u/FoodieNurse247

I just typed out a whole thing and it deleted LOL. So basically my son has been waving since 12 months, but it was always like a hand flapping wave, but whatever that’s fine he understood what the gesture meant and when to wave hi and bye. Now for the last few weeks, whenever he waves he is doing the typical “open close” of his hand, but his palm is facing him instead of facing out. I thought it looked so cute but naturally I decided to google if this was a “typical” thing before figuring out to flip your hand outward. Everything that comes up is having waving toward oneself is a sign of autism because they copy the motion exactly as they see it vs understanding that they have to turn their hand out too.

So naturally coming here to see if any of your littles had a phase of waving toward themselves? Is it truly that worrisome? I feel like I always have these little concerns about my son and have since he was really little, and I’m constantly on the fence of wondering if he may be autistic or not (not much speech at all only like 3 words, he gestures, knows his body parts, but then does “stim” occasionally and does not know some items I feel like he should like ball etc so idk truly lol) . Overall I know it’s truly too early but little signs here and there still have me keeping my eyes out (we have a dev pedi for my oldest that already said she’d gladly eval him if I wanted, but to not do it too soon just to waste our time for him to clearly not get any diagnosis from being too young).

My 15 month old has always been “late” to the speech type milestones - babbled right at the cusp of 9 months and then didn’t really start varied babbling until after 12 months. Now at 15 months he has 2 solid words “done” and “down”. It seems like he’s starting to understand “dada” and “mama” more but not enough for me to actually consider them words and not babble. I know this falls right on the cusp of the milestone for 15 months. Pediatrician has 0 worries and said we will revisit at 18 months. My insurance won’t cover speech until 18 months anyway and my state EI is not free and quite honestly horrible quality for the cost, and I’m not convinced he’d qualify anyway due to his receptive language being appropriate. Wanted to see if anyone had a child who had their speech bloom a little later and caught up!

My son finally just had his 15 month appointment around 10 days late. He only has 2-3 consistent words with maybe 1-2 more emerging. “Down” and “done” are the two consistent. Dada is used for everything but I can’t say for sure if he attaches it to his dad. And Mama and “up” are starting to seem more consistent. He has 5 signs that he uses independently - more, eat, yes, open, please. His receptive language is on target from what I understand. The pedi said he’s “right on the cusp” and that it’s okay right now. I feel like a sitting duck though? Because our state EI is not free and of TERRIBLE quality, I’m not going to rely on qualifying for their services right now. My insurance won’t pay for speech until 18 months. I cannot afford OOP costs for speech right now. So I feel like I’m failing him or doing him a disservice by just waiting another 3 months. Anyone else in a similar boat with not many words still?