At what age was it obvious you weren't NT?

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I think I flew under the radar , for the most part, until going to prep(boarding) school a few days after my 8th birthday. I had not wet the bed for quite a few years, but from 8 to about 11 years old at prep school it was a regular occurrence. Being away from my parents was a major change that I struggled with.

It became obvious that something was wrong when I was almost 4 and a half (the day I started school), but it wasn't easy to diagnose me with anything then because my "peculiar" behaviours weren't the typical autism behaviours.

Before I started school I was very much like any typically developing toddler. I was articulate, I interacted normally with my peers, I was interested in my peers, I didn't line or stack toys or other objects, I didn't display any significant abnormal repetitive behaviours, I made eye contact, I verbally expressed how I was feeling, I wasn't bothered by loud noises....the list goes on.
Then all of a sudden when I started school, I was all frightened and my behaviour changed. It's so weird how that can happen, as my brain seemed to be developing typically before, then all of a sudden I "forgot" how to behave socially and emotionally and became this anxious, tantrum-prone, difficult child.

So if you have a 3-year-old with normal developing social skills for their age, don't put all your eggs in one basket yet, as there's still time where your NT 3-year-old could turn into an autistic 4-year-old, then nothing will be the same again.

About the age of 47 because although I know I have always been different, I did not know what NT meant until then.
If asking at what age I knew I was different? The first time I started school at the age of 4 I guess, because though I would occasionally see another child my age, seeing one child is not the same as meeting lots of children my age and older.
I spent the first two years at play times just standing in the corner of the playground as far away from everyone as I was allowed and I would just stand there not wanting to play or anything. I would just watch people. Hardly spoke a word. I was terrified! And when someone did try to "Play" with me it was an enforced play which was actually bullying... As this kid would try to push me to the floor to try to ride my back. He has older brothers so I guess he was used to riding on their backs. I was petrified.
Then the second year of being in school, a teacher sent reading homework for me, so my Mum spent hours reading the whole book with me time and time again. When in school the teacher would sit us on her lap and we were supposed to read to her, but she had strong perfume and she smoked so the smell (I have later realized how smells have triggered shutdowns) in close proximity (Also I did not like to be handled as I felt claustrophobic) meant that I just could not read.
The teacher assumed I had not done my homework, and sent a note back to my Mum. My Mum wrote back to say I had done my homework. The teacher objected and for the rest of the year she put me in a room on my own ad did not teach me. It was fine by me except she would shout at me despite me not having done anything. It was like I was some sort of enemy to her?
It all ended when other teachers started asking questions and so the teacher gave me a piece of paper and put a glass jar with a few pencils in it in the centre of the tables. I was alone again, and after a while I went to reach for a pencil which I was told I could use. The glass jar tipped over and started rolling towards me, so I placed my hands to catch it when it rolled off the table. However, just as I was about to catch it the teacher came in and shouted "Watch" and I was shocked at her shout which made me miss the jar as it fell.
As the crash had alerted the other teachers and se had to clear the mess up, she dragged me into the class room for the last month or so, but still did not teach me. Every day for the last half hour... Maybe an hour, she would have the children sing, but if I joined in I would be smacked and shouted at. I did not mind, as I preferred not to get involved, though spending every day in the corner standing up when all the other children were allowed to sit down was not fun.
She then was taken ill and ended up with some sort of dissability.
My parents did not know this was all happening and I did not know how to tell them. I missed many playtimes and sometimes missed lunchtimes when I was in that room, but somehow this was a relief for me because playtimes meant bullying by that kid.

The third year was another elderly teacher (The first year was a young teacher). She realized I was intelligent. I had found a single friend in the first year but obviously I was seperated from him in the second year. Found out later he was autistic). I just got back to being allowed to see him again when he dissapeared. Turns out when he was at home he drank some bleach and was off school for ages. I assume he had to go to hospital. After about half the year had passed and he came back to school, he was clearly not with it and he could only rock back and fore. It was something that I had not noticed him do before. I was stopped from seeing him and he was then taken to a special school. As (I did not know this) he was known to be violent after drinking the bleach (Meltdowns?) when I saw him in the village and tried to see him the other childrens Mums and my Mum would stop me. I was told it was because he was autistic, so in my mind I thought autistic people had to go to the special school in the town and taken away from everyone else as soe sort of punishment.
The teacher that year realized I was intelligent and she really brought me on. I quickly caught up and even surpassed most of the children so by the time I was 7 and went to the junior section of that school with a new young teacher, I was doing ok... But...
Then came learning handwriting. Learning it was ok, but it was then that I first realized I learn by a "Two take" system. I mean... I can learn something new. All goes well, but I can come back another day and it is as if I have never learnt it? I have to start all over again and learn it again. The new teacher noticed. She had told me off for not trying at first.
Then she arranged for a man to come to the school and I along with two others were taken out of the classroom and into a small staff room just to see this man with a beard.
I am naturally shy and hardly speak when I was in school. The man asked me questions and I was not answering. Then I heard one of the teachers (I think it was the first teacher I was with from years ago) say "If you don't speak, you have to go to the special school in the town" (She named the town). I did not want to go to the town away from my parents and no way did I want to go to the school where I assumed I would be sent if I had been naughty, so I spoke. Even at that age I was able to see straight through the questions and was able to give answers to avoid going to that school! I remember doing it. I remember thinking to myself the variables and the outcomes of my replies. It was not about speaking the truth for me. It was about avoiding going to that school! I felt homesick every day in the school I was in and that was only two or three minutes from where I live!
The man said "I can't see anything wrong with him" and I was sent back to the classroom by the puzzled teacher I had. She was puzzled! I hardly said a thing when I was in class!
All then went well until I was 11 when we changed to the secondary school. I had passed with high marks from the last school, but the change of schools really effected me and so within two years I went from one of the top classes to the bottom class just above the remedials. Quite a few teachers were puzzled because of this. One elderly maths teacher who seemed somehow to have always been in that school as he taught my Dad and both my brothers, one who is 18 years younger then I am, said to my parents "I don't get it". "I teach him a new subject. He really gets it and can answer everything... Yet he comes back to the next maths lesson a few days later and it is as if he has never been there before! I have to start all over again in teaching him!" I thought this was normal. I did not know the other kids did not do this. It is only since I read something on this site when I realized it is unusual.
Anyway.... Uhmm. I think I have gone off at a tangent as I don't remember what the question was!

My Mum and I have issues with prosopragnosia which is a wierd thing to have because when it kicks in we do not know and other times it does not seem to kick in if that makes sense?
Anyway, before I started doing much research about autism as it was the researching on prosopragnosia which led me to research about autism, I spent ages tryng to find out all I could about prosopragnosia on youtube. I watched every single thing about it on the whole of youtube and it was the last one (Which I was trying to avoid looking at was called "Ask an Autistic" (Because so many people had said I was or asked if I was I was becoming annoyed and autism was becoming a touchy subject with me as I did not think I had it... (Awaiting assessment)), so when I finally clicked on that last link on prosopragnosia, it was like everything started to unravel.

Back to what I am trying to say... It is very common for children that have prosopragnosia to be very quiet and withdrawn in school, but the opposite at home, or with their parents if out and about. This described me at that age to a T.
Every job I ave worked at I have been homesick in. Also every school or collage I have had the same feeling. Why? Because with prosopragnosia one needs the familiar enviroment where one knows every family member. At a school one has to really concentrate on who is who especially today where all schools have their own standard uniform. In the first school that I was in there was no uniform back then so it did make things easier as some kids wore the same clothes and others with rich parents always wore the latest fasions. These differences helped work out who was who when one was less able to remember faces.
The worst place for me would be in the army (Never joined) as apart from being away from the familiarity of home and being constantly homesick everyones haircuts are the same and everyones uniforms are the same. It would be as if everyone had blank faces to me if the prosopragnosia went into overdrive.
I remember voices and the way people walk or talk to recognize people.
It can really throw me off if a lady as changed her hairstyle or hair colour. Mind you, if I know someone has an unusual hair colour like pink for example, it can make it much easier for me to recognize them.

Prosopragnosia is wierd though because sometimes I can recognize people without issues and other times I may upset many people not having a clue who they were. I think anxiety and stress can effect my ability to recognize people. I am not sure.

Anyway. What I am saying is that there is also a link between prosopragnosia and autism because an unusually high proportion of people with protopragnosia are also on the autistic spectrum.

So the being an average child until one hit school age may not just be due to autism but it could also be related to prosopragnosia.

It became obvious to me around the age of 13. I'm not sure when it became obvious to the rest of the world. Probably much earlier.

In my 50s because until then I had no concept of what a neurotypical is.

It should have been obvious by age 4, but neither I nor my parents knew the relevant concepts so it took another 32 years.

obvious to my folks when i was a toddler. obvious to me about 4 decades later [late learner].

Probably soon after my first birthday.

I was probably about 8 when I knew I wasn't like most other kids, but didn't have a word for it until decades later