Have you ever looked at old videos of you and thought...

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There is a lot of videos filmed of me when I was a baby, and I didn't seem to show any Autistic traits.

I watched a video of me, at 7 months, at a family get together. I was the youngest, and the rest of my cousins were bigger and could play more. I just sat on my mum's lap, playing with a set of toy keys. My dad then shook a teddy in front of my face and I tried to grab it, then laughed. I seemed to love people paying attention to me.

Then there was a video filmed of me on my first birthday. I was walking then, and I kept on wanting my Nan to play with me. Sometimes babies like the look of a particular person and want their attention. Then I toddled under the table, banged my head on a chair, and started crying. Then bits were shown when I was playing with a toy bus I had got as one of my presents. I pushed it along a bit, then kept on putting the little plastic people into my mouth.

Then I watched one of me at my cousin's birthday party, when I was 3. It was a noisy party, with lots of small children (who were all a bit older than me) running around, and going mad on the bouncy-castle. I was on the bouncy-castle too, but seemed to small and weak to bounce, with bigger children bouncing all around me. So my dad held my hand and stood on the edge of the bouncy castle and I bounced whilst holding onto his hands. Then I was filmed playing party games like pass-the-parcel in a circle with the other children, and for a 3-year-old I was playing it right, and my mum said it was my first time I ever played it. I watched carefully what I did - I saw me look at the child next to me as I passed the parcel to her, and I didn't know this child. She was a friend of my cousin.

So in the videos I've watched of me as a baby, I didn't look very Aspie, although my AS is so mild that it probably wouldn't have shown when I was that young anyway. All the traits came out all at once when I started school.

When I was 8 my class was video'd on stage doing our Christmas play, and I didn't stand out from any of the other kids. I just stood still like all the others, and only said one line (which went fine), and when we sung I sung along with all the other children.

But I saw a video of me when I was 14, and all I did was complain. I wasn't satisfied with anything around me, and there was a dog with us what kept on doing those high-pitched barks, so I had my fingers in my ears a lot. Then I kept catching me fiddling intensely with my fingers, and wouldn't relax my arms. I looked more Aspie there, as a teenager, than I ever did before as a small child!

One of my favorite childhood videos was from I was about 3 years old. It was Easter and my parents had an easter egg hunt party with all the kids in the neighborhood. When my mom told everyone to go and find eggs all the kids started running around like crazy. I walked over to a bush, found one easter egg, put it in my basket and sat back down. My dad told me to go look for more but I think I just ignored him or something... I was too interested in my one easter egg.

The only other childhood video of me I can think of the top of my head was my 1st birthday... starting my sister. I would open up a toy, look at it for a second and then my sister would take it from me and play with it. I didn't seem to upset when she did, I think I was more interested in the wrapping paper. The only toy I got that I really looked excited about was a rocking horse, I rocked back and forth on it twice, smiled and then my sister pushed me off it to play with it.

Its kind of entertaining to watch now. My sister is always the center of attention in family videos and I am always just somewhere in the background doing my own thing. They also do a great job of showing how, fundamentally, neither me or my sister have changed our personalities.