As everyone else has said, my six year old nephew is extremely independent. He takes a shower by himself, pours his own drinks, can make his own sandwich (makes a mess, but can complete the task quite easily), walks by himself in public but stays with us. He can even change my 20 month old's diaper. I don't let him do it unsupervised but I've watched him do it before and he does a great job. Socially, he's still at the point where he's kinda shy around strange adults but with kids...he's good to go. He can spend all day doing "pretend play", as in making up his own little world in his head and going with it. He still pretends plays with his toys, yes, but now he's getting much more in detail with his pretend playing in different situations. If that makes sense. One day he'll spend the whole day being Sonic, the next he's Mario and he wants me to be Luigi. Yes, that was in depth for a nephew but I watch him everyday because he lives with me!

I feel your pain, my 20 month old was just "officially" diagnosed with autism and it's like everyone else around has thrown in the towel. We're working on getting more services in place because he only has one hour a week with an ITDS right now, but I feel like friends and family expect less out of him now. Which is bullshit in my opinion, I know Elliot is fairly capable he just has to work a lot harder. I give major props to you for fighting the therapists, etc. I really hope that five more years into this journey I still have it in me to fight like you do!

Edited By: ImKellyAndIHaveGas 11/24/2012 10:27 AM. Edited 1 times.