why. May well ahve been USA research so linked to poverty (poverty is more widespread in American black community, a sad fact).

Teaching- ATM teachers typically undergo a day max of training on all the SN, yet their views are considered essential when providiong a dx. Our teachers for ds1 were adamant there was nothing up, at 10 he is on HR Care and a cadidate for a place in a special AS comp unit. Formally diagnosed since 6.

And with adults I think manya re misdiagnosed: I have obvious at time undiagnosed low level AS; I have coping mechanisms and if you met me you might think I was depressed, I am not. The specialist (Paed Psych who runs a tertiary clinic and the clinic for diagnosing people who are adult or who have severe LD so specialist) who came into Uni to chat to us about it says that she only sees adults if tehir ASD has caused them specific problems to trigger a request: relationship split, unemployability, MH issues etc. Whereas there are a lot of us ticking along in marriages to supportive dh's either in work that we can cope with or maybe being SAHP or retired that will never see the light of day, and if we ever did present at a GP I would hazard a guess we'd get a prescription for prozac before anything else was considered.

And yes what SF says LOL- the cynic has to agree.

And yes the internet helps (am considering an MA diss. on that actually) but word was spreading anyway- I spotted DS1's ASD when a charity I worked for asked me to get BIBIC in to do a chat on ASD. I'd worked with severely affected individuals before but not those with AS. Up until then I thought I was just a shit mum.

OP you don't have to take her to the GP they cannot diagnose only refer. I would go without her so you can spell out concerns initially. Have you talked to school pretty much the first thing a paed will do is write to school and ask for their view.

However, If you can get the GP on your side and wavelength, then he can possibly expedite the referral and get a quick appointment. Otherwise the referral may disappear down a black hole.