General Autism Discussion

X3 X4 Yeah that's AD(H)D in a nutshell by the sound of it. Once you can get into something or be in an environment without distractions things can be done quickly, but in a more relaxed environment with lots of possible distractions (like this place) gaining that focus is very difficult.

@Mousa

Speaking as a wannabe author, I also have trouble finishing projects. One thing I do is try to find an audience, somebody who will read it as I go along. If that person is enjoying the story and wants the next chapter, I find it easier to stay on task and write the next one.

Motivation - it's very important. Having feedback really helps a lot. So does having even just one person to talk to about ideas and what you're doing. They can motivate you as well, with encouragement, or taking the stress off of coming up with ideas entirely on your own. There's a reason why so many books have a "Special Thanks To" listed in them.

Yeah, I long discovered I was extra motives when I got feedback. Problem is that I don't get any. Finding an audience is like finding a self esteem: effectively impossible. Because I am basically a worthless schmuck no one has any interest in reading or commenting on any of my writing or art skills, that method is sort of out.

One thing I think would be interesting is to poll neurotypical people about things like having too many ideas, never seeming to finish anything, etc. I suspect those frustrations are universal.

My advice is to keep asking people. I didn't expect my girlfriend's sisters to be among my most avid readers, but they are.

But that would involve directly interacting with people I don't know. At least throwing crap into the internet's metaphorical winds doesn't cause anxiety.

The trick is to seek people who are in the exact situation you are. In your case, a writers group would seem helpful to you.

The more people you meet, the more likely you'll find someone who has connections. It's like the saying "Those who try harder get luckier." However, there are people who try and try forever and get nowhere, likely because they're trying the wrong things.

Anyway, the free chat therapy site 7 Cups of Tea has helped me with a few things and even helped me meet someone who has a surprising amount of connections to people who are doing some pretty impressive stuff, and she's helping me with a project idea of mine right now. (I realize I'm being vague, but I don't want to go into more detail at the moment)

Give that site a try. It won't cost anything, and some people there do understand autism. Some have it. Searching "autism" and "aspergers" helps find them. There are people who are inactive, or who go inactive for a long time, and the people themselves are all different, so it's rather hit-or-miss. But, life itself is hit-or-miss. Might as well try a few.

edited 5th Mar '15 9:55:23 AM by BonsaiForest

Neuroimaging might detect autism

Since autism is diagnosed entirely by visible symptoms now, I think this would be a big important step. It would mean that we can finally explicitly say "THAT proves the person has autism/doesn't actually have autism". Lying about it will be a lot harder, proving that someone with a barely detectable form actually does have it will be easier.

What gets my attention a lot more is this:

That part I bolded right there. Subgroups within autism.

Autism affects people in SO many different ways it's not even funny. One person might have an incredibly high pain tolerance, yet itch a lot (like me as a kid). Another person might have to cover their ears because they feel physical pain when an ambulance drives past with its siren blaring (someone I know online). Some learn to talk at a very young age and yet show all the Aspie traits you'd expect (the son of someone I met online). Others learn to talk only with intensive early intervention (me). Some end up driven and able to hyperfocus on the things they're working on, while others have problems concentrating on any one thing. And sometimes, people change from one form to another later in their lifetime (for example, my sensory sensitivities decreased as I got older, but I lost my high pain tolerance). You can even find opposites - for example, I hate to go barefoot and I hate to wear anything on my head, as doing those things feels weird to me. Yet I know someone who is the opposite - she always goes barefoot when possible, and prefers to wear a hat when possible because of how it feels on her head.

I strongly believe that there are subtypes of autism. It seems to me a little crazy that you can point to someone who rocks in place and covers their ears to block out the agonizing world, and someone who is very talkative and friendly but a bit odd and eccentric, and say those two people both have the same condition. In a way, they do. But in a way, they kind of don't. Identifying subtypes of autism would make it a lot easier, not only to say "this person has _____", but also to recognize that different people are good/bad at different things. And possibly lead to targeted treatments that solve conditions that are a problem, while leaving in place other arguably positive traits (like hyperfocus) the person may have.

Looking for different subtypes strikes me as all the more important now, considering this tragic story I just read. Carly Fleischmann is non-verbal. She is only able to communicate by typing. But she's actually losing the ability to do even that. She typed a seemingly gibberish message onto her Facebook account, that was "translated" into plain English by her therapist, who noticed that she was typing a coherent message with lots of random extra letters shoved in there. Her message, as translated by removing the gibberish, says basically that she needs help and fears this may be her last Facebook post ever, and that while she's not giving up because she's a fighter, she feels trapped with no way out.

Now that is scary, and truly sad. It also makes me wonder, what the hell is autism? I mean, what exactly? I doubt any of us know for sure, though we can certainly speculate. Is it really one condition with numerous variations? Numerous conditions grouped together with a common name? What is causing her to deteriorate and lose her ability to communicate? A very specific form of autism that she has that most do not? A comorbid condition?

edited 6th Mar '15 12:58:10 PM by BonsaiForest

The answer to that, Bonsai, is something the scientists don't know.

I strongly believe that our current ideas of mental illnesses & conditions etc. are frighteningly primitive, and that by classifying people into "disorders' via symptoms we're actually bundling together people with wholly unrelated issues, as well as likely dividing groups who actually have the same underlying things going on.

They are starting to sort it all out, and I think we will know orders of magnitude more than we do now, but sadly not soon enough to help that young woman.

Morven, I think you may be right. Symptoms alone are, well, symptoms. They're not causes. We look at symptoms that often appear together to try to guess the cause, but it's very flawed. We can't yet diagnose mental conditions the same ways we diagnose many physical conditions.

Brain structure varies depending on how trusting people are of others, study shows: "Brain structure varies according to how trusting people are of others, scientists say. This research may have implications for future treatments of psychological conditions such as autism, said the study's lead author. Each autism diagnosis is on a spectrum and varies, but some diagnosed with the condition exhibit problems trusting other people."

Now, are autistics mistrusting due to being abused and mistreated, or are they inherently mistrusting due to being autistic? Also, some autistics are too trusting, and are manipulated because of that. Actually, that's also quite common. Therefore, I'm skeptical of that discovery's connection to autism.

I saw this comment on a blog post recently, which I found enlightening:

I e-mailed that to my parents and older brother, and my older brother said he noticed that, but it was nice to see it spelled out.

I think one thing this indicates is that there's very likely more to autism than just a disability. If it's a totally different communication style, then that is something that is neither good nor bad on its own, though of course in a world where many people communicate the opposite way we do, it of course creates problems for us. But that right there appears to be a characteristic of autism that, if supported, could possibly be a positive.

It also throws fuel onto the fire of the "Is autism only a disability, or is it a mixture of potentially positive and negative traits?" debate. As well as "Is autism only a disability, or a combination of conditions/changes that usually includes disability, but non-disabling characteristics as well?"

The point about two people with Aspergers/autism engaging in this particular communication style and being totally comfortable with it (and that's been my experience as well - I much prefer the Aspie style of communicating) also indicates that this is just a characteristic of us as a group, and when two Aspies are together, talking like this, it's not a bad thing.

edited 10th Mar '15 5:36:55 AM by BonsaiForest

One thing I’ve noticed in having conversations with people on the spectrum is that subjects are usually information- based and that there is less reciprocity or back and forth in the conversation. In other words, the person with autism dominates conversation with information and it’s hard to get a word in edgewise.

Oi wey. I've had complaints about this ever since I was a child.

I have the exact opposite issue, I am pretty much entirely silent, it's all the normal humans that go on and on and on.

Same here, usually. My problem is that occasionally, someone mentions a topic I'm actually interested in, and so I start going on that for a bit instead of emotionally connecting with that person. This happened just the other day when I met someone I hadn't seen for a while. You'd think the appropriate thing to do would be to ask how he's doing, talk about what we've been up to, etc, but when I tell him that I'm a Stage Manager for a show, I suddenly veer into just advertising the show and telling him to come without talking about anything else, which basically killed the conversation.

I can also sometimes talk about some show, game or comic that I like despite the other party not being too into what I'm trying to say. I've gotten a lot better about this, but it still happens.

Being hyperverbal is fairly common in autism but it's a subset of us, not all of us.

Speaking of autism subsets, research is coming out indicating that the stereotype of the smart Aspie may actually be an autism subset itself.

There are genes apparently linked to it, for one.

That may explain why autism seems to crop surprisingly often in the kids of smart parents. Like, why is it on the rise in Silicon Valley? (which was known over a decade ago)

I'm also seeing one quote from someone saying that the genes that cause autism can increase intelligence provided the autism doesn't get in the way. Well, that makes me wonder what exactly it is that gets in the way? Specific symptoms? Specific forms of autism?

Still, if we're gonna talk about subsets of autism, or the many forms it can take, it seems to be possible that higher intelligence, to at least a small degree, is a particularly common "symptom" or subset of autism.

Be careful, Bonzai. You're so focused on the whole "subset of autism" thing, you're missing the "may never have been under the right umbrella, ever" one.

CFS/ME/FM, IBS, MN and a fair few "don't really have names" conditions can share overlapping symptomology... with parts of the autistism spectrum. Yet, investgating that hasn't been on the agenda (which a lot of us in the blobby bits have argued desperately needs doing).

There may be an awful lot of the picture being missed, because of labels and where research money goes because of them.

edited 10th Mar '15 1:37:22 PM by Euodiachloris

Yup, I definitely see your point. That autism may be something very specific and that some of the things that we associate with autism may be co-occurring conditions - some of them undeniably unpleasant (like the higher risk of health problems such as food intolerances - which I have and hate).

This study seems to link genes that are related to autism to higher intelligence. Of course, it's just one study and way more needs to be done. But it's also important to keep in mind that we don't know what autism itself truly is, such as whether it's one condition or not.

Does anyone have trouble dating? Like, not finding a date, but making a transition to a relationship?