survey on problem births and autism?

[bambi06]

im been wondering for a while whether my difficult birth with my son was ever a trigger for my sons autism and am curious to find out how many of you have had the same experience, could you let me know whether you did in fact have a problem birth or was everything normal lets try and get some figures here, dont worry im just a curious mom not some undercover research team so any info you think appropriate would be briliant..many thanks

Hello bambi06 - interesting question. Although my dd3 birth was not difficult as such, when she was about 3 hours old a rash began to appear on her truck. Around 2 hours later this was all over her trunk, face and spreading to arms and legs, and was now very deep red blotches. She was then taken to special care and injected with antibiotics and kept there until it all cleared up then sent home. This of course may be nothing to do with dd3s asd but I have wondered if this was maybe a trigger.

I had problems with ds birth he was in shock in scbu for 7days after and he is NT. Would details of problem births help atall?

tom- asperger's /ADHD- ventouse delivery-after long labour-18hrs- 2hours of him being stuck in birth canal-maternal exhaustion. Jaundice following birth.

Leigh-asperger's - short intense labour- 4 hours- he was laid on my spine-

alex...likely ADHD- 10 hour labour-waters had to be broken-transverse till 1 week before born

When I was considering whether to go for a vaginal breech delivery with dd2, I was told that statistically there was a higher incidence of 'soft' neurological problems with vaginal breech births than with caesarians.

This apparently means things like ADHD, Asperger's etc. as opposed to 'hard' neurological problems like CP. They were pretty vague about what the mechanism for the connection might be, though.

I went into hospital to be induced when ds1 was a week overdue. I was in labour for 40 hours. His readings were a little erratic so he was monitored internally with the thingummy that they attach to the scalp. He was pretty determined not to be born. When he did eventually make some progress his shoulders got stuck. There were concerns that we might both be at risk of infection because my waters had been broken for so long and so we were both given antibiotics while waiting for results of blood tests. The tests showed no sign of infection so we both came off the antibiotics again. Ds1 wouldn't feed at all (breast or bottle). By the time the MWs took it seriously (3 days later) ds1 was in a bad way and had to be tube-fed before being taken off to the SCBU. He seemed to shut down for a while and did nothing but sleep for the next 2 days. The nurse would phone the postnatal ward to tell me that ds1 was awake. I would get there 2mins later (literally as the 2 wards were side-by-side) and he would have fallen asleep again.

Ds2 was induced 2 weeks early because of his size. Labour was only 6hrs long and generally straighforward but a MW did comment on ds2 being difficult. The shoulders got stuck again but this was expected and a doctor was already waiting by my bed. Ds2 fed straight away for 40 long minutes. We went home the next day.

Some people have suggested a link between syntocinon use and autism. But then syntocinon tends to go with less straightforward births. It's always going to be hard to separate out the variables, DS1 was born by section after a long labour (induced). Syntocinon was used, but he never showed any signs of distress. (Section was for non-progression).

Dd was born after a long final stage when she refused to budge and was eventually delivered by ventouse. She refused to breastfeed and was back in hospital for severe jaundice a week later. She has had no problems at all and in fact has always been well ahead on every milestone.

Ds on the other hand, was born after a labour totalling 4 hours, with 1 puff of gas and air and no stitches. He breastfed very well after a slightly tricky beginning but has autism. The only 'alarm bell' I can think of in retrospect was that he was a bit slow to cry after the birth and the midwife seemed quite relieved when he did.

ds was a small bump and I had to get extra scans. He was born at 6lbs 2oz and at 8 days late was labelled 'small for date'. The birth was quite straightforward though. I just had one shot of morphine and he came out fairly easily. He was a difficult baby, didn't seem to know how to feed... I'd say the autism in his case happened before he was even born. Interesting topic.

DD- long, long, long second stage and eventual delivery by ventouse. Foetal head monitor. Very distressed and nearly had a section. Turned back to spine during labour. Epidural late on for really bad back pain. Apgar scores fine, though, and came out screaming. Nightmare breastfeeding, too 'aggressive'. Jaundice and light treatment for 48 hours after birth. DD has autism (for those who don't know!)

DS- slow warm up then really straightforward, quick birth with a little gas and air. Breastfed fine.

We don't know if my dd1 is on the spectrum but she has some traits and it hasn't yet been ruled out.

Induced birth with prostin as 2 weeks late. Undiagnosed breech. Short very intense labour: tried to deliver her vaginally, got to late pushing stage but she was stuck and suffering foetal distress, so I had an emergency Caesarean.

Physically fine as a baby but screamed non-stop when put down for the first five months. PND and serious bonding problems that still not completely resolved

twin girls, i had c section as a had renal colic they were born at 35 weeks 4lb 8oz and 4lb 14oz,
they have autism and i think they always had autism, my son born at 40 weeks 28 hour labour then section as only 4cm dilated son very alert and no problems, he developed well talking and using potty by 18 months then lost it all overnight after being poorly, started lining jumping flapping head banging lost all words and all eye contact, i feel he became autistic around 18 months.

My friend had a very difficult birth and her DS is currently undergoing tests for aspergers/autism. Don't know if he's on the scale or not and even the experts are finding it difficult to pinpoint but he definitely has hearing problems which is probably making things a bit more difficult for the wee soul.

Interesting topic - shall watch with interest

Gosh!
Will look at this with interest and a little worry.

Ds born at 42 weeks. Was booked in for caesar, but went into labour two days prior, was still in labour at appointed time but wasn't allowed to have it as had to 'try myself'. He was very big and head never engaged. Had emergency caesar in the end. He was in distress. They took blood from his scalp in utero twice to get oxygen readings. Apgar scores OK. I do wonder about all the morphine I was having post-op, it must go into breast milk? He had antibiotics (pessary) at one week for umbilical stump that wasn't healing, me too for scar not healing properly, guess this probably gets into your milk too.

We adopted J and so can comment on his birth personally, however we did find out , by accident some very interseting info relating to his arrival into this big wide world.

pparently his birth mom had decided that she was going to give birth to J by herself with no medical intervention. She was in labour for over 45 hours and finaly relented and called a cab to take her to the hospital. Unfortunately J was born whilst she was getting out of the cab - he literally fell out and sustained a head injury which resulted in him spending 72 hours in the SCUBU.

We are unable to find any details relating to this incident and the hospital can not trace his records giving reasons why he was in the SCUBU - all we have is some unreadable scribble in his developmental book.

Pead has offered us a CT scan or MRI but both would involve a GA - last time J had a GA he was rushed into ICU because he had a bad reaction to the GA - don't want to take the risk again.

I am pretty sure that J had his ASD traits from birth but they appeared to become much more noticable by the time he reached 24 months. My hubby is convinced that J's ASD was triggered by the MMR vaccine. He had it at 22 months - the night following the vaccine he had a raging temp and was covered in a rash all over his body - he was admitted to hospital because he was convulsing. Hubby says thats the night we lost our son - I'm not so sure though. I think J always ahd ASD traits - we just were naieve and didn't recognise them.

J is very small for his age - nearly 9 and in age 6-7 clothing and he has the smallest head - hence the nickname his brother calls him - pin head.

Thanks for starting this thread; following the discussion on another thread I am very curious about this too!

My DS1 nearly died when he was born. The foetal heart monitor had not detected any signs of distress, and there was no meconium, but after what seemed to be a pretty normal labour and delivery he came out blue, not moving or crying, not making any respiratory effort and with a heart rate of only 40 bpm. It took over ten minutes and three adrenalin shots, the third one odirectly into his heart, to bring him round, by which time he had obviously suffered lack of oxygen although it was not possible to tell the extent of this.

Should have said, DS1 only scored 1 on his five minute apgars.

Jay'smum- you could be both right. Some children are born more vulnerable. Children who are slow to develop (within the normal range but at the slow end) are slow because their nerve cells are slow to mature (just biological- not a sign of lack of intelligence or anything- just like some children get teeth earlier than others). Anywya if your neurones are less mature they are more open to damage. So along comes the MMR (or something else) and a bad reaction knocks him off course.

We think a whole series of events led to the severity of ds1's condition. Clearly there's a genetic predisposition to immune conditions in our family- there are loads of them. Thimerosil and autoimmunity are now known not to be a good mix. Added to which ds2 (completely NT) developed speech in a very odd way - although language was always fine. DS1 certainly had some sensory problems from early on, and was in the late but normal range for all his milestones- but then at 11 months he became ill- was treated quite aggressively (had to be) and after that had a very obvious regression. Whether he was heading into problems before the illness I'm not sure- I'm sure aspects of his development were a bit out, but I think the illness was the trigger for the severity of his autism.

I know of a local paed who says something quite similar about the potential pathways to autism (ie some children are more vulnerable to environmental influences and therefore more likely to be affected by vaccines/illness etc). He is the paed for my friend's dd who had a very similar reaction to the MMR to Jay- and this pead has said that although they can never be certain it is likely in her case that her condition was MMR triggered.

wow what a response, thanks everyone,its certainly interesting what everyone says and there seems to be some link whether by the fact they were predisposed to it or it was the cause, who knows and i wonder whether we will ever know? but i feel personally that my son had something from the moment he was born, wasnt interested in feeding and only wanted to sleep then had to be rushed into scbu at 10 days old due to an umilical infection and was admitted for a wek of intravenous antibiotics, he still doesnt eat and i mean really severely restricted diet!reached all his milestone swell ahead of time. sitting up at 4 mths ,crawling and pulling himself to stand at 6 months and walking at 10 months with a full set of teeth by 1 yr old but ironically he doesnt eat with them!! he had the mmr late at 18 mths and behaviour became more pronounced lthough he did have from early age certain traits but i feel it pushed it over the edge when he had the mmr and i`ve refused the booster.god knows whether i should have just accepted the cs when the birth got more difficult and the fact he was 3 weeks late maybe didnt help but i refused to be induced and he was monitored and everything was normal so ...?anyway thanks for info and keep the thread going and well see what everyone thinks about this ..take care all

Jimjambells, your son's history sounds very similar to my DD (think we've had this conversation on a thread elswhere!). Although there were early signs with DD (a high pain threshold, an intense early 'stare', an incredibly passive personality), DD hit all her milestones- crawled at 6 months, babbled, imitated our facial expressios etc until a really bad ear infection at 8 months. Following those antibiotics she totally shut down and had a very marked regression. She went silent almost overnight. I often think about it and the fact that she had had the 'triple' vaccine at 4, 5 and 6 months- so much for her immune system to take, if she was particularly vulnerable. My DH's uncle had a very bad reaction to one of the very first whooping cough vaccines. He had learning difficulties and I think there is a strong possiblity he may have been autistic but DH's family won't talk about it. I thought long and hard before giving DD the triple and spoke to several professionals about it.

i've heard this theory about difficult births and learing disability before and I'm not sure there isn't someone researching it somewhere...... or did I imagine it??
DS's birth was quite difficult, meconium in the waters whcih is not a good sign, had to be vetoused and had a big red veiny point on his head, also didn't cry immediately. However, my feeling is (and that's all it is) is that in his case, he was "not ready to be born" iyswim. I think his moderately difficult birth was because he already had problems. Imagine the sensory overload of being born to a baby with autism and big sensory issues! I know many other mums whose children with ASD had difficult births, but then many others who had birth problems and no ASD...... THis is one of the reasons I opted for C section with DD last year, just a very little doubt that his birth may have contributed, although I think he already had ASD you don't want to take any chances do you and with 11 people in the operating theatre (not inc me and DH) DD certainly got lots of attention!

I had a very difficult birth with dd and I still beleive it has contributed to her microcephaly and learning disabilities. i am still waiting 5 years later for anyone and genetics to prove me wrong

I had a c-section with my 2nd aswell and so far no problems.

there was study i think about learning disabilities and bad births going hand in hand but i suppose this is quite difficult to prove tbh.

jakbrown, there are learning disabilities on dh's side of the family but it is never spoke about. Dh uncle lived with his mother until she died and was then institutionalised. All we ever get off MIL is he was 'simple' and my nephew is so obviously dyspraxic but sil and bil insist he is so clever as if a dyspraxic diagnosis would hinder him in any way sorry will get off my soapbox now

I had a difficult birth with dd but as I know her condition is genetic I assume her condition 'caused' the difficult birth. A bit like Davros I don't think she was 'ready' to be born. Basically she didn't turn to get through the pelvic bone and I now think that was because her brain wasn't sending her the instinctive messsage to do so. Just as she isn't 'instinctively' walking or talking.

i reckon it maybe something to do with kids born with autism not wanting to participate in the whole birth proceedure, and who can blame them, it must be sensory overload

I never thought of that Davros & HITC.
Ds3 was induced with syntocinon 72 hours after my waters broke, 8 days late. Once the drip was started at about 7.30pm the labour was fast and he was born at 9.00pm.
I declined the antibiotcs offered to him and in fact discharged us both from hospital against Doctors advice as I was not happy with post natal care.
I think he always was autistic, but that an operation at 1 yr in which he experienced breathing problems and required large doses of antibiotics compounded his needs and imo, particulary the fairly severe memory problems he has.