Instead of a looking for a cure...

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All this talk of finding a cure for that which needs no cure has started me thinking. The groups of people who are looking for a way to fix and eliminate autism/AS seem to be mostly comprised of NTs wanting a "normal" child. I consider myself fortunate that my parents are not those kind of people, and while there are many misunderstandings and disagreements, for the most part they make an effort to connect with me.

I don't have a problem with my AS, other people do. Instead of fixing a problem that mostly only other people have with us, we need to educate them. Let's find ways for them to communicate with us not only in their way(which many of us simply cannot do), but in our way as well.

To those of us with NT people who make an effort to understand us, think about what they do/have done to communicate. Sit down with them and figure out what works and what doesn't, and why. Find methods that people can use to connect with us in our way and let us know about them so we can share them.


I guess I'll start us off with something from my own life.

My mother is one of the most "neuro-typical" people I can think of at the moment. We have an understanding when we talk, especially when she asks me to do something that I usually need to know the why behind it. Most of the time, I have to ask for this extra information, but often she volunteers it before I can puzzle over it. Other times, like when she's telling me she'll be home later than usual, she starts going into details that really don't affect me, and I let her know that I don't need to know why, and the flood of unnecessary information stops.

As an example: My dad spends the day in an adult daycare, and let's say my mom was supposed to pick him, but can't, so she calls me. Here's how the conversation might go.

"Is there any way I can talk you into picking up your dad today?"
"I guess, but why can't you do it?"
"Oh I've got a client that canceled their appointment suddenly show up and I won't have time to-"
"OK, I get it. Work stuff, I'll pick him up."

In this example (which is partly fiction to make a point), I needed to know why I was being imposed upon, but not the specific details that didn't relate to me. My mom understands both sides of that well enough that we don't have any big issues with it.


I'm hoping we can all work together to find such methods for dealing with the gap between NT and Autie/Aspie, as an alternative to eliminating autism/AS as a cure. If anyone has a story or ideas they'd like to share, please post so we can all learn from them.

I have the exact same thing!

She's like, 'can you haul that stuff from the basement to upstairs?, because I want to do blablablablabla'.
I don't need that info, I just have to know what I have to do so I can do it and be done with it.

They is a way just it's hard to untie Society views of what healthy is, they think focusing on the external world, what is in the outside world makes you healthy, but has anyone noticed how they deal with it...

They ignore it, live in fantasy land, end up getting they expectations crushed, to me balance is about a middle ground between someone who focus on the internal & also the external, if people constantly turn to other people for advice instead of listening to themselves they going to find themselves in a pit of depression.

& logic like I do this because other people do this to me, how u know the person in front of u has done anything like that to others for you to turn to that logic is unhealthy if u think about it a balance between internal & external is key...

& like to point you to Introversion since people took the test here It's time you understand what it is to be an introvert http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt50903.html

Do any of u question why they are so covert about the information of the course of As


I would look at the book " The Introvert Advantage: How to Thrive in an Extrovert World " since they all point to the tony attawood books when they talk about As this will tell you about Introverts ...

Here’s 1 triad of impairments I can crush, people with as also have these in common interests, totally unconnected interest Game programming ( totally unconnected to ) Genetics, science, physiology... Yes? Incorrect I am an INTJ Look at an INTJ possible career types......

It seems that so many NTs refuse to open up their minds to other ways of thinking, to other kinds of temperaments. I have gotten so frustrated through the years with teams of school personnel trying to create programs for my aspy son and profoundly autistic daughter. It was rare when they got it right.

There's no excuse for people whose jobs it is to educate kids -any kids -to not take them on their own terms, according to what their temperaments can handle. The educators can do it if they humbled themselves enough to realize that all humans aren't like them. I think people who are good with animals, who pick up non verbal cues from animals, would be the best for teaching.

As for parents, they are wasting valuable time, obsessing over cures, when they should be helping to guide the process for helping their kids be successful adults who don't hate themselves.

My daughter suffers because of serious autism related problems but there's nothing wrong with my son. He is whole and complete and wonderful and even more wonderful because he has learned to work twice as hard as any NT to keep his temperament in check as he navigates through the narrow minded NT world.

You know what, all talking about cure is going to lead into a huge war, watch, its going to happen. Think about it, if there is a cure, ppl like me who will refuse to get a cure, will get rediculed all the time and yelled at "go get a cure already" and the help i get from the government and stuff won't be there anymore due to the fact, nt parents want their children "normal". Nobody realizes though, that once they cure this, theres always going to be a new syndrome thats going to start an epidemic, and its going to start all over again. People who don't want to get cured, will be forced eventually due to so many nasty ppl out there, before u know it, its going to even nastier. What this world really needs is acceptance and fast. If there was acceptance, there wouldn't be ppl like the virginia tech gunman killing ppl, it all starts due to being rediculed, put down, pushed around before somebody cracks and innocent ppl pay for it. Every parent wants to help their child, i understand that, but curing them won't solve anything, new things will come about. Sorry if i offended anyone, im just so upset about all this cure talk, that i really want to just stop going on the internet altogether.

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Being Normal Is Vastly Overrated

As much as I'm sure everyone would love to see a world where all Aspies and NTs accept each other and live in understanding harmony, I don't think this will ever happen.

In fact, I'd rather honestly find a cure. Many people I've seen here seem to very unhappy with their social/sensory abnormalities, yet don't want to find a cure because of the heightened intelligence and specific talents AS gives them. This confuses me to no end.

I think a cure is a good thing, and far more likely than NTs and autistics one day just having an epiphany and completely coming to terms with each other. A lot of people go on about "we don't need a cure because AS isn't a disease", which I can understand, but the fact is that it's a problem; an abnormality, disorder, syndrome, whatever you want to call it. It's not typical and it's not normal, and it's been identified as a specific medical condition, which means it merits a cure.

I don't think the misunderstanding between NTs and Aspies will ever be cleared up completely. As nice as it sounds, there will always be those NTs who don't accept Aspies' social differences, and there will always be plenty of Aspies who refuse to believe that NTs are anything but arrogant jerks. I don't see it happening; I can only see a cure completely wiping out the confusion that exists between the two groups.

autism is a type of disorder that will most likely not be able to be cured for individuals currently living with it.... perhaps some of the milder cases or perhaps some mild improvement for more serious cases...

there may be future treatments, if applied early in life when autistic behaviors start emerging that gene therapy can help minimize the impact... but that again is only going to apply to the more severe cases... cause how many of use went unnoticed for most our lives? and i somehow doubt that a prescreening will be able to be made, so i dont think the whole abortion thing will happen... cause the developmental divergences dont seem to occur until after birth... and i think there is more than just genes at work in these kinds of things so i dont think it's enough to look at a baby with genes that are predisposed and abort them (i dont even think there are mutations per se that are responsible). at the same time, i do think that the genes contributing to autism are permanently in the population and so it will always be present to some degree within the population.

there are days when i hate myself but i think that ill get by so im happy how i am... but i know there are those who feel differently... yes parents too. if something is ever available to help parents improve the quality of life for their child in a manner they see fit... i dont want to deny them that.

just to add for clarity...

i think it is the dysregulation of normal genes that contributes to autism.... the so called "junk DNA" found in between all our genes is beginning to be discovered to not be junk... but to play very considerable roles in how our genes get expressed and thus allow us to function.

sure there are some studies that say gene ____ has a mutation and contributes to autism.... but then another study goes and looks at the same gene and finds no correlation. mutations happen and so can definitely contribute to autism when they do occur on critical genes... but i think the major contributor is this gene "misexpression"... which gives the same results as a mutated gene... but if you go and look at the supposedly mutated gene... you'll find no mutation. that's why there's all these conflicting results at the genomic lvl for these kinds of conditions.

imho.