Signs of AS in babies

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classic autism is usually more apparent early on. Kids with AS tend to have more typical development until social skills start being an issue. Most babies like familiarity and routine and repetition. I'm an ASD consultant and I didn't really think my kid was actually on the Spectrum until recently and he's 30 months. The current diagnostic tools aren't normed for kids under 24 months, with one normed for 18 months and up.

Sensory processing disorder is usually easier to detect at younger ages- signs such as intense defensiveness or seeking sensory input beyond the norm for kids their age, poor sleep habits, hyperactivity.

I would just look for missed or skipped milestones. I just had my 3rd baby. I have 2 NT children, 7 and 9 (with my ex-husband). However, this baby is with my new husband and he has a 13 yr old with ASD.

Our baby reminds me of how my kids were at her age. She is 7 weeks old and so far everything seems just what I am used to. However, to my husband everything is new. She just started cooing and she'll grunt and we've heard a few happy shrieks. At times she is definitely making an attempt to "talk" with us. Yesterday she said "ah-goo" which I remember both my kids did as babies. My husband said his son never did these things, never made any attempts to talk. He also never did the thing where the baby tries to push off with their legs like a little frog, our daughter does this and he said it's the first time he has seen it. My stepson started walking at the age of 14 months, he never crawled. The crawling part is supposed to be important. He didn't talk until 4 and a half years of age.

Babies are fascinated by a lot of things; lights, sounds etc. It doesn't mean they have ASD. They can also get overstimulated being at malls or restaurants. That is normal.

Apparently skipping milestones is a red flag that something isn't developing as it should. It may not always be the case but it was with my stepson.

Also, my NT kids were never shy of situations. They never cried when they went to preschool or stayed with a babysitter or I dropped them off at any kind of child care (like at the gym). My husband said his son was always in hysterics if he tried to leave him anywhere so he is 13 and has never in his life had a babysitter, he never went to preschool, never in aftercare, nothing. That may have nothing to do with ASD, I don't know, but he is still that way. He'll freak out if his Dad runs a short errand and to this day has never been left home alone.

Also, our baby girl responds to faces, real or just a picture or a face on a toy. She'll look excited and interested and maybe coo. I guess my stepson never responded to faces. He still doesn't seem to read anything from facial expressions which is one thing that is hard for me to remember; I need to say everything and not rely on my facial expressions to convey the message as I do with my other kids.

As far as my NT kids, they started babbling at 3 months, crawling at 5 months and walking at 7 months. My husband said he felt his son was different from birth, I wasn't there so I don't know. My NT son was a fussy baby but active and very curious in his environment. My NT daughter was a very easy baby and more content to sit and look at a book or play somewhere near me. My baby is in between, not terribly fussy as my son was but not as easy as my daughter was. She has her fussy time in the early evening but my son was fussy it seemed all the time so I am okay with her occasional fussiness.

There is also the head circumference thing. There is some link to babies born with a small HC, followed by accelerated growth, to autism. All 3 of my kids had HC's above the 90th percentile. My stepson's HC was at the 25% and then grew very fast the 1st year so he fits that theory.

All I am concerned with is if she is meeting milestones and she seems to be. I don't care if she meets them early but I would be concerned if she was meeting them very late or missing a milestone (like crawling). Right now it's too early to tell. The only thing that seems to be progressing normally are her attempts to talk with us by cooing and her responding to people, smiling at us etc. She also has neck control and pushes off with her legs. Not much else to tell at 7 weeks.

Grace09, it is so fun to hear about how your new baby is doing. I am sure she keeps you VERY busy!

My AS son never missed a milestone, and was very social, but he was different in that indescribable way. As for childcare, my NT daughter cried when I tried to leave her with someone else, but never in the way my son did. With her, it was just what the daycare people are used to: tears for mommy that are gone within a few minutes after mommy is gone. My son - - his upset stayed. Gosh, I'm getting sick to my stomach just thinking about some of the stuff I tried to put him through based on flawed theories. Well, he survived it, and is a happy child, so onward and upwards, eh?

I wish the best to your new little one. It's nice to see your visiting!

My parents say that as a baby I was, "very serious, very active, very observant, independent, strong-willed, and curious about everything."

Before I started talking, I wanted to know the words for everything. When I saw something I had never seen before, I would point at it and say "wa! wa?" until I was told what it was and what it did. I also didn't waste much time crawling, and walked early.

I was interested in seeing how things in my environment fit together. When I spoke my first sentence, I pointed at some birds eating outside the window, then pointed at a picture of birds eating and said, "Birds eat!" Early speech was used primarily for asking questions and expressing observations.

I also did my first representative drawing when I was only a year old. There was a red flower in a pot on the table. My mother drew a picture of it. I observed her and copied her technique.

I also had a strong fixation on colors, animals, and making up stories. Shortly after I started speaking in sentences, I would say things like, "The yellow lion roars and runs. Then the red horse goes into the house and eats dinner. Blue birds fly in the light blue sky. Then it's night and the sky is dark and the moon is big and white."

I was also a "little professor" at an early age. My dad says that one morning when I was 2, I sat down at the breakfast table and simply said, "So, let's talk about insects." No nonsense, straight to the point - I wanted him to tell me everything he knew about insects.

Don't know how much of that is AS-related, though. I guess it is easier to tell in hind-sight. But I'd like to add that children and adults with AS are probably about as different from one another as babies with AS - there's a lot of variety - so it helps to use the label as a tool but not get too fixated on it.

Hi DW! Yes she is keeping me VERY busy! lol!

It seems that AS kids are all over the board, I mean there is no 'set' way they behaved as infants, just a lot of theories that fit some; not all. I have been struck though with how many people here have mentioned not crawling. That said, I think my SS is not a mild case, not severe, but not easy. He never had any early invention so I have been on heightened alert so any signs but so far haven't noticed anything different. My 2 NT kids hit milestones early but that was something that runs in my ex-husband's family (that is what he told me) so I only expect her to hit the milestones on a normal schedule.

I am going to try to go to the gym for the 1st time with the baby today. I plan on going dressed for a workout, and just running on the treadmill for 30 mins and picking her up (showering at home) as I am SO worried she will be upset - but hopefully she will be okay. She does prefer me to Dad but I think that's normal.

My SS is doing fine but funny thing I noticed yesterday - he is totally unaffected by teen culture. I saw a movie and saw the rooms of the teens. I remembered (when I was a teen) how I had a room with posters of rock bands etc. His room has 4 blank walls. He doesn't care about dressing in cool clothes. My 9 yr son is NT and very concerned with looking cool as is his 7 yr old sister but my SS really doesn't care.

The only disturbing thing is that his Dad bought him Grand Theft Auto and he will just play that game hour after hour - but that is another topic I guess! I noticed he was starting to swear after he started playing that game all the time - but his Dad told him he will take it away if he hears him swearing. Of course he is forbidden from playing the game in front of the little kids which is why he spends hours holed up in his room. Ok, going off on a tangent (maybe due to 7 weeks of sleep deprivation!) so I'd better go do something constructive like change a diaper...

Do typical children stare at lights or flick the switches?

I think any baby will notice light and sounds. I think someone mentioned fans and that reminded me that my SS (who has NVLD) - well I wasn't there but my husband told me he was obsessed with fans and vacuums cleaners - but I think he was talking about his toddler years? He was so obsessed with cords, cables, and stuff like that that my husband used to go to thrift stores to buy old VCRs and vacuums cleaners for him to play with.

I was wondering, because I don't know too much about the developement of typical children. I used to stare at lights alot as an infant, walk on my toes, and would flick the switches for quite some time if my parents let me. I hear about it in some kids with ASD, but I wonder if this common is typical children as well.

Looking back, my daughter had some red flags, but they were clearly masked by how intelligent she was. She would toe-walk, but if I asked her why she was walking on her toes she said "I must be a flamingo" She flapped her hands, but would also say "I'm flying!! !" She walked at 9 months, skipped crawling, but did do the commando thing to get the cross-eye hand (her arms weren't long enough to get her big belly off the floor). Is talking in sentences an indicator? She would speak in full clear sentences, like "I'm a flamingo" from at least 1 year old. If other people asked her if she was a flamingo she would get all sad and say "I'm just a plain old toddler."

It can be. I was saying things like "Mama read book!" at about ten months old.

My own son seemed quite average at first. Just seemed very shy, that ended up being selective mutism At 8 he has numerous tics, is clumsy and has an odd gait. Also has a couple of very serious interests. Is interested in interacting w/other children but when he has a chance will just stand and not become involved.
Me, on the other hand; I could not crawl or roll over.Just started walking one day. My mother said I was her 'little turtle' because if I ended up on my back she would have to turn me over. Had a serious aversion to light...had to be kept in a totally dark room alone to be calm. If they would open the door to check and light got in I would just scream until it was closed. The same with noises...anything out of the ordinary would cause me to go ballistic. Didn't play much w/toys. Later had very little to do with other children; was quite content being alone. Had major speech difficulties. Went to public school which was a nightmare....this was the early 1950s. Anyway, could go on but OP asking about signs in babies and I'm up to grade school years.

a vampire!

LOL

That is really odd. My AS son's first incisors came in normally, but he got his canines almost at the same time, and LONG before the second incisors finally came in to fill out the front of his mouth. I wouldn't say he showed any ASD signs until about 14 months or so, when he stopped learning new words (and a few months later started losing them, which lasted for about a year and a half). However, he was a very low-maintenance baby and did tend to get night and day mixed up, which some people cite as signs. And looking back, his fixation with wheels goes back to 5-6 months old, if not earlier.

Being totally new to this I don't know if some of these are signs of AS but I don't think they are normal since the nurses commented on them. Cole was born 9 weeks early and right away he was able to lift his head and turn himself over--nurses thought it was very unusual for a premature baby to do that. He had very strong neck muscles and was able to hold his head up well on his own. He also would track sounds by moving his eyes to where the sounds were coming from days after he was born. He hated the lights in the NICU and would "salute" a lot so the lights were dimmed or they covered his incubator with a blanket. He would wake up every day at the exact same times and would just look around at everything--never cry. He did not want to breast feed at all. If I tried to get him to he would scream. When we brought him home he would not sleep; he was up 8 hours straight one day when he was 7 weeks old (he was 9 weeks early). He was happy to just watch everything and did not like to be cuddled. His first word was "bird" followed by "book" by 7 months and he never babbled until he was almost 2. He was reading books out loud by two and a half but never spoke to anyone. He did not play with toys he played with cords and the vcr. When we tried to talk to him he acted like he was ignoring us. He crawled very late and started walking (more like running) at 15 months. He didn't care who held him or if we left him with someone he was happy and didn't cry once. Once he did start talking at 3 years we can't get him to be quiet.

Also reading the comment with the vampire teeth--ds was the same way! He looked like a vampire for almost 3 months then his teeth started coming in all at the same time and man he was grouchy!

Thanks for that. I did some reading on the Tilt Test. We tried it out on him as a curiousity and he keeps his head in line with his body. He is not quite 6 months yet - 6th of March he will be 6 months.

He's doing really well these days. He even said his first word the other day. It was 'yeah'. My husband and I have been laughing and saying 'yeah' whenever he grins or giggles, so he laughed first and said yeah. It was really clear and he did it a few times. He has also started to mimick our facial expressions. He has always been a really curious little guy and every day he gets more curious. Basically, he's going along well. I think we'll just keep the AS thing in the back of our minds, in case he does require any help at a later stage.

Just my thoughts.

I am an aspie. I was a very normal baby, aside from never wanting to be out of arms. Apparently I could tell even in deep sleep if a hand touching me was taken away, and would wake crying. One of my parents had to be touching me at all times! Exhausting for them they claim. Apparently me own daughter's sleep issues now are what I deserve. :p For smiling and interracting as a baby and toddler I was pretty normal.

Just a thought for anyone trying to diagnose a tiny baby, an amusing memory that comes to me is when my daughter was born, at about two days old, my mom and my sister (playfully) saying that she had poor co-ordination, bad eye contact etc. It was all true! Nothing you wouldn't expect in a two day old baba though. Some things are just phases for babies. They aren't born compassionate for example. That develops.

I know that autism can be diagnosed by 18 mths, as there was a great article about the dramatic effects of early interventions. (Some of the kids fell off the spectrum!)
For aspergers, the lady who diagnosed me told me that she could diagnose from two and a half?

Signs will be there before, but kids can grow out of them. I have a 19 mths old and we have been watching her like a hawk. I have my suspicions she will be an aspie when we finally test her, but any signs we see are things that could change dramatically over the next year. (I hope so... last two days she's thrown fits getting into anything but tracksuit/babygrow....)