Toni Braxton’s son was not cured of autism and it’s irresponsible for her to say so

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TheSnakeWhisperer
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12 Aug 2016, 12:33 am

It seems to me that a big part of the problem here is how autism is defined and from who's perspective.

So far all we've heard is the mother's side of the story, and the DSM seems to place alot of emphasis on behaviors in terms of how they are viewed by people outside the autistic person and not enough on their inner experience of the world and how they feel in it.

In order to truly consider somebody cured we'd have to know that from the individual themselves.

If they are straining to hold these changes which "put them off the spectrum" then this is just masking and not true cure. If they still experience the world as difficult and overwhelming (even if less so than before) than I would deduce that they are still autistic.

The DSM criteria probably needs to be updated now that so much more information has come to light about the inner experience of being autistic. With so many of us who are now older and still finding certain things in life difficult (and more able to describe it than before), with all the new information by us, for us about women with Aspergers, and the new information about just how broad a spectrum it is, it seems the DSM is slow to keep up.

I often wonder who these people are who decide the DSM criteria. Are any of them autistic themselves, or are all of them neurotypical? I suspect the latter. And if that's the case, then they are missing a very important part of what being autistic means.

It's problematic when parents decide to speak as proxys for their children because some things invariably get lost in translation. They are not inside their child's head. There again all they can really go on is what they see in the child's behavior and that's only part of the story.

If autism is in fact a hard-wired neurological difference then I don't see how it's logically possible to "cure" it anyway. That would be like saying that you can "cure" a computer of being a MAC or a PC. It is what it is and no amount of wishing or software changes will make it something different. It might help its limitations to be less problematic but it doesn't magically make it something else. Somebody on Youtube used this analogy and I think it fits perfectly.

There is neuroplasticity, but I doubt that neuroplasticity is capable of completely re-writing a person's entire underlying neural network. Everything I've read suggests that neuroplasticity creates new neural pathways but doesn't take down the original ones so that implies it's compensatory, not a replacement.


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SG
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12 Aug 2016, 1:26 am

Autism is defined by the medical community as a list of negative symptoms. Cure the negative symptoms, cure autism.

The negative symptoms include:
* Oxidative stress and overworked immune system leading to blood-brain barrier problems and neurotoxins in the brain, brain rise in temperature and partial alzheimers symptoms.
* Inability to lower glutamate levels resulting in excitoxins.
* Sensitive skin related to B6 and Zinc problems.
* Adrenal Exhaustion related to low folate levels, and low selenium levels for selenomethionine.
* Gut problems due to low selenium levels for selenocysteine.
* Low thyroid activity due to low selenium levels.
* Low acid/alkaline balance due to low potassium/sodium levels due to being used up as electrolytes in the brain first due to over work.
* Exercise causing semi-heat stroke due to low electrolytes (potassium, sodium, calcium, magnesium), and low Lithium.

Cures include:
* Vit C, B, Zinc, Selenium, natual folate, exercise with electrolytes (potassium, sodium, calcium, magnesium).

Foods:
* Lemons, Spinach, Brazil Nuts, Eggs. Semi-fasting once / week. Electrolytes with exercise.

All fully curable, yet promoted like you should be proud of it to keep the public mentally compromised.



bushratcandy
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12 Aug 2016, 1:52 am

Here here! Do people think we can never learn anything? Yes I think differently than many people. Yes I can't abide fools and have been accused of being rude when I didn't really mean it, and I don't care. So what? I'm a bit odd? I certainly don't care. I'm also a brilliant mathematician and excellent computer programmer and get excited when I spot Mars or Venus in the sky or a special rock on the ground. This talk of 'cure' is so much BS. Our brains are wired differently ie the wiring is DIFFERENT not WRONG. Sure many of us need extra support to get on in a world filled with NTs, and we can stuff up lots of times, lose jobs, can't get a job in the first place etc. These are things we need help with and many of them take us longer to learn, we aren't totally stupid, if fact some of us are brilliant, we can all learn lots of things.

However just because we learned how to play with the NTs doesn't mean we become one of them! Frankly I don't want to be dull and boring, sitting in front of the TV thinking that man's greatest achievement is sport because some dullard on TV told me so. (what a load of crap!) Personally I think curing autism is like trying to cure homosexuality or being black - We are who we are, & if society has to accept transgender people, gay marriage and the like they they should also accept us for who we are, different and beautiful ( we don't need to be cured just a little help from time to time.) :heart:

PS I'm not trying to attack ppls sexuality, it's just that your sexuality is part of who you are just as being autistic is part of who I am different isn't alway bad.


B19 wrote:
She also stated that she believed that autism was a punishment from God, saying she thought this has happened to her (not her son, it seems all about her, and maybe this is another publicity vehicle) because she had an abortion before having her son. IMO this is is far more toxic and offensive than the false cure claim. I also notice how she skirted around (at least in the articles I read) exactly what these "cures" she used were. (Abusive behavioural conditioning techniques? MMR? Drugs? All of these?)

One wonders if this child is safe in her custody, safe emotionally, psychologically and physically. What happens to him if he has a "relapse" or a series of them in future? Does she go on pretending while isolating him from contact with others perhaps? Refuses to get him supports he needs to maintain the concealment? It will also be interesting to see what kind of statement Autism Speaks makes about this (if any) or what they have said (if they already have).

All of this may possibly stem for naivete, ignorance and suggestibility on her part, though with the amount of information so readily available instantly to everyone, those reasons are hardly valid.


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Uncle
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12 Aug 2016, 2:31 am

Colorou wrote:
Different Brains. Different Problems.
It's just different brains. There is no cure. We need diversity in order to evolve, neurodiverse brains think differently and excell at life in ways Neurotypicals do not and vice versa. Humans love to freak out over people that are "different". So what we have a sensitive nervous system and get sensory overload. I also see a lot of my traits as survival strong instincts. We need to embrace Autism and push for mentors hip programs for people on the spectrum. We learn by observing not sitting in a classroom. We all need something different, we all offer something unique to the World when we try.

I don't know about you but I feel like I'm f*****g awesome and intelligent in a special and rare kind of way that draws a lot of cool people to me. :heart: I'm offended people think it's a disease or can be cured. This is neurodiversity. For all we know the high functioning aspergers brain is what we a re evolving to. A sign...of you will :twisted: :P :jester: :mrgreen:


I also agree with you! I myself when young was very vocal, then it became internal. He also had intervention at an early age, which is great, but as mentioned, to proclame he was cured is not a very good thing to be putting out there.. I know the article in question and if you looked at the replies of some of the mothers of their autistic children it seems rather than accepting and trying to do what they think is right for the child and what makes them happy its about themselves... I wrote a few responses and was immediately attacked, i tried to give the analagy of how mens brains are wired differently to women and how aspie brains are different to both... This was the response: the last couple of sentences saddened me the most!

A birth-defect only means one was born with the defect ... even if said defect can be traced all the way to the DNA.

It doesn't matter who brains are wired or wrongly wired; they CAN BE rewired; s'all I'm saying.

A brain that has its wiring badly off, will need a lot more to have it properly wired than one that is not so screwed up.

It makes no sense to suggest or imply that the defect that is autism is the same degree of severity for all victims.

And by the way, 'coping mechanism' IS part of the means to of rewiring brains!
Mental and physical actions, materials consumed, etc DO change the wiring of brains.
That is how habits are formed or neutralized.

And please with the delusional comparison of male, female and autistic brains.

Male brains and female brains ARE NORMAL brains!

Autistic brains ARE DEFECTIVE brains!


and that was pretty much the tone throughout! I feel for these kids that are none verbal but yet able to hear everything their own mothers are saying about them! A mother also used 'damaged' to describe her child! is it really their children they are thinking of or have they convinced themselves their own thoughts are that of their childs! Also what seemed interesting was mu upvotes seemed that of those on the spectrum and the down votes seemed that of NT mothers... I was surprised i dindt see adds plastered over the page promoting the snake oil of MMS! I found reading the article and comments not as much angering, but saddened me greatly, realizing how ! article has now reinforced a false myth to soo many people!! ! media is very powerful if used in the RIGHT way! however for each step forward i flick the page to see im going 50 steps back! Only thing i can do is HOPE people start listening to those on the spectrum for a change!



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12 Aug 2016, 8:01 am

I think it incredibly fair that she be challenged on this.

On one side I do see where, as far as the state of understanding of autism is concerned, it's neither wholly environmental nor wholly genetic.

In theory I don't think its necessarily impossible, just that I'd have to go to Sagan on this - it's an extraordinary claim and it would need extraordinary scrutiny to be vetted. Also from what has been seen to date, even if someone did somehow have their autistic symptoms just reverse out and evaporate, there would be no reason to believe that the mechanism was simple enough to replicate the conditions on a mass scale. It would be interesting if it were true but regardless highly unlikely and being this is a celebrity speaking colloquially all the more so.


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12 Aug 2016, 8:07 am

Wow the last time I saw that much shame coming from a parent was when the doctor made my mom get on the scale ... Surely its very obvious that Toni was ashamed of the diagnosis that her main focus was looking for a "cure"



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12 Aug 2016, 8:19 am

TheSnakeWhisperer wrote:
It seems to me that a big part of the problem here is how autism is defined and from who's perspective.

So far all we've heard is the mother's side of the story, and the DSM seems to place alot of emphasis on behaviors in terms of how they are viewed by people outside the autistic person and not enough on their inner experience of the world and how they feel in it.

In order to truly consider somebody cured we'd have to know that from the individual themselves.

If they are straining to hold these changes which "put them off the spectrum" then this is just masking and not true cure. If they still experience the world as difficult and overwhelming (even if less so than before) than I would deduce that they are still autistic.

The DSM criteria probably needs to be updated now that so much more information has come to light about the inner experience of being autistic. With so many of us who are now older and still finding certain things in life difficult (and more able to describe it than before), with all the new information by us, for us about women with Aspergers, and the new information about just how broad a spectrum it is, it seems the DSM is slow to keep up.

I often wonder who these people are who decide the DSM criteria. Are any of them autistic themselves, or are all of them neurotypical? I suspect the latter. And if that's the case, then they are missing a very important part of what being autistic means.

It's problematic when parents decide to speak as proxys for their children because some things invariably get lost in translation. They are not inside their child's head. There again all they can really go on is what they see in the child's behavior and that's only part of the story.

If autism is in fact a hard-wired neurological difference then I don't see how it's logically possible to "cure" it anyway. That would be like saying that you can "cure" a computer of being a MAC or a PC. It is what it is and no amount of wishing or software changes will make it something different. It might help its limitations to be less problematic but it doesn't magically make it something else. Somebody on Youtube used this analogy and I think it fits perfectly.

There is neuroplasticity, but I doubt that neuroplasticity is capable of completely re-writing a person's entire underlying neural network. Everything I've read suggests that neuroplasticity creates new neural pathways but doesn't take down the original ones so that implies it's compensatory, not a replacement.


Neuroplasticity includes trimming pathways that are no longer being used. If we didn't take down old pathways, we would all be stark raving looney. In fact, one theory about why some autistic toddler lose verbal skills is that they fail to trim the baby pathways while setting in the more mature pathways and its too much to handle. (I don't know if that's been debunked or not.) People with schizophrenia have too many pathways. Their brains are too active, not too inactive. Trimming keeps us sane.

Just a note from a biology geek. I totally approve of the bulk of your message. :wtg:



lordfakename
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12 Aug 2016, 8:25 am

SG wrote:
Autism is defined by the medical community as a list of negative symptoms. Cure the negative symptoms, cure autism.

The negative symptoms include:
* Oxidative stress and overworked immune system leading to blood-brain barrier problems and neurotoxins in the brain, brain rise in temperature and partial alzheimers symptoms.
* Inability to lower glutamate levels resulting in excitoxins.
* Sensitive skin related to B6 and Zinc problems.
* Adrenal Exhaustion related to low folate levels, and low selenium levels for selenomethionine.
* Gut problems due to low selenium levels for selenocysteine.
* Low thyroid activity due to low selenium levels.
* Low acid/alkaline balance due to low potassium/sodium levels due to being used up as electrolytes in the brain first due to over work.
* Exercise causing semi-heat stroke due to low electrolytes (potassium, sodium, calcium, magnesium), and low Lithium.

Cures include:
* Vit C, B, Zinc, Selenium, natual folate, exercise with electrolytes (potassium, sodium, calcium, magnesium).

Foods:
* Lemons, Spinach, Brazil Nuts, Eggs. Semi-fasting once / week. Electrolytes with exercise.

All fully curable, yet promoted like you should be proud of it to keep the public mentally compromised.


Oh yeah, I remember when I was diagnosed with autism by a dietician.

Wait, no. Psychiatrist. Based on the actual symptoms of autism, not a bunch of pseudoscientific nonsense



TimT
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12 Aug 2016, 10:21 am

For minimata type autism, the only repair is prayer for the damaged nerves. There is a man who had this in a rural community near Jacksonville. Classic case. For years his mother prayed for him. He developed to just about normal. He got a doctorate in college and now is the pastor of a church here in town.
For Neanderthal type autism, John Elder Robison is the closest thing to a cure I know of. His mirror cells now work, giving him empathy. He still has the big bones, strength and focus of a Neanderthal.



br0wser
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12 Aug 2016, 10:38 am

SG wrote:
Autism is defined by the medical community as a list of negative symptoms. Cure the negative symptoms, cure autism.

The negative symptoms include:
* Oxidative stress and overworked immune system leading to blood-brain barrier problems and neurotoxins in the brain, brain rise in temperature and partial alzheimers symptoms.
* Inability to lower glutamate levels resulting in excitoxins.
* Sensitive skin related to B6 and Zinc problems.
* Adrenal Exhaustion related to low folate levels, and low selenium levels for selenomethionine.
* Gut problems due to low selenium levels for selenocysteine.
* Low thyroid activity due to low selenium levels.
* Low acid/alkaline balance due to low potassium/sodium levels due to being used up as electrolytes in the brain first due to over work.
* Exercise causing semi-heat stroke due to low electrolytes (potassium, sodium, calcium, magnesium), and low Lithium.

Cures include:
* Vit C, B, Zinc, Selenium, natual folate, exercise with electrolytes (potassium, sodium, calcium, magnesium).

Foods:
* Lemons, Spinach, Brazil Nuts, Eggs. Semi-fasting once / week. Electrolytes with exercise.

All fully curable, yet promoted like you should be proud of it to keep the public mentally compromised.


I take a multivitamin every day and a magnesium supplement to boot. Does that mean I'm cured?!?! Hallelujah for miracle diets!! !

Pffft. Codswallop. Citations to studies, please. You can't just go throwing assertions like THIS around without citing reputable sources and expect me to just believe them.


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12 Aug 2016, 10:38 am

You want pseudoscientific nonsense? I'll SHOW you pseudoscientific nonsense!


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somanyspoons
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12 Aug 2016, 11:20 am

Wow. The crazies have come out to comment on this thread.

Maybe because it was advertised in emails? Twice actually. (I'm not a conspiracy theoriest, but it does make me wonder if Braxton's people offered Alex a fee in exchange for linking to information about her tour. Any publicity is good publicity? Anyways. I guess it really doesn't matter.)

Neanderthal Autism. That is a new one. And really kind of funny. Takes one to know one, I guess?

I wish wrongplanet had a unfollow button to click like facebook. This thread is goin' DOWN. Their ain't no place other it can go after saying that we are neanderthals and claiming vitamins can cure us. lol. (All these years! If only I had taken more vitamin b!! !!)



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12 Aug 2016, 12:55 pm

I'm not normal. I refuse to be normal. Not being normal is awesome; in fact, some folks with open minds see it as Super Epic. I have great respect for Alex for developing this site as it helped me to develop my writing talents that I never developed in any creative way in either school or work; just on a couple of occasions where for some reason I broke free in middle school for a Christmas story contest and Philosophy class in college.

In short, i reached deep down and expressed emotions in words that was very difficult for me to do other than short factual statements all about non-fiction, of course.

Anyway, I don't post here anymore, because it is very difficult for me to conform to the form of what folks name as the way the English Language is written in straight lines all the way across the page.

In my opinion, it should be expressed naturally like sound waves, or perhaps more poetically put like the waves of the Beach and what is left when the essence of the Ocean become the shorelines of that essence as waves and never ever straight lines.

I am a curvy person now; I do not move by sidewalks in steps or lines of pages by words. But, Smiles, most of the rest of the world sees lines and sidewalks, and moves accordingly the straight and narrow path of what is designed by the architects of sidewalks and pages. I am much more now like the Matrix oracle and Neo2 and architect3.

Anyway, to make a 'normal' paragraph break. I refuse to be normal, because i can. I am re-tired with rubber now on what once was hard and metal wheels, and am Financially Independent and without that millstone of Having To Conform, and by the way I would fully capitalize those three words for emphasis but the straight line and sidewalk folks of the world, of course, would see that as yelling, instead of simple emotional emphasis as that is the what normal expects; and sure, I understand that as i used to conform to normal to survive in society.

There are two types of intelligences assessed in science. One, is fluid intelligence; and the other is crystalized intelligence. I just so happen to have a great deal of both, as empirically assessed, now. What that this means is I know the facts and I can revert back to normal writing, if I apply the rule of sidewalks and lines of conformity in crystalized intelligence.

According to research by Michelle Dawson, non-verbal Autistic folks with a verbal delay in childhood, like me, who had this difficulty until age four, often compensate with fluid intelligence as neuroplasticity and epigenetics will humanly and naturally do to adapt to challenge of environmental struggle and change. And later in life they actually exceed so-called 'normal' 'neurotypical' folks in measures of fluid intelligence.

And interestingly, these once non-verbal so-called Non-Verbal Autistic folks, also have been shown in Dawson's small studies as exceeding so-called folks with the diagnosis of Asperger's Syndrome, in measures of fluid intelligence. They still lag behind, though, in crystalized intelligence as measured in standard IQ test way. The Raven Matrices measure of fluid intelligence provided the measure needed to illustrate this 'Autistic Advanatage', per the non-verbal folks with language delay of spoken speech.

In reference to one of the comments in 'this' discussion, where an individual stated that their classmates sort of stagnated after high school, per Michelle Dawson's research, this makes a little common sense, as use it or lose it applies to all stuff human being.

Go to school and learn facts and get a job and do the same thing over and over and sit in the same basic way of sitting down all day; and physical, sensory, emotional, fluid, and crystallized intelligences stagnate from not doing very many things different anymore, than at least school demands in the way of learning so-called new facts, from before that increase crystalized intelligence in memory way.

And yes, of course, it is more complicated than that but I'll try to keep this somewhat short in what my potential is of writing close to a Novel in one sitting, as I continue to increase both types of intelligence by simply using it, gaining it, and never losing it, to this point at least, in my life.

Interestingly, when Hans Asperger's case study patients were followed up on later in life; most had found niches they were good at and were doing quite awesome, in fact; credit fluid intelligence of course, in adaptation to challenge of struggle in the environment, and change.

Now, then, the thing about the original assessment of what Hans named as Autistic Psychopathy; verbal delays like mine until age four were included in that assessment. The APA was as they say, stuck in the world of crystalized intelligence and wanted to make the diagnosis as 'normal' people do, by the Crystalized Intelligence book of before. So, they made basically a watered down version of what they already named as Autism, by simply reducing the number of diagnosing elements to 'Autism Lite', also known as Asperger's Syndrome, back in the 1994, DSM IV addition of that diagnosis.

Now, the DSM 5 has come up with a behaviorally determined cover-all diagnosis to make life even easier for them to label it as just one thing. This is what normal people do. They come up with labels and pills to make life easier for them to solve problems.

Problem is; this approach is symptom based rather than root of condition based. And of course that root in the case of Autism is in the whole of the human being in all types of intelligence; including sensory, physical and emotional intelligences that Standard IQ does not assess at all. And if you've ever met a psychiatrist; most lack high degrees of emotional and physical intelligences as they are medical doctors and they have been studying facts in the way of crystalized intelligence for literally decades sitting at a desk and now even worse, attached to a computer all day; even in the office with the patients at-hand attempting to do mechanical cognition and social cognition at the same time, which even science shows now, is not what human beings are evolved to do efficiently without the potential for great stress and reducing the proficiency of both types of cognition now, when each is not focused on separately. And of course that is common sense, but no, common sense is not always the way of the crystalized intelligence of what comes before in book way. By the way, wow that was a really long paragraph and sentence; it could be so much easier to read without these long, long lines.


I am diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome by three diagnosing professionals, still. I have the paperwork to prove it. My sister is also diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome. More than likely my father and grandfather had the same condition but of course, the diagnosis was no where to be seen in most of their lifetimes. My father did law enforcement and never rose above the 'degree' of Deputy Sheriff as he lacked the social skills to supervise. My Grand father was an X-Catholic Priest and a noted Author of last Century who even dined with Einstein in the socialist party circles in New, New York in the intellectual circles of that place then. By the way I am very wordy and can be very precise and detailed too, if I choose to express that type of intelligence with relative human free will.

Initially, my doctor diagnosed me with PDD NOS, because of the language delay in childhood; but after further assessment changed me to the Asperger's syndrome diagnosis, per the original Hans Asperger's diagnosis of the condition that includes a potential language delay in childhood that is often associated with Hyperlexia, in which I was a very precocious reader with difficulties in reading comprehension that fits that mold too.

I have extreme tactile sensitivity, which means I cannot touch anything manmade without extreme discomfort. I spent most of my life in man-made environments with hands closed and rarely open, to avoid touching man-made stuff with my finger tips.

This Wrong Planet Internet site, helped me immensely to express myself in writing. I thank Alex Plank, very much for the opportunity to write on this site, as by the time I was able to accommodate 19 medical disorders, enough to write on a computer, about two inches from the screen in extreme pain, with most of the disorders, likely a result of Autistic Burnout after conforming to what society expected of me in over 30 years of work; yes, this site probably literally helped to save my life, as I was suicidal for the two years before that. I had Type Two Trigeminal Neuralgia, the worst pain known to humankind, like a Dentist Drill in my right eye and ear without novocaine, for a total of 66 months, from wake to sleep; including 33 months with a lot of that time spent here writing as no drug would touch that pain, and writing helped me a little to remove it from my focus.

It took me 66 months to recover from two years of fight or flight stress that basically almost killed me, as science shows now the stress hormones will break down one's body from head to toe, which did happen in my case. Doctors have no idea what causes Type Two Trigeminal Neuralgia, but in my case it certainly may have been associated with the break down of myelin sheaths as i was in pain in every cell of my body from head to toe, too. I was also assessed with Fibromyalgia, Sjogren's Syndrome, Dysautonomia, and Severe Degenerative Arthritis in my spine, etc., but the worst part was losing my emotions as without emotions there is no glue for cognitive executive functioning.

What I found in my personal research in the road to having an incredibly awesome and epic life now as assessed by some third party interests, is increasing my physical, emotional, and sensory intelligence through free style dance and free verse poetry to connect language with emotion and to regulate emotions and integrate senses through the art of movement (dance/martial arts) as all emotions and senses flow through the human body, and moving naturally regulates emotions and integrate senses when one moves innately, instinctually and intuitively without lessons on how to move.

Anyway, I am comfortable in my own skin now, in ways of getting around the world with advanced proprioception and in emotionally regulating my feelings in the human environment and integrating senses, which means I am centered and no longer lost in an environment, 'out there'. Yes, I have great self-awareness now, where I was incredibly deficient in this human skill before that seems to come naturally for most everyone else.

Here's the thing though, with use it or lose it; I received all my gold stars in school, through my Hyperlexic 'super power' of reading very fast and memorizing rote facts that I spit back like a computer on multiple choice tests. The teachers loved it, as they never had to help me do anything in the way of learning or tests. Problem was that had little to nothing to do with the real life of work that I would encounter after earning three degrees in college, So, in a way, this incredible strength was my incredible weakness, as I failed to work very very hard on the types of physical, emotional, and sensory intelligences that would make life so much easier than the incredible hard it was that almost literally killed me by age 47.

I survived. I adapted to struggle and changed. I continue to rise now and thrive.

There is even a song for that I will share below. I am so sorry that I did not continue that line above to the side of this page, as I must conform here to come back to even say all of this. But here's the other thing, my so-called professionally labeled Autism is Super F iN epic and it has made me one of the most epic individuals to ever dance and write on this earth, and I prove that by writing the longest long form poem in the history of humankind, now approaching 4 million words; and sure I literally prove it with my signature link below, as it is way too long to ever ever publish in print.

In fact, Microsoft word says it would take over 30,000 paper pages to print what I name as the 'SonG oF mY SoUL'. And i also have fully documented almost 6,000 miles of dance in tens of thousands of photos in that same Super Epic personal bible of mine in autobiographic fashion too that includes close to 1000 selfies of gorgeous college age girls smiling ear to ear with me at the dance hall I have danced now for 122 weeks named Old Seville Quarter in Pensacola Florida. Funny, the girls never liked me in school, much. And now totally beautiful college age girls I do not even know attempt to kiss me, or at least that's what it looks like at the dance hall with their friends, as recent as last night. And I can even prove it here, with my signature link in my most recent blog post with the photo, as the photo is too big to fit the formatting here, in case one wonders, if i am telling the truth.

I make zero dollars by doing this. I have danced walked a free verse style of martial arts and ballet everywhere i go now for almost 6 thousand miles after I recovered from the disabling portions of those 19 disorders that without question I suffered with, like A Biblical 'Job' for 66 months, as a shut-in in my home. Yes, Autistic Burnout hurts, very bad, as I can certainly attest to.

So what does this have to do with the topic at hand. Autism cannot be assessed by behavior alone, as far as what makes it the most difficult of all to deal with in the inner Universe of the human being. No one could see the stress I was under when I was in those two years of flight or fight stress at work, as i conformed, as I truly believed I would never ever get another job because people most always thought and expressed I was weird. I wore a mask of Okay when I was literally slowly dying inside. It really hurt, so bad.


No one could see that hell, but me. I looked normal enough on the outside, and still do now. I am different. I am even too different to post here the way I normally speak now in words, and I accept that as I do not expect anyone to tolerate or accept me, as often folks don't. To each his or her own is the way I live. Where folks tolerate and accept me it's wonderful, and where folks don't, I move on to greener pastures, as online allows an environment out of my closed- minded community in my red state area to do that in ways of blog and poetry to express all of who I am as different and human being.

As far as dancing everywhere I go like a Bruce Lee Ballerina at around 6 feet tall now at 235 Lbs of solid muscle. I am stronger than every Marine in my military gym with legs now that press close to half a ton 33 times in what the strongest folks who leg press there cannot even budge as I've watched them try it up close and personal to their dismay. So no, i am no longer that uncoordinated Five foot 10 inch, 120LB scrawny boy from Middle School with the long blonde hair, pretty blue eyes, and eye lashes that people called the F word and not Fred.

My genetics are different, I matured slowly, and am still getting stronger by the day, as empirically assessed at the gym. So, no one messes with me in the general public, as I can easily pass now for a College Linebacker who floats like a butterfly and can sting like a bee with martial arts kicks every which way and loose.

Botton line is, I do not fit in, but I still rise to the occasion of all my human potential and am no longer held back by anyone who lives on the pages and sidewalks of crystalized intelligence. I am fluid as whole, and I am the Ocean and Field and Wave and Particle whole as one in trinity of threes that even science assesses as real.

As above so below, inside, outside, and all around. Most folks don't realize we are walking and talking mini-me's of the Universe when whole and part the same. I was blessed by Nature in what I view as God to be able to see and feel this.

If my Autism Is a Disability, I fail to see and feel this. In fact I fail to see any labels at all.

I am, I rise and thrive, end and beginning of the story whole.

And this will not make total sense to perhaps
95% of the people here as you folks are
much more normal than me,
as whole
as my
history
shows here.

Oops, I did it again. Again, just dropping by out of respect for Alex. He probably is more Autistic like I am when I was his age too. And sure, he has already done something super epic by creating this site. It just took me longer at age 50 and after to start the journey of me finally getting free away from societal expectations that make no sense for me.

I was the last kid picked on sports teams, and the one who was picked on by almost everyone for being different in middle school.

I am now, likely the most different person of all in my local community, as assessed by that 'general audience'. But here's the thing, I accept all of who I am now from head to toe. No one stops me from being me now, because I am strong enough to be me now, no matter what anyone else thinks or feels about that..

I no longer conform.

Again, I rise, I thrive.

I sing
A Song
of Free.

Thanks Alex.
You did a great thing
by making this site.

And no, no one will ever ever cure me
again into the insanity of normal as insame..;)

And as the moderators predicted, I am still incurable from being me. And at least for me I F in Love it. And no, I cannot come back, 'cause I will not conform. But again, that doe not mean I do not appreciate Alex for helping me to finally be me, by creating the opportunity to write on this site, as Super Epic in so many ways never ever seen before.

Have a nice day.
I hope every one here will
one day rise, thrive, and never
ever conform again. But yes, first,
make sure you have some money,
as the working world will not accept that;
The 'normal' one at least, with smiles; but sure, I could on and on about that so bye, and I do mean bye to this straight line..;)



(Song Rise, by Katy Perry for inspiration. Inspiration is important in life
and so are emotions fully expressed and not repressed or oppressed.)


Whatever it is i have.

It is a gift

Bottom line,
and I prove it everyday,
for the naysayers of life that
say you can't, you can't, just 'cause you are different.


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TheSnakeWhisperer
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12 Aug 2016, 2:16 pm

somanyspoons wrote:
TheSnakeWhisperer wrote:
It seems to me that a big part of the problem here is how autism is defined and from who's perspective.

So far all we've heard is the mother's side of the story, and the DSM seems to place alot of emphasis on behaviors in terms of how they are viewed by people outside the autistic person and not enough on their inner experience of the world and how they feel in it.

In order to truly consider somebody cured we'd have to know that from the individual themselves.

If they are straining to hold these changes which "put them off the spectrum" then this is just masking and not true cure. If they still experience the world as difficult and overwhelming (even if less so than before) than I would deduce that they are still autistic.

The DSM criteria probably needs to be updated now that so much more information has come to light about the inner experience of being autistic. With so many of us who are now older and still finding certain things in life difficult (and more able to describe it than before), with all the new information by us, for us about women with Aspergers, and the new information about just how broad a spectrum it is, it seems the DSM is slow to keep up.

I often wonder who these people are who decide the DSM criteria. Are any of them autistic themselves, or are all of them neurotypical? I suspect the latter. And if that's the case, then they are missing a very important part of what being autistic means.

It's problematic when parents decide to speak as proxys for their children because some things invariably get lost in translation. They are not inside their child's head. There again all they can really go on is what they see in the child's behavior and that's only part of the story.

If autism is in fact a hard-wired neurological difference then I don't see how it's logically possible to "cure" it anyway. That would be like saying that you can "cure" a computer of being a MAC or a PC. It is what it is and no amount of wishing or software changes will make it something different. It might help its limitations to be less problematic but it doesn't magically make it something else. Somebody on Youtube used this analogy and I think it fits perfectly.

There is neuroplasticity, but I doubt that neuroplasticity is capable of completely re-writing a person's entire underlying neural network. Everything I've read suggests that neuroplasticity creates new neural pathways but doesn't take down the original ones so that implies it's compensatory, not a replacement.


Neuroplasticity includes trimming pathways that are no longer being used. If we didn't take down old pathways, we would all be stark raving looney. In fact, one theory about why some autistic toddler lose verbal skills is that they fail to trim the baby pathways while setting in the more mature pathways and its too much to handle. (I don't know if that's been debunked or not.) People with schizophrenia have too many pathways. Their brains are too active, not too inactive. Trimming keeps us sane.

Just a note from a biology geek. I totally approve of the bulk of your message. :wtg:


It's very possible that this is why some of us have sensory overload (brain not trimming old wiring or not enough). I believe what you say about kids who lose their verbal skills. That does really make sense! This might well be a severe example of sensory overload and their brain can't adequately handle both the new and old wiring.


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iggypop
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12 Aug 2016, 5:14 pm

Quote:
You want more listening? Then listen. I am one of those kids. I was diagnosed in the early 80's with various learning disabilities. I was put in special education classes. I was told that I would never go to collage. I was kept out of science and art classes because "you're not going to need those" in order to make room for more remedial classes. I was an under-the-desk crier. I hid under that desk every day, rocking and crying, until they forbade me. Then I hid in the closet, the bathroom, anywhere to get small and quiet. I never got recess but I didn't care because recess was a horror show. At home, I stayed in my room in the basement alone, pretending I was on the Battlestar Galactica, a game I never once shared with another human being. Aspergers was not in the DSM at the time and I was verbal (and somewhat hyperlexic,) so my diagnoses did not include Autism, but they included plenty.

And then around 13 years of age, everything changed for me. I had the growth spurt that most 13 year olds have. Internally, I began to understand how to use my "special interests" and intense internal world to assist me in being with the outside world, instead of just keeping me away from it. (I imagine being friends with the people I know from TV shows and let them give me advice on socializing. Its weird, but it works for me.) From my parent's POV, years of interventions were finally taking hold.

I was a F-ing success story. I went from a remedial/special education track in middle school, to the honors track in three years. I graduated high school with honors and an AP class under my belt, and went on to earn my undergraduate degree from a competitive school, and then went on to get a graduate degree, too. People love this sh-t. They eat it up. Not a dry eye in the house if I tell it right.

I'm not the kid anymore. I'm a 41 year old adult. And I'm here to tell you. I wasn't "cured." I didn't "grow out of it." I learned to cope. And that's great. But I'm 40 now, and I was so busy being good at being a teen-ager that I missed out on learning the things that I need to learn as an adult in her 20's and 30's. Most specifically, how to work in a social environment where I'm the boss, not the student, or where I have to deal with parents of my students (a weird kind of 1/2 boss, 1/2 employee situation.) And most painfully, how to be in intimate relationships.

I learned the things they wanted me to learn in elementary school. That success is real. I'm not "faking it." But I'm not cured!

I need help with adult things and we don't give help to adults with stuff like this. And part of it is because of BS like you are posting here. Just because your kids matched their childhood lessons, doesn't mean that the job is done. It doesn't mean that there is no more need. You're going to launch those children into adulthood, thinking that everything is A-OK. Because that's what they've been told. It's this giant myth that if we can just provide this great childhood experience, you'll be perfectly equipped for adulthood. But someday those kids will have trouble in graduate school, or they will get in conflict with a boss, or they will have a hard time finding a romantic partner, or they will have a child and feel overwhelmed. And they are going to feel lost, and its going to SUCK for them to go through what I had to go through to re-claim that part of myself that was really struggling. To remove the story that I "recovered" and to really accept that I'm still different.

Parents and teachers need to stop this self-serving non-sense about curing their kids of their differences. And to get away from the idea that their kids will need the same skill set in the work place than they do as kids. Its very different being an adult. There will be new challenges. And that's OK. But your kids need to hear that that's OK. Telling them that they will not have the challenges that many autistics have because they are doing well with childhood skills is harmful. Heaping all this praise on them for being "normal" is setting them up for a life of not embracing their differences.


I think we may be twins.
The hardest thing is that my coping mechanisms have become so ingrained that I seem so "normal" most of the time. When I start feeling overwhelmed or introverted, when my face and words don't match (usually when I am too tired), when I get repetitive or stuck on ideas, people who love me get upset and hurt. If I showed more then those things would be accepted, allowed and understood.
My internal editor that makes me seem normal makes me inauthentic. It makes my life easier most days but I worry that I have lost part of myself. I have reached the age and place in my life where I no longer wish to be like other people. I enjoy my fascinations. I love my viewpoint on the world and my ability to see facts though the haze of emotion. I have a great, understanding wife (most of the time) and 3 kids who I teach everyday to speak plainly, listen intelligently and hopefully be better humans because I was their father.
I have not been cured, I have adapted. I just seem like them. It is body language camouflage. If they were more like me, they would be able to tell.



momuf2
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12 Aug 2016, 7:55 pm

testing