Collateral damage in autism

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I think that if you are, for a structural genetic damage, born incapable to read the mind of others, it’s also very difficult for you, to communicate with your parents about many fundamental questions of life, morality, priorities in life goals, ways to exorcise or cope with dreadful menaces and facts (death, sickness, suffering: Job’s problems) . In other words you will not be able to assimilate a viable interpretation of mundane experience. It’s unthinkable that you may learn about these problems through school, peers, books, or ministers of cult. These people come after your parents in terms of time and charisma. This is perhaps not much taken into account in the literature about autism.

Ah yes, very interesting point. "Loss of parents" because of the syndrome.
A terrible amputation at the heart of ones life because of the communication etc difficulties.
And equal incomprehension of other peoples joys and strengths gained from their relation with parents. And if there is an increase in aspie etc numbers then a corresponding rise in dislocation of this primary bond and relationship between generations in the society.
Yep.
Oedipus.?
And a loss I have felt for years and years and have only just begun to feel sad and sorry about rather than full of fury and blame. As I have understood how it came about.
Yes, haven't heard this before. And even worse........... realising another reason for my own difficulties as mother of my 8 year old; how could I be a mother?
A monster , yes? But someone loving and caring and connected and able to understand what he needed and wanted , when I had not had that experience myself of looking face to face and talking with little signs of eyes and brows and mouth, to my mother? Fat chance.
Just recently I began to feel sorry about loss of my father; to realise how wonderful it would have been to have been able to relate to him without so much fuzz and misunderstanding . But then he has it too, has talked of it obliquely, his feelings not seeming connected to him, or spontaneous.

Aren't there at least two other central greek myths which involve being separated from parents, cut off and brought up by strangers , aswell?( the one with the maze and the minotaur? and another) It wrecked Oedipus' sexuality . And caused him to kill father as a stranger. Merlin took Arthur away from his parents . Rapunzel. Are there any other tales of babes cut off from parents? Did it start with the Greeks?
Are there any in the bible? You mention Job.( I was thinking bible looks like an aspies lament from start to finish!!!The old testament anyway! Cain in meltdown over perceived illogic and injustice by authority figure for example!! Just had fun thinking of several major biblical characters as aspergers, ! !)
Severance from parents as integral part of the aspie/autie experience.
I wonder how much this may have contributed to certain aspects of society. Unusually detached questioning of parental authority.

For "Job's problem" perhaps two different things are meant. One is, generally, the problem of evil in the world. Why evil if God, according to the Bible, is all powerful? Why evil, suffering, injustice, sickness? To this there is the answer of God himself in the Book of Job. God is not allpowerful, and anyhow his designs are too difficult to understand on the basis of human intelligence. The Book of Job may be interpreted as a paean to the wisdom of wild life. For me the Book of Job is an extraordinary piece of poetry or literature and, in a sense, a defence of the logic of evolution, not contaminated by human artefact (don't exploit the wild donkey, don't harness the hippo: if they are there in the shape they have, I only (God) know why they are that way and with their habits). Something of that sort is in the Chuang-tzu of Tao, with its condemnation of the domestication of wildlife. This is the second more specific meaning of the Book of Job.
This is an aside in the thread.

I made a promise to myself to stop talking about Jung at WP...but his book "Answer to Job" is demanding to be mentioned here . Jung pulls no punches with God in his treatment of Job. I thought you might find this interesting, a little about this book, and Jung's approach to the problem of the Job story :-

http://www.cgjungpage.org/index.php?opt ... &Itemid=40

The problem of connecting with some older protecting subject is getting worse and worse as a consequence of the disappearance of the extended family and the increasing insularity of family life. Aunts, uncles, grammas and granddaddies are kept at a distance and considered interfering nuisances, when they exist and don't live miles away in different cities. The presence of a kinship community is a resource for children who can find some form of alternative benevolent protection and different life styles around them (cousins and their peers). Moreover, the more a couple is "dysfunctional", the more it is inclined to overvalue its own singularity within walls of intolerance, avoiding friends, neighbors etc.

Yes, I agree with that. One of the things that made my childhood tolerable was the fact that I had extended family nearby and spent as much spare time as possible at the houses of friends. They generously shared their mothers with me, so my own was not the undiluted ogre that she otherwise would have been and also showed me what it is to be feminine/motherly, which my own mother couldn't do. (Because she was neither) It is a positive thing for children to meet as many people as possible, I think, to show them that there are other ways of living than the example which their own families provide.

I get my name Othila from a rune which symbolization basically means seperation from the family. I have always seen it as both a curse and a strength to not be bonded well with your family. The rune's underlying meaning makes sense to me. I change and grow more away from my family then I do embedded in them. When I live in a different surrounding I feel I can just be me versus a child whose has suffered social problems all her life and who is weird and therefore unapproachable. Basically i feel i most choose between two different paths. Either i can go out in the world on my own and survive like the lone wolf and perhaps benefit immensely from not having my family's constant critcism about not being normal fill my ears or I can stay sheltered with the family members who are growing increasingly frustrated by the fact that I am not the person they want me to be yet who will love me regardless because i am their kin. Like my name choice I desire to break free I just havn't thought about how Iam going to do it.

not because of me I hope:? Jeez - it was only a joke

but I don't think about parents and brothers too much. Our lives are quite separate. Apart from my mother (who seems to be making a bit effort to get to know me again) none of them want to see me, but I would like to think they care all the same.

No, not because of you Baz Because Jung is a different language...and it is sometimes boring to other people. I don't want to become a Jung bore, (or an old bore, come to that. lol.)