*sigh* "I guess we're ALL autistic!"

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Somewhere in the world there is a tree, that the genius who replied "yes" to the blind question needs to find, and apologize to for wasting the precious oxygen that tree gave them.

I feel that what people with a formal diagnosis of ASD needs to keep in mind if they meet someone who makes the statement "we are all autistic" or "they say we are all of the Autistic Spectrum"

While there is some truth in these statements, I feel that such statements are similar in nature to the broad statements that are made by the medical community about mental health, in that all people have a predisposition to suffer from various mental health ailments in lesser or greater degrees.

I am not saying that all people have significant mental health problems, just that all human beings have their own presentation of symptoms that make them fall into one or more areas of mental health symptoms, in varying degrees dependent on the individual. With each presentation of symptoms being only significant if the symptoms become an issue for that individual during their life.

So, keeping this in mind.
What is important is to keep in mind with regards to the statement that all human beings are thought to be "on the spectrum" is that this statement is true, while at the same time needs to be placed in context.

Yes. we all suffer from Autistic traits, however for Autistic Spectrum Disorder problems to be of significant level in medical terms and thus warrant a formal diagnosis that bears the name ASD, an individuals ASD symptoms needs to be of a significant level that causes excessive detrimental effect on that persons ability to cope with the various demands of their normal life.

I guess a comparison is like the old "stress" analogy. Imagine, a person walks into their doctors surgery who is suffering from an acute anxiety attack, and tells their doctor that they are suffering from stress.
The doctor turns around and says, "well we all suffer from stress, why do you think you deserve special treatment?"

Yes, all human beings even the most robust human beings, suffer or experience at some point in their lives "stress", however whether that stress has a significant impact on a persons ability to cope with normal life determines as to whether someone is suffering from an anxiety disorder or not.

Not everyone that has every experienced stress will be diagnosed with an anxiety disorder. Not everyone who suffers from stress in any shape or form will have an anxiety disorder.

This is similar to the fact that everyone suffers from some autistic traits, however, not everyone has ASD.
Hope that helps.

Saying that is often an underhanded way of saying stop being lazy try harder.

We all scar and scab so we all have a little leprosy.

Someone posted this on another thread. It is one of my very favorite videos.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWnyDvG7XEk

I think that it comes from the fact that a lot of our symptoms are found in the non autistic population, but for us, we need at least 5 and they must be clinical. In that regard I can understand where the confusion comes from, but it's still a rude and flawed view. Adhd is also treated the same.

I.e.:

Lucy the nt is an introverted, she has a hard time coming out of her shell.

Bobie the aspie has
-trouble making eye contact, more than a few seconds will make him gag
-he doesn't understand proper timing in social situation, he will fail to make friends or drive potential ones away because of it
-he loves ww2 planes plays way too much, he has 252 miniature models, 5 rc planes and can tell you the specs for each planes.
-he has a very specific way to lock the doors at work before he leaves or he has to do it again
-He chooses very carefully the time he will go shopping because he gets overwhelmed by sound easily

The problem is that everyone feels or experiences tiny variations of what we go through every now and then from time to time and usually it is only one thing at a time in very small degrees. What makes us Autistic is that we experience extreme variations of multiples of those issues all the time and at the same time in debilitating, impairing, or even crippling degrees.