Seeking Advice: Family member has Asperger's too?

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Here's some background knowledge and science-y stuff on what I am seeking advice for:
The statistics of Asperger's are that there are more boys who get Asperger's than girls. The reason behind that is genetics. The gene that is affected by Asperger's is on the X chromosome. Boys have only one X chromosome, which is always passed on by the mother. (Boys are XY) Girls have two X chromosomes, one passed on by the father and one passed on by the mother. (Girls are XX) Say you have a mother with one X chromosome that has Asperger's and one X chromosome that doesn't. The one that doesn't have it acts like a spare part and "replaces" the mutated Asperger's chromosome, meaning she doesn't end up having Asperger's. But if that mother marries a man who has an X chromosome that also carries Asperger's and they have a daughter- she has a 50% chance of getting the Asperger's chromosome from her mother. She already has one from the dad. And the mom COULD give her one. Now, having a kid as a teenager increases the chances of the "normal" chromosome mutating into an Asperger's chromosome. So now the daughter has a 75% chance of getting Asperger's. That's a REALLY high chance.

Now to my problem. My Grandma might have Asperger's. She definitely has at least one Asperger's chromosome. My mom and my aunt also BOTH have one Asperger's chromosome. My mom and my aunt had me and my cousin in their teens and we both have Asperger's as a result. I believe my Grandma has Asperger's, but I don't know how tell her. I want to ask her to go see a therapist to check, because I believe it will help her. However, my grandma is about to turn 65. I feel like she is either going to be offended or not care. Does anyone have any advice on what I should do?

Actually there have been hundreds of autism causing genes identified and there are some environmental factors as well. The reason it seems to occur more in males is likely just because people believe that it is more common in males and are therefore less likely to diagnose a female with it thus preserving the correlation.

It does run in families though. Although I disagree with the exact values you got it is still quite likely that she is autistic, in fact my maternal grandmother is probably autistic too.

Uhm.... Okay, thanks.

Although I recognize that you have different scientific reasoning and whatnot, that does not help me solve my problem. Does anyone have any actual advice instead of argumentative theories on the science behind my background information?

The causes of autism are not yet known, so your theory is correct for some genetic disorders but not all. It is the reason why men are always at the extreme though...the best at anything is likely to be a man, as is the worst, and women tend to be in the middle as they have their genes more tempered. Males tend to have Aspergers more than females as it is a more extreme version of the brain-type they usually end up with anyway.

Secondly, males are not "XY", males are "Y plus anything", it is the presense of the Y that makes you male so a male could also be XXY, or any other variation that does occasionally come up.



If your only reason for suspecting she has AS is due to your science, then if I was you I'd drop the whole thing. You might not like us arguing about your scientific analysis but I'm afraid if that is what you are basing this on, then your science is wrong ergo so are your conclusions.

If you think she has AS because she is displaying symptoms then the only thing you can really do is pull her aside and talk to her about it. You know what kind of relationship you have with her so you can come up with a strategy\words that you feel is appropriate.

However given her age and generation it may well be that she won't be interested in taking this up. That generation just got on with things, they lived through wars without suing anyone. They tend to not discuss these things and given she has lived her whole life as she is, again it might well be she is quite happy and doesn't see any need to upset the apple cart.

Of course she might not react like that, she might be interested in seeking a diagnosis, we don't know her. As I said, all you can do is talk to her, you can't make people get help, they have to want to help themselves. But only do this if you have more to go on than your rather shaky grasp of science.