16.5 month old possible asd or as?? need insight please :)

Post Reply New Topic

Both my children have ASD. The first child talked at an extremely early age, the second one, born three years later, would drag me around the house and just point, grunting, until she was about 3.

Now they are 18 and 21. The youngest is very outgoing amongst her friends, she must have a dozen of them...The eldest, the early talker, only has online friends. Both of them are doing well.

Regardless of the diagnosis, future, just remember he will be fine! Mom's love stretches forever....

I spoke at an extremely early age and didn't discover I had AS until I was in my thirties. My son just turned two and is still at the dragging and grunting stage and I worry about this a lot. How did your second begin talking? Did she require therapy and effort or did it just come along naturally? Were the skills picked up quickly once begun?

My daughter said a few words before 3, but preferred not to talk. Once she started talking, she talked a lot! No special intervention was needed, she just picked it up on her own.

I did have her in day care from age 2-3, and she never spoke a word there. They were very concerned. She would speak to her peers there sometimes. She was diagnosed at 8 with Selective Mutism, a physical inability to talk in certain situations due to extreme anxiety. She was also diagnosed with Central Auditory Process Disorder - she hears fine, but can't process the words until much later. She seems to have outgrown that, as she does so well in school, and doesn't need to take notes, she just gets it right away. I have CAPD and still have problems with it.

By the way, your son is adorable!

Thank you

As we parent our own son, my husband and I are looking back at our own past for clues. He did not speak until he was 3 - and alarmed his pediatrician. My MIL insisted it was because his brothers were doing all the talking for him, so the clue was completely ignored...but apparently he began speaking in full, clear sentences at the age of 3 and was teased for most of the rest of his childhood for talking too much. I get the impression that this is not unusual for the kids who don't speak who eventually talk (don't have any experience with the kids who remain nonverbal, sorry.)

I'm no professional, but provided your son can hear and respond well, I'd work on making sure he has a way to practice communicating - homemade PECS or something of the sort.

my youngest, dx autistic disorder, also was delayed in speech seemingly by his own choice. he could say a few words by 2, and phrases by 3, so he didnt quality as significantly delayed, but the main issue was he chose not to use them. there was only one word he used a LOT, it was "no" (or rather "gnome" which was how he pronounced it ) and he used it every time we asked him to say something ask him to say mommy, "gnome", ask him to say juice, "gnome", bribe him with chocolate to say daddy, "gnome", and he absolutely loves chocolate! he did a lot of pulling us around by the finger and pointing at what he wanted. he'll be 5 this week, and he is very verbal and talks a lot, altho he still has issues with conversational speech. once he started preschool at 3.5 yrs, his speech really took off. he does get ST now for articulation and pragmatics, but that didnt start until he had started talking a lot more.

we had autism suggested to us a couple times in his toddler years, in part because of his speech. we put it off and blamed it on familial history; my SO didnt talk until he was almost 4, and he was always trying to calm my fears by saying that Einstein didnt talk until he was 4. whoops, heh, at the time, we didnt know my SO was autistic and Einstein had traits and some think he was, too.

LOL. I wonder how many adults are in the same boat.

Find the M-CHAT ASD test for toddlers online and run through it. My little one absolutely aced it.
In fact I just retook it and he's still 16/23 and 6/6 at 4 years old.

My daughter never pointed at things, they had to teach her to do that but she would drag us to things and put our hand on it. Also she did babble constantly sometimes she still does, we call it "Maddy speak". She started making animals noises around two and a half and said words after therapy started at three. She started speaking in sentences at four and is now five and nine months and can carry on a bit of conversation. If anyone wants to see her progression from age five to now she has a few videos on youtube entitled Autistic Princess.
Typically Asperger's is not diagnosed until after age five and they start school but I have heard of kids being diagnosed much younger. My son was diagnosed at age six. I also have an eighteen year old daughter who was diagnosed shortly after me when she was age sixteen. We were all diagnosed after my five year old daughter. We didnt know what Autism was until we had her. Im very thankful for her not just for obvious reasons but because we became very well educated in Autism and were able to see it in two of my other children and in myself. Its been very helpful to all of us to know and to seek the assistance that we need. Acceptance and understanding is the key to happiness, at least in my world.