You're basically acting as a whistleblower. If your bosses knew about the problem and did nothing, and you have decided that you cannot tolerate this state of affairs, I'm not sure that there was anything else you could of done. In the US, you could get fired for that, but that's a risk you have to take if you put consumer's rights before that of your employer. The only other alternative I think you had was submitting your report anonymously.
A small error in that study: SSRIs don't inhibit serotonin, they potentiate it.
Not surprised, considering that excess serotonin is suspected to play a role in ASD.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
Since there are studies showing that autism isn't one condition, but multiple conditions with certain things in common, maybe we'll one day find out that specific things cause very specific forms of autism?
I read an article that I don't have the link to now, which brought up examples of very specific forms of autism that always show up with the same symptoms every time. One form of autism specifically causes the individual to be very chatty despite having awful social skills. Another form of autism was called "waiting room autism" by the doctor studying it, because as he puts it, if you see someone with it in the waiting room, it's immediately obvious they're autistic.
Because of this, I've even seen researchers who claim that autism may soon be split into numerous conditions with different names depending on which form each one is. It's a complicated condition/series of conditions, and honestly, I think giving it multiple names could ironically simplify it a bit. Calling them all "autism" means that if you're told a person is autistic, it could mean a host of different things.
Bird mom
Why is it that I'n both Austic and Depressed?
The Crystal Caverns A bird's gotta sing.
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
Because comorbidity
is a thing.
My friend (diagnosed Aspergers as a kid) also has chronic depression. It's been a problem since childhood.
Does people with "waiting room autism" get impatient very quickly?
I can't answer that; the article didn't say. By "waiting room autism", he only meant that if you see people in the waiting room of a psychologist's or doctor's office, their autism is totally obvious even if you know little about autism. By which I'm assuming he means, they show the obvious, stereotypical symptoms - the symptoms aren't subtle or hidden or repressed.
There's some debate whether causes of autism also cause depression or if austistics are more depressed because of how they're treated. But basically, if you have one mental disorder you're likely to have another.
The "Autism Cop", who trains other police in how to deal with autistics. He's got two sons on the spectrum, though the article doesn't say what they're like.
"This is an emergency," he announced at the checkout, as the cashier glared daggers at him.
When Zink arrived at the group home, he found a patient with autism in the middle of a meltdown, tearing apart the furniture and fighting the staff. Zink offered the M&Ms in truce, and the man was pacified.
That exaggerated form of autism is, I won't lie, rather alien to me. I understand being upset with routine being broken, from personal experience! And not having the opportunity to get something I greatly desire, particularly if it's common to obtain that thing in that specific situation (see: any time in 4th grade popsicles were given out and I was unable to get grape). But I wonder what triggered this specific incident. Did the man have a routine where he always gets M&Ms at a specific time, and this one day, that routine was broken? Or did something else (or a collection of things) upset him to the point where he had a meltdown, and giving him something comforting and familiar was what it took to calm him down? From what I understand, either could be the case.
Monday night Zink led a community forum in West St. Paul with a roomful of parents of autistic children, many of whom are on a first-name basis with Zink because he's the one they request when their kids need police intervention. A handful of Black Lives Matter activists were also in attendance with St. Paul mother Maria Caldwell, whose 18-year-old son Marcus Abrams was forcibly arrested by Metro Transit police at a light rail station in September.
Abrams, who had been standing on the tracks and not responding to police orders to get back on the platform, was taken to the ground and handcuffed. He suffered a seizure in the process, but his mother says it could have all been avoided if the Metro Transit officers had the proper training to recognize that her son was autistic.
edited 16th Dec '15 1:01:32 PM by BonsaiForest
Black, autistic, and killed by police
The focus is on one particular story that ended in tragedy, but later it goes into detail about black autistics and their encounters with the police in general.
Taken together, these statistics suggest that black people with developmental disabilities and mental illnesses are less likely to get diagnosed or get medical treatment than their white peers. And if they do encounter police, which Debbaudt says they are more apt to do, they are more likely to be shot and killed.
If you want the details, check out the article.
I am guessing that police tends to misread behavioural patterns associated with mental illnesses (including ASD) as a threat or suspicious behaviour.
I had a run in with police when I was hiking once. I do always walk in a slow-and-run pattern that two policemen mistook from running away (I had not seen them) when they encountered me on a road. They were persuaded after making a phone call and when I explained that I wasn't running away, though.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
A procrastination in of itself
Part of it is probably also literalism, I belive Bonsai previously linked to a case of a guy arrested for dug use because when asked he said he had taken drugs, however due to context blindness he didn't include the fact that they were perfectly legal drugs.
It's a thing I'm prepared to run into as I will often carry my prescription with me when traveling and could get stopped, I know that the "are you carrying any drugs" question is just about illegal drugs but I still wouldn't be able to say "no", however I'm context awere enough to realise the best idea would be to elaborate and say "none beyond my percription drugs".
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran
I bought two physical copies of NeuroTribes. I was about to also order a copy of the economics-oriented Rise of the Robots, about how machines may well take many human jobs, but Amazon said that the book was out of stock or something; I forget. But either way, I have two copies of NeuroTribes to give out on Christmas.
The author of NeuroTribes is interviewed yet again in an article about why the book is a good Christmas recommendation. He actually addresses arguments that his book glosses over the severely afflicted autistics:
Finally, I figured out that what that blogger had done was to flip through the index until she found the phrase “low functioning,” which is indeed only used on nine pages. But that’s because, as I often say in my talks, I avoid framing people in terms of “low functioning” versus “high functioning” because those phrases lie. By spending time with people all across the spectrum, I’ve learned that people who are considered “high functioning” are often struggling to get by more than is apparent to the casual observer, while people who are written off as “low functioning” often have talents and strengths that could be cultivated and developed if they were given appropriate tools for communication and a supportive sensory environment. So, yes, the phrase “low functioning” appears very rarely in my book, but that’s because it’s a hell of a way to describe a human being.
One of the other autistic adults I describe in depth in my book, Mark Rimland, was indeed a “head-banger and diaper wearer” was he was young. His father, Bernie, was so horrified by Mark’s behavior that he launched the movement to cure autism through biomedical interventions in the 1970s. He once said that he would either make his son “normal” someday or die. Well, Bernie, who is celebrated in my book as one of the brave founders of the autism parents’ movement in the United States at a time when parents were wrongfully blamed for causing their children’s autism by medical professionals, passed away in 2006, and Mark is still very autistic. He was one of the real-life models for Dustin Hoffman’s character of Raymond Babbitt in Rain Man. But he’s also one of the sweetest, happiest and most authentic people I’ve ever met because the people in his hometown accept him and appreciate him for the eccentric person that he is. He’s also a very gifted and original artist and an athlete who has won medals in the Special Olympics. When I asked Mark’s mother Gloria if there was one thing that she wished she’d known when Mark was young, she replied, “How well he’d turn out!”
edited 21st Dec '15 12:23:57 PM by BonsaiForest
Well, this is eye-opening. Here is a non-verbal autistic adult describing how her autism affects her.
In the photo that accompanies the article, she looks totally average - normal - the same as any other person. Autism generally is something that doesn't change the physical appearance of the individual who has it (with some notable exceptions, actually, as science has found specific forms that do in fact have a certain appearance with them).
And there's an adult non-verbal autistic explaining autistic behavior. Not to mention, that with the way she articulates herself in writing, it really does show that "low functioning" and "high functioning" are misleading terms. Someone who can't talk and bangs her head would be considered "low functioning" by those who use such a term, and would be assumed to be mentally retarded. But it's obvious that she isn't.
I have to wonder how many autistics have been written off as "retarded" when they're actually far more intelligent than people assumed. And how those people can be helped, and accepted into society.
I've seen autistics say they don't want a label. Here's an editorial providing a counterpoint to that.
I believe the label is a necessary evil.
edited 22nd Dec '15 12:00:34 PM by BonsaiForest
Editorial: Celebrities on the autism spectrum need to admit it
The autistic self-advocates are getting more and more vocal. However, the writer of this editorial is not autistic himself! Now, here's an editorial asking any celebrities that are on the spectrum to "come out" and serve as success stories and role models for other autistics.
(...)
Those few times I’ve been bold enough to ask someone who possesses the symptoms (difficulty communicating, obsessive interests, social awkwardness) if they’ve ever been diagnosed as autistic, that person usually exhibits the same combination of denial and disdain one would exude if you wondered about that person’s sexual preference.
To be fair, it can be considered rude to ask the question even if the symptoms are mega obvious. But I do see his point - that autism should be more openly admitted to, and therefore made more public so people will understand and come to accept it.
It's one of those situations where what benefits the individual does not benefit society, and vice versa. A single person comes out as autistic, and that person risks discrimination and mistreatment. Tons of autistics come out, and society is forced to realize how commonplace we are, that we exist in large numbers, and to learn to understand and accept us.
As controversial as it is, I have in the past straight-up asked people who showed obvious Aspergers-type signs if they were on the autism spectrum... and more often than not, they said yes. I haven't done that in like a year or so, but I'd done it in the past. Still, I see the many potential problems in asking someone if they're autistic.
I'd like to know more, but I see what he's saying.
“Yes, celebrities who display autistic characteristics should speak about their neurology and how they’ve adapted, or what they’ve adapted, in order to succeed,” Strickland said. She also believes more autistic savants, like medical researchers, nanoparticle physicists or, in Strickland’s words, “other sciency dudes,” should be celebrated for their contributions to society. “One or two sentences about their accomplishments fail to mention their autism, and it’s because of their autism, not in spite of it, that they can hyperfocus. Or, because of their autism, they think outside the box and eureka moments happen.”
In the last paragraph, the author says that he himself is not autistic, but his brother is, so he has a vested interest even as a non-autistic in getting visibility and positive portrayals of autism out there in the open.
edited 4th Jan '16 1:11:06 PM by BonsaiForest
There's a website called spectrumnews.org - guess what it's about?
It's got some great, really long, in-depth articles, too. Like The Missing Generation, about undiagnosed adults with autism, and The Lost Girls, about females going undiagnosed a lot.
For these reasons, what autism looks like in older adulthood, and what it means to age with autism, are still mysteries, says Piven. (...)
So far, the few studies of older adults with autism suggest they suffer from myriad health conditions and lack appropriate support. In studying this lost generation, Piven’s team and a few others are uncovering hints about the nature of aging with autism — along with some harrowing stories.
The site is definitely worth checking out. I'm the type of person who craves in-depth info and detailed stories, and so far, I'm liking what I'm reading. Well, in the sense that I like that it's well-written and informative and interesting. Some of what I'm reading is actually, well, quite upsetting!
(...)
His team discovered that 14 of the residents — or 10 percent — had undiagnosed autism. All but two of these people had been given a diagnosis of chronic undifferentiated schizophrenia. The fact that they were being treated for a disorder they didn’t have — and that their treatment wasn’t working — was obvious in the files. “The frustration of the psychiatrists just leaped off the page,” Mandell says. “No matter how often they changed medications or tried different treatment strategies, these folks weren’t responding to treatment. Of course, it’s because they didn’t actually have schizophrenia.”
edited 5th Jan '16 1:32:19 PM by BonsaiForest
For those of you who live in the US, PBS is airing the documentary "Autism in Love" tonight.
Meanwhile, there's a problem on my mind I've wanted to bring up. My online friend diagnosed with Aspergers used to be very seemingly upbeat, and had optimism for the future. She believed that she could easily hide her autism and come off as "normal" enough to fit in, and that her autism wouldn't make it difficult for her to find a job or find happiness. She also was involved in many social activities, such as theater.
Well, she has severe depression, that she's had since age 10. It comes and goes to some degree - or maybe I should say it intensifies and abates. Her most recent intensification of depression has been going on for 6 months.
A few weeks ago, she told me that she wants to stop engaging in social interaction (with two exceptions, me being one of them). I pointed out all the social activities she participates in. She said that she doesn't feel like she actually fits in, like she actually "connects" to anyone. She said that social interaction is painful and upsetting for her; she always feels embarrassed or self-conscious, along with not feeling connected.
She's already in the process of cutting off her involvement in community after community. It's painful to watch. And I'm pretty up to date on what she's doing, considering we chat every day.
This isn't the first time I've seen an autistic excitedly talk about their plans for the future, only to lose all their optimism once they get there. But in her case, there's the added problem of depression. And it appears to be biological depression; she's had therapists and given prescription drugs since she was 10.
It's really upsetting. I realize this isn't autism alone that's causing this, though from what I've been reading, autism often doesn't come alone anyway. It's awful to watch her lose her optimism and go from thinking "my autism doesn't affect me that much" to "my autism is ruining my life". And yes, she's said that she'd be better off without autism (or born, actually; she's that depressed).
I'm trying to cheer her up, by explaining that autism is becoming increasingly understood and accepted, and one day society will understand us, and that day is coming sooner and sooner. She's unconvinced, and nothing seems to cheer her up. Sometimes she blames her autism, sometimes just her depression.
As a fellow Aspie, I can say with full confidence that I've felt the same way as your friend, barring the depression. Though I have 'adapted' to my classmates and long time acquaintances (i.e the only people I can comfortably talk to.), and made quite a few close friends, I would sometimes just stop and notice how little it seemed that I belonged. More like an outsider despite being best friends. It can be rather disheartening. And no one but me and my parents knew I had Aspergers (my parents flat out denied it, saying the diagnosis was false, just goes to show) so it wasn't stigmatization.
But other than that, we're taking separate paths. I'm trying to get more involved socially, even if it's through Internet forums. I'm not complaining about being an Aspie. I live with it, and despite the challenges, I don't let it rule me. I survived normal high school with it.
Also, I followed your reading of Neuro Tribes. Real eye opener for me, great job. I'll see if there are any copies I can get here in South Africa.
Thanks. I'm glad people were liking my in-depth coverage of NeuroTribes. My parents are reading it now, and my older brother bought a copy and has been reading it rapidly. (He's almost up to the chapter on Hans Asperger, or just started it)
Anyway, I watched the documentary Autism in Love last night. A PBS documentary. Here's the site for it.
It follows three stories, and they're quite a varied lot, at that:
- A stereotypical "Rain Man"-esque autistic man, Stephen, who has a very flat affect and speaks only in simple sentences, and his job at the post office doesn't seem like a terribly intellectually challenging one (at least he has a job, as statistically from what I read, the majority of autistics do not). He was married to a non-autistic woman, Gita, for 20 years until her death from brain cancer. Gita has a mild learning disability, and says that a non-disabled man might expect too much from her, so being married to a disabled man is probably best. (She was interviewed before her death, while he is shown both before and after) Stephen is very much the "Rain Man" stereotype, able to immediately figure out the day of the week any date occurred on, and explaining things in very robotic terms - "Gita died on March 2013. It was a Thursday. I was sad." (not his exact words, but basically his style)
- A man named Lenny, who seems like a wannabe dudebro, except he's autistic. He makes it very clear that he hates being autistic, and has brought that up many many times. "If I could choose to be an autistic man with a million dollars, or a non-autistic man, I'd choose to be a non-autistic man." He follows sports, plays GTA, and tells his mom that he doesn't want to put his trip to Comic-Con on his dating profile. He is unemployed (near the end of the documentary, he gets a job bagging groceries), and seems to believe everything said about traditional gender roles. He refuses to consider dating a woman who has a job ("that puts her above me"), or is more educated than he is (he didn't go to college, while most of the people he knows did). He's very politically incorrect, talking candidly about how men should provide for their wives (which, again, puts him beneath almost all women in his eyes since they have jobs and/or education), and he says he couldn't date a black woman because they're too independent and hard-working. Lenny presents with a distinct voice that sounds like the sort of voice one might associate with a mental disability. However, his personality and presentation otherwise actually struck me as more or less a regular guy who'd been brought up in dudebro culture. I didn't notice much in the way of distinctly autism-related traits in his presentation, other than the eye contact thing.
- Lindsey and David, two autistics who have been dating for 8 years. I didn't catch Lindsey's job, but David is a meteorologist, and yes, his Aspie interest is weather. There two are the least obviously autistic individuals. Signs of it, especially in David, are noticeable if you know what to look for (in Lindsey they are muuuch more subtle). They talk about their differences and working them out, but while I enjoyed these two, their story is probably the least interesting to me. Probably because they're the most "normal". However, the fact that they're not blatantly autistic to the average person's eye is something work mentioning, and the two have talked about how their autism has affected them. Lindsey used to have meltdowns, for instance.
The documentary's choice of these three stories is a great decision. It shows just how different autistics can be, and how differently they can present themselves. From people who hate their condition (Lenny, easily), to those who seem to have accepted it and/or are okay with it (David and Lindsey). From people who just accept their difference from everyone else (David and Lindsey), to people who desperately want to act "normal" and fit in and be the same as everyone else (Lenny, who heavily presents as wishing he were a dudebro). From people who are unemployed (Lenny, until he does get a low-paying job later), work low-end jobs (Stephen), or work high-end jobs (David).
People who are basically living stereotypes (Stephen, easily), to those whose autism is very subtle (David, Lindsey), or might present as something other than autism (Lenny, at least to me). Stephen and Lenny even have odd sounding voices; Stephen speaks robotically and with no inflection, while Lenny basically has the sort of voice people stereotypically associate with a mental disability. David and Lindsey don't "sound autistic", so to speak. From those who have friends (Lenny, who has friends of both sexes) to those who don't (Stephen). I don't know David and Lindsey's friend status. We also see how Stephen is rigidly connected to routine, while David much less so (he won't let anyone interrupt the weather!).
Oh yeah, Lenny even hired a prostitute at one point. He amusingly remarks that her name, "Diamond", sounded fake. He said that having sex with her felt meaningless, because he didn't know her personally and it was such an artificial arrangement.
Anyway, it is a nice documentary that, if nothing else, shows just how different autistics can be.
edited 12th Jan '16 12:19:25 PM by BonsaiForest
Autistics can be very different indeed, but as a former coworker (who did the insulting in front of a lot of people I told way long back then) told me, obsessing over the condition itself is counterproductive and the time spent moping could be used in better ways.
Speaking of depression and social withdrawal, I have accepted the fact that social interactions is a norm, and deliberately avoiding them is escapism at beat, but at the very least, as I said before, internet has allowed me to find people sharing the same interests which is rare among people around me, which makes me feel like in a space that I belonged to, if temporarily.
However, I am still depressed (but thankfully, not to the point of clinical depression) that I am considered a weird person, even by my family instead of trying to understand why I am myself. To a lesser extent, I am forced to repress my own negative emotions (then again, I am in the progress of making this unnecessary) and pretend that I am happy, something which frustrates me as well.
I also attempted to reinforce my individuality (and resist assimilation by the society) by doing things that is considered nonsensical by others. For instance, I'm travelling to Penang this Saturday, stay for a night and returning the next morning, which leaves only 7 hours of actual travel activity out of 28 hours of travel period, all for the sake of having a chance of playing in an arcade until night, something that is not allowed during my regular arcade visits. My coworkers outright told me to just dispose my bus ticket and cancel my hotel booking (both of which were paid beforehand).
edited 13th Jan '16 7:02:16 AM by murazrai
I'm glad that my family is actually interested in reading the book. A lot of autistics have reported that their families don't even fucking bother to try to understand them, but instead bitch about the person's differences.
Moping is not productive, no. Although my friend isn't "moping"; she has severe clinical depression. She's at least trying some new things; she signed up for an internet course that's supposed to help deal with depression somehow, and she also wants me to talk to her mother about her mental illness from my own perspective. Which is really sad, that so damn often parents will listen to someone other than their own kid tell them about their kid. But they won't listen to their (adult in this case) kid. She's turning to these unusual measures, because the usual things aren't helping her depression. That she's had since she was 10.
Autistic self-advocates aren't "moping". They're trying to get themselves understood so society will learn about autism and come to accept it. They're changing laws and influencing politicians. They're influencing TV shows (The Bridge hired an autistic self-advocate to help portray an autistic lead character better). They're making society realize that autistics can't change, so they need to be accepted; just like the disability rights movement tried to make people understand. And it's slowly working.
To the friend who's moved on from my child with autism
A very short editorial. People come, people go. My friend told me she's experienced it a lot, and it's not really a tragedy if, say, you lose interest in a friend because the only thing you shared in common was a hobby and not a deep emotional bond. Perhaps.
But it's still far harder on someone who has a very hard time making friends in the first place. They're hard to make, they're hard to keep. Sometimes the person really just doesn't like you the more they know about you. Sometimes you fulfilled a need that they no longer have. Sometimes the friendship was based on something temporary and fleeting (see: a hobby). Sometimes they were your "protector" rather than your friend.
This parent is reporting on it from her perspective seeing it happen to her son, not her son's perspective.
Anyway, speaking of the needs of understood, accommodated and such, occasionally I have a very hard time making others understand what I am speaking and thinking, which applies in the opposite direction.
For instance, I had an argument with my elder sisters regarding a work issue. The company that I am working for has an issue with confusing wordings on a product's packaging. Said product, being tapioca flour, is worded tapioca starch in English despite otherwise worded correctly in other languages. This becomes a problem when GST (VAT for US and Europe tropers) the former is zero rated while the latter is not and the supplier of the product has charged GST upon us, which caused a dilemma as selling it means breaching GST regulations but not selling it is not a long term option.
Thus, to prevent our supplier from accusing us of causing trouble (since that we have essential goods from them and switching suppliers is massive pain in the butt), I have suggested someone to file a report to the local customs authority under personal name, something that I decided to do myself. My elder sister immediate called me out for turning work problems into personal ones. That's fair game, since this is senseless sacrifice and a massive breach of general work ethics.
What makes this issue a problem with understanding is when I tell her that this issue has serious implications with regards of consumer rights, as in consumers could get charged for GST for goods that is not supposed to. Her response is "had this not being a problem with my company, would you have reported it otherwise?" I'm trying to tell her that the implication does not disappear if I have decided to not file the complaint and this issue still have to be solved, but she just repeat her point. Then I decided to stop talking.
Now, how you deal with issues of trying to get your message across properly and getting what exactly others trying to say?
edited 8th Dec '15 7:25:39 AM by murazrai