Childhood

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So here's me with another silly/useless/whatever question...
How were you as a child?

One of the many things that confuses me about whether I have an ASD or not is the fact that symptoms must be present before 3 years of age. Now, I was a very "sociable" toddler/child under that age, I didn't do things like not turning when called and I have no idea about my eye contact but it's not uncomfortable for me to have it with my family, now (at least, I think? I never notice what I'm looking at while I talk). I started having "problems" in kindergarten, I had a vaste knowledge about animals and I preferred drawing, writing (I started reading at 4) and being with the teacher to playing with other children. Still, I played quite a lot in primary school, and I did have a best friend who came to the same middle school as me so we had the same group of friends (but we completely lost contact in high school). I've never been shy, and in fact I recently noticed I tend to take the role of the clown when I don't really know what to say, so I suppose I was like this as a child too... but still, despite my being "outgoing" (I still consider myself an introvert, because I have much much more going on inside than what I say despite talking quite a bit) I have big problems in making and keeping friendships.

I would like to know if not having significant symptoms in my early childhood means that it's highly unlikely for me to be on the spectrum, and if that's not the case I would like to hear from someone with a similar experience.

Showing symptoms in early childhood is rather necessary for being on the spectrum.

However, there are plenty of things that aren't noticed until after the fact once they've gotten noticeable because of higher expectations. I was a sociable baby, I didn't avoid getting held, I spoke slightly early, I did those types of things on time.

But looking back, I was showing symptoms then even. I didn't avoid getting held, I was insistent on being held abnormally much (which is probably a sensory seeking sign), I smiled at people, but didn't make eye contact.

Although I have been formally diagnosed, I also often wonder the same thing. My issue is not that I didn't display any AS traits as a child, only that I wonder if the cause of this early behavior might not have been other, outside factors. For example, I was born almost four months premature, so before the age of three I had been in and out of the hospital for various check-ups and surgeries over a hundred times. Furthermore, from the age of two to four, I had a tracheotomy which made it difficult for me to speak except to wheeze my words.

Both of my parents were also very young (under 20 when I was born) so between work, my health issues, and the beginnings of Bipolar Disorder in my Dad, they were necessarily preoccupied with things other than my social development. I wonder if my AS traits in childhood might not then in part be accounted for by a disrupted attachment style.

As far as I know, autistic behaviors must be present in early childhood to be diagnosed with ASD. Before the '90s, when autism was unknown to the public and high-functioning autism unknown to everyone except the people who had actually read Kanner's and/or Asperger's papers describing autism, many autistic children were not diagnosed in childhood, but even without the diagnoses, the autistic behaviors would have been noticeable by age three. It is hard to conceive how an autistic child could have not displayed autistic behaviors at an early age, because the masking of autistic behaviors requires conscious control and faking NT, which young children cannot do and adults find exhaustingly difficult and largely ineffective.

I was strange, very quiet. I had very strict routines, read more than almost anyone else my age (and started reading earlier). I tended to sit in a corner and rock a little just thinking about my own little worlds.

I was very open and trusting until I've reached the age of 8 and than I became more cynical and selective about my friends and who I talked to, because I was picked on so many times.

Well, I was talking, and whistling by 2. I hated eye contact, except with cats and dogs. And my least favorite activity was anything involving parts, or people coming to visit. Oh and I was very curious, I can recall taking my highchair apart.

I was a weird kid. I was diagnosed with AS when I was two. I leaned my alphabet and how to count to ten in three languages at 18 months. I always fought with my little sister about trivial things like where I was sitting at dinner. I would melt down if I didn't get what I wanted. I also enjoyed destroying things and throwing my toys in the lake at my cabin. I must have been a nightmare for my parents..

When I was in elementary school I was the kid who read more books about animals and other nonfiction topics while other kids read Clifford books and such. My favorite toys were robots instead of Barbie dolls. I had a few friends throughout elementary school but kids would always ask me why I never talked. I won the spelling bee in for my class in 4th grade. I also played soccer and basketball for a few years.

This is the biggest thing that makes me wonder about it too. When I read about symptoms of Asperger's in adults, everything fits. But when I read about signs of autism in children, it doesn't sound anything like the way I was as a child. I read through a list with my mother and she agreed I didn't do any of those things as a child. I was always responsive to other people, smiled, and showed things to people.

I also never had the classic signs of ADHD. I was never hyperactive. Sometimes I got in trouble for talking back to adults, but other than that I was extremely well-behaved, so much that people usually commented on how "good" I was. Very quiet and polite. I ran around a lot outside at recess, but never had a problem sitting still in class. People always said I was "shy" but I never felt that I was.

I am an only child, grew up out in the country and before I started school, I rarely even saw any other kids at all. I remember occasionally playing with older kids, who were the children of my dad's friends. They were really aggressive and mean, and I was afraid of them. They did bad things to me.

When I started kindergarten, that was the first time I learned how to play with other kids. I came home from the first day of school, covered in red dirt. I was already interested in boys, and I had 3 boyfriends. I had one friend who was a girl. Other than that I didn't have any friends in particular.

Things changed when I started first grade, and everyone found out how "smart" I was. Up until then I smiled in pictures and looked like a normal kid. I wasn't happy, but I sure knew how to smile and ham it up for the camera. From age 6 onward I looked like a different kid. I looked stressed out and pissed off. I hated being in gifted classes. I am tensing up really bad just thinking about it now. Everyone treated me different because I was "smart". They thought it was all easy for me but it wasn't. I knew there was something wrong with my brain, and I was convinced I had a brain tumor. I cried almost every day at school.

The whole symptoms present by three years of age = Autistic disorder. Asperger's has no such limit. Symptoms are usually noticable once you enter school though.

I was a bit delayed at talking, walking, etc and I was aloof and uninterested in everything that wasn't a pad of paper, a pencil and a cat.

Thank you all for your replies.

I walked and talked early, taught myself to read, etc. before three years old.

I also hated to be touched or held. I am not quite certain as to my sociability in my first three years, but I did tend to spend a lot of time in my own world.

In my parents' eyes, I was perfect - I hardly ever cried and never looked for attention. I started to talk at a freakily young age and spooked the neighbours. I walked at an average age. I was also a livewire, never sat still, always dancing, running or spinning, but stopped when I was asked to. I taught myself to read by the age of 3 and was then sent to school a year early. In the teachers' eyes, I was perfect - I was quiet, polite and caring, did everything I was told to and never appeared to struggle with anything. In those days, a child like me was one to be proud of and to puzzle over and cast blame on, when they were struggling with certain things. These days alarm bells might start to ring.

I didn't show any signs under the age of 4. I got some videos of me as a baby, and I was perfectly typical. One of them was me being filmed by a relative at a birthday party. There was a bouncy castle, and lots of children, all between the ages of 4 and 6. I was the littlest - I was only 2, and also my younger cousin was only 9 months, so we obviously didn't participate as affectively as the other children. Well my baby cousin just stayed on her mum's lap most of the time, and I did go on the bouncy castle but I couldn't do much on it because I think it was my first time on a bouncy castle, and the other children were jumping about on it too much so I had difficulties standing up. But it was a noisy environment, but I didn't seem bothered about the noise at all, and there were lots of children running about and I didn't seem bothered by that either.
Then when I got off the bouncy castle I slipped and fell, and started crying so my mum had to cuddle me and make sure I was all right. I calmed down soon after, and then it was time for party games. I saw myself sitting down with the rest of the children and I was even bobbing up and down excitedly (like I've seen kids do), as though I was really enjoying myself. We played ''pass the parcel'', and although it was my first time, I looked like I knew what to do by watching the other kids, then when it came to me I passed it onto the next child, looking at her as I did so. Then when it came round to me the second time, the child next to me wasn't looking, so I tapped her on the arm as if to say ''here, take the parcel'', and she did. I watched myself play other party games too, and I looked like I was really enjoying myself with the other children. I was only 2, so you can't exactly expect too much from a child of 2, but I did seem very typical in the video.

My mum had a ''Baby's Milestone Record'' booklet, where parents record each new thing what the child learns and what age he or she learned it at, and all of mine were at the average ages. I wasn't really delayed in anything.

It makes me laugh when people say things like repetitive behaviour and liking a certain thing is a sign of Autism in toddlers, because I've always seen repetitive behaviour and liking a certain thing in typically developing toddlers too. In fact, quite often. Also I've often heard of toddlers being afraid of loud noises like the hand-dryer in public toilets. I know an NT child, she is 7, and got a bit worried when her dad was banging a nail into the wall. It wasn't that loud, even to me, but she went upto me and said, ''I don't like it when daddy does that.'' Also she is scared of loud barking dogs. And she loves reading and is very bright. But she is not on the spectrum. She has normal developing social skills like other kids of the same age, and the teacher even said she participates well in class and is not different in any way from the other children. Well, I just know she's not Aspie, and why label a child with an ASD just because she loves reading and don't like loud noises? She'll probably grow out of the loud noises thing, and NT kids are entitled to enjoy being creative or reading.

This is usually because when people say that repetitive behavior is a sign of autism, they probably don't mean what you think they mean. It's not any incidence at all of repetitive behavior, or liking something, or disliking loud noises. It's like the difference between not being able to walk a straight line and not walking at all - in this analogy, when people talk about not walking at all, you point out that many NTs can't walk a straight line either.

Quite.. There are fewer social opportunities under 2 years old and most play revolves around toys and one-on-one games. Quite how any one could reliably identify aspergers in a 2 year old is beyond me. Without the social context, what issue could there be? I'm sure in hindsight some signs were there, but nothing clinical.

I think the confusion here is that the DSM says that speech development should be normal (as in some progress by age 2), which might be confusing things.

Jason.