I know my father is Autistic

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Hi guys

I have great belief that my father is Autistic but he is an old man now ( late 60's ) and he will never get diagnosed. He is now on anti depressants and he wont even leave the house to go the local shop, which is visible from his front door! His personal hygiene is not good my brother who lives near him has to tell him to wash and change his clothes. He repeats himself all the time and just does the same day in day out, sat in front of the TV watching the same programs day in and day out. He is always right and never wrong, we all just let alot of his ways go over our heads as we see and know he isnt 'normal' so to spk whatever normal is. Even before it was mentioned to me over 2 yrs ago that T seems to be Autistic, i said t family members that T reminded me of my dad, very Jekyl & Hyde that is T and my dad all over.

I knew when i was a kid he had mental health problems but never knew what and now i have researched ASDs i have read about my son but also my father, my reseach explained alot to me. If i am honest i have to say i believe i could have an ASD too, i always felt different to my peers growing up and i love my own space, being touched and spoke to i do not welcome like i should and eye contact is very hard for me unless i feel comfortable with the person i am talking too. I have medical records that state they did a brain scan and chest scan of me when i was 4 yrs old, this was because i would stop breathing sometimes, i would blink my eyes really fast and i would be in a gaze. They were unable to examine me as i wouldnt allow it and i was a very nervous & shy girl. They said they would not suggest medication at this stage but would see me in 6 wks time, they suspected me having a petit mal ( fits ) guess what guys they never saw me again.

This was in 1977, so u can imagine very little of Autism would of been around then and i can honestly say i feel many, many people would never of been diagnosed in them days, especially High Functioning & Aspergers.

Do any of u guys think like i do and have people within your family who show Autistic signs? i know its genetic and i can honestly say i believe it to be very true regarding my situation even thought my dad has no diagnosis and also me. I have read that its harder to pick up in girls and not that its more in boys than girls, because girls are much more timid than boys anyway do u believe that too ?

Alexia x

Hi Alexia - my Dad is also clearly HFA. Sadly, he refused to attend all weddings in the family,has pushed everyone away and is basically a hermit, though a very cleanly one. Everything always has to be in its place and very clean. My grandfather was the same and became increasingly eccentric in his later years. I too believe autism to be primarily genetic.

I can't say I know anyone else in my family that has AS or autism. However, the majority of them seem to be quite hyperactive.

I have been diagnosed half a year ago.

My mother thinks she has it since she learned about it from me. She also thinks her mom may have signs of AS.

One of my 4 male cousins appears to have AS.

I don't know about my 2 sisters but there are AS tendencies in them. But not as pronounced as they in me.

My Dad was probably PDD-NOS. He was a great communicator being an auctioneer and real estate agent but he was very very obsessive about very narrow range of interests, he was extremely socially awkward and plenty of people ridiculed him behind his back. He used to frequently talk about him self a lot and to himself a lot.

I also have 2 other siblings with very similar traits.

My dad has never been diagnosed, although he finally decided to try anti depressants about 10 years ago, after years and years of denying that there was something "different" about him. He can calculate three digit multiplications in his head within seconds, but is very distant - he was never affectionate with us, and everything has to be just so - any changes in his routine stress him enormously.

I don't think he'll ever be diagnosed. It was hard enough to get him to go see the doctor and admit he had depression and anxiety issues, nevermind being diagnosed with something as misunderstood as autism / ASDs...

I consider myself lucky because although I share his symptoms, I was brought up in an age of information and tolerance. More than him, anyways. I am worse than him when it comes to speaking to people face to face and reading "between the lines" though... but we are two of a kind, my father and I.

There must be a genetic factor involved.

My little sister gets obsessions and loves rules like me. Also seems to be faceblind and cannot understand body lanuagae. Probably AS or HFA. Both parents are rather NT.

There is also have a couple of silblings who bites their hands a lot in frustration and leaves callouses from doing that just as I bite down hard with my jaws when I get frustrated. I would not like one of my hands to be in there when I do that. I would bite through to the bone. I know hand biting is another autistic trait.

I also had an Aunt who probably would of been at the low end of the spectrum.

Alexia, you haven't been diagnosed yet? But your profile says you have.

Unfortunatly, the default setting is "Have a diagnosis." Maybe, like me, she has overlooked it at first.

oh I thought you changed it to 'have aspergers-undiagnosed.'

[quote="paulsinnerchild"]There is also have a couple of silblings who bites their hands a lot in frustration and leaves callouses from doing that just as I bite down hard with my jaws when I get frustrated. I would not like one of my hands to be in there when I do that. I would bite through to the bone. I know hand biting is another autistic trait. quote]

I haven't read that before but it makes sense because i've always done it!

Thax guys for ur replies very interesting

I know what i now know about ASDs and this has pieced together parts of the puzzle for me, so to speak and makes me have more understanding.

I too got no affection from my dad i would get the opposite physical abuse then 5 mins later he was nice to me, this is the behaviour that i just couldnt get and i knew something mentally was wrong ( i was aged 14 at the time ).

The things he flipped and i mean flipped over was the door being left open ( still the same about doors being left open to this day ) and if i was late home from school, he would say he knows the buses and they are never late ( telling me the time of arrival ) all this i lived with and saw on a daily basis and now he is a mess, he dare not even leave the house he wont if he can get away with it. He too talks to himself and about himself like i said repeating the same things over & over, well i know more now than i did when i was a teenager and i see the reasons now.

Alexia x

My dad has aspergers IMO, I thought it was just ocd (and general, social anxiety) because he hides it very well, but I realised he's exactly the way I am, he only speaks in information, he's never been able to share emotion with anyone but my mum, and he had some serious drives and obsessions until he met her and she became it. Theres plenty of other aspects but I won't go into them right now.

Despite this he's been a wonderful father in many ways, it makes me wonder why he can get along with my obviously NT mother and I can't seem to ever maintain any sort of connection with a woman without losing the plot.

Though she is VERY submissive in terms of agreeing to his every demand, and every interest etc.

My cousin is diagnosed as schitzophrenic as well.

Wow, it's almost scary reading the description of your dad... so much like mine. He used to freak out if you didn't stick the shower curtain to the wall properly when showering and a bit of water got on the floor. Once I forgot to wipe down the walls of the shower stall when i was done showering and he called me into the bathroom, yelling at me (he actually slapped me in the back of the head - and he's never hit me despite all his threats) This sparked a huge meltdown with me, I was self-injuring and becoming violent with my parents, so they put me in the hospital for two week, where for some reason I was diagnosed with ADHD... ???

My dad seems happier since he got his new position (he's worked for the city all his life). He's now caretaker of the water reservoir, and he and my mom live in a house out in the sticks (well, at the reservoir) and there's no one around for miles. Now that's pretty anti social, if you ask me.

My father was a campionnaire of fixations, imaginary sicknesses, ideas of having “enemies”. He entered my room and yelled at me that I was an imbecile and a slothful person, without any reason at all. I was not a fool and not at all lazy. I was certainly “special”, a loner, incapable of facing persons aggressively, in the right way, him in the first place. My mother defended me when she witnedssed these attacks, but she was a very selfish and cold person. She was herself in permanent war with my father and the relationship between my parents was a wreck, with my mother having the upper hand in most things, my father being dependent on her. There was no affection, and not even sex, between them. In a way it might be defined as a conflictual alliance, where I was made the scapegoat. I had a sister 5 years older than me, but there was never any solidarity, any form of complicity between us children. My life in the family was hell. So I had only one project for life: to flee away from my parents. But I was badly equipped for rebellion and a real independence. To gain independence you must be capable to establish friendships and solid relations outside the family. Being both my parents in their turn incapable of friendhips there was never a circle of sociality, a group near my family where I could find some one who could take my side, protect me. This half external half internal role of support is usually absolved by some relative. But my parents constituted a closeknit, although, sick unity, not permeable by the external world, not socialiazing with sane people. My father was a very well kown person, powerful in a way, and was not approached with a natural confidentiality. I was all on my own, but I was not myself capable to make real friends. Being literate and cultured, I might plagiarize some peers and live for some time on these fake friendships, but they were wholly unsatisfing. And every where I applied for a space for myself, in work and other social activities, there was the shadow of my celebrated father. In most case I was used and I didn't even know, or knew later. So my effort for independence, autonomy and selfassurance were futile from start.
I have spent a long time blaming my parents for my failure, but now I know that while the family may be hell, persons are born normally with an enormous capacity for resilience. They revolt, they fight parents, they flee successfully. It is a hard struggle that can be won. Except when you are lacking the natural capacity for socializing. The story of many of us, from what I see here, is a double combination of sick family and the inner problems of being born with autism. For all parents it’s difficult to cope with an autistic child, in a sense even more difficult if the child is of the kind apparently “functioning”. In most cases I see here, both parent and child are more or less fuctioning autistics and when you put together autistics in a realationship of power so strong like that of father and child, or mother and child you are headed for utter unhappiness.