Autism

[useless]

I created an Autism thread so if anybody wishes to express their thoughts on this subject they can do so here.

 

 

[KentVillan]

One thing I don’t get is how wide a range of different conditions it seems to cover.

Like you have these profoundly autistic people who don’t really speak and it’s very much a severe mental disability.

And then you have the “high functioning” autistic people who basically struggle a bit with social cues, tend to be quite obsessive about facts and so on, but live pretty normal lives.

I feel like the latter category is a pop psychology diagnosis handed out routinely to about 90% of the male population (guilty)

I just wonder how closely linked they are and what the science is. I am not clued up on this at all, so apologies if I have misrepresented anything.

I think it’s good there is much more awareness and acceptance of neurodivergence and neurodivergent people, but I’m not sure the average person really understands it at all. It seems to have become a bit of an insult that can be thrown around very casually.

[choffer]

43 minutes ago, KentVillan said:

One thing I don’t get is how wide a range of different conditions it seems to cover.

Like you have these profoundly autistic people who don’t really speak and it’s very much a severe mental disability.

And then you have the “high functioning” autistic people who basically struggle a bit with social cues, tend to be quite obsessive about facts and so on, but live pretty normal lives.

I feel like the latter category is a pop psychology diagnosis handed out routinely to about 90% of the male population (guilty)

I just wonder how closely linked they are and what the science is. I am not clued up on this at all, so apologies if I have misrepresented anything.

I think it’s good there is much more awareness and acceptance of neurodivergence and neurodivergent people, but I’m not sure the average person really understands it at all. It seems to have become a bit of an insult that can be thrown around very casually.

The best way I’ve seen it described is that everyone with autism is different. It’s the rest of us that are all the same. This came from my wee mate who I looked after every weekend when he was younger. He’s been in a Sen school all through his childhood but is what many would call “high functioning”. If you ever met him, you’d know there’s was something but you wouldn’t necessarily know it was autism. He’s had to learn so many things that come naturally to many of us. Even when he’s learned them, he still has to remind himself about social cues and the like.
Then there’s this amazing brain in him that’s complete genius. He just knows stuff. At nine, he was lecturing the staff at the aquarium about the different sharks they had in their tank and they were saying that he knew stuff they didn’t. Then he went through a train phase where he knew literally everything about trains. He’s currently into war history and I cannot wait to take him to the Imperial War Museum next month. 

Such a deeply complex thing to try and understand. I think even those who study it don’t always have a handle on it. 

[il_serpente]

30 minutes ago, KentVillan said:

One thing I don’t get is how wide a range of different conditions it seems to cover.

Like you have these profoundly autistic people who don’t really speak and it’s very much a severe mental disability.

And then you have the “high functioning” autistic people who basically struggle a bit with social cues, tend to be quite obsessive about facts and so on, but live pretty normal lives.

I feel like the latter category is a pop psychology diagnosis handed out routinely to about 90% of the male population (guilty)

I just wonder how closely linked they are and what the science is. I am not clued up on this at all, so apologies if I have misrepresented anything.

I think it’s good there is much more awareness and acceptance of neurodivergence and neurodivergent people, but I’m not sure the average person really understands it at all. It seems to have become a bit of an insult that can be thrown around very casually.

It seems to me your first sentence is why, at least over here in the US, people are generally now referred as "on the spectrum" vs. being labeled "autistic", which suggests some well-defined, unitary condition.

My nephew is on the spectrum, fairly high functioning.   He's struggling with school now that he's nearly 15 and without really having any friends any longer, as the differences between him and kids his age are now much more pronounced and limiting their common interests and ability to relate to one another's' lives (he is still very much into Pokémon).   He's not local to me, so I'm not up on the details of the  basis for diagnosis, but it's pretty obvious from being around him that he shares common traits with the types we used to label as autistic, just not nearly as severe in terms of isolation from the outside world.  I think there's a much stronger scientific link than just a subjective similarity in social awareness and obsessive tendencies, but those are surely part of the evidence playing a part in the diagnosis.

[Chindie]

I've often wondered if I'm mildly autistic. There's a few elements to my personality, the way I 'read' things, the way my head works that I don't think are normal. Only mildly though. Either that or a psychologist would have a field day.

I do think that whilst also thinking that there's a lot of people who are apparently autistic but are so extremely mildly so that it's not really an important or useful diagnosis, if it's correctly diagnosed at all. I imagine a decent whack of the very high functioning autistic people are self diagnosed either to be fashionable or excuse personality flaws.

When I was younger I was told that a cousin and a family friends son were autistic, but I'm not certain that was actually the case. My cousin was like a child, like his brain got to 6 or 7 and stopped. He had some problems with communication and control, and needed care. The family friends son needed pretty constant care, he was like a very young toddler, non verbal, could just about walk, wasn't capable of understanding anything really. He used to spend the week at a care facility and come home for weekends. I suspect that it was just easier to say 'he is autistic' than to go into the full diagnosis with both of them.

[choffer]

The best entry into understanding autism that I’ve found is the book The Reason I Jump by Naoki Higashida. It’s an easy read and says what it’s like to be autistic. It’s a wee bit contentious as many doubt the boy wrote the book but it’s still a good insight into what it’s like to have the condition. 
There is also a documentary of the same name on Disney which is largely reflective of the book but uses a wide variety of insights from autistic people or their families. 

[mjmooney]

My elder daughter seems to have got the idea that she may have undiagnosed autism. She's a happily married mum, with a degree and a career in project management. Very similar to me in many respects - plenty of friends, keen reader, musician, GSOH, Villa fan. The main difference is that whereas I'm pretty much an extrovert, she tends to be somewhat shy and introverted. She's had some sort of diagnosis, that concluded that she's probably not autistic - which doesn't surprise me, but she seems to find slightly disappointing. My gut feeling is that the 'spectrum' concept is right - and we're all on it somewhere. Some people are so far along that it can be a major problem, for the rest of us perhaps better education and empathy are all that's required. 

[ozvillafan]

My youngest son is on the spectrum. He's now 18 and in his last year of mainstream school (albeit in the inclusive education section).

We did some early intervention when he was first diagnosed at 4 years old. He got past stage 1: Where you can look people in the eye and where you can look at yourself in the mirror and recognise yourself.

Somebody mentioned earlier that people on the spectrum don't learn the things we learn naturally just from growing up. This is definitely true in my sons case. Everything had to be re-learned or learned "the hard way" by repeated instruction and examples. By the time he was in year 6 (12 years old) he was already intellectually 4 years behind his peers.

Being older now, finding friends is hard. He's super independent, works part time at the supermarket and desperately wants to be known for who he is, not for being on the spectrum.

[Xela]

From the NHS site

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/autism/signs/adults/

Quote

Common signs of autism in adults include:

- finding it hard to understand what others are thinking or feeling
- getting very anxious about social situations
- finding it hard to make friends or preferring to be on your own
- seeming blunt, rude or not interested in others without meaning to
- finding it hard to say how you feel
- taking things very literally – for example, you may not understand sarcasm or phrases like "break a leg"
- having the same routine every day and getting very anxious if it changes

You may also have other signs, like:

- not understanding social "rules", such as not talking over people
- avoiding eye contact
- getting too close to other people, or getting very upset if someone touches or gets too close to you
- noticing small details, patterns, smells or sounds that others do not
- having a very keen interest in certain subjects or activities
- liking to plan things carefully before doing them

To be honest, I could tick a number of those - especially in the top section. 

[leemond2008]

I actually had quite an in depth conversation about autism at work today.

There is a bloke at work who is 50 years old and has just been "diagnosed" with autism, he is a work shy dickhead (for want of a better word) he constantly bleats on about how he is victimised because he is gay and now he is constantly bleating on about the fact that he is autistic, I cracked a joke about someone with a disability at work the other day, it wasn't anything malicious and it wasn't anything nasty at all, he sighed and said "you know that not all disabilities are physical or visible don't you" I just ignored him because I do everything I can not to converse with him, then I heard him talking to someone else about how he has started using the disabled bogs at work, when the person asked him why he is using them he said "how dare you ask such a personal question, you know that not all disabilities are physical or visible don't you" 

Basically I am 99.9% sure that he has gone out of his way to get this diagnosis just to safeguard his job (because he has been in the naughty books for some time) and so that he can use it as a stick to beat everyone with and keep them on eggshells.

Now the thing that really bothers me about this is that I have had numerous people over the last few years approach me and actually ask me if I think that there is a possibility that I could be autistic or if I'm on the spectrum or whatever you want to say, I've watched countless videos online about autism in adults and there was one that really really hit hard, I thought for a while about going to the quacks about it but ultimately...I'm a 37 year old bloke and I've gotten by just fine, what would a diagnosis do for me? 

looking at that list that @Xela posted I've highlighted the ones that I can tick off, not just ones where I sometimes do it but ones where I regularly do it.

- finding it hard to understand what others are thinking or feeling
- getting very anxious about social situations
- finding it hard to make friends or preferring to be on your own
- seeming blunt, rude or not interested in others without meaning to
- finding it hard to say how you feel
- taking things very literally – for example, you may not understand sarcasm or phrases like "break a leg"
- having the same routine every day and getting very anxious if it changes

You may also have other signs, like:

- not understanding social "rules", such as not talking over people
- avoiding eye contact
- getting too close to other people, or getting very upset if someone touches or gets too close to you
- noticing small details, patterns, smells or sounds that others do not
- having a very keen interest in certain subjects or activities
- liking to plan things carefully before doing them

I pretty much tick all of the boxes, there are other things that I can add to it as well, one of them being my eating habits, textures of food play a massive part in what I like and what I don't like, I can't eat barely any fruit because of the texture, it took me till I was in my mid 20's before I could be persuaded to try anything like a chinese or an indian, my food consisted of nothing but chicken sandwiches until I was about 18 years old.

If there was a single pea or a carrot on my plate I couldn't eat my dinner.

My whole life is planned around a specific routine, I am one of the most antisocial creatures you will ever meet, I love nothing more than being at home on my own because I find being around people absolutely exhausting (more so in social situations rather than being in work) 

I can have a conversation with someone for 30 or 40 minutes, walk out of the room and 5 minutes later I would not be able to recognise them if I saw them in the street because I have a habit of looking through people rather than at them when I'm talking to them (the eye contact thing really is a big point on that one) 

The one thing that I saw in a video is that if you do go undiagnosed then you will probably stick to your single routine until the point that you are in your 50's and then you'll think "wow, what have I done with my life" (or What haven't I done with my life")  and that is very much the path that I am heading towards in a fast way, yeah it is a little frightening but at the same time I'm content with where I am now so I don't see the need to change it and other than feeling like I've got a stigma about if I get a diagnosis I really don't see the point in looking into it.

I'm terrible with social queues and if I go out with a group of people (even if I've known them for 20 years) I will sit in the corner and not say a word until I have got at least 5 pints down me, that is one of the reasons I drank so heavily when I was younger, it was the only way that I could overcome the crippling anxiety of trying to socialise and fit in.

Anyways, I don't really know where I'm going with this so I'll leave it there, but those are my thoughts.

[LondonLax]

7 hours ago, mjmooney said:

My elder daughter seems to have got the idea that she may have undiagnosed autism. She's a happily married mum, with a degree and a career in project management. Very similar to me in many respects - plenty of friends, keen reader, musician, GSOH, Villa fan. The main difference is that whereas I'm pretty much an extrovert, she tends to be somewhat shy and introverted. She's had some sort of diagnosis, that concluded that she's probably not autistic - which doesn't surprise me, but she seems to find slightly disappointing. My gut feeling is that the 'spectrum' concept is right - and we're all on it somewhere. Some people are so far along that it can be a major problem, for the rest of us perhaps better education and empathy are all that's required. 

Our society tends to value extroverts far more than introverts, to the point where many introverts feel like there must be something wrong with them. 

[KentVillan]

Apparently a lot of autistic people are extroverts and get frustrated with the misconception that they are introverts.

[Jonesy7211]

One thing is certain, there is nowhere near enough resources helping people get a diagnosis.

It currently takes 6-9 months just for the first phone call to a doctor to take place, there's a huge backlog. So many children who need extra help are being let down and missing out on support for many, many years. Children at school not able to understand what's being taught, or struggling to fit in because they don't have the capacity to follow social cues. It must be awful for them.

It's another Tory scandal.

[mjmooney]

3 hours ago, LondonLax said:

Our society tends to value extroverts far more than introverts, to the point where many introverts feel like there must be something wrong with them. 

This, I think, is my daughter's problem. She feels bad that she's a bit shy (actually way less so than many people), and thinks that means there's something wrong with her. Like, if she could be diagnosed as mildly autistic, that would make it OK, as she'd have a 'condition', rather than being some sort of social 'failure'. Which she isn't, anyway. 

[Anthony]

17 hours ago, leemond2008 said:

I actually had quite an in depth conversation about autism at work today.

There is a bloke at work who is 50 years old and has just been "diagnosed" with autism, he is a work shy dickhead (for want of a better word) he constantly bleats on about how he is victimised because he is gay and now he is constantly bleating on about the fact that he is autistic, I cracked a joke about someone with a disability at work the other day, it wasn't anything malicious and it wasn't anything nasty at all, he sighed and said "you know that not all disabilities are physical or visible don't you" I just ignored him because I do everything I can not to converse with him, then I heard him talking to someone else about how he has started using the disabled bogs at work, when the person asked him why he is using them he said "how dare you ask such a personal question, you know that not all disabilities are physical or visible don't you" 

Basically I am 99.9% sure that he has gone out of his way to get this diagnosis just to safeguard his job (because he has been in the naughty books for some time) and so that he can use it as a stick to beat everyone with and keep them on eggshells.

Now the thing that really bothers me about this is that I have had numerous people over the last few years approach me and actually ask me if I think that there is a possibility that I could be autistic or if I'm on the spectrum or whatever you want to say, I've watched countless videos online about autism in adults and there was one that really really hit hard, I thought for a while about going to the quacks about it but ultimately...I'm a 37 year old bloke and I've gotten by just fine, what would a diagnosis do for me? 

looking at that list that @Xela posted I've highlighted the ones that I can tick off, not just ones where I sometimes do it but ones where I regularly do it.

- finding it hard to understand what others are thinking or feeling
- getting very anxious about social situations
- finding it hard to make friends or preferring to be on your own
- seeming blunt, rude or not interested in others without meaning to
- finding it hard to say how you feel
- taking things very literally – for example, you may not understand sarcasm or phrases like "break a leg"
- having the same routine every day and getting very anxious if it changes

You may also have other signs, like:

- not understanding social "rules", such as not talking over people
- avoiding eye contact
- getting too close to other people, or getting very upset if someone touches or gets too close to you
- noticing small details, patterns, smells or sounds that others do not
- having a very keen interest in certain subjects or activities
- liking to plan things carefully before doing them

I pretty much tick all of the boxes, there are other things that I can add to it as well, one of them being my eating habits, textures of food play a massive part in what I like and what I don't like, I can't eat barely any fruit because of the texture, it took me till I was in my mid 20's before I could be persuaded to try anything like a chinese or an indian, my food consisted of nothing but chicken sandwiches until I was about 18 years old.

If there was a single pea or a carrot on my plate I couldn't eat my dinner.

My whole life is planned around a specific routine, I am one of the most antisocial creatures you will ever meet, I love nothing more than being at home on my own because I find being around people absolutely exhausting (more so in social situations rather than being in work) 

I can have a conversation with someone for 30 or 40 minutes, walk out of the room and 5 minutes later I would not be able to recognise them if I saw them in the street because I have a habit of looking through people rather than at them when I'm talking to them (the eye contact thing really is a big point on that one) 

The one thing that I saw in a video is that if you do go undiagnosed then you will probably stick to your single routine until the point that you are in your 50's and then you'll think "wow, what have I done with my life" (or What haven't I done with my life")  and that is very much the path that I am heading towards in a fast way, yeah it is a little frightening but at the same time I'm content with where I am now so I don't see the need to change it and other than feeling like I've got a stigma about if I get a diagnosis I really don't see the point in looking into it.

I'm terrible with social queues and if I go out with a group of people (even if I've known them for 20 years) I will sit in the corner and not say a word until I have got at least 5 pints down me, that is one of the reasons I drank so heavily when I was younger, it was the only way that I could overcome the crippling anxiety of trying to socialise and fit in.

Anyways, I don't really know where I'm going with this so I'll leave it there, but those are my thoughts.

I suppose the question to ask yourself, is "Does this negatively impact my life?"

It seems like it did when you were younger. Now you're stable. And reading what you wrote, it seems that in the future you expect it to negatively impact you again.

What a diagnosis could give you is a specific set of tools to help you navigate through issues, e.g. "If you're autistic we know that XYZ won't help you at all, so don't waste your time, but we do know that ABC really can help."

[choffer]

9 hours ago, Jonesy7211 said:

One thing is certain, there is nowhere near enough resources helping people get a diagnosis.

It currently takes 6-9 months just for the first phone call to a doctor to take place, there's a huge backlog. So many children who need extra help are being let down and missing out on support for many, many years. Children at school not able to understand what's being taught, or struggling to fit in because they don't have the capacity to follow social cues. It must be awful for them.

It's another Tory scandal.

My brother’s kid is on the spectrum and getting any help is like pulling teeth. He’s incapable of regulating himself in many ways and mainstream school has completely failed him. Imagine being a teenager, knowing there’s nothing for you at school, all you get told is that you’re a naughty kid. One teacher did manage to connect with him and he was transformed (relatively speaking). Of course that teacher is not his firm tutor any more so it’s all back to square one. 
While I agree with you in much of your post, I think it’s a bit more complex than just being the Tory’s fault. I’m the last person who’d ever speak in their defence but it is the education system we are tied to that’s the issue. In this country we have a very rigid approach to education and if you don’t fit, there is no alternative. I know this government will have made things immeasurably worse over the last decade but unless we start considering a change in approach, we will continue to fail kids. 

[tonyh29]

Edit - maybe not 

Edited March 17, 2023 by tonyh29