The Non-Autistic Sibling(s)

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My husband's siblings really have nothing to do with us.

A whole lot of baggage from living with an undiagnosed Aspie sibling. There was nothing that could or would have been done. This was during the 60s.

Everything revolved around meltdowns and "s**t behavior", so outings where cut short blah blah blah....There aren't many happy family memories from ages 7-15.

Now they are polite, like you would be to a not well known coworker. I wish it were different.

Sort of miss read the question you asked.

I'm the NT, my husband the Aspie.

People viewed the NT siblings as those poor things that have to deal with THAT----> Aspie Kid. And people would invite sibs and not Aspie to many things due to his meltdowns.

My husband was complete baffled by his siblings, because his TOM, and social skills were that so poor. His two younger NT brothers have IQs higher than his 130, good looking, super social and charming. He thought the brothers received so many friends etc because they were "super smart". My husband didn't see that they could both charm the birds out of the trees, and had model good looks. He completely missed the social aspect to friendship. All the work that goes into keeping a friendship alive.

Aspergers was not diagnosed in the 1960s. Everyone blamed his problems on that he was one month premature and this was his mom's first kid.

He tells me childhood was 18 years of never understanding what was going on, amd how could people know what was going on out of the thin air? (all non verbal cues)

I mostly get along with my siblings, none of the others are on the spectrum...but not sure they're 'neurotypical' my brother who's 21 has dyslexia, my sister who's 24 seems to always need to be doing something or planning something or she gets anxious, then my youngest brother who's 13 seems fairly normal as far as functioning and is into drama, I did see one play he was in. They all have blonde hair and mine is dark my sister and over 13 brother have both died their hair black in the past, as did plenty of people I went to school with.

I have a younger sister who is NT. Growing up, we avoided each other more than we fought. We don't really share interests, so we've never done much together. I wanted to play outside, she wanted to play with dolls. We "get along," but we are not close. She is much closer to her friends than she is to me.

Growing up, she repeatedly told me I was weird. When we were young, she would provoke me and I hit her. I was always the one that got in trouble, being told that "I was the oldest, so I should know better." She always had many friends and was off-and-about while I was left home alone. I was envious many times and wished she would play with me sometimes so I would have a friend. I'm pretty sure she was envious of my academic skills.

We are in contact. We see each other a few times a year, and talk on the phone once or twice a month, but it is nothing compared to the contact other women I know have with their sisters.

I don't have any siblings, but I have an NT cousin only four months older than me and we have practically been raised side by side. My relationship with him has always been the best. When I was little, more severely autistic and totally nonverbal, Liam always knew what I wanted and needed and spoke for me as like my interpreter. He has always acted like a caretaker for me and also has shown that even though I have required a lot of extra care and can be a handful sometimes, that he really likes and loves me a lot and we are best friends. I am really very thankful for him.

See, ironically, I was the 'normal' sibling until I was recently diagnosed. My younger brother has severe learning difficulties and right from birth has needed a lot more support. He has speech issues, and at fifteen is perhaps nearer a six year old in mentality. I adore him. He is a wonderful, if sometimes annoying, brother. He is caring and has no social inhibitons at all, but growing up he was the one who needed most of the attention and I was in more of a carer role.

On the one hand this is probably one of the reasons my aspergers went unnoticed for so long. When you have no NT comparison things which might be big clues to some parents aren't so noticable. We had pretty strict routines in place for my brother, we had to be exlicit and sometimes use sign for him. With him around I had a role to play, I knew how to behave and look after him so I often came off very mature.

It was only when I went away to university things collapsed and we realised something was wrong with me. It was not a pleasant time but we got through it and I got my life on track again with my diagnosis.

Although I think growing up with a sibling who has more additional needs that me has perhaps led to stinted emotional development in myself (I don't really know how to do emotions at all) because I got very used to putting myself aside so my brother could have the attention, in other ways it brought huge benefits. Although I know I'm different and have difficulties, I also grew up with a culture of, youfind your intelligence in what you can do, not what you can't, so I don't feel 'disabled'.

Also, now my brother is older, he is noticing some of the things I struggle with, and now if I have to do something like collect charity things for church he insists he comes with me because he is social, I'm not, yet he knows if he is there I can do it because my focus it on helping him learn to interact. He is protective of me too, quick to try to look after me if I'm upset. He even gets rid of spiders for me because he knows I'm scared of them.

For me, I will always say growing up with my brother has taught me more than I've ever lost because of it, but from the perspective of more able sibling you do sometimes miss out on things. All I would say is, just because you are autistic doesn't mean you don't need to learn to step back for a sibling. It's hard, especially when young, but I think parents need to be firm about it too. Yes of course an autistic child may need more attention, but you have to be pretty strict about being fair to make sure there is no resentment or anything.

Growing up with NT siblings for me was mostly a nightmare. We had great times sometimes but usually not especially when I got older like middle school and high school. Then it was mostly nightmare. But it was also a different time then and HFA was not really known and Misophonia had never been heard of. So all of my issues were considered simply as behavioral problems and were treated accordingly. People just assumed they stemmed from jealousy or rebellion which was not always the case. Now, especially that I know that I am Aspie and Misophonic it is easier and we are closer as siblings because I now understand things about myself that I did not understand before so I can tailor my interactions with them much better. Now my oldest brother, whom I did not grow up with and my sister, whom I did, are my best friends other than my husband.

I think the best advice I can give you is to be very patient and very calm and to really try to listen and understand so that they feel heard. This is one of the things that is hardest for me is when I am not able to be heard. Also always remember that their thought patterns and ways of understanding and perceiving things are not the same as yours. One thing that really hurt us growing up is that people thought my "behavior" was personal attacks towards them for something I wanted when they were actually responses to sensory overload or frustrations I was having because of processing issues. This still happens now with me a lot and people misread my signals that my body is putting out thinking that I am feeling a certain way towards them and acting out specifically at them when I am not doing this at all but rather trying to deal with the overwhelming environment around me. But they make snap decisions about what they think is going on, insist that they are right about the decisions they make about me and then hold me accountable and treat me according to the assumptions they made no matter how incorrect they are.

So be very careful not to make snap assumptions and judgements because of what you think is happening. Always give people the benefit of the doubt. Now we are not perfect and sometimes we do things directed at people. Some people on the Spectrum, just like anyone else, are also very mean. So sometimes it will be a behavioral attack or whatever. The key is to know the difference. So the benefit of the doubt is always a good start. And if the person is deliberately being mean it will come out in time. But it's better to be slow to react and give the person a chance to show his true self. Hope that helps.

You're your own person, so you're good, just deal with the older autistic ones. How 'severely' is their Autism?

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My late older brother and I were/are NT and our little brother has HFA, never formally diagnosed. Our mom has bipolar 1 and is just generally not a good person.

Whether intentionally or not, parents can treat autistic and non-autistic kids differently, which can make it hard for the kids to be close. My older brother and I were teenagers when our little brother was a toddler. My mom ignored my little brother a lot and forced us to take care of him. We didn't know he was autistic, just that he was different, didn't understand things the same, needed things a certain way. If we wanted to go in our rooms and be away from him for awhile, my mom would say (purposefully so he could hear her) "He'll think you HATE him..." Then we'd be guilted out of our rooms to play with him some more.

He's almost 30 now and doesn't remember this stuff. But that kind of thing tricked him into thinking that we hated him and were only playing with him because we had to. Which wasn't true. We were teenagers and were overwhelmed. To my mom, she didn't get that my little brother understood her, because like I said, she's a bad person and doesn't think about other people's feelings.

My elder NT siblings made my life hell. I even got flack for having petit mal seizures( until I was 10 ), because I got extra attention. Who are the nuts here?

My siblings were actually step-siblings.

I suppose they were ok really although I don't see any of them anymore.

My NT daughter is very loving toward her older, ASD brother. If I give her a cookie, she asks for another one to give to him. If I tell her there are no more, she breaks hers in half and gives some to him, even if he's in another part of the house and doesn't know she has a cookie.
Unfortunately, brother doesn't reciprocate. If I give him two cookies and tell him to give one to his sister, he will try to sneak off and eat them both.
I can imagine her looking after him some day, which makes me both proud of her and a little sad for both of them.

I am the youngest of 3 girls. Both of my older sisters are very smart NTs. We fought often as kids, but they also looked out for me, and would protect me in a heartbeat should I ever need it, even though I spent a lot of my time off in my own world figuring things out by myself, not thinking to ask for help. As adults, they are some of my best friends. I love them.

I feel bad for the scars that my sisters have from our childhood. My mother pushed them so hard, because she saw their potential, how classically bright they were, how if she kept at them about it, they would earn straight-As to please her. There were a lot of other unhealthy adults that floated around us as kids too, who said things that sometimes hurt my sisters. My constantly being either physically in my own world (up in a tree somewhere most of the summer), or just being mentally somewhere else protected me from both of those things.

To this day, I consider my inability to detect passive aggression my finest quality. I didn't feel the pressure and expectations they did also because I think mom gave up on pushing me at some point. I was just the "stupid" sister.... except that I secretly wasn't the whole time