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    Joined: Jul 2016
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    I have a daughter that is a davidson young scholar. She is currently 7 but was reading (actual reading) by 20 months. She could take a new children book off the shelf and read it. She was also quite verbal, etc. etc.

    Now my youngest son is 2. He also seems to be reading very early, like my daughter. HOWEVER, he is also delayed in his speech. So this looks different that just being gifted like his sister. He can read almost any word put in front of him, so he is able to say the words clearly, but they don't seem to hold a lot of functional meaning. So like he could read "Max needs to put the ball in the box." and if I told him to do what the words said, he'd be lost.

    Even more than letters and reading, he has been obsessed with numbers from a very young age. OBSESSED. He can read printed numbers up into the 1000s, count that high as well. He understands what they mean and can do very basic math. (Like you could ask him "what is 53 minus 1" and he'd say 52). He counts things, reads every number he sees at the grocery store, etc. He seeks out numbers. Anything involving numbers (books, games) will hold his attention for hours at a time. I remember when he was about 18 months it would take forever to walk through a parking lot with him because he had to read every license plate (loudly and joyfully!).

    He is in early intervention right now for his language delay and seems to have sensory issues as well. (Jumping, flapping, extremely picky eating). It's only been a few weeks but he is already making progress. Hyperlexia, hypernumeracy, and sensory issues are the "diagnosis" from the therapist.

    While my Young Scholar was also quite advanced in reading and numbers, she wasn't obsessive about it like he is. She also didn't have any of these speech delays or sensory issues. So it just seems different. My oldest son was also number obsessed but not to this level of obsession or proficiency.

    He has no signs of autism in my littlest guy, so I'm told, as he is quite social and makes good eye contact. But I would imagine a very high function autism could be a possibility, he's just too young to know right now.

    Anyone else here dealt with this? I'm torn between letting him do what he loves (numbers!) versus always trying to redirect him. It seems like this could be a positive for him in some ways, but I can see it could also be a distraction and a fixation.

    Is this something that requires special attention (like once he is 3 and can get special ed services - if needed - through the school district) or not?

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    Sounds very similar to my son, who is now 7. I would say that if he has interests in a certain area, to go with it. My son was also obsessed with numbers, and we indulged him, by buying math manipulatives, letting him watch Youtube videos, flash cards, etc. And if you have any areas of concern, it's good to get them addressed early. Have you had him evaluated by a developmental pediatrician yet?

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    Flapping , sensory issues, picky eating, and obsession are all behaviors commonly associated with autism. It is possible to make good eye contact and also be on the spectrum. Personally, it sounds to me like he is displaying many of the signs of what was previously described as aspergers. Many of these may just go away over time, but I would read up on aspergers and see if you feel like that fits your child.

    I do have a similar child who is 5, and we are discussing whether or not to get an evaluation.

    Last edited by Nolepharm; 05/24/17 12:35 PM.
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    My DS10 was [mis]diagnosed with hyperlexia when he was 6, so I've done a lot of reading on the subject.

    Hyperlexia has 3 subtypes. Type 3 has autism traits and some argue it is an autism spectrum disorder. However, with appropriate therapy, kids with hyperlexia-3 outgrow their autism-like behaviors. The prognosis is excellent with early intervention of speech, language, and social pragmatic therapies.

    If you are not comfortable waiting, you could pursue autism evaluation to get insurance to cover therapy now.

    The difference between hyperlexia-3 autism-like behaviors and autism spectrum is that hyperlexia-3 will get better with treatment. Call it whatever you need to in order to get therapy. JMO

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    I would not *always* redirect him. Using his passions can also be beneficial regardless of diagnosis.

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    Originally Posted by Nolepharm
    Flapping , sensory issues, picky eating, and obsession are all behaviors commonly associated with autism. It is possible to make good eye contact and also be on the spectrum.

    My DD was not diagnosed until age 11, and a substantial part of that was because she always had good eye contact. It is totally possible to be autistic and capable of good eye contact.

    If you're being told by people who don't actually work with autistic kids that he doesn't show signs of autism, I would pursue getting him evaluated by an actual autism center. The worst case scenario is that they don't diagnose him with autism and you're in the same place, right? But if they do, trust me that you want to know about it now and not when he's 12 and running away from school personnel and making them worry he's going to be hit by a bus.

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    Thanks so much for all these responses! smile I'm a little familiar with aspergers only because I babysat a kiddo that was diagnosed with aspergers when I was a teenager. I know enough to know that kids with aspergers can be very different from one another, so it does make it hard to identify. I don't know at what age such a diagnosis can be made. (Maybe I should have posted this in the twice exceptional forum, sorry!!)

    Is two just too young to really try for this type of evaluation? I'm thinking once he hits three and will be eligible (age-wise) for our school district special education services, and at that point a diagnosis might be more helpful.

    For now he is making good progress in speech, but our therapist (and pediatrician) are recommending we taking him to a "feeding center" to help with eating issues. So I've starting searching for that... They are also recommending an occupational therapist for both the eating and the sensory issues. I'm trying to not be overwhelmed with this new world of specialists and just take things one step at a time.

    So do kids with hypernumeracy and hyperlexia tend ease up on the obsession as they get older - or is this a "only time will tell" situation?

    Any books to recommend on this subject? I'm a bookworm, so any good titles - just lay them on me!

    Thanks again!!

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    Originally Posted by ElizabethN
    Originally Posted by Nolepharm
    Flapping , sensory issues, picky eating, and obsession are all behaviors commonly associated with autism. It is possible to make good eye contact and also be on the spectrum.

    My DD was not diagnosed until age 11, and a substantial part of that was because she always had good eye contact. It is totally possible to be autistic and capable of good eye contact.

    If you're being told by people who don't actually work with autistic kids that he doesn't show signs of autism, I would pursue getting him evaluated by an actual autism center. The worst case scenario is that they don't diagnose him with autism and you're in the same place, right? But if they do, trust me that you want to know about it now and not when he's 12 and running away from school personnel and making them worry he's going to be hit by a bus.
    Yes.


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    If a provider is telling you there are no signs of autism, and yet the child has a language delay (in terms of functional communication, it sounds like) and hand flapping/jumping, then I would definitely take their statement with a grain of salt and seek an opinion from an ASD diagnostician because those are all present in ASD. It's very true that lack of consistent, appropriate eye contact is almost always present in ASD, but what is considered appropriate, consistent eye contact can be difficult to gauge, and of course, there are outliers. Being social also doesn't exclude someone from an ASD diagnosis, it's more in HOW they're social, if you will. Autism assessment is my career--at my center, we casually refer to it as "boy autism" versus "girl autism." They tend to present differently, for a myriad of reasons, and often girls go undiagnosed because they are "social."
    At the very least, I'd see how he does on an MCHAT or an SRS.

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    I agree that that the Modified Checklist for Autism in Toddlers (MCHAT) may be helpful, but isn't the Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS) meant for children over 4 years old?

    Here is a brief roundup of outreach resources to help inform parents about ASD -
    - CDC summary of the DSM5 criteria for ASD and "Learn the signs. Act early." campaign
    - Understood.org... search for 'ASD' or 'autism'
    - wrightslaw... scroll down to select 'Autism Spectrum' in the columnar list of Topics in the left margin
    - SENG YouTube videoThe Misdiagnosis of Gifted Children and book Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults: ADHD, Bipolar, Ocd, Asperger's, Depression, and Other Disorders.
    - National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) - US National Library of Medicine (NLM) - National Institutes of Health (NIH) - Measurement Issues: Screening and diagnostic instruments for autism spectrum disorders – lessons from research and practice
    Originally Posted by NCBI NLM NIH author manuscript
    The items that best discriminated between children with ASD and children with other developmental problems were those that measured joint attention behaviours (pointing, bringing things to show), social relatedness (interest in other children, imitation) and communication (response to name).

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    From a special ed perspective, it may also be valuable to remember that very young children don't need a diagnosis of anything at all to receive services. They can be qualified under developmental delay, and serviced based on identified needs. Treatment is the same regardless of label, and this avoids some of the fallout that may result from early misdiagnosis, where there is ambiguity. The EI provider may be operating under that framework--hence the collection of descriptives, rather than a unified diagnosis.

    Implementing appropriate interventions for the language delay, sensory sensitivity, and stimming behavior is more important than applying a specific label to a very young child. You should, however, make sure the referral from EI to your local school district's special ed occurs at age 2 years 9 months, so there is a smooth transition of services.


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    Great point!

    For those who may be looking for more information on this, wrightslaw provides a webpage on Child Find.

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    Originally Posted by indigo
    I agree that that the Modified Checklist for Autism in Toddlers (MCHAT) may be helpful, but isn't the Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS) meant for children over 4 years old?
    [/quote]

    Just to answer this question: the SRS has two forms; the early years form begins at 2 years 6 months smile

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    Good to know! smile
    Thanks for posting that clarification.

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    I think it's definitely something to keep your eye on, and if you are worried about autism, you should get him evaluated by a developmental pediatrician. My guy was obsessed with numbers and letters at a really young age. We just bought him math manipulatives, and let him watch YouTube videos about numbers. He was diagnosed with autism when he was 5, and he gets ABA therapy 4 days a week at home. If you met him, you would just think he's shy. He gets speech therapy at school, it's just once a week. For me, the main reason I got him evaluated was because he was so asynchronous. Just so advanced in math and reading, and so behind in verbal communication and social skills. Now that he's 7, he's not super obsessed with numbers anymore. He has friends, and loves being around people, but still has a hard time with verbal communication, but is being much better from therapy. I would say just trust your gut, and if you think there are issues, have a specialist evaluate him.

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    I also had a child who was diagnosed very late. Partly because I was kind of parenting in isolation and didn't know some of her quirks were extremely unusual. For example it took me about 6 months to teach her the correct use of personal pronouns, ie that she should refer to herself as “I" and to me as “you". Let me tell you those endless conversations with an 18 month old about who was who were confusing for me let alone her! But at that age everyone we met was telling me how wonderfully she spoke, it would never have occurred to me that she need a speech pathologist. She had lovely diction, a massive vocabulary for her age, (mostly) excellent grammatical sentences, etc. I had no idea she had a significant and diagnosable speech issue. She also never really had an eye contact problem. She generally flapped from happiness not distress…

    At 15 she's doing great and most people would never EVER guess she has a diagnosis, and that is due to being gifted, a girl and years of careful management, not because it’s not real. I am SO glad she does have a diagnosis because as good as she looks life is still HARD for her and the self awareness of where struggles come from is invaluable. And with the value of diagnosis in mind, if I could do it all over, I would get the diagnosis before doing all the therapy and intervention that we did, which made the later diagnosis so very hard. After years and years of hard slog that had all really helped enormously, if your kid is still has big struggles and you realise they need that diagnosis, you don't want to be sitting across from professionals who are saying "Mmmm, we can sort of see it, but she's doing so well...". I had to actually point out to some of them that if she had a diagnosis before all the interventions, and we were sitting here today having this chat about where she was at, you would be saying "Congratulations, your child is doing brilliantly, it's all working really well, they do of course still have Aspergers and always will..."

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    My kid who is now 10 had some similarities but also differences. He had a speech delay but it wasn't language so much as actual speech production. He scored very high for receptive language ability but not expressive. There was a gap. He was very inarticulate, hard to understand, dropped endings off words, had problems combining words. But he seemed to understand directions just fine, he would watch shows like thomas the train and seem to understand (and then do imaginative play with his own trains). When I did the MCHAT he was kind of borderline. He was a very quiet kid and lost in his own explorations. He wasn't obsessed with anything in particular, but seemed to know all the numbers, letters, etc. (and when he was around 3 1/2 he began sounding out words, could recognize most of the sight words, etc. and when he started K he was reading at around a 3rd grade level). In 4 year old preschool he could solve math problems like "If you have 37 trees in your yard and I cut down 16 how many are left?" But he seemed to learn these types of skills like math and reading without being all that interested. I didn't even know he could read until I showed him a list of sight words and was shocked when he read the list. Whenever he got excited he would flap his hands (for instance, if he was about to jump off a diving board). He would walk on the balls of his feet and still does that sometimes. He was ultimately diagnosed as having muscle weakness and low tone and a chiari malformation. Turns out that a lot of kids with chiari malformations have autistic like traits, speech issues, etc. But a chiari malformation is compression of the cerebellum. Thats a totally different mechanism than whatever causes autism. I guess my point is that you just need to keep your eye on him...maybe treat the symptoms like you would if he had autism but it's probably too early to tell. It would be helpful to have a neuropsych eval (make sure you go to someone reputable and research-based, like at a university). We had various evals for autism and they basically all said DS didn't meet the criteria despite the fact that he was flapping, toe walking, he had sporadic eye contact, some social issues, etc.

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    A few more resources, in case they may be of help to future readers of this thread. The first 3 are informal checklists, the fourth is a summary of the DSM-5 diagnostic criteria for Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), which may be used informally at home as a checklist.

    1- old post with link to article comparing gifted characteristics and ASD characteristics (Aug 2016)

    2- post with checklist comparing gifted and ASD traits (Sept 2017, hat tip to BananaGirl)

    3- post with link to Gifted Resource Center of New England (GRCNE) article comparing gifted and ASD traits (Sept 2017, hat tip to Nolepharm)

    4- Summary of DSM-5 ASD diagnostic criteria
    https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/hcp-dsm.html

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