I'm just being a dick, right?

[_Meep_]

I can't believe I am going to ask this. I've never really worried about this with either of my children until now, so it's all very new to me.

Autism.

Seriously? I'm now worrying about this? I have a 15 month old girl who (so far) has been completely typical really - smiled at 3 weeks, laughed at 10, has always been very engaged/engaging, interested in toys and people, ahead with gross motor skills, normal with fine motor skills, fine with language (15-20 'words', crap pronunciation - like most 15 month olds - but consistency of usage bang on). She took a while to start pointing with her index finger rather than her whole hand but has been doing this for a number of months. She claps on command, waves when someone is leaving or when she can tell a phonecall is coming to an end, and says 'baaaaa' ('bye'). It's very cute. She also nods in response to any question - not because she entirely understands everything, but because she recognises a question for what it is, she shares interest/displays joint attention, responds to her name (most of the time), has what I would assume is good eye contact, adores and looks up to her older sister, has recently started playing imaginatively (pretending to brush her hair, feeding dolls, putting Duplo figures to bed with a blanket etc.) ... the list goes on.

Why am I so worried, you might ask? Well, recently she had a mild stomach bug with some diarrhoea and vomiting for a couple of days, and then a few days after she got over that she completely lost her balance. She was falling over her own feet and occasionally nothing, walking into doorframes, staggering around like she was drunk, and obviously I freaked out, even though I KNEW it was clearly a growth spurt and it did stop after a week or so, although her walking style has now changed from a definite toddle to more of a 'walk', and she is still a little clumsy at times, presumably because of this. I mean, her feet are closer together and she's going from heel to toe rather than stamping about like a new walker - bit of a counterproductive progression if you ask me, since it seems to make them MORE accident prone, but it is what it is and it's getting better all the time. She can also run now.

Unfortunately, however, I have bad anxiety and it takes me a while following a trigger episode to settle back down, so the freak-out over the sudden clumsiness is clearly still affecting me. My daughter has, of course, chosen this completely unhelpful time to start doing weird shit with her hands.

Flapping. Twisting/pulling/flicking/fiddling with her fingers. Squeezing and opening her hands repeatedly, like a heroin addict preparing a vein to jack up. Great.

She's also gone back to predominantly pointing with an open hand.

None of it is constant (she only flaps when she is excited that she is running about and occasionally while she is eating), obsessive (she doesn't even look at her hands while she is messing with her fingers and is usually unoccupied and gazing off around the room) or prolonged (she'll do the hand squeezing thing for a few seconds, when she wants something just out of reach, mostly). It does seem to have coincided with a positive change/maturation in the way she examines and manipulates toys and other objects with her fingers, so I don't know if she's just receiving all sorts of new sensory input through her hands and feeling them in a different way, or what ...? Anyone have any idea if this is a thing with toddlers?

I do vaguely remember my first daughter fiddling with her fingers in a similar way at some point around this age, as I was worried briefly that she had Rett syndrome (yes, I know), but I was also so utterly obsessed with her 'hand preference' and the fact I was convinced she had cerebral palsy (I KNOW) at the time that I'm not sure I gave it too much thought. So the exact details are hazy.

Gah. She's fine, right? I know deep down that she's having a developmental leap in terms of language and cognition right now and I know that's going to manifest physically in some interesting ways, but my lovely backstabbing bitch friend Google has told me she has autism. And I guess I'm a little worried that all of this, including the (temporary) balance problem, is the beginning of some awful regression that is going to leave us all heartbroken.

Aside from the current change back to open-handed pointing, she continues to interact, make eye contact and respond to her name (though seemingly less now that I am calling her every 3 seconds to check she can still do it). But my heart still sinks whenever she does any of the things with her hands that I have mentioned.

Tell me why this is happening. Tell me about your experiences, your children and their habits, their quirks ... tell me I am being a dick. Don't hold back.

Thanks.

 

[jessmke]

Both my kids did this type of thing with their hands, my son is 14 months and does exactly what your daughter does and I don't have any concerns about his development. It's a totally normal developmental thing for them to do, I think it becomes a marker for autism if it extends beyond the age where it is considered normal (although I have no idea what that age is). My daughter still flaps her hands occasionally at nearly three years old. She also didn't point or imitate actions at all until she was well over a year old, probably 18 months. She just had a check up yesterday at the doctor and they have zero concerns about her development. My son is 14 months old and he points (mostly with one finger but sometimes with his whole hand), he hand flaps and fiddles around with his fingers. He also had a check up yesterday and no concerns with him either. I think your daughter's actions are totally normal and nothing to be concerned about.

As an aside, I have three nephews with autism and only one of them hand flaps, so in itself it isn't a very good marker for autism.

 

[_Meep_]

Thanks. I think it's because it is new and coinciding with some mild 'regressions' (clumsiness, pointing with her whole hand, and now I've convinced myself this evening she has stopped responding to her name ), I'm making it more than it probably is. She's also teething badly and sleeping like crap at the moment, and has been so overtired and hyper tonight, which probably isn't helping her general attention. It's helpful to know other children do the hand things too.

 

[_Meep_]

P.S. I have also said many times to people on here who are worried about hand flapping etc. that it's only a concern if it continues past a certain age, but clearly I can't take my own advice!

 

[noon_child]

I know it's hard but please stop Googling! Unless it's an emergency, there's no reason to get any medical info via Google, and talking to an understanding empathetic real person will always be more productive and reassuring. I know why you do it...in the vain hope that if you check, if you get the answer, if you get the reassurance you can end the constant tape loop of "What if?" that accompanies all uncertainties (been there) BUT IT DOESN'T WORK. Be kind to yourself *hugs*. I'm not going to give you feedback about your daughters behaviour, because it wont make any difference to your reality - your post has already shown you know what's what. Hope you can get over this anxiety soon.

 

[_Meep_]

Me too! Thanks. Google has always been my downfall lol.

 

[_Meep_]

So she's responding to her name again this morning following a night of sort-of sleep lol. Her comprehension also continues to be fabulous. She's so very bright ... I just hope she's ok. I've got to remember that this fear only arose from some hand movements which appear to be pretty typical in young toddlers, and anything I notice from now is likely to be a product of my own over-analytical fear rather than anything that is actually a real issue.

 

[crownest]

She is also getting to the age where they develop selective hearing and like go ignore you calling them to drive you nuts !

 

[krissie328]

She sounds typical to me. But one thing that I wondered with the balance and unresponsive to her name was possibly an ear infection. It sounds like those issues have resolved now though.

 

[catty]

I honestly see nothing here that indicates autism, if anything I think she sounds very advanced!
When she started getting clumsy it could have been something like a mild ear infections that was making her lose her balance or maybe because she was working on bigger things - ie. The running.

I do think all kids do weird hand things so I wouldn't worry about that. Maybe as an older child but she's still so teeny.

My friends child is almost 3. Doesn't respond to her name and never has. Hand flaps, tip toe walks, runs away without a second thought and has 0 sense of danger and has about 10 words.
My other friends son is now 5 but from about 18 months he wouldn't look at anyone or respond and would lie on the floor sucking his thumb at social events (we thought he was extremely shy)
Both of them were told the age you are describing is way too young to tell as any 'normal' child can do these things such as tip toe walking.

I feel your pain though, in a Googler and it's horrible but honestly I don't think she sounds like she has any of the markers - the pointing she could honestly just be working on something bigger and thats taking up alot of her little brain.

 

[_Meep_]

Thanks you two. I did of course have her ears checked straight away (went to out of hours GP) and they were clear. I'm 99% certain it was a growth spurt as, when it resolved, she needed to go up a clothes size and was suddenly bending down to look through a glass panelled door we have as there was suddenly a wooden slat in her eyeline! She also visibly slimmed out around the belly/thigh/bottom area and her dimple in her right cheek is much more pronounced now as she lost her pudgy look overnight. Oh the things I notice!

I'm still a little concerned and probably will be for a couple more weeks until it's obvious she's still progressing, but I actually think she's having a language explosion right now. She is so engrossed in stuff (so she won't always respond to me) and is absolutely obsessed with pointing out things in picture books that she recognises. She will use her finger to point in a book but her whole hand right now for anything else?! Little weirdo. She has also added L, N and S sounds to her vocabulary and lots more words are coming through right now. I'd estimate she has about 20. Which is great! And it's progress - she isn't losing, but gaining.

So yeah, she's probably fine and just going through some leaps right now, but it's certainly brought some rather odd behaviours with it!

Should any fellow Googlers find this, I'll continue to update when I know what's what, but if you are seeing this in your child, don't be too worried just yet as I'm pretty sure mine is absolutely fine.

 

[_Meep_]

Oh, and the hand flapping has mostly stopped and lasted about two days?! She still finger fiddles and occasionally does her jack up motion, but it's all in context, i.e. 'I'm bored', 'I'm excited', 'I want that!' ...

 

[_Meep_]

Back to index finger pointing now. God knows what's been going on with my child, but basically all the behaviours I was worried about seem to have resolved?! She now has a definite cold so I think the inevitable sore throat and muggy head feeling that comes at the beginning before you get the horrifying snot fountain may have contributed to the few days of spaced-out/uninvolved behaviour we saw.

 

[Bevziibubble]

She sounds normal and quite advanced! These kids like to worry us don't they As you know, Google is my downfall too and it never leads to reassuring answers.
I'm glad the behaviour you were worried about has resolved. They tend to go through phases where they have little quirks. Hope she's feeling better from her cold soon

 

[_Meep_]

No it never helps, but still we can't stop??!

I am pretty sure she is fine now but she's having loads of trouble breastfeeding at the moment, so that's my new worry! Her nose is really blocked up so I guess that's part of it, but she was having trouble a couple of days beforehand as well, so ... the teeth? Something else? Boohoo!! I hope it goes away!

 

[Bevziibubble]

It is probably because of the blocked nose. James gets really annoyed when he tries to feed with a blocked nose as he can't breathe!

 

[_Meep_]

This is sort of S's problem. She usually breathes between swallows but now she's doing lots of frantic swallows in a row without breathing and ends up gasping for air!

 

[Bevziibubble]

Aww, bless her!

 

[Weebles]

Meep, to me your daughter sounds rather advanced as far as development is concerned. She's much further ahead than my LO who is roughly the same age and she's right on target. About the hand flapping, I wouldn't worry about it. I did the same thing when I was little... and for some time longer. I remember it worrying my parents but truth be told I was holding onto miniature imaginary animals and in order to do things I had to put them down first... So there was lots of flapping. Of course I couldn't articulate this to my parents.

 

[_Meep_]

Haha that's very cute!

I do feel bad really posting threads like this as I know there are other mums out there who genuinely have just cause to be worried and upset about their child's development, and I know I'm 99% likely not to turn out to be one of them. The trouble is, you hear all these stories about children who developed perfectly normally and then lost all their skills. That is literally my worst nightmare - I cannot even imagine how awful that must be, but seem to spend a lot of my time unwittingly trying to imagine it.

I think, because of my anxiety, for me it is really hard to accept that anything that came from me or that I made could possibly be so perfect - so I'm just waiting for it all to mess up, and jump on every tiny sign and obsess about it ...

I'm so lucky to have two girls who have been so quick and early to learn. I do feel selfish and indulgent worrying about them, but I can't seem to help it.

My baby is fine though, I can see that now a little time has passed. She is adding words by the day, and has even learnt a colour (blue)! The flapping has pretty much gone and thankfully the clumsiness seems to be totally gone now too. That was really scary for me.

I should try to remember all these things from my first, and it is easier not to worry about the baby so much having been through similar anxieties over my first, who has turned out better than awesome, but sometimes I do seem to get caught out!

I'm working on it.