People are starting to notice that dd2 doesn't speak

[Marne]

We took dd2 to get new shoes yesterday and then took her to a few shops as its not often i get the chance, dh had the day off work so we thought it would be nice to take dd2 out.

She had a melt down in the shoe shop and the lovely lady in the shop was trying to talk to her, dd was totally blanking her and babbling to herself. The woman looked a bit anoyed that dd was blanking her .

Next we looked around a couple second hand shops, in each one the laddies behind the tills tried to talk to dd2, one asked if she was shy, i said 'no, she has autism' and got a very odd look.

Dh was a bit upset as this was the first time in a few months that he had been out with dd2 and he said 'people are starting to notice that she is different' i felt a bit upset but what he's saying is very true. Dd2 looks a lot bigger than her age (she's3.2 but as big as a 4-5 year old), she still goes in a pushchair as sometimes she will refuse to walk.

This morning i put her badge in (which says 'i'm not ignoring you, i have Autism) as advised by dh and then i get people coming up to me and questioning whether she has Autism and saying 'all kids ignore people don't they?'.

I just get fed up with people staring, i don't mind people knowing she has Autism and i like telling people about Autism but i worry about the people who don't have a clue what Autism is and thinking dd is thick because she can't talk.

Sorry about the rant, just needed to write down how i feel .

Oh I've been through this too, ds1 is exactly same age as yours 5 in a bed, he starts reception in September and still has very disjointed and atypical speech. Some days it really gets brought home to you, I have that a lot now ds2 is coming on with his speech (he's 20 months with about 150 words and now putting 3 words together, ds1 had about 15 single words at that age)

I'm quite a friendly person so used to get into conversation with people when out and about but dread them talking to ds and him not responding. I tend to just say, oh he's a slow talker, his dad didn't speak until he's 5 and hasn't stopped since. Which is true, but I hate having to do it.

I'm slowly starting to get that it doesn't matter what other people think. I was chatting to a mum at playgroup with 3 ASD children the other day, she said she's long since given up bothering about others' reactions, she just gets on with things. She is a lovely bubbly person so it was quite reassuring to chat to her. I'm lucky in that a few women at one of the playgroups we go to have direct experience with ASD and similar, even though it's a MS playgroup.