(UK only) 'Is Aspergers real?'

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Three counties radio had a talk about whether AS is real or not. Here's the link

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00z2l8r

Unless you want to hear a long conversation about porn, skip to 1:29.00. It probably won't work in the US or other countries so if anyone wants to write any thing down for our overseas friends please go ahead.

Just so you know - Your link works just fine in Oregon USA

I wasn't sure if it would! I know a lot of my American friends have trouble watching/listening to BBC programmes!

yeah - and youtube has the famed "not available in your Country" thing too... glad I was able to let you know

I've listened to anout 10 mins and 'Mary' is making my blood boil. 'Thick as mince' is how I'd desrcibe someone like that. I can't bear to listen to another minute.

I probably will not get a great deal of support on this particular site but despite having a diagnosis myself, I would not categorically state that I do believe it is real. Essentially, it's a list of, not only character traits, but traits which logically could have a common cause of have caused each other. You could make a list of anything you want to and say "people who are like this are disabled and require dispensations" but at the end of the day, whatever you call it, it's just a type of person. Before Asperger's was "real" or common, a lot people who are now Aspies were just the geeks.

They've taken a group of people and labelled them as disabled because aspects of their personality makes some things in their life difficult. Yes, I'm not great at socialisation, does that make me disabled? If so, why am I disabled because of that and not because I'm not good at cooking, or football?

I'm not trying to be all "I'm not disabled, I'm differently abled" motivational speaking here, but I think it probably isn't a real disability with a biological cause. Sure, I'll go along with it because I get stuff (extra time in exams etc) but I don't see how the issues I have which make some parts of my life a bit harder than some people's is any different to a person who is bad at, I don't know, maths or being punctual.

It is a disability because I cognitively shut down and overload with everyday common things. I suffer mutism and can't speak. I fall over things and things pop out of nowhere. Lights are blinding and there is a huge delay before understanding things. I get lost if I simply turn around in a circle. I can't feel if I have to pee. I am hungry ALL the time or NEVER hungry. I don't care at all or I care way too MUCH. I break a bone? I don't know it! No energy... can't go in sunshine... food allergies.. medicine allergies... I don't hug my own mother or my children without having to prepare for it! I can go on.... but I won't.

Social issues? That is the LEAST of my problems. I can't do math... who cares. It is a disability in it's own right - even if it is the co-morbid things that make it so.

As for getting things for it being classified as so... I don't. I work and push my limits every day. I work for every thing I have and do not have any "special" permissions. Yes it is a disability, but I do not use it for personal gain and should I need to use the system in place you can bet I would if it makes this very difficult and struggle in life easier. For those that need to use those things for legit reasons... I am very happy they have that to aid them in their life and rightly so!

Social issues... I WISH that is ALL it is!

I am sorry to come off forceful in my post.. but my buttons have most definitely been pushed. If my life were as simple as your post makes it sound, I would be one very grateful person. That said - the opening line to your post seems bang on. At least to this one member.

Some of the things you described are not because of Asperger's though, for example, to be able to break a bone and not feel it is a separate medical issue, that doesn't come under the ASD banner. My point is that all of the symptoms of the milder kinds of autism are just character traits that show up in NT people all the time.

Of course Asperger's exists.

I suppose that is where I disagree. Sensory issues are a huge part of Asperger's and autism. Yes - SPD stands alone in a diagnosis... but I do not believe we have Asperger's AND SPD. Or Asperger's and CAPD etc... these things are so tightly interwoven and vary in severity among each of us, just as the spectrum of Autism does. This article may help explain better than I can http://www.autismtoday.com/articles/dif ... iences.htm

I was NEVER considered a nerd.. not even before the big boom of Asperger's diagnosis started happening in the 90's (I think it was the 90's - I may remember that wrong). I was a shy little girl who had severe difficulties in school - too stupid to learn. I wasn't that classic "nerd" with all the smarts. I have the IQ of an ape - and I am NOT kidding there... but I am NOT dumb nor am I unintelligent. I am simply a more visual person and live for art. Yet, I went at age four (1979) to be tested for classic autism. I was different, they just didn't understand back then, how I was different... I fit the classic autism diagnosis minus a couple points... so they simply said I was not classicly autistic and told my mother to accept me as I was... and I became Gloria being Gloria (I have posted that before so I am sorry to sound like a broken record) but I was not normal and it showed. Much of it was my sensory perceptions interfering with learning and understanding.

We are not so different from the NT's out there in a lot of regards... but what is unique is our frequency of the issues that NT's only suffer occasionally. Also the degree of severity is different as to what an NT experiences. My boyfriend created the perfect term: Asperger's = plus plus situations. But that isn't to minimize the black and white thinking, rule bound thinking, perfectionist thinking, catastrophic thinking, and truth bound thinking. Those issues cause me no end of bother on a daily basis. They get me viewed as rude, stand offish, prudish, uptight, etc... who wants to be viewed that way? Especially if it isn't intentional. Who wants to be last to get a joke and then laughed at because yet AGAIN it whizzes over your head.

If I didn't have Asperger's, I can almost guarantee (and I only say almost because I can't really see myself any other way!) I wouldn't suffer the face blindness, sensory issues and I wouldn't have the too many to list issues that keep me confined to a tiny room that has all the windows totally covered. I would be like my siblings out in the world in a successful career, have a family. Not the divorced woman who lost the most precious people to her, her children because her issues overwhelm her life.

I love my children... so very much. Sitting alone in a room and missing them every single day of their lives says it all to me. I am not someone who gave up their children. I fought for them.. and lost due "to her issues"

I am not like my siblings, and it isn't only because I can't talk like they do. That is just the tip of it. As I said before... if social were it... I would be a very happy woman. You have Asperger's.. but maybe you are at the beginning of the scale. We are all different and we all have a different degree of issues. Mine have put my life in a lonely, sad place. If yours has not, then I am truly very happy for you.

Going to have to agree with you. My Aspergers makes life very difficult for me on a day to day basis. I wish I did fit the 'maths genius' stereotype because at least then I would be good at something! I'm more artistic than mathematical.

It does come under ASD. Sensory processing issues are a major part of ASDs. This could be to the extreme end, wherbey a broken bone doesn't feel particularly sore. It is not a separate issue at all. I was recently at an autism seminar, for parents, and at least half of us reported having kids wth unusual responses to painful stimuli. My own daughter had a broken leg for 24 hours before we realised she needed to go to hospital.

I know I come off sounding hard - but Asperger's has put me in a hard place. I am glad for others adding their feedback.

So you believe whole personality types - including sensory issues - are hereditary then? Because according to you they must be, as both me and my daughters have AS.

I didn't say it is hereditary, what causes personality is still unknown but generally accepted to be a variety of things. People act like people in their family because they live with them, especially their parents because small children copy the behaviour of adults and take it as their own. If a person had sensory issues and unusual social habits and was diagnosed with AS (it's irrelevant here if AS is real or not) and then that person had a child, the child would be reasonably likely to also have sensory issues (depending on the other parent) and also adopt certain bahavioural patterns consistent with AS. The child may be diagnosed with AS entirely because of its parent, but not actually have the condition.

Inheriting through environment a tendency to stim when stressed or to avoid eye contact is no different to how my brother has the exact same walk and speech mannerisms as my father. A child of someone with an AS diagnosis is very likely to have AS symptoms regardless of whether they have AS or not, and the AS parent will be more aware of the autism spectrum so be more likely to have the child tested and push for a diagnosis to avoid the child having to have a difficult childhood like they did.

My overall point is that Asperger's has no characteristics which can't quite easily, and with statistical likelihood, be explained through the random chance of inheritance and personality, and the fact that AS seems to "run in families" is not at all proof its existence, in fact it is to be expected given that young children are genetically and environmentally influenced by their parents (and other family members) to become who they are.

Sorry - I have to disagree with 100% of what you said here again. I will reiterate this fact to you again... I do not behave like one single member of my family and I went from being a "perfect" child personality wise, behavior wise and any other wise you can think of to a child that no longer talked, smiled, sought out sharing, stimmed etc. I didn't LEARN that from anyone. Every single member of my family are social butterflies. They LOVE everything social and can not grasp even remotely how or why it affects me so badly. Yes, inheritance can be a part of it... I believe that firmly... behaviors can be adopted as well. But what CAN not be adopted personality wise is this:

The 100% black and white thinking that happens without ANY shades of gray.

The perfectionist thinking

TRUE stimming (stimming is HIGHLY personal and what works for one does NOT work for another - any LEARNED "stimming" is simply a HABIT and not stimming AT ALL)

The catastrophic thinking and behaviors

Rule bound thinking

Theory of Mind

Empathy

Truth Bound thinking

While every single person alive has habits and mannerisms and learned and copied behaviors - AS people DO have those as well. What makes AS AS is the fact that the neurological parts of us that DO not have one jot to do with personality. When I am completely overwhelmed and melting down - there is not one single thing someone can say to me to calm me down. Matter of fact, if they try I will spiral MORE out of control. If it were simply a BAD personality trait when I got my way or what ever trigger were addressed the meltdown and bad attitude would simply vanish. Melt downs have serious recovery periods. Not just simply say "ok sorry I changed your plans.. we can still go to such and such" I don't simply say.. Ok lets go. I will be total opposite that. I will tell them where to go get stuffed and I will refuse to go and melt down that they now said we could go etc.

This next point may be a bit icky - but I will say it to prove a point. I have this driving need to look at a picked scab... or if I blow my nose etc... I have to look. That is NOT a habit... there is a NEED to look. That is a KNOWN part of AS. That is not a picked up trait from my mother. That anyhow would gross her out completely.

I am NOT quirky or happy go lucky in my nature. I am NOT like anyone in my direct family. I did NOT simply learn to be this way. I do NOT choose to melt down. I DO NOT choose to lose my ability to speak. I DO NOT choose to become lost because they put a stop sign on the corner on my route home so I no longer know how to get home! I CAN NOT learn math no matter how HARD I try. I DO NOT choose to misunderstand people. I DO NOT turn my hearing of WILLINGLY when I read IT JUST HAPPENS. I DO NOT choose to get nauseated and dizzy when my dog barks! NOT ONE person in my family has these traits that I could have LEARNED them from. NOT ONE person in my family has these traits that I could have inherited their traits. I DO NOT choose to be able to write backward easier than forwards. I think I made my point here.

If you STILL don't change your thinking about AS and autism.... you are an aspie STUCK in black and white thinking and you are an aspie STUCK in the groove of aspie thinking patterns and it will take Hercules to get you to see the truth of it. I won't reply here again - as it will be pointless and I am energy zapped as it is so I will spend my energy elsewhere and not on this losing thread of thinking.

Personality quirks... Learned family traits....what trash is that... That is uneducated talk period. I DO NOT choose to have these struggles in my life. I DO NOT simply have BAD HABITS. I DO NOT choose to be different than anyone else in my family. I DID NOT inherit sensory issues from my parents. HOWEVER my children HAVE inherited sensory issues and AS traits from me. AS is real - NO MATTER how it comes about in your life via chemical damage - after birth or inutero. Via prematurity, via brain damage from lack of oxigen, via inheritance etc. There are TOO MANY countless ways to bring AS and autism into someones life. Regardless, it is VERY real, VERY debilitating the more down the scale you go.

If you are so lucky to be an aspie and barely affected - lucky you. BUT DO NOT turn around and say to those affected to the point of life being very difficult and rub salt in the wounds with your talk you have been doing here. If you don't think it is real - then DON'T call yourself an aspie. DON'T take the aspergers diagnosis. REJECT IT fully. You are living your life from a bogus place to accept the diagnosis and turn around and say you will take the benefits it reaps your way for it. Don't be bogus then. Own what you are saying here. When you do that.. YOU CAN authentically say you DO NOT BELIEVE AS is real. If you can't authentically say you ARE NOT an aspie - then you are arguing a moot point.