I?ve started a new thread here (sorry) cos I didn?t want to hjack the other one with my very specific query! In Greenspans ?Engaging Autism? He writes:
^The core, or primary components of autism involve difficulties in the areas of relating, communicating, and thinking. Parents and professionals should consider the following:
? Is the child having trouble establishing true intimacy and warmth; seeking out those adults they are really comfortable with like the mother, father, or key caregiver? Can he show some warmth in that relationship?
? Can the child communicate with gestures, with emotional expressions? Can she get into a continuous flow of back-and-forth emotional signaling with smiles, frowns, head nods and other interactive gestures?
? When the child uses words, can he use them meaningfully in emotionally relevant ways? In other words, are the words invested with emotion or affect so it?s ?Mommy, I love you? or ?I want that juice please? rather than ?This is a table?.
If these three components are not present ? the capacity for intimacy, the capacity for exchanging and reciprocating different types of emotional gestures in a continuous way, and the capacity for using emerging words or symbols meaningfully with good emotional intent, then we should consider that the child may be showing a form of an autistic spectrum disorder.^
MY CONCERN: is that for DS1 (2.5 with a dx of ASD) we can answer ?Absolutely!? for the first 2 primary components. The third one is harder as he is very limited verbally. I would lean towards saying ?no? at this stage. What I don?t understand is that if 2 are present and 1 is not ? is he still (by greenspans definition) ASD? Or much he have all 3?
We have been struggling with understanding all the ?grey? in ASD, struggling to understand how exactly the dx was made,and what are the key underlying issues that we need to address are (NOT knocking the dx as we are estatic to be in the system and know that time will be the greatest indicator)