Parent with a newly diagnosed child - what if you doubt?

Post Reply New Topic

In regards to getting a second opinion - I totally agree. As much as social sciences have come a long way much of this field is subjective to some degree. I read somewhere in your replies that getting an assessment may be a financial hardship.

I would definitely look into your local resources to see if any of your clinics do assessments for free or on a sliding scale. Even if they don't, I am sure that any clinic near you would be pretty well versed in how to find additional financial funding for families who are having trouble paying. In the state that I live in for example, we are required to provide ABA services to low-income children diagnosed with ASD.

I work as an ABA technician and I definitely see a huge range in terms of what "Autism" looks like from the nonverbal aggressive kids to the kids that can make you question the diagnosis at times. There is a bit of a corny saying that goes something like "If you've met one kid with Autism, you've met one kid with Autism". I wouldn't worry so much about the diagnosis because in a lot of ways if your child has any additional needs a diagnosis of Autism can end up being a good thing for them. The reason for this ultimately being that Autism is a disorder that is generally well-funded and has a ton of awareness surrounding it.

Just my 2 cents

As someone else stated, autistic people vary quite a bit from one another in their symptoms and personalities. All the items I quoted above are qualities my ASD son has, and are from your "goes against" list.

Some of the "Goes Against" are true for me too. Everyone with Autism is different. I agree that you should seek a second opinion, if you don't agree with the current diagnosis. I wish you luck.

I had another thought and wanted to add it.

My son is 2 and is "overly" neurotypical.

But he does have a few autistic mannerisms that he has picked up from his dad, who is autistic. I have also caught myself doing autistic type things after living with my husband and other autistic family members for so long. So a kid can pick up some things from a relative or a friend. Like most of us have said, it's just so hard to tell with kids.

I wonder how does a doctor separate these things? Like how would they know if a kid is actually autistic or if they have autistic traits or if they are just modeling it from their autistic sibling or parent?

I used to question if my poor social skills came from my father because kids model their parents but then I realized if that were true for me, then my brothers would have poor social skills too and also be like him. So I don't think my dad caused it in me. Plus there are other role models NT kids have such as their friends and their peers so they do learn normal behavior and even normal family members will model it for them.

I sometimes think its easy to blame autistic symptoms on environmental factors if the kid is that mild. Parents just don't want a disabled child so they will find excuses to justify their symptoms if they can and might find reasons why their kid isn't autistic such as but not limited to "my kid is very affectionate" "my kid interacts with me and always looks at me" "My kid likes to be held." As my therapist told me in high school, "Parents like to blame things for their kid's behavior." I have heard contradictions about symptoms like I have a hard time figuring things out like the rules and right from wrong because I was in a self contained classroom with inconsistent rules and also not knowing what the rules are in my classroom in second grade when I was put in mainstream but my therapist said the opposite, he said it was my AS and I told him what my mom said and that was when he said that to me. But then I find out none ASD kids who are in self contained classrooms because of their own disability, they don't go mimicking behaviors in that classroom like I did so when I told my mom that, her new excuse was "I think it was because you were still learning how to communicate so you learned the wrong behavior for getting the teacher's attention." She will never say "That was because of Asperger's." But sometimes it is true that a kid can mimic autistic symptoms due to environmental factors.

Just wanted to say that from my own experiences with Aspies (higher-functioning end of the spectrum), I'd say that these items from the "goes against" are actually "in support of diagnosis" or at least "commonly seen in Aspies":

Of course it's only part of your list, but my point is that these items are well within the variation that's found among people on the spectrum. My experience is almost exclusively with high-functioning individuals, ones who were able to live fairly normal lives as they were able to adapt to the social expectations of the NT world around them. However, among those Aspies I've been around, these traits wouldn't be out-of-place at all. They're standard enough that I was reading the list going "Wait, these are the 'non-Autistic' traits?"

I think that the only way to know for certain whether he's Aspie or not would be to be able to discuss with him how his mind works, and it sounds like he's still young enough that doing so will be difficult. So, for now, I'd say try to learn how he works, and be less worried about which title the doctors or teachers are using for it. Whether the special programs are helpful or not seems to vary from one person to another, so whether he qualifies or not probably isn't too big of a concern - just trust your instincts as a parent regarding what's best for him day-to-day as you continue to try to learn and see if you can get a more solid diagnosis.

EDIT: I read through the first page and no one had commented on this; just saw that on the 2nd page someone else made a very similar post. Whoops. Didn't mean to duplicate. But also from reading the 2nd page wanted to add that like SocOfAutism, I have noticed myself acquiring autistic-like traits from my autistic partner, after 6 years together, so I think there is some "rubbing off" that happens. Part of why I think that until the individual is old enough to explain how they think we can't really know if their neural processes are neurotypical or neurodiverse. Even though I exhibit neurodiverse traits at times, I still know my thought processes are neurotypical (which is why there's some things my partner can do that I'll never be able to do - in my opinion, many Aspies are geniuses).

My opinion is that if they deny you access, you probably don't want your kid in that program. I've heard horror stories about why therapists denied parents access to watch their kids' therapy.