Is it true that the first symptoms of autism can be seen in an infant of a few months? What might these symptoms be?
The first symptoms of autism usually appear before a child is three years old. However, research and parents’ accounts show that they often notice certain behaviours that worry them even in the first year of their child’s life. Children who may later develop autism have difficulty making eye contact, have little interest in other people, do not pay attention to the faces of others, and do not share attention (e.g. if an adult looks at an object, a healthy child wants to see what the adult is looking at and looks at the object and then looks at the adult’s face again). They are pale facially. Their face, body are not very expressive. They have difficulty using gestures. Very often these children do not point when they see something interesting, they do not bring things of interest to their parents e.g. a book, a pebble. Sometimes they give the impression that they cannot hear. They don’t always respond to their own name, they don’t seem to understand what is being said to them. They respond better when a command is supported by a gesture rather than simply spoken. They are unable to play ‘pretend’ – pretend to feed a doll, cook, drive bricks to a building site in a car, etc.
If you want to monitor your child’s normal development, you can perform diagnostic tests that include TSH, total IgE and glucose.
Speech does not develop properly in children with autism. Some children do not speak and compensate for their lack of speech with facial expressions, gestures. In other children with autism spectrum disorders, speech initially develops correctly – the first words appear, sometimes even tasks, and then there is a regression. The child suddenly or gradually stops speaking, communicating with the environment. In the case of children with Asperger Syndrome, it is difficult to notice abnormalities in speech development in the first years of life. These children speak a lot and have a rich vocabulary. Because of their good speech development, they are sometimes referred to as “little professors”. It is only when they are a few years old that one notices that these children have difficulties with dialogue, are interested in what they themselves say and not in what their interaction partner has to say, etc.
In some children, we also observe so-called motor mannerisms – fluttering hands, rocking, turning in circles. In addition, children with autism often row objects, not just their toys. They can stare for a long time at the rotating drum of a washing machine, spin the wheels of cars. Sometimes they give the impression that they cannot hear, while certain sounds make them scream, in which case they cover their ears. Sometimes they like a lot of pressure and squeeze between the back of the sofa and the wall, but they also avoid being touched, especially if it is a gentle touch.
In addition, parents often report their children’s problems with food (vain eaters, eating only a few selected foods), colic in infancy, abdominal problems (constipation or diarrhoea), sleep problems (difficulty falling asleep, very short, restless sleep, waking up at night crying, screaming).
Source
- https://www.medonet.pl/magazyny/autyzm,jakie-sa-pierwsze-objawy-autyzmu-,porada,1658350.html
