Aspergers Criteria C

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If you can hold down a job, shop, go to the doctors and such other imprtant stuff, do yuo have Aspergers, even if you fit the other criteria? It's seems you wouldn't...

It would still depend on your social skills... ability to read and interpret non-verbal cues, reciprocity in relationships, understanding and relating to others emotions, ability to develop and maintain friend/intimate relationships, desire to do so.

I can shop, hire and deal with repairmen, deal with medical professionals... in other words, I deal with short, brief interactions pretty well. But long term... major disaster zone here. Eventually fired from every job I've ever had (though I held the last one 3 years!), reprimanded in volunteer organizations, criticized for not respecting teachers/instructors, not invited to club get-togethers, not promoted...

Fortunately I don't have to work for a living anymore, so I'm working on the happy hermit model... except I did manage to find a loving and accepting partner, so only a semi-hermit. But everyone else I related to this past year has gone off on me, blaming and yelling and telling me what a difficult person I am.

It's a spectrum. It's pervasive.
Damme... is this what was hiding under the bed?!

But how much 'socialness' is enough to not fit the criteria?

And how important is social stuff as an area of functioning? Are they working off the assumption that someone will keel over and die if they don't have enough friends and go out with them at least once a week

You could still have a significant social impairment if you can't keep friends, get in troubler with your partner, etc. I'm not sure about if you can't keep friends, have no partner, etc. and are fine with. I guess some clinicians would judge you to have a significant impairment because they hold you to NT standards, and others would say since you're happy with your life, y ou don't have a significant impairment and don't meet criterion C.

But if they're diagnosing someone with Aspergers, the person is obviously not NT, so why do they hold them to NT standards?

It's because those standards are social standards that - independently of culture - apply to all people, and not to a specific minority (or in this case, majority) of humankind. Those social standards are the accepted norm not because non-autistics would be imposing them on people with ASD, but rather because those are the social rules that make a society, either on a small or a greater scale, function smoothly.

Behaviour that has been diagnosed as 'autistic behaviour'; feeling uncomfortable about eye contact and avoiding it as a result, having trouble approaching people to ask for assistance or instructions, being unable to move through a crowd for fear of either locking down or having a fit of rage, reluctance -or failing to see a reason- to greet people, to apologize, to say 'thank you'... these are all factors in how I, personally, have felt hampered in my social functioning, and continue to at times. I know others on this forum have felt the same or similarly.

I know that if there were a society consisting completely of people who chose to behave how I behaved socially when I was about 12 years old, it wouldn't be a very functional society.

Compare it with near-sightedness. I'm a couple of degrees in the minus, but it's okay; I can correct it with a pair of glasses.

My questions were: what are the other improtant areas of functioning, and what does it mean by social? I can walk through a crowd fine, buy goods, go see a doctor etc - does that mean I'm socially fine?

Between clinically significant impairment and 'fine' is a lot of space for weak, bad and impaired.

You can suck at a lot of things and suck at life as a whole and have not a single disorder as defined by the DSM though you may have a neurological condition.

On the social aspect, it's really personal for everyone, so this is a question only you can answer yourself. How did you receive the diagnosis of an autistic spectrum disorder, whether it was by a professional, or a self-diagnosis? If you can indeed function adequately or more than adequately in social situations, then surely you must have done some work to pass some hurdles and get where you are now?

The 'other important areas of functioning', I think refer to different tasks that don't apply to social behaviour but basic daily activities and actions some people on the spectrum may well have some trouble with, plus sensory issues or even issues of comprehending things like signs on the street. Basic things like getting dressed, cleaning, and other minor or major things? I have heard (and experienced, too) that pinning yourself on a routine or a schedule too tightly (which we can be prone to), can also mess with functioning quite a bit. I remember I had problems with my motor skills when I was a child, and I was late in learning how to ride a bike and never learned how to swim. I don't know that the latter two things have ANYTHING to do with autism (probably not, the bike thing just mayybe), but I believe this is the area you should think of when they say 'other areas of functioning' beside social interaction issues.

Also, sensory issues can be a jam outside of social situations, too.

I was diagnosed over a decade ago... and I'm only 15. How did they judge whether I'd be able to cope in 'social situations' and such, when I was only 5? I'm not sure they even asked me

But criteria C means someone can have Aspergers when they're 5, and not when they're 15, even if they fit all the other criteria.

Good question IMO- if it's a hard wired neurologically based thing how can it go away? Maybe it's better used as an indication not if someone has Asperger's but whether they need outside assistance. The whole thing needs to be adapted as they discover more about the spectrum I think. I have a new psychiatrist at the non profit mental health facility I go to. It came out of substance abuse treatment but now it's just for meds management. I asked her about assessment and she said (and I found this refreshing) that she didn't think she was qualified to do it.

Easy:

Social = inability to form peer relations
Vocation = unable to work (or works far below one's qualifications and needs allowances made to keep the job)
Academia = unable to attend/complete mainstream schooling (perhaps possible with allowances given)
Other areas = independent living

You only need one of these above. Most people with run-of-the-mill AS will have more than one area severely affected.

I know Baron-Cohen requires people to have all of these [in addition to comorbid depression], but he uses a modified DSM-IV-TR that's stricter.

OMG! IN that case, even I wouldn't have AS, despite not being able to live independently (I'm in a psych institution), not having a job or ever having had one, having dropped out of college and not having any friends beside my AS bf, because I've never had clinical depression. And I thought I deserved a Noble prize for survivorship for NOT having become depressed after 1 3/4 years in institution, but if SBC gets his way, it'll cost me my dx.

Unable or unwilling? How does the psychologist know the difference?


What sort of allowances? Ones which aren't really that difficult to make, or ones which cause an inconveinience to they employer? As long as they can hold down a job...


Again, what sort of allowances? Ones which any good society should be able to make quite easily, or...


A lot of NTs fit this criteria Anyway, if the diagnosis is made when the person if 4, this doesn't really apply. Then again, neither does Academia or Vocation...

How many Aspies wouldn't fit the criteria if society changed just a little?

As for myself... can't say I can hold down a job, because I've never had to. Academia - I probably could manage (now), but they never really let me Social - yeah, I can make peer relationships, and personally think that part should be scrapped from the DSM. Independent living - never tried, but all evidence suggests I could manage it.

Looks like I'm not an Aspie afterall, despite fitting the other criteria