ASD diagnoses 3 yr old boy

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I have a three year old who has just been diagnosed with ASD. I think it is high functioning though I am yet to understand more about it. what confuses me is the diagnoses there is a lot of grey area in how people are diagnosed in India.Here is some info on my son: My son doesn’t make any sounds when he stims ( I don’t know whats stimming ) although he tries to feel surfaces and sees them from the corner of his eyes when hes tired or hungry. Ive also seen him flip pages quickly but that only happens when hes exhausted. Is that stimming?
He mostly touches surfaces and walks when he is outdoors in a new place with us. He loves to see elevators opening and closing and likes the idea of going on the escalators by himself. He is fiercely independent when it comes to operating gadgets etc. He used to find washing machines and fans interesting now hes over them and loves to flush all day long. Hand leading present when he had no vocabulary now it is better now because he says the name of the object and then if I still wont get it for him he would lead me by my hand. He knows how to play videos and games on the ipad , phone etc, he started combining two words together but not as often as it should be. he does recognize and speaks numbers letter of the alphabet in Hindi and English, animals vehicles etc, he also can count upto 20 and recognizes most shapes. He can also say his name if asked what is your name and spell it too.
My son sings almost all rhymes and song some words are understandable and getting clearly with time and yes you can hear beats more than the words in some songs. The problem with him is he does not interact with his peers although I see a lot of parallel play now and very often he gazes at children playing and smiles back at them. He even says hi and bye to everyone in the playground these days and makes more eye contact than he used to.He just doesn’t know how to play with them.
He has also shown some pretend play like cuddling and kissing his teddies, overtaking his toy vehicles or using a bucket as a steering wheel and talking on toy phones but not as often again according to my DP. He also smiles and makes eye contact with me more than anyone else and very often kisses and hugs me and even says I love u . He is also completely potty trained now. He did rotate objects when till about 2 years some months but then now it has completely stopped. He has also learnt to stay dry at night so were doing good there. Yes another big problem he has is that he wont chew food he used to have a bad reflux as a baby but now i don’t know why he just is not interested in chewing as a baby too he never put things in his mouth even if he did it wasn’t as often as most children do. I have to get a speech therapist to intervene now for this problem. But what does his behavior sound to you? Is he really high functioning or are these doctors just trying to make money out of me.

Someone with children is better placed to answer, having babysat a lot in my teens he sounds like a normal, socially interactive 3 year old to me. Just because a child shows some autistic traits doesn't mean the child is autistic.

There may be other things that will present problems later, or things that you haven't described, but from what you have written here he sounds like an interactive, sociable child.

[Moved from General Autism Discussion to Parents' Discussion]

Try and find a support group, other moms, other aspie kids. A picture speaks a thousand words
Figure out what you can do for him and his welfare.

Watch his diet, he will likely be more sensitive to foods than other children.
When you change his nappy, you can monitor how different foods affect him, as well as joining dots between foods and behaviours

I am not sure if you are doubting his diagnosis and wonder if he has autism?
Or if you are doubting he is high functioning?

He sound like there is a lot of traits of autism in your description. The high functioning is probably because of his language skills and interactions.

There are all levels of ASD and it is very difficult to tell the future based on the level of functioning at age three.

"Functioning" is a very undefined term and I don't think it really has good medical use.

The thing that is important for you right now is to make sure your son is getting what he needs. Sounds like speech and communication are areas of concern. I am not sure if there is a speech therapist available to you, but that would be a wise use of your resources if so.

There is a very good website I just found with a collection of resources for parents, including speech resources, here: http://www.asha.org/Publications/leader ... bsites.htm

I highly recommend the Itunes U lectures on autism that is linked there - essentially it is an undergraduate behavioral science course offered by Yale University. It is very helpful to understand autism and acquire the language needed to talk to professionals. I'm about half-way through the course, it is free and can be viewed from the internet, so you should be able to get it in India.

I am a little confused, too. It sounds like you are asking if he has HFA (High functioning Autism) or if he is neurotypical. One of the things I have learned is that the labels are not so important necessarily as knowing what specific strengths and weaknesses he has unless you need the label to access help.

So whether he is HFA or not, if he has issues with speech then he has issues with speech. You know what I mean? So if you are wanting to know if the therapies being suggested are a waste of money, probably the best thing to do is name all the therapies that have been suggested to you and what they are supposed to fix (and how delayed your child is, in whatever that skill is) and then we can weigh in on what experiences we have had. Not everything that is autistic needs to be or can be "fixed." Some things are actually positive if not necessarily typical of neurotypical children.