Autism Spectrum?
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How can I figure out if Connor needs to have an Autism evaluation? Your posts on my "hitting" subject spurred me to think I need to investigate a little.
The things I struggle with are:
1. Hitting- He seems to do it when he's mad, but sometimes he does it randomly. And, once a day he'll even hit himself in the face over and over.
2. Eating- He's still very picky. I put new things in front of him all the time but he refuses vegetables or anything warm. He'll touch it and say "hot" and then refuse it. He won't eat pizza, mac and cheese, spaghetti, hot dogs...anything remotely warm he won't put in his mouth. He smelled broccoli last night only because I told him it was a flower. He won't eat it though. (BTW, he has NEVER had food that was too hot and scared him away from warm food.)
3. Drinks lots of diluted juice- Over the course of the day, he'll drink 12 total ounces, but I dilute them in his sippy cups. He has 3 in the morning and another 2 in the afternoon. They're super diluted. Although, he started doing this after I took away the pacifier when he was 14 months old. It was about the same time he began getting picky about his food.
He eats a lot, but it's the same food over and over and over...
What do your SLP and OT think? I know when I see kids that I might think are on the autism spectrum, I am often the first to notice some of the characteristics. Doctor visits are usually so quick and focused on health issues that a lot of times doctors don't pick up on the subtle characteristics. He's eating stuff is classic sensory disorder and the OT or SLP should be working on this. You have my email. If you'll send me your snail mail address I can email you a packet of info on things to do at home to work on this. Doesn't he have an eval at Johns Hopkins soon?
Here's the DSM-IV criteria that is used to diagnose autism, Asperger's, PDD, etc. When I have a child in therapy that I suspect may be on the spectrum I highlight the criteria that I have seen and jot down some specifics like for stereotyped behaviors I'll write "hand flapping" or "twirling" to give the doctor some specific information since the doctor may or may not see that behavior during the visit. A team and/or a neurologist would do the evaluation.
Hey Pam, thanks so much. I will look at that link tomorrow morning. My eyes and body are too tired tonight.
I am supposed to get an eval at Kennedy Krieger but I heard that if there isn't a red flag for Autism, they won't see them for 6 months, at least.
I'll call the county OT who saw him. She told me that he was just a picky eater because he uses a spoon and fork well and will eat gooey things like yogurt and applesauce. However, at the time, I didn't think of foods as being "hot" because he never told me why he wouldn't eat those foods. Once he found the words, I found a pattern. I should have known. He refused warm milk at 4 months of age.
He doesn't do a lot of hand flapping but he will jump A LOT. He doesn't have a lot of imagination with toys, but maybe I just need to rotate them more often. I have a hard time cooking for 5 minutes without him wanting to be held. He wants to be held A LOT, almost like he likes the pressure. He's even started to fake cry though which gives me reason to believe he might be doing it for attention.
Grrrr...makes me wish I had stayed pre-med...
Heidi, I have a great checklist of red flags, which is packed in the filing cabinet tonight but I'll try to get to it tomorrow. When we were trying to figure out what was going on with Seth, the DSM-IV criteria was almost pointless. It was just too hard to wade through.
Offhand, the major points I can think of are lack of imagination with standard toys (not making honking or vrooming noises when playing with cars, not pretending to feed a baby doll), a need for rituals and things in a specific order (pjs, teeth brush and then a book when getting ready for bed, NEVER a book before brushing his teeth), self-stimulatory behavior (hand-flapping, spinning, jumping in place), a lack of eye contact unless forced (this one stymied us with Seth but we realized he was looking at our mouths, not eyes), does he point out or look for an airplane when one is audible and flying overhead?, does he show off his block towers or want you to build them with him? Does he play ritualistically with toys (spinning the wheels on a car or lining books or videos up and not wanting them moved)? Does he want to watch the same movie or TV show over and over? (Seth would watch Fantasia on video up to 6 times a day and loved old Tom and Jerry cartoons. I realized he liked T&J because there is almost no speech, just physical humor.)
That's all I can think of tonight. Fried brain must be going around tonight. I'll try to find the list I found so helpful tomorrow afternoon. I realize that you and Pam have probably exchanged email addresses but if you'd like to talk to a BTDT mom, drop me a line at t i n k a m a r i n k a t g m a i l d o t c o m {{{Heidi}}}
My guy isn't officially on the spectrum, but rather has some autistic tendancies.
The eye contact is a big one. Mine was also really funny with other people, like they didn't even exist. Although he would point things out to me and show me, with others he would just ignore them.
Likes to line stuff up. Things all have an order. For example, we had one of those roller coaster bead things, he would have to put all the blues together and would just flip if something was amiss.
For us the key word was "intense" he was just "more" of everything than other kids. Louder, busyier, etc.
Mine does lots of self stimming, touches his belly button, has to play with ears, can't handle certain textures of clothes, etc.
All that being said, mine is labeled as sensory dysfuction and we just started some adhd meds which sure help alot, so I guess that will be a dx now too.
Heidi:
I was reading your post, and wanted to add that ARI has a great check list on it's website. If you google Childhood Autism Rating Scale or CARS rating scale you should find it. You can also check out our chapter's website and read our definitions on what autism is. Our website is: www.freewebs.com/calnaa/
The CARS rating scale you can mail to Autism Research Institute (the address is on Adams Street in San Diego) and they will mail you back the results in about a weeks time. I did this, and while you cannot use their results as a diagnosis, it can be very helpful to take to an IEP or evaluation. I don't know how old your son is, but most of the questions ask about behavior between the early ages of 0-5 years old. Sometimes, it is hard to remember all the things you saw if your child is older, but it can as I said be extremely helpful.
Please also feel free to write to me off list at Aria@NationalAutism.org
Good luck.
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