Hello-
Our 9 yo daughter was having trouble in math last year so we had her tested. She was diagnosed with a non verbal learning disorder. We had further neuropsych testing done independently which validated the diagnosis. Other than difficulties with math and my daughters anxiety about it we are not seeing any other siginificant sx which I have read are associated with NLD. She is well liked by peers according to teachers and our observations, she has average gross motor skills and enjoys athletic activities. She isn’t afraid of novel situations, and wants to try/join everything under the sun. He handwriting is not great but it is legible. She has started receiving OT services in school over the last 6 months.
I am just concerned because what I have read about the symptoms and diagnostic profile of a child with NLD seems pretty specific and significant and don’t seem to descibe her strngths and struggles well. Have other people seen a great amount of variability in symptoms with kids with this diagnosis? Are there any good references out there that describe subtypes of the disorder?
9yo daughter newly diagnosed NLD.
Interactive Metronome helped with social skills? Wow, I never thought of IM being one of the reason that my sons social skills improved (not great, but better).
9yo daughter newly diagnosed NLD.
I agree that it doesn’t seem obvious that IM would improve social skills. I reached that conclusion after having two different family members who live out of state tell me how much more connected my son was. He had done IM over the summer.
Re: 9yo daughter newly diagnosed NLD.
My 7 year old daughter has strong characteristics of NLD according to her neuropshy eval 2 years ago. She has some social difficulties, in that she is not comfortable in groups of kids…she gets kind of goofy and awkward, but with family and close friends she is great. They can’t believe she struggles socially. There really is a wide spectrum of characteristics and there are no two individuals alike with NLD. That is what makes it so frustrating. I am hoping that my daughter doesn’t have it or at the very least has it mildly. She was able to learn to ride her bike and tie her shoes easily, and those tasks seem to be ones that they say kids with NLD can’t do, so who knows. I am trying to treat any symptoms as opposed to getting caught up in a diagnosis. It is hard because I am constantly looking for something to tell me that she definetly doens’t have it or she definetly does. I heard that you need to have all three criteria to be able to be diagnosed with NLD and that is and IQ spread between Verbal and Performance greater than 15, social issues, and fine or gross motor difficulites. I would say your daughter doesn’t have it if she doesn’t have any social issues. Best of Luck!
Has your daughter been diagnosed with NLD at the level of a syndrome? I ask because I think there are a lot of children who have some characteristics of NLD but not a full blown case. I was in your position a number of years ago, having had a neurologist diagnose my son with nonverbal learning disabilities.
I kept waiting for things to get worse.
They have not. We did Interactive Metronome which helped with motor skills and with social skills. He was not terrible before but just seemed more connected afterwards. And his attention was def. better.
He is 14 now. He still doesn’t get some things in social situations (humor) but has friends and is popular with girls. I think he is enough out of it to be attractive to them! He played on varsity basketball in middle school in a small school so his coordination is decent now. Again IM did help.
Beth