My 17 month old might have autism

For a few months my husband and I have expressed mild concerns to each other regarding our youngest child, 17 months old. My husband has been much more concerned, but not me. Figured she was just a "in her own time" kid. I'm in a local mom's Facebook group and a few weeks ago someone linked an assessment form for a clinical study of autism diagnosis before 18 months (at our local, renowned hospital) and I filled it out for the fun of it. Got a call from the coordinator asking me to bring my daughter in for an assessment based on my responses. I said sure, but told her I was afraid we'd be wasting their time. They assured me that it was no problem.My daughter had a 2 hour assessment this morning. Despite usually being the parent to handle things like this, I asked my husband to bring her because I was SURE they'd say she was fine. Apparently she isn't fine. They did the Mullen Scales of Early Learning and she scored less than the 10%tile in fine motor, receptive (1% here), and expressive language. They didn't give her an autism diagnosis but said she was at high risk for a diagnosis and recommended we enroll in an intensive, in-home, 12 week therapy program and then follow up with early intervention.I'm beside myself. On one hand, she's young, and this was only a 2 hour assessment in a new environment with people who don't know her. It could be wrong. But on the other hand, she DOES have shitty communication skills, is delayed in speech, and tends to get fixated on certain toys. Despite autism being so commonplace and therapies at our disposal I'm freaking out. Don't know exactly what I'm looking for in this post. Maybe just need to write this all out. via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/2qdcMiv