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Late onset of symptoms - is this possible?

Completely In the Dark

My 12 year old daughter has had a rough 15 months since starting high school. She has a good mix of friends and a good range of hobbies outside of school. She has been struggling to cope with growing up however resulting in panic attacks, self harming and a number of suicide attempts. We have been seeing CAMHS for 8 months and she has had several counsellors trying to help her. The last CAMHS assesment mentioned that they now believe that she could be somewhere on the autisim spectrum. We have looked at the symptoms and apart from not maintaining eye contact when she meets strangers, she displays no other symptoms ( this has been backed up by school and relatives with experience of autisim in their professional field). My question is, can a 12 year old start to display autistic symptoms when she has never shown anything during her developmental stages?

Parents

  • I work as an outreach teacher with children with ASD in mainstream schools.  Girls with ASD often go under the radar.  They tend to present differently to boys, and are often social chameleons.  They are usually very keen to please, and can have wonderful coping strategies, being able to recognise and copy what other children do and how they behave.  This can lead to their condition not being recognised, even by professionals, until a time of elevated anxiety (starting secondary school is a common one) rocks their word and causes them to struggle to cope more. 

    Clearly these are generalisations, but I hope this may help you to understand some reasons why your daughter has suddenly started struggling.

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  • I work as an outreach teacher with children with ASD in mainstream schools.  Girls with ASD often go under the radar.  They tend to present differently to boys, and are often social chameleons.  They are usually very keen to please, and can have wonderful coping strategies, being able to recognise and copy what other children do and how they behave.  This can lead to their condition not being recognised, even by professionals, until a time of elevated anxiety (starting secondary school is a common one) rocks their word and causes them to struggle to cope more. 

    Clearly these are generalisations, but I hope this may help you to understand some reasons why your daughter has suddenly started struggling.

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