Question if a person with severe ASD can turn into HFA

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Is it possible for anyone with profound case of Autism to become higher-functioning?

I have PDD-NOS and Autistic Disorder.

I used to have profound delays in most of my areas, but it became milder over time and with the help of therapy, IEPs, services and medications



From my early to late childhood, adolescence and adulthood, I had developmentally delayed milestones, social anxiety, thought disorder, paranoid ideation, derealization, transient psychosis, grandiosity, callous and unemotional traits, disregard for others' feelings, excessive need for admiration, or social isolation and often unconventional beliefs.

I had delusions that aliens exist on earth when I was three years old and had imaginary friends that caused me great distress in daily life.

I am now better than before at reading or understanding emotions, facial cues and body languages, but I still have developmentally delayed social-emotional reciprocity and I still talk about things that fits my specific subjects of interest, often manifesting as a borderline obsession with a few areas and/or hobbies.

Ever since I was a little child, I would have severe defects in social communication, both verbal and noneverbal cues, used to have lack of social skills, had bizarre interests, borderline intellectual functioning, psychosis, sensory issues, psychological issues and sometimes would have self-injurious behaviors, but it was rare.

My symptoms from my early childhood included:

1. Intellectual disability (an IQ of 69 or below).
2. Impaired social communications or interactions, bizarre behavior, and lack of social or emotional reciprocity.
3. Delusional interests and bizarre behaviors.
4. Sleep problems, aggressiveness, and self-injurious behavior are also possible frequent occurrences
5. Lack of eye contact, inadequate body language and a lack of emotional or physical response to others' behaviors and emotions.
6. Lack of communication (both oral communication – i.e. nonverbal autism – and body language), Repetitive use of words or phrases, and lack of imaginative play skills.
7. Respond only to very direct external social interaction from others.
8. Severe deficits in communication skills (verbal and nonverbal), inflexibility of behavior, extreme difficulty coping with change, and extreme difficulty with shifting focus and attention. Individuals with level 3 autism would initiate very limited amounts of social interactions and would respond only to direct social approaches from others.

My symptoms of developmental delay from my late childhood included:

● Difficulty in social interaction, often due to issues with nonverbal communication
● Specific subjects of interest, often manifesting as a borderline obsession with a few areas and/or hobbies
● IQ can vary, but is generally higher than average
● Suppressed and/or difficulty expressing emotions

My symptoms of developmental delay from early to late adolescence and adulthood included:

It is common for individuals with PDD-NOS to have more intact social skills and a lower level of intellectual deficit than individuals with other PDDs.[2] Characteristics of many individuals with PDD-NOS are:

● Communication difficulties (e.g., using and understanding language)[6]
● Difficulty with social behavior
● Difficulty with changes in routines or environments
● Uneven skill development (strengths in some areas and delays in others) # I used to have thay problem
● Unusual play with toys and other objects
● Repetitive body movements or behavior patterns
● Preoccupation with fantasy, such as imaginary friends in childhood

I used to have profound developmental disorders from my early childhood.

It got milder, because I had IEP plans and meetings.

When I was 0-8 years old, I had some symptoms of Profound Developmental Disorder.

When I was 9-10 years old, I had some symptoms of Asperger's Syndrome.

When I was 11-19 years old, I had some symptoms of PDD-NOS.

Now I feel like I have Learning Disorders, with a Broad Autism Phenotype.


Social-emotional reciprocity is the back and forth interaction that takes place in communication. We take a social approach in having conversations with others, and we share our interests in our conversations with others

That is a very important question. In order for Aspies to be included in the autistic spectrum, there must be a spectrum - low functioning, medium functioning and high functioning. And in my opinion individuals must be able to transition upwards through the spectrum. Otherwise Aspies/High Functioning Autistics should be in its own separate category.

A member on Wrong Planet is Jason Lu. He is an Aspie and has two children (one low functioning and one medium functioning). He developed a unique training methodology to transition them into the high functioning autistics. He wrote a book about it. The name of the book is "Eikona Bridge"

Thank you

Tony Attwood also documents a case where he reevaluated one of his previous clients and was able to say that clinically he no longer had ASD. It did not mean that he didn't have ASD, but rather he had change enough where he did not meet clinical standards for the need of support.

Thank you

I've literally seen it happen, a girl online I knew in my early teens, would always talk to her online. She was pretty much non verbal in person, would not speak to anyone. This girl now lives in Sweden with her girlfriend and has a fancy apartment and a job. It is totally possible, you just have to put the sheer graft in to get to that point, constant learning and trying new things. Oh and actually taking peoples advice rather than thinking you know best.

Thank you

I used to have more severe ASD and now I'm HFA so it's definitely possible. The key for me was overcoming my sensitivity to criticism which helped my self-esteem and allowed me to be myself since I didn't feel worse anymore no matter how people reacted which greatly reduced my stress which made it easier to understand myself and other people much better. I plan to post more about how I did it later. For now, I'll just say I was highly sensitive because of classical conditioning (my mind associated criticism with rejection probably since I was a toddler) which caused painful emotions when people criticized me, acted uncomfortable around me, or reacted negatively. I treated it by being myself and deliberately seeking out criticism while constantly telling myself that criticism doesn't equal being rejected because most people are good people who were probably just uncomfortable or misunderstood me. Eventually, my mind no longer associated criticism with rejection and when that happened I no longer felt worse when people reacted negatively. I think stress from feeling alone and rejected caused most of my problems because everything became easier once I was able to just be myself without being affected by how people reacted which greatly reduced my level of stress.

Thank you

I was apparently considered severe as a child...but my mother has always had problems with her memory and her story is always changing.

But Temple Grandin was apparently considered severe when she was a younger child.

Thank you