Thursday, July 25, 2019
Questions and Comments
Hello folks-- Blogspot has changed its method of handling comments and I have just figured out how they are doing it. If you posted a comment in the past months, I apologize for not seeing it! Please try doing it again and I will try to stay on top of this. Problem is, they used to send me an email reminder when there was a comment, now they don't. So sorry!
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Hi Jean - You have a wonderful blog. I've spent the last few days reading almost all of your posts on Autism and eye contact.
ReplyDeleteI'm hoping you can give me your opinion on my 10 week old daughter. I have a few concerns:
1) Eye contact/smiling - She sometimes makes eye contact with me and smiles at me and others. However, she does not smile more than 3-4 times per day. She can track objects very well. However, she does not seem to focus on or 'prefer' faces. I'm concerned that these are symptoms of autism or another social development disorder. What do you think?
2) Fine motor skills and noticing hands - She does not seem to have hand/eye coordination. She has not really batted at objects and does not bring her hands to her mouth. I'm worried that these are further signs of autism because of the delay in fine motor skills. What do you think?
3) Noises - she inconsistently turns her head to noises and my voice. Her newborn hearing screening was normal. Again, I'm concerned that this indicates autism. What do you think?
I hope I'm being overly anxious. She is able to do many wonderful things. She has excellent head control for her age, does very well in tummy time and her eye-tracking of objects is great. Finally, she is very talkative. Often when I smile at her, she will respond with a coo and we'll talk back and forth for a bit.
Thank you for reading.
Hi Katherine-- let me start by pointing out that babies do not do everything they can do at every moment, any more than adults do. Also, keep in mind that babies in general do not develop every skill at exactly the same rate of speed. Fir example, babies who are working on walking often do not show much progress on talking at the same time, and vice versa. The "numbers in the book" only tell you averages of a lot of babies for the ages at which they achieved certain abilities. they don;t show you how many babies were earlier or later than that though perfectly normal. Your baby did not read the book, anyway!
ReplyDeleteThe cooing and back-and-forth are really good signs that she is progressing well. In my opinion, you are worrying too much for your own good. I wonder whether it might be good to ask your OB/GYN for a depression assessment. I know worrying does not sound like depression, but they are connected. You may need a little extra support at this time in your life.
Just play with the baby-- don't spend your time looking up autism in the Internet! I bet that a year from now you will have forgotten all about this concern!