Developmental Disorders

Henry Montero, LMHC, CASAC-2, CTTS

Alquimedez Mental Health Counseling
1154 E. Tremont Ave Bronx, NY 10460-2452
Tel: 718-664-7679
www.alquimedez.com
Email: info@alquimedez.com
Twitter: @henmontero
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So what exactly are developmental disorders? According to the Kennedy Krieger Institute, these are chronic deficiencies that mean an individual has an impairment when he reaches the age of 22. This mental health concern is quite likely to last a lifetime and mainly affects the person’s functional capabilities. He faces limitations in several aspects of his daily life.

The early years of a child’s life are dominated by their parents and teachers paying much closer attention to his activities at home and in school. This is precisely why developmental disorders are detected mostly when children are still young.

Predominantly, when a child reaches school going age, it becomes more facile to scrutinize his behavior and make conclusive decisions before professional help is required. Of course, in some cases, symptoms may not manifest until the individual is much older. There are plenty of instances where the individual is an adult, and then he faces an onset of symptoms.

Types of Developmental Disorders

Autism
You may have heard the terminology at some point in your life since autism is one of the most commonly occurring developmental deficiencies worldwide. In earnest, autism begins during childhood like many other mental health issues. It is characterized by impairments in an individual’s ability to interact with others in a social setting. Therefore, a person who is autistic will have limited vernacular and be restricted to behaviorally when he engages with others in society.

Autism occurs on a spectrum, which means that it can vary from one person to another. For example, it may be severe in some cases. This means the autistic individual may struggle to complete daily activities and as he grows older that difficulty may only augment.

On the other hand, if a person has a less severe form of autism, he may seem entirely normal, but may face shortcomings in certain aspects of his day to day life.

Stuttering
Stuttering is identified as a disruption in the reasonable fluency and time patterns of a person’s speech. Generally, this does not align properly with the person’s age. At the advent of stuttering, the speaker may not be cognizant of the fact that there is an issue.

They may use linguistic mechanisms like changing their rate of speech, skipping certain situations like using a telephone or conversing in public in a bid to conceal the issue. Another aspect of stuttering is that it may come with motor movements. This means that behavior traits like blinking the eyes, jerking of the head and clenching the fists may occur contemporaneously.

Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder (DMDD)
DMDD is a chronic and persistent case where the individual is prone to being extremely irritable. What may be construed as a temper tantrum of a fit of rage may be a sign of the child having disruptive mood dysregulation disorder.

If these tantrums transpire with regularity, then parents should speak to the child’s teachers to corroborate their suspicion before they seek medical attention.