Is Donna Williams truely autistic?

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On You Tube, the mother of a severely autistic adult son claims she dosen't think Donna Williams is truely autistic. She claims Donna Williams has multiple personality disorder and one of her personalities is autistic. Is she or is she not autistic?

From what I remember reading about her, she is.

I think your right. The mother of the severly autistic man even claimed she might be a little bit biased becuase her son is so severly autistic.

She's both autistic and multiple, and all of her selves are affected by that (in different ways though). I know that she's autistic because her pattern of autism resembles my own in many ways. It's not the most common pattern of autism, and so a person who has it will not always seem like the most common sorts of online autistic people. But it's a real pattern that I know many autistic people who do fit it. It's just relatively rare. And that's why she has certain experiences of the world that are not the autism stereotype and not the most common.

I don't really like threads like this though. Partly because I've been the subject of the occasional one and I know how it feels. (I've also written them in the past before I was aware of how it felt.) The thing is, it's very uncomfortable when people you've never met think they have a right to pontificate about your diagnosis, or satisfy their curiosity, or pick you (or a mental construct they think is you) apart in public, or insist that they know things about you that only you and your close friends and family and medical professionals have a right to say they know. It's a side-effect of becoming even moderately well-known, but it's not one that ought to be encouraged. Even when people are "just curious", even when people "mean well", they're crossing a boundary line when they start getting into this territory. If people don't know someone extremely well, "figuring out" that person's diagnoses is none of their business. Especially when the person themselves has already been clear that they have that particular diagnosis.

I talked to Donna. She is good. I do not know about if she has autism or not as that is not my department.

Punky, the woman on YouTube apparently doesn't know how autism works. If you're autistic, your entire brain is autistic; you can't be autistic with DID and not have all personalities affected. Now, some of them may deal with the autism differently than the others, but they are all going to be neurologically autistic because they are all using the same brain. It would be all over the scientific journals if they ever discovered someone who had DID and autism and one or more personalities weren't neurologically autistic. It would be a huge discovery.

So, yeah, even if I had no idea who Donna Williams was, I'd have to disagree with the YouTube video.

I read her book and it would not suprise me if she did not have MPD based on the abuse she suffered, but I know that if one part of her is autistic...the rest of her is too.

The woman on you-tube obviously never heard of HFA if she thinks that only LFA is really autsim.....that is why it is a spectrum disorder!! !

I read her book and it would not suprise me if she did not have MPD based on the abuse she suffered, but I know that if one part of her is autistic...the rest of her is too.

The woman on you-tube obviously never heard of HFA if she thinks that only LFA is really autsim.....that is why it is a spectrum disorder!! !

I think I know what woman you are talking about on youtube. She seems to compare her son to everyone and if you aren't like him, you're not autistic.

I do think Donna is, I have read one of her books. I never liked people going around questioning peoples diagnoses and playing the doctor.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lNTZYu2Thc[/youtube]

She did not even answer my question about people like Temple Grandin and myself who are severly low functning autistic as young children but become more Asperger's-ish as the grow up.

I see she does think AS is real but she doesn't see it as autism. Makes me wonder what she does think of people who go from autism to AS?

Presumably the same thing most sane people think: that since the diagnosis is made based on early history, you can't go changing it based solely on current presentation. Doing so (calling all functioning individuals AS and all non-functioning individuals autistic) is basically defining autism as low-functioning, generally for the purposes of making arguments that weren't valid anyway but seem slightly more sensible if there are no readily-available examples of successful autistics. In essence it's defining autistic as worthless so you can argue that autistics are worthless, and by definition excluding people who are not.

And it's stupid and I hate it. It leaves most real people (on the spectrum) in limbo, because most of them (arguably all of them) are less pathetic than the stereotypical low-functioning autistic, but few fit the stereotype of the high-functioning non-disabled Aspie. Few people are truly either, if any. (I come as close to the latter as anyone. Living it is not like the stereotypes.)

if someone can write a book, someone else will accuse them of not really being autistic.

it's as if a certain degree of (seeming) functionality negates the autism, and i wonder if it comes from an autism speaks sort of place where it does not promote their agenda to have people in the spotlight, proud of their lives and accomplishments despite their autism.

Does that kind of thinking imply that lower functionning people are never going to be able to learn to interact in a more NT acceptable way? not necessarily passing, but at least show the world they are not as empty as they are thought to be? because that borders on abusing in my opinion. It's basically saying, I do ABA with my son, but he will never be a functionning individual. Why do any therapy then? Some parents might just take it the wrong way and institutionalise their kids because after all, there is no hope ....
it's not only strange, as a lot of high functionning adults were non verbal for the first years of their lives, but it's also sending a message that i find a bit dangerous...

Hmmmm...now that you say that (scratches chin)
We are just going by this unhonnerable woman's word that the LFA kid is even her child. She could just be an actress for Autism Speaks bashing Donna Williams cause Donna has proven that you can be autistic and still live a functional, dignified life. There is no proof that this woman is not doing this. The question need be is what is Who benifits from this woman talking about Donna like this?
Answer: Organizations like Autism Speaks

Anyone who preys on desperate parents. That includes any institutions that turn a profit from their business. Anyone who profits from the existence of institutions. Also, therapists that aren't really good at their job.