In response to an earlier post...
I just wanted to share with you all something that happened today with my dd. She just turned 5 last week.
We went to the mall today and she got a special trip to Build A Bear. Her language has always been an issue and even with drastic improvements, I still had a deep gutted concern that she was never going to develop "normally." Her pragmatics have always been weak and she could not seem to ever "explain" herself.
But, all the sudden, she leaped forward and seems very age appopriate. Just today this is what I saw...
Build a Bear: Hi, whats your name?
DD: Ashleigh and I am five now.
B a B: Wow, what do you have here? Three bears?!?!
DD: Yep, one for me, one for my Mom and one for my Grandma...
B a B: Goodness, what are you naming your bear???
DD: Abigail...
B a B: How did you come up with that name???
DD: Well, my Mom is having a baby and that was the name for a girl...but, she is having a boy...
B a B: Nice name, what is your little brothers name going to be???
DD: We picked out Aiden.
...I can go on and on...she was just talking away.
It didnt stop there. We have a huge play center in the middle of our mall. We took the kids there to burn some energy and she made a friend and played with her the entire time. The little girl fell down and went to her Mom. I watched my dd and before they left, my dd hugged her and said she hoped she was ok.
Now, this is nothing I would have expected years ago. When I first thought of ASD, my dd's future seemed so scary. I was a WRECK and constantly on edge. Everyday now, I see so much growth and she is really coming into her own.
Her only main "autistic" trait is the stimming when she is excited...she still does the finger wiggling and facial grimace. Oh well, that is FINE with me!
There is soooo much hope and to be honest, my dd has had hardly any therapy. I quit my job and pretty much spent every waking moment of life trying to "fix" her myself. I was constantly reading and researching to come up with new ideas. Overall though, I think it was her own maturity that helped her the most.
That is sooooo awesome an d inspiring
She is 5 now. I started thinking something was "wrong" when she was two. She was non verbal then and always stimming. She has only had the one stim...the finger wiggling thing.
To be honest, I dont have a dx of autism. She has been seen by a ped neuro and a developmental ped. Both were in agreement that she had "traits" but were not ready to dx. They felt her eye contact was "too good" and she was "too social" because she never wanted to leave my side during the evaluations.
In my heart I think she could have been dx'd if I took her in for evaluations at two, I waited mostly out of denial and fear until she was three. By three she had words, but she was mainly echolalic. She tried to communicate but it was very jumbled and she was reversing pronouns. Her language skills were a mess. Her dx came out as developmental language disorder and sensory dysfunction.
Looking back at all her symptoms though...I think she falls on the spectrum. She was late to point, late to communicate, could care less about me until she turned three...that was the hardest. She repeated us like crazy, did not master pronouns until after 3.5, she stimms and has very little true pretend play. I can go on and on...
The age that gave me the most hope was 4. She made sooo much progress. Now, at just barely 5, I see changes daily...
Thank you - your DD's story is sooo encouraging That is very rich, appropriate language for a five year old. I hope that my girls start progressing in leaps and bounds like that, soon! They will be five in a month and a half, and that, to me, is a scary age, because at five, most kids are fully fluent and my daughters are still not. I'm hoping that constant, daily exposure to NT peers this fall will really kick in their language development.
Fred, seeing your videos and reading your posts, I see so much of my own dd.
One thing that your daughters have though is a beautiful tone in their voices...my dd still has a little "ASD sound" to her tone. Its much better and I really feel it will improve but even now, she does not have that "natural" tone when she is talking at times.
I am real proud of her and I know she will be ok, that is the feeling I have been wanting for years. I can really appreciate feeling good, it took me a long, long time...