Recent Article About Autism Recovery

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Some With Autism Diagnosis Can Recover Study Finds

What do you guys think of this?

I would be skeptical of any article that uses the term "so-called autism spectrum." It makes it sound like the author has an anti-advocacy agenda. Even if this is not true, then my comment would be that some people certainly CAN improve. In fact, probably most people can become more social and can adjust to their environment with the appropriate treatments and care, so this is nothing new. What is appropriate though varies from case to case and there is no one-size-fits-all.

I suspect the so-called recovery is actually the child masking his experience and learning to mimic neurotypical communication.

“Some children who do well become quite independent as adults but have significant anxiety and depression and are sometimes suicidal,” said Dr. Fred Volkmar, the director of the Child Study Center at the Yale University School of Medicine.

I'm not surprised by the above quote. These children/adults must spend an enormous amount of energy and suffer a great loss of self esteem by pretending to be something they are not.

My son has a dual diagnosis of PDD-NOS and Landau-Kleffner syndrome. With antiepileptics he's improving slowly, and doctors said one day he could -in theory- get out the autistic spectrum. But since his father has AS it's quite unlikely.

I assume there are other boys with LKS or something that mimics autism who get their diagnosis changed as they get older. But it's just a guess...

I suppose I don't see how mimicking neurotypicals is necessarily an improvement, as it can cause a lot of issues in itself. For instance becoming more social is not necessarily 'improvement' unless its something that person wants. Improvement is subjective and i think only an individual can decide what improvement looks like to them.

I smell snake oil. It seems as though his parents are full of beans to me. I just hope they don't fart.

there is nothing wrong about noticing that the symptoms are no longer visible, i myself have doctors rapports that state my symptoms are gone, only to have a psycologist test a few months later that clearly state i managed to hide/control the symptoms.
indeed, those kids, especially on the higher end of the spectrum, might no longer "appear" autistic, but i'll bet that either they were never on the spectrum to start with, or they still are and just hide it better

I mentioned in other posts that I do believe that high fuctioning part of the spectrum can often mimick NTs, often with ease, so that it can feel natural. But often the symptoms leak out but not in ways that others may be aware of unless you live with them. I have recently "lost" friends because of something I didn't realize I did and only found out about it by accident--a year later. Many people as adults are fragmented and in so many different places so it is easy for not one person to get a "full" view of the person. If one person with AS makes a faux pas once with each of 100 people, then all those people may not think it part of a larger picture since they may not share notes with each other about that AS person. NT people have lives and preoccupations that are more important than to simply observe us 24/7 LOL

There are lots of treatments that various people try that are recognized as possibilities that "need further study" by scientists but aren't officially published as autism treatments. I wonder if one or more of these methods are actually effective in some cases.

I doubt chelation is effective, but there could be a variety of other popular treatments that are successful. For example, some parents have taken their children to clinics in Singapore and South Korea for stem cell treatment. Maybe some children are cured this way, but the parents don't report what they did for fear of legal action.

I just find it sad a child would be raised and taught they have to 'hide' their autism lest they be 'doing it wrong.' aren't making any 'progress' I mean I wonder what that does to the self esteem and emotional state of these people. Of course nothing wrong with positive improvements but constantly having to hide the way you are sounds terrible and very isolating.

On the other hand, acting out who you are can be very terrible and isolating. So it's kind of a catch-22. The best outcome may be putting yourself in a situation where you can do some of both.

I think that can be true.
My "aspie" traits are fading away as I grow up. Even sometimes it amazes me how "normal" i'm becoming... But deep inside, I feel comfortable when I'm acting like a real "aspie"
(Listening to music now. Been talking to very few people last week... Lonely, but not sad).

I agree with the findings. I believe (based on available evidence) that a child with AS may eventually "outgrow" or overcome AS to such an extent that they could eventually be indistinguishable from so-called "Neurotypicals". I think it is possible (though difficult) for an Aspie to learn to socialize and communicate in a way that may seem natural to the untrained eye.

This may not always be the case, as some Aspies may have other issues that inhibit their ability to make autonomous decisions and act on them.

So some children, if they are whacked with a rolled-up newspaper ofter enough, get really really really good at acting "normal."

I notice no one asked these former autistic kids-- all of whom are old enough to speak for themselves and must, if they are considered "recovered," be fully verbal-- how they feel about their "recovery."

NOT IMPRESSED.

Oh for me it was a wooden spoon. I was freaked out by my "mother". She never let me get stuck on anything, and I jumped out of whatever I my preoccupations were because of my fear of her.

I'm sorry, but I refuse to try to act like an NT when that isn't the way God wired me. I like the way I am; I'm not changing for anyone.