Advice for Aspie 3 year old

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I am noticing that my daughter seems to lack this ability to see cause and effect. I might be wrong, but I would almost swear she can't figure out that her gameboy broke because she threw it. It's like she throws it all the time, and it never broke before, so why would that do it.... Anyway, I started to think about this concept more with other things, and things in my life, and I'm starting to think it might very well be an Aspie trait. I'm not really sure what to do about it at this point.

I posted something about this in the general forum, and I'm not getting much a response, so I think I'm trying here. I would really value your opinions on the subject, and if anyone has ever heard of this "cause and effect" concept with Aspergers.

I honestly don't know, but it could be a component of the theory of mind issue. My first instinct is to tell you that cause and effect is an issue with many 3 year olds; I think that was true with both of my children (one is AS, one is probably NT). Could it be something that takes longer to learn with AS? Quite possibly. My AS child has trouble seeing all sorts of connections that I see, and that his younger sister can see.

No offense...But a 3 year old. That is WAY to young to be diagnosed and evaluated. AS requires for a diagnosis:
1. No speech delay.
2. Average to above average intellegence.
Number 2, and the other long list of criteria for Aspergers, makes it impossible to determine on someone who is as young as three.
It also requires an assessment that measures intellectual ability, the earliest that assessment can be completed successfully is 4 years old, and even then its not always reliable. At the age your child is at, there is NO WAY to determine whether or not they have AS (regular autism, yes, but that requires a speech delay). If a professional claims as much, they should leave the profession. It is usually around 5 that it is the earliest they figure out whether or not someone has AS, but it is usually so obvious, such as the kid has clear obsessions, technical knowledge beyond thier respective age range, and horrible social skills. Most kids with AS, especially girls, take anywhere from 3-6 months just to do the evaluation and diagnosis, and that often does not take place until elementry school, where the diagnostic criteria can be properly determined. I don't think your child is even at a stage of development to determine if the necessary criteria for diagnosis is there. Right now...you are describing a toddler.

What you have on your hands is a toddler right now, pure and simple. Whether or not they have AS is impossible to determine at this age.

Normally I'd agree with you, but in this case, it's a little different. She is actually diagnosed PDD NOS because of the speech delay, but really it's Aspergers with a speech delay. I call it that because that is just what it is in my family. In other words, we are all in that group that would be diagnosed Aspergers if it weren't for the speech delay, and actually, the ones dxed outside my daughter got Aspergers even though there was a speech delay. So I call it AS just because it's a better description of what I'm dealing with because PDD NOS can mean almost anything. See how I eliminated a whole paragraph just by using AS instead?


Her social interaction so far seems pretty normal, but she has her moments where she doesn't make eye contact, ignores other people around her, and totally misses the nonverbal cues...and more in an Aspie way rather than a toddler way. Her main thing is the repetitive behaviors. My nephew wasn't diagnosed until he was like 5, but he was the same way. When he was 2, everybody knew autism was at play (except his mother of course). The psychologist that dx'ed her was through the birth to three program our state offers, and she's highly recommended in private practices. Her first reaction was that my daughter was going to be too young to diagnose, but because we already have a history of it in our family, and I seem to be more aware of what Aspergers and related dx's entails, and after seeing her, it was obvious enough for this lady to make a professional diagnosis. She used a testing method used on older kids all the time, and given many of the answers were based on what I had to say, but I was being very objective trying to not rule out other possibilities, and when an Aspie is trying to be objective, we usually succeed. When I read the list of symptoms of autism for children that my state's university's autism center hands out, she fits about 95% of the list. I could go on and on about this, but I'm almost positive her dx is accurate. My mother thinks there could also be ADHD going on because she's so hyper at times, but I think that's also a part of the Aspergers. We could say she's bi polar because of her meltdowns, but that's Aspergers. That's a major sign right there is the melt downs. Her sister has temper tantrums. My older daughter rarely gets temper tantrums...generally she totally melts down. She also gets that Aspie glare where she stares off into infinity...oh and when she is hyper focused lining up toys, stacking cans, playing with blocks, etc., yeah it's so Aspie obvious.

I also believe early intervention is probably the best thing you can do for children on the spectrum right now. I'm trying to do just that. Even if the issues I'm talking about here are more toddler related, it doesn't hurt to try something to help her learn what she needs to learn. But I really think there is something about cause and effect with Aspergers. If you read many of the posts on the WP, you hear people talking about problems and not making any connection to how they brought that problem on themselves. I have such a hard time doing that, and I realize I always have. That might be why so many Aspies "make excuses" and have a hard time holding down a job and have a hard time with self management issues. When you strip that down to a concrete level (such as what a toddler goes through), you are looking at the idea that the connection might be harder for Aspies to grasp of cause and effect in the sense if you throw it and it breaks, it broke because you threw it. Like in my daughter's case, she has thrown her gameboy probably 50 times and it never broke, so why would the one time it did break when she threw it would she connect throwing it to breaking it? She also does that when she hits her sister. She isn't making the connection that her sister is crying just because she hit her. I have a bunch more examples, but you get what I'm saying. I also notice the lack of nonverbal cues going on. She constantly wants to play games where she is having fun but nobody else is enjoying it, like hitting people and pushing people down. To her it's a game. To everyone else, it's not. She has no idea. Her sister who is a year younger than her and slow on the milestones has figured out how to read faces. She still is in the phase where she checks facial expressions to see what's okay and what's not okay. I know because I have to force myself to make them sometimes just so she can understand her boundaries. The older one has never done that.

Anyway, I had to stop mid thought to save my military ID from getting flushed down the toilet by the three year old, and now I totally forget where I was trying to go with this, but anyway, that's what's up right now.

I don't know why--but for some reason the phrase "cause and effect" brings executive functioning to mind. That is, the part of you brain that pertains to

* regulation of impulses - I.E "I better not do this or..."
* planning -I.E "If I do this now, then this later")
* and prioritization -I.E Do this first because it's most important/urgent,then this, then this

I've heard that people on the spectrum tend to have difficulties in that area--and that much of those difficulties are biologically based. See if that takes you anywhere...

Thank you