My daughter just turned 2 a few months ago. At her 12 month appt she was referred to have a speech therapy eval because she was not saying 20 consistent words (was only saying about 10-15). She didn’t qualify because she was right on the average mark and I was just given some tips to further her speech.

Fast forward to yesterday, I had a follow up now that’s she’s two because I wanted to make sure we were on the right track. My daughter says 50+ words, can count to 10 on her own, and knows/ can say the whole alphabet except maybe 2 letters. Basically the speech evaluator told me her “receptive language” is very behind. She knows words and what they mean, but if asked “put your snack in the trash” she does not understand the action. She’s more accustomed to “labeling and the everyday routine” of things. So long story short, she wasn’t “severe” enough to qualify for services, but the evaluator pushed her through anyway. So now we will be getting help once a week.

Now the autism part. My daughter laid down on the ground to show the evaluator how she colors and she thought that was “questionable” because some autistic children do that. I also told her that my daughter can count to 10. She came back with, does she count objects? I told her sometimes, but a lot of the time she will just randomly count out loud. I thought this was just because she was proud of herself and we worked on it for weeks! Well, the evaluator thought that was concerning and she might be “stimming”.

So any toddler girl mommas have an autistic girl and can shed some light on their first signs? Or maybe what the doctor said was concerning? My daughter makes eye contact, responds to her name, is affectionate, plays with others, and can obviously speak.

Possible concerns: tip toe walks 80% of the time, makes a high pitch sounds when bored/ happy/ excited, and now the randomly counts to 10.

If you made it this far, THANK YOU.