I just find it incredibly frustrating to see how my son is supposed to be getting this "one size fits all" treatment and I KNOW it's not what he needs.
What is "one size" about what he's getting?
FWIW, I see it as Mum3 does; to me (over the internet, where one cannot diagnose anything even if one were qualified), your DS sounds like gifted/autistic. Many or even most autistic people have comorbid conditions, so the combination gifted/autistic/apraxic is certainly possible, as are any other combination of exceptionalities.
Have you been to a neuropsychologist yet? Or the kind of autism clinic that can do a really thorough workup? You are spending so much energy fretting over the diagnosis. But it is very reasonable to treat symptoms and work on language skills and behavior while seeking further information.
DeeDee
the "one size fits all" comment was in terms of therapies we were recommended by the evaluation team that did the initial diagnosis and by what the school district is offering. His IEP meeting basically looked like this ... "oh, he has Autism diagnosis. So he qualifies for this this and this and will be receiving this this and this|" (part of which I declined and part we will be doing). But again, nobody addressed my concerns regarding the way he speaks and regarding the possible reasons behind his motor issues. If he does in fact have Autism but there may be a possibility of Apraxia / Dispraxia my understanding is that the approach to speech therapy is somewhat different in kids with Dispraxia. I just put him through 9 months of speech therapy that clearly wasn't working for him and he just hated it. The last couple of months turned into DS seeing the therapist (nice girl ... definitely not a bad person!), crying and repeating "bye bye! Go away!" over and over. With both boys all together, we've been through 5 speech therapists, 2 physical therapists, 3 OTs and 1 developmental therapist. Speech for both of them was a complete disaster. They would shut down and stop responding to the therapists (with the exception of the school therapist that DS4.5 has and who is the same person that will be doing ST with DS3 starting probably in 2 weeks through the school district).
As for the diagnostic eval he had, that WAS through a major Autism center. That's why I was surprised that they would come to a diagnosis after seeing him for such a short time. It was a team of therapists and a neuropsych I think who was watching from behind the wall. The therapists team was writing up the report somewhere in another room while the neuropsych was talking to me. He did say that DS has signs of giftedness as well as Autistic traits, he did ask about family history (a lot of the quirky things in both our boys definitely come from me as I was the same way as a little kid), my education, etc. And then basically pointed out that DS3 might turn out just like me. Then he left, the team of therapists came back and gave me their report, saying he has High functioning autism and in most areas ranked him 1.5 - 2 years behind. I pretty much felt like they were telling me he won't most likely talk and needs to learn to communicate through pictures and go to autism school. So I was leaving the place knowing that's just not my child! We will have another re-evaluation sometime before Christmas. So we'll see.
DS4.5's evaluation was much more detailed. We went to Children's 3 times, did receive PDD-NOS diagnosis but also were referred for further testing to confirm or disapprove the diagnosis. We're on a waiting list for that one.
DS4.5 is also the clumsy kind of child, with poor fine and gross motor skills (walked and reached many of the physical milestones even later than DS3) but his problems look nothing like when I watch DS3' face and hands. They are basically lacking movement. I'm looking a preschooler trapped in a 1-year old's body. That doesn't seem right, which is why simple Autism diagnosis does not satisfy me.
