Me and DH are thinking about having a 3rd child. My oldest ds has (4) HFA, my dd (22 mos) is developmentally normal. We just had ds dx in July, but I have been wanting another child since I had my youngest (crazy I know), but I finally brought myself to talk to dh about it and he kinda wants another one also... :bouncing: !!! I'm very excited about this.

Anyway.... I was just wondering if anyone made the decision to have another after knowing that one was autistic? If so, how did that child turn out and did you give that child any shots? We are alittle scared to have another boy... :eek: for fear of this, but I also hear that the chances are only slightly higher and the higer functioning the child you have with Autism, the better you chances on having a typical child... either way we would love it no matter what!

Hello,

As you know from my name I have 4 boys, but the first boy is my husbands from an other marrage. our first 2 boys where born 18 month apart. then the last one was born 2 years later. We first froung out our middle boy was Autistic. Then our older was going through testing at his pre school to see if he would meet requierment for speech. They said he had some autistic behavors, but not mainy. Now our youngest is 11 month old now and he is addvance all the way. We are still giving him the shot because he doesn't show any signs of autism. We also making sure he is on track and pushing him to keep on ontrack. I'm pretty sure he's going to be ok. I hope I help and anwsered your question. :)

I really wish there was that magic 8ball. KWIM?
A wise friend of mine with two kids on the spectrum once said to me,"Statistics don't mean much once it happens to you."
We have twins. Baby A is my ASD child. Baby B is kind of NT, not spectrum, but language disordered (apraxia, et al). I'd love to have another baby, hopefully just one, LOL, but I get scared.
I say you have to just pray (if you're of that persuasion) or trust your instincts.
God bless you. ((hugs)) And y'all will be in my prayers. :)

My son's DX was given 4 weeks after the birth of my baby girl.Of course we knew he was autistic when I got pregnant again.My daughter is now a year old has SEVERE food allergies and seems to be showing signs of autism.I WOULD DO IT ALL OVER AGAIN.....

[COLOR=Indigo]We have decided to keep it at 2 kids.....I'm busy enough! :angel:

I have a son with high functioning autism. My hubby and I always said we wanted 4 kids(he was our second). I almost died having him and am unable to have more but I would have if I could have!!! :) God only gives you what you can handle, and I guess he felt I could only handle 2...oh well. Best of luck in your decision.
Kathy

I have also considered having a third child - my oldest is high-functioning and my youngest (who is almost 3) has a slight speech delay but otherwise seems to be developing normally. Sometimes I think I must be nuts to consider having another one - not only is there the question of whether he/she would be autistic, but I wonder if it's fair to my autistic son - would I have less time to devote to him? When I had the 2nd child I was afraid that I wouldn't have enough time for both but we have handled it ok I guess. So I understand your concerns. I go back and forth so much on this decision and I know that my husband would be happy either way. I have decided that this is too big a decision for us to handle by ourselves and we should put it in God's hands because I truly believe that He only gives you what you can handle. I love being a mother more than anything and I would love to experience it one more time, but if it's not meant to be, then I will be at peace with it. Good luck with your decision and try to have faith that whatever is meant to be will be.

SHReed... I thing you just explained my life. I also believe that my 22 mo dd has a "slight speech delay", but she is talking now... although, I don't think the doctors would be happy with it... anyway..... My son LOVES kids and I don't think he would be that upset with another child. He is very loving and happy despite his problem... so I also leave it in God's hands, He is the one, like you said, knows how much we can handle.

hi - good question, we're struggling with this one also. me, i'm willing to try again, wife no. chance of recurrence is higher than for the general population. i've seen as low as 3% and as high as 10%. personally i believe the higher numbers in the 8 to 10 percent range. If you attend any conferences or meetings with other parents of autistic children, you will meet plenty who have more than one kid (non-twin) on the spectrum. one speaker last year i heard has three boys on the spectrum...

the 3 -10 percent figure in my understanding is for another spectrum diagnosis , but there is also risk for developmental problems non-spectrum wise (just a touch of autism if you will).

This is not meant to discourage anyone! just my own observations!

I just had my third child. He is just now 6 weeks old. An unplanned child. I have a 16 month old baby girl. My oldest who is 4 has been diagnosed moderatly autistic. I have my hands full. My children are probably the sweetest you could ever meet. All have kind hearts but they are still children. I suffer from bi polar depression and I am completely over whelmed. It wouldn't be so bad if my oldest wasn't so delay because he could help out. But he is an excape artist and go missing frequently.

I love my children dearly, but if I had known that my oldest had this disorder, I probably wouldn't have had the second one although she was the best thing for him. The third child was never planned. I didn't find out I was pregnant until I was almost three months along. WOOOPS! *laughs*

Right now I have all these parents telling me about all the therapy I need to be doing with my son. All the scheduals I have to keep so that he can get the tools he needs to live an ordinary life. BUT all these parents have only one child or there special child is the youngest. They have the help of the older children.

Just this weekend, my tire blow out. I was alone, my cell phone was dead. The baby was screaming which upset the toddler which really upset the autistic child who hates loud noises. He would continually keep getting out of his seat and escape the van while I was trying to change the tire. I was a little stressed. But I got it done. However it took me hours instead of minutes because I would have to stop and feed the baby or change a diaper. Three children that need diapers changes! EWW! But everything would have gone a lot smoother if I could have gone, "John, give the baby his bottle. Hold the bottle for him."

If you can handle the stresses I say go ahead and have another child. I can but barely. I can't go anywhere unless they have a large shopping cart for all the kids to sit in.

God Bless,

Roz

I have three children. My 13 year old son was dxed when he was 3 1/2. At that time, my daughter was 5 weeks old. My daughter, now 10, is NT and very intelligent. It took me and my daughter quite a while to talk my husband into a third child. My youngest son is now 5 1/2 and also ASD. My oldest two have been fully vaccinated. My youngest has not had any immunizations. Yes, it is very hard have two ASD boys, but I would not trade any of them for anything. It is also very hard on my daughter, being the only NT child of the family. I would like to adopt a little girl now, but my husband said I was crazy the one time I mentioned it to him.

I thought about having another child After my son was diagnosed and decided against it its just really hard to care for himand icould never do it again believe me i wanted to!!!!! :angel:

My son is 6 and he is autistic and is the most loving child , he being different just makes him even more special. he does different things in his playing. He likes to walkunder lines and follows them line of trees.he mimicks everything he says even acting it out.Watching him is like watching tv. What different things does your autistic child do?

My son loves to look at himself in any reflective surface. It could be your glasses, the dishwasher or tv...anything. He is such a ham. This is the main reason for his eye contact problem. Other than that, there isn't too many. My son is "almost" normal... his main problems are in the social department. He likes adults or younger children... My niece was over yesterday, she played with my dd who is 2, my son just did his thing... but if you think about it... is this "really" a disability? If they can do what is asked of them, but just don't like to "hang" out with kids... is that so bad? JMO

The social difficulty is the biggest (and worst) part of this disability. It's not that they don't *want* to "hang out" with other kids, they do not know how to go about doing so. This is largely due to communication problems -- both verbal and nonverbal. They do not "get" social cues. Autistics don't know what needs to be said in order to initiate interaction or conversation, and they don't naturally know how to imitate or pretend. All of this needs to be taught and reinforced, or else the child will always be a social outcast. I don't know about everyone else, but this is the thing that keeps me up at night. I don't want my child sitting on the sidelines his whole life, and being the "oddball." I'm going to do everything in my power to help him learn how to socialize. It's so incredibly important for so many reasons.

I know what you mean. I worry about my son not getting invited to parties and things... but my son's personality is so out there, that it is hard to imagine that it WON'T happen. You can't help but love him. He is very friendly and loves to talk and play. He will go up to someone and ask them to play with him, and I hope that it evolves more as he gets older...

He will go up to someone and ask them to play with him

That is fantastic! It's a big deal just that he'll approach a child to play! Yay for him! :)

My son is 4, and his teachers are working on this on a daily basis at the integrated preschool class he's in. He is excellent at reading, so they made him signs to read that say things like, "David, will you play with me?" :( It's so sad, but so sweet. When the teacher told me about the signs, I cried! The saddest part is that he loves to read the signs to people, but he hasn't grasped the fact that once you ask someone to play, you have to follow through and actually play with them! He reads the sign, gets all excited about the fact that he did it, and then he walks away! :(

Ah, well. I guess at this point it's a work in progress, and it's hard to be too sad about it because he's such a happy little kid. He has no idea he's missing out on the most important part of childhood by not knowing how to join in. He's actually starting to play with his little brother on occasion, and that's pretty huge, so I'd like to think that he'll get the hang of it eventually. He has such a great sense of humor and loves to play when someone else initiates it, so that's a good start, I guess.

MY 8 month old daughter was unplanned but she was the best thing I could of done to help my son. Chris never played with kids before she was born and he plays with her alot. The other day he went up to his cousin and wanted to play which blew me away. My doctor said that my daughter will be a key person in Christophers social development.

I agree with you on that. ds plays well with my dd, and I'm so happy for that. I was just thinking about that today! Good point

I, too, am so glad to have another NT son, especially since he has such an incredibly outgoing personality. He truly is a blessing for all of us, and he will be so good for my autistic son. He literally forces his brother to answer him, pay attention to him, play with him, etc. (not in a nasty way -- I mean the way kids do when they're very social!).

I'm so glad I had my NT son before I found out about my older son's autism. I'm not sure I would've had a second child, at least not that quickly, and that would've been a real shame. I feel so bad when I hear a parent say they don't plan on having anymore children after finding out their first is autistic. I can understand how overwhelming it is to deal with a child with these issues, so I know where they're coming from. But you eventually learn that life does go on, even though life is a different than you expected it to be. And having another child is actually a great idea for many reasons in the long run.

(I do want to point out, though, that I'm not saying that people should have more children mainly to "service" their autistic child! That's not a good reason to have another child in and of itself, of course!)

I have a 7year old with autism( i have aspergers and so does my husband...go figure) How that happened, is still a mystery. Anyhoo, I have a younger son who is 4, whom I am very protective of as well. He seems to not have any problems that we have. Although i feel parenting has alot to do with a childs behavior, it is not always the case. I am doing a better job now than what I did when my oldest was a baby, because I didnt know any better at 18) My oldest will always have social issues, just like me and his father, but my youngest is a ball of fire. And I really more ready with this baby the second time, it gave me a chance and to understand to learn to do it right and stop blaming myself and make the situation better. to learn how to get my oldest son to show more affection and socialization also. I believe my youngest son was an angel sent to us because had he not come, we would be a very confused family because none of us have good social cues or communication. It was just as if somebody had brought a bunch of autistic children an puppy or something to love easily and to express through emotion. I work more with the older one and put the effort to show him my love for him , but my youngest gets so much love because he comes to get it. My oldest is in first grade and my youngest is in pre-k,)(he got in because of the circumstances surrounding our dx and has been in since he was 3) I wanted him to be around "normal" people so that he wouldnt get confused and/or might have a better chance to have more outgoing social skills than us.All I remember is that I wanted the baby just like you do, and thats the best way to have a child(taken money and stress isnt keeping you back)Good Luck, I love :angel: babies.