I think my 3 yr old nephew may be autistic...

Victoriahl

Hi everyone


I just wanted some opinions really on whether you think my three year old nephew may be autistic, as it's not something I feel I can bring up with the child's mother or grandmother. I've looked on a couple of autism forums but the posts on there are rarely replied to, and I know people on here are generally very helpful and give good advice in many areas.



It's actually my niece's child in question- he's three and three months now and ever since he was a baby myself and other members of my family have thought there was something 'not quite right'. He's never really interacted at all- when he was a baby you could call his name, shake rattles, throw balls, anything to get his attention, and he never responded. None of the usual smiles and baby gurgles, or wanting to roll a ball; just a vacant stare somewhere else in the room.



Now he's three there's still no independent speech- he'll copy two or three words when he's playing with my five year old son, but he'll never ask for anything or interact verbally. If we take him to a theme park, play barn or zoo, he'll never crack a smile or run around looking excited like most children do. Even if he's on a ride, he'll sit impassively, never catching anyone's eye if you stand waving at him.



I've heard his mother asking him things like "How does the choo choo train go?" and then being pleased if he makes a "choo choo" action with his arms- to me this is something a one year old should be doing?


He's not potty trained either, which I know some boys aren't at gone three, but I just can't imagine him even being able to ask or convey that he needs the toilet; as I said, he doesn't communicate at all.



He spends a lot of his time playing on his own in the house- my niece (who's not the brightest spark to be honest) just thinks she's got a quiet child, and her mother (the child's grandmother) would be so defensive if I was to mention that something might be wrong, that I don't really want to broach the subject unless I've got a bit more information.



He goes to nursery, so I don't know if they've picked up on anything, but they might not notice if they've got lots of other children to concentrate on as well?



I know some boys are slow at talking, slow at potty training etc, but that combined with the lack of expression, emotion and interaction, just sets off some warning signals to me- do all these things sound pretty typical of autistic children? I just think the quicker he gets some sort of help if he IS autistic, the better...


Thanks
Victoria

balletshoes

How often does he go to nursery Victoria, and how long is he there for when he goes?
If he goes to nursery regularly, and is there over mealtimes etc I'm fairly sure the nursery staff would notice what you're noticing, and would have spoken to your niece about it already if they thought it was a concern.

MX5huggy

Has the Health Visitor been in at all for 2 year or 3 year checks?

They should be picking up this type of stuff.

tea_lover

Has his hearing been checked recently?

daska

TBH I have no idea, it doesn't fit with my experiences of autism but ASD is a huge spectrum and, the quote runs along the lines of "if you've seen one child with autism, you've seen one child with autism".

However! As a parent of a child with severe language delay (though totally unlike this child in all other ways from what you've said) I would suggest that you broach the subject of him not talking as well as his peers. If there is a problem then the sooner the Speech & Language therapist starts working with him the better his chance of catching up before he starts school.

But maybe you can do it subtly? If you have a local surestart would you be able to suggest that you and she take him to a playgroup together? (I suggest Surestart because they're closely tied to the other services - I often find the lady in charge of S&L or HVs or any number of them are around if I visit.) If not a call to the Health Visitors to express your concerns might prompt them to start balls rolling.

cte1111

I think they don't usually diagnose autism until the child is older - about 5 I seem to remember. My son showed some signs of autism when he was 2-3, particularly in relation to his speech. Happily he is now able to speak as well as the other children in his year 1 class.

It's tricky for you to do much at this stage. If I were in your position, I think I would try to do my best to take your nephew out with your son. You can then ensure that he is given chance to interact with yourself and your son and see for yourself how he behaves.

If you still have concerns, then I think you need to talk to your niece. Perhaps suggest that she broaches the subject with her health visitor?

whitewing

I don't know what you feel you would be able to do, if you don't feel you can bring it up with mum or gran?

Is the family English-speaking at home? Speaking more than 1 language can delay speech.

You could possibly raise concerns with the health visitor. In fact, that would be a good port of call. You don't need to say who you or the child are but could talk generally. Then you could decide whether to speak to mum about your concerns, if you had more understanding of whether it may be normal or not.

I agree with everyone who says the hv should be picking up on this.

I don't think you can assume that nursery will raise it. It may be that they have spoken with mum, but not in such a way that she has realised it is a genuine concern, especially if he is quite passive so isn't demonstrating bad behaviour.

It may not be autism, it could be parenting needs a bit more support, or other factors you don't know about.

It is good that you are able to raise concerns here, and I hope you get some advice that you can go along with, as it doesn't sound right to me. HV is already talking about whether to refer my DD to a speech therapist, She is quite a bit younger than your nephew but seems similar on the speech front.

VfM4meplse

I would leave it well alone, because no-one is going to thank you for intervening. Some children are late developers and some parents are not the brightest sparks themselves, IME those that aren't are less likely to be objective about their children.

The best you can do is gift your niece a book on child development and let her work out for herself whether her son is on track.

GobbledyGook

His nursery should pick up on any concerns (although they can only bring it up with the parent so even if they do if she does not agree you may hear nothing about it). Being 'behind' isn't so much of a problem as long as he's making progress of some sort.

She may not have HV checks. Round here you don't see them after a couple of months and the 2 year checks have been scrapped so they'll not see children except on injection dates.

First port of call though would be getting his hearing and eyesight checked imo.

daska

With regard to nurseries picking up on things, it really depends very much on the quality of the nursery, the staff, how long he's there, how good they are at communicating problems etc.

We thought we had DS2 in an excellent nursery but after they expelled him we discovered that essentially he'd just been viewed as a problem and contained more than anything else.

So I certainly wouldn't recommend relying solely on a nursery to spot problems - they might just have a real wild one to deal with and be glad that he's content to sit quietly in a corner. It's also possible that they've tried to raise the matter 'sensitively' with mum and she hasn't wanted to hear/understand. Or he could behave completely differently when he's there.

madjay

The Health Visitor do not always pick thing up. My son was statemented at 4 it took 18months up hill pushing to get any where. From what you state it does look like ASD but on the other hand he could be just a late developer. I agree with cte111 about the way forward with it. It is a hard subject to bring up even our health Visitor found it hard to bring it up will some of her Clients.