New and confused

As the Parent of my son now 36 who is severely and profoundly autistic.  His first sounds were "Caw Caw" copying the Crows. He did not speak any sounds that were imitative to words such as sounds mmm and a couple of others.. etc as a precursor to speech sounds until he was probably 3 years old, This was our first thought that their might be a real problem and we started to seek help, because by then we had been gradually getting at our wits end so slowly that we did not realise it was happening with the problems that had occurred since his birth and were so obvious in retrospect. Starting When I had to supervise and record his actual precise intake of feeding quantities from day 8 as he was refusing food this included suckling in the hospital and was, and still is very  distressing for my wife.  This as I later read was an obvious symptom of a mental handicap.. Had I not done so he would have died as a graph of his weight was a straight line to zero in a week or so. 

We had been taking it for granted that he was like our other 5 older children who are not autistic and were making sounds Mum Mum first as I remember.  We did not start to get worried until later with our youngest as we knew nothing about autism.  

The only food that my son would tolerate was SMA Gold for the first 18 months of life. and he gained weight at the rate or 6kg to 1kg. any thing else was vomited back after the 5th teaspoon, and then I was having to hold him still enough while he was being force  fed. Such was his rejection of food. we have had problem all his life of him vomiting up food he has just eaten as if it was a trigger for him to vomit. It has been a lifelong problem, today it is extensive excessive drinking of fluids. This we are told is a result of his medication and started only when he was 26,  as he was becoming more and more violent. Most of the time he is perfect, but he can and obsessively want to attack you. You just have to be wary.

The reasons for my son  being autistic, is in our case he was deprived of oxygen at birth. There is a test we had done to see if he had what is referred to as fragile X syndrome which is indicative of an heredity condition. This came back negative. Your doctor could organise such a test.

I have mentioned feeding as you have highlighted this as a worry., you seem to imply he would take no nourishment unless you plugged it in.  Let your doctor know. It could be he just likes you feeding him. It gives him  Mum time.

As the Parent of my son now 36 who is severely and profoundly autistic.  His first sounds were "Caw Caw" copying the Crows. He did not speak any sounds that were imitative to words such as sounds mmm and a couple of others.. etc as a precursor to speech sounds until he was probably 3 years old, This was our first thought that their might be a real problem and we started to seek help, because by then we had been gradually getting at our wits end so slowly that we did not realise it was happening with the problems that had occurred since his birth and were so obvious in retrospect. Starting When I had to supervise and record his actual precise intake of feeding quantities from day 8 as he was refusing food this included suckling in the hospital and was, and still is very  distressing for my wife.  This as I later read was an obvious symptom of a mental handicap.. Had I not done so he would have died as a graph of his weight was a straight line to zero in a week or so. 

We had been taking it for granted that he was like our other 5 older children who are not autistic and were making sounds Mum Mum first as I remember.  We did not start to get worried until later with our youngest as we knew nothing about autism.  

The only food that my son would tolerate was SMA Gold for the first 18 months of life. and he gained weight at the rate or 6kg to 1kg. any thing else was vomited back after the 5th teaspoon, and then I was having to hold him still enough while he was being force  fed. Such was his rejection of food. we have had problem all his life of him vomiting up food he has just eaten as if it was a trigger for him to vomit. It has been a lifelong problem, today it is extensive excessive drinking of fluids. This we are told is a result of his medication and started only when he was 26,  as he was becoming more and more violent. Most of the time he is perfect, but he can and obsessively want to attack you. You just have to be wary.

The reasons for my son  being autistic, is in our case he was deprived of oxygen at birth. There is a test we had done to see if he had what is referred to as fragile X syndrome which is indicative of an heredity condition. This came back negative. Your doctor could organise such a test.

I have mentioned feeding as you have highlighted this as a worry., you seem to imply he would take no nourishment unless you plugged it in.  Let your doctor know. It could be he just likes you feeding him. It gives him  Mum time.

In response to NAS38972 .

The Concerned mother did not highlight they were not feeding,

she actually said  “I have a 17 month old son with him who doesn’t HOLD his own bottle or talk apart from row row”.

Holding a bottle and not feeding are not in any way the same,

he may well like being fed as most young children do, it doesn’t make him more likely to be autistic!

As said by many understanding and loving parents  here don’t start worrying your son will have to be held down and force fed, that will never be done.

Times have changed since 1983 and even then I cannot imagine a medical professional advising that as a way to give nourishment to a young child!

” and then I was having to hold him still enough while he was being FORCE fed”.

On who’s advice was this a right way forward?

what did the professional people do to find out why he vomited?

What was the outcome of medical tests?

What advice was sought and what was given?

I wish you well NAS38972 and I hope your son is living a life with much love and understanding.