Are you really autistic? my thoughts on this

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I have the strong obsessions and the meltdowns. I guess that's a yes.

We are currently out of stock of gorilla DX's. We can offer you a 'great ape" diagnosis in the meantime. We apologize for any inconvenience.

That was such a great post glider. Even when people disagree you still don't get argumentative. May I have that trait? I'm hurt easily and my response will often be full of profanity.

I also agree with Cockney Rebel. Don't forget the sensory sensitivity. My latest hurdle as a band photographer is dealing with strobe lights.

I think threads on this topic stir up too much and just attract the user with multiple accounts who is behind all the recent stirring in the first place.

Yeah, I'm sorry I got sucked into it once again. No reflection on OP. It's like when you want to have a discussion about theology but you know it's going to devolve into an "am not/am too- am not/ am too"-level of discourse right away. We just have to agree to disagree. But it gets me to thinking about something. Is there any one characteristic of an autistic spectrum disorder (notice I did not specify Asperger's) that could not be possibly attributed to something else? Isn't it the whole package and those elements vary according to many different factors? For instance I wonder about the diagnostician who decides someone can't be autistic because they make eye contact. How do he know it isn't excruciatingly difficult for the person but they are forcing themselves. It was almost impossible for me as a child and now that I'm an adult I can do it but that doesn't mean I like to do it or that I'm not thinking about when I get to pull my eyes away rather than what the person is saying.

Thanks for the helpful post, glider18.

I first heard about Asperger's from a colleague at work in January of 2004. I immediately saw a similar pattern of behavior in myself and in my family. It's now almost six years later and I've spent countless hours researching the autism spectrum to see where I fit. Research included (naively) going for an evaluation at a place that mostly evaluates children. I don't have an autism spectrum diagnosis.

But what I do have from the last six years is a lot of understanding about myself -- I learned that I had a language delay, I began to understand why I was bullied in school, why I had to teach myself to look at people's eyes, why I had difficulty academically, why I isolate myself, why I can remember details that I saw thirty years ago, why some social situations give me nausea, why I can only work on things that interest me. I've learned that my brain wiring is definitely not typical, but it is what I have. Learning to accept my unique way of experiencing the world is allowing me to improve my outlook. I no longer think that I am broken thanks to the concept, the idea of the autism spectrum.

Z

I have read the posts since my last comments, but I will respond in general here. I appreciate your honesty and openness with this thread. Why did I do this? Because I have found numerous members getting a bit frustrated/upset/etc. with the doubts that they are not sure as to whether or not they autism.

My purpose is to try to offer my support to those members that are struggling with doubts of their autism. I know of some people like this, and they are often quite confused about their life in regards to who they are. So, it concerns me when I see them get more doubts

As in any population there will be fakes. But my intent is aimed at those members who are truthfully searching for their discovery---and so far it seems like autism may be the answer. As for the fakes---they can be hard to find. And, they would represent a small percentage of our membership. Our focus on WrongPlanet must be toward the large percentage---the autistics and those with autistic family members and those wanting to learn about autism, and to those who are self-diagnosed and the ones not sure if they have it or not. The fakes will exist anyway---we have to overlook this small group and move on with our purpose or we may shift our focus of the WrongPlanet away from its intent.

Unfortunately for our truth-seeking discoveries there is no brain scan at this time or other test to say, "You are autistic, or you are not autistic." I believe the reason for this is because it is a syndrome with multiple different types of traits that can organize themselves into an infinite array of possibilities. There must be an infinite array of ways the autistic brain can be wired in the first place. Any brain scan would probably lead to confusion in the interpretation of data anyway.

So what are we left with to discover our truth? Actually the answer might be quite simple afterall (even though it doesn't offer a 100% guarantee---but it is still valuable). In fact it is staring at us like Edgar Allen Poe's "Purloined Letter." It is perhaps the best tool we have to determine if we have autism. It is called Occam's Razor. As many of you know, Occam's Razor is a tool used by scientists which states (after some revision through the years) "when you have two competing theories that make exactly the same predictions, the simpler one is the better". So---for those autistic symptoms that could possibly be symptoms of some other condition---use Occam's Razor. Write out your symptoms on a piece of paper and look at other things that that can be mistaken for autism---such as:

Giftedness (even though it can occur with autism---called "twice gifted")
Narcissism (yeah I know , but there are some interesting similarities)
Schizophrenia
Etc.---You can find other things too that can be similar in appearance to autism.

In my journey I looked at Schizophrenia and determined quickly that I wasn't schizoprhenic. Then I looked at narcissism and discussed this with my therapist. He said I wasn't narcissitic at all. I even took a test on narcissism and scored below the average---so I am in the opposite direction of narcissism. I also looked at giftedness and found my school IQ scores and other testing results. I am not academically gifted even though I have a higher than average IQ of 111. Now for Occam's razor. Out of all the possiblities, which solution is the simplest? For me it is easy---it is Asperger's Syndrome. And, that is what I was diagnosed with by the professional expert. He knew what he was talking about all along.

Now for you---look at all the possibilities for your symptoms. What solution fits it the easiest? What solution is the simplest? If it is autism, then Occam's Razor has diagnosed you. This reasoning is about the best we have for those who are not sure or for those who have doubts about their diagnosis---whether it is officially diagnosed or self-diagnosed.

Remember that my aim with this thread is for those who are on a truth-seeking mission to discover if they have autism or not. It's for those not sure if they have it or not. It's for those who have doubts.

Thank you for your respect 88BK in clarifying your position with me. I appreciate that very much. And I respect you. May we all offer respect to everyone. And what you are doing is debating---and I felt like debate would happen. Is debate bad? No, in fact it is often through debate that helps us understand ourselves better. So thank you for your input. Because of your debate, I have been able to offer more or my understanding on this issue.

My intent on this thread is to offer some members hope and comfort for those confused in life---because I have been through this too. Eventually I had to tell myself to relax, the puzzle pieces of my life fit AS/autism better than anything else. AS/autism is a combined group of criteria that can manifest itself in differing ways.

Enjoy your journey in life.

glider18

I agree with you Glider. I just add my 2 cents. Untill DNA-Test its basically impossible to discern autism from "fake" autism. Is it possible actually that from a genetical/biological point of view a Phisic Nobel Prize is "more autistic" than a non-verbal autistic who (badly) recived brain damage when he was a fetus. Autism is know viewed as a behavioural and functional problem.

I'll try an analogy. Suppose that you have 2 kind of flying objects:

elicopters and airplanes.

you can't see the real object but only see things like radar, time of fly and things like that. In many cases you'll be able to say: "this is an elicopter", "this is a plane" but not always because you have vertical-rise planes, you have elicopters bigger than planes, you have piper-plane and so on. What they do with autism is the same and also they look only at "broken" planes.

Profound autistic behavior can be induced also in NTs due to Trauma or brain damage.
I don't have problem beliving that in the same way (due to less sever problem, personality, life expirience, etc.) some autistic guy can behave in a "nearly" normal way.

Gilder I have read your last post just now. I was a gifted child and when I went to doctors due to behavioural problems they usually said to my mother: "he is just too much intelligent" (When I was 7-8 y-old I had the mental age of an adult). Can you give me a quick check list to make a differential analysis between very high functioning autism (like mild-Asperger) and giftedness. I've also read a book called "Einstein syndrome", the autor say that "his children" are only gifted and not autistic, but looking at the case studied for me they are simply intelligent and coping autistic.

Virtual autism? topic

How in the world could autism be faked?

My great communications/social skills are text based. In real life, much of the time, I am not doing so well.

I hope I am a piece of classic literature or non-fiction in my next life.

I can't locate the one I originally saw, but here is one similar:

http://giftededucation.suite101.com/art ... xceptional

i think that many people who claim they have autism (and are undiagnosed and unsuspected by people in their lives to be) adopt that idea because they have read about asperger's syndrome and autism in general, and they like to attribute to themselves all the unique and positively represented characteristics that they read.

some people have a very high opinion of themselves that they have never seen anyone else share.
so when they read about autism (and they ignore the unappealing stuff and focus on what they read about "savant" abilities), they may easily place themselves in that category and then try to prove it to someone
they can not do it in reality , and they see how they can google up enough info to fake it easily to people on line.

i do not believe many people who claim they are autistic on line really are.
i do not know, but i just do not believe. i also do not really care. they are people anyway.

i do not feel completely isolated from humanity, and i think they all deserve to be taken seriously even if they are adopting a temporary and unsustainable persona that they will divest henceforth.

Last edited by b9 on 02 Dec 2009, 11:58 am, edited 1 time in total.

Thanks for the link Gilder but (as usual) it doesn't save me

The bolded ones fit me, the italic ones no.

From: http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/eric/fact/asperger.pdf

Last edited by Nightsun on 02 Dec 2009, 12:20 pm, edited 2 times in total.

Hi Nightsun. This is a tricky area indeed. I might be able to help you a little bit here since I am a gifted intervention specialist (high school). The gifted students I have had so far are much more socially involved and not as akward as the AS students I know. Do you know your !Q? To be intellectually gifted you usually have to have an IQ of the 125 range and up. The problem here is that you can have an introverted gifted person that might appear more autistic than an extroverted AS person. But, if you feel like you are under the spectrum due to the issues you have in the criteria of AS, it might be that you are twice-gifted---if you have the IQ score of 125 or above. Good luck in your journey. Keep me posted.

Excellent post, glider. I checked out the link that you posted, as well as many other sites relating to giftedness. I fit both the gifted and Asperger's criteria. So, I guess it will all come down to my assessment in January.

Thanks Glider, I've updated my previous post with new data.
As I said at 7-8 years old my intellectual age was the one from an adult. After that I stopped testing "like a child", at 11 y-old I had 125 I.Q. with an adult scale. Now (27-y-old) I'm between 150 and 170 depending on the test.
Now I'm barelly "old" but my main problem is that I don't want that my daughter have a childhood and adolescence like mine (we don't have gifted program in Italy by the way). Look at my post: http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt112779.html
If you want we can continue in PM if you think it's too much off-topic.
I have still some problem understanding if I'm "not too much" autistic because I'm gifted or if seem autistic because I'm gifted or I'm simply both :/

By the way I'll take the differential DX to my psicologist when I'll go for the diagnosis.