Heart defect may have caused my autism

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When I was 3 I had a major heart operation for fallots tetralogy and because of my illness my brain may have had restricted access to a normal oxygen supply, and I am currently seeing a psycologist about my self concerns to having Asperger's. After the interview I decided to google autism and fallots and lack of oxygen to the brain causing autism. So Ive decided to get it onto the forum so that it may be documented. Have any other people with autism had a medical condition when they were little.

I caught pneumonia immediately after being born and had to spend the first 3 months of my life in an oxygen tent.

As far as heart things go Im told when I was 4 or 5 I downed a bottle of my grandmothers heart medicine and had to be taken to the hospital but thats about all I know about that incident.

Well, I never really thought about that. Just be happy it happened EARLY, and isn't bad. As for ME, I DID have nephritis, my mother wanted me AWAKE(turns out that could have KILLED me), and the doctor was a QUACK. Who knows WHAT happened? ALSO, I was delivered early because my mother wanted the doctor that was going to go on vacation! BTW she kept giving me Aspirin. I guess I'm lucky I didn't get reyes!

Steve

Unfortunately I have yet to see how a lack of oxygen can change 'wiring' in the brain when autism is a neurological 'condition'. I've not really read a plausible explanation in any article that really points out how this is fully possible. The majority of the cause of autism spectrum disorders is genetic. Often autism will show its signs around 18 months to 3 yrs of age at times very subtle.

I think they are two different events, but I think the outcome can appear very similar. I describe my opinion in the thread about PDD-NOS. Lack of oxygen, strokes, heart stopping all can cause brain damage. Parts of your brain "die" and other parts of your brain may compensate.
There have been studies about people post-stroke that suggest there are savants among a variety of neurologically impaired people.
It makes sense, one part of your brain doesn't work and another takes over.
Some autistic traits originate that way.

I had some head trauma when I was 3 or 4, but I don't think that has anything to do with it for me. I was displaying signs of autism when I was just several months old.

What caused the heart defect and what was the effect of the defect before it was corrected? If it was a genetic condition for the heart defect then were there other physical things that it may have effected. There was recently an article about using a certain abnormality of the blood vessels in the placenta as a predictor of an ASD. It may be in part genetics but there seems to be plenty of discussion about what triggers that. Like OCD for instance has a genetic component (most agree) yet there seems to be a trigger so in a sense you can be born with it yet not have it until after a certain event.

MishLuvsHer2Boys,

I can see your problem. It is two fold. #1 you don't understand the lowest levels of brain repair. I don't either, and can't help you. #2 you apparantly aren't considering brain repair at a higher level.

It is almost like a computer with a memory map unit, or a disk drive with a bad block index.

1. Part of the brain is hurt, or is apparantly not reachable.
2. Because the brain is VERY plastic when you're young, the connections route AROUND the problem just like that MMU or BBI!
3. Things WILL get lost!
4. connections are longer, and may be to a differently specialized part of the brain.
5. Other connections, and overcompensation, etc... MAY make more of the memory usable.

That not only makes sense, and explains ALL the symptoms, but the remapping has been PROVEN through biopsies, autopsies, MRIs, surgerys, etc....

The only real requirements is that it happen BEFORE most growth has stopped, and that it is enough brain damage. A loss of oxygen could do that.

Steve

BTW I first showed obvious differences in my language BEFORE I was 2, so it DID happen very early with me. Who's to say it couldn't happen later though?

Steve

I know lack of oxygen doesn't directly cause Autism, because I had absolutely no signs of brain damage when I was scanned at 3 years old according to the doctors and I'm diagnosed as High functioning Autism. The genetics need to be there in order for it to happen in the first place, as the genes dictate how the brain should structure itself, my guess.

I should note I presented Autistic behavior as early as 4 months old.

Nexus,

I DID say "or is apparantly not reachable". I forgot to add that t COULD possibly get mapped back. BESIDES, the damage is OBVIOUSLY not THAT severe, because the average AS child is SMARTER than normal.

I had an accident a year ago, and had a CAT scan of my head. I am toying with the idea of seeing if I could see it, if it would even show it. Nobody has ever called any such damage to my attention either. Bear in mind that they always pointed out my bad symptoms as something I had to live with, non existant, or something that just IS!

"OH, He's shy"!
"OH, he needs to keep his head up!"
"Wear earplugs!"!
"The light's aren't blinking!"!
"He needs to find common interests"!
"He needs to get away from ....". My interests aren't THAT limited, but others always think they are.
"OH, he need to play sports!"!

I even act a LITTLE different. Even TODAY I will do things akin to monk with his touching things(Like in his opening shot. I will just like tap the wall every few feet or so.). I don't make it very obvious, and don't HAVE to do it, still it is odd that I seem to be the only one that does. I never even REALLY noticed that before.

Sometimes I get angry if a pattern is broken, or anticipate. Others wouldn't know, but I DO. I took it for granted everyone did. Maybe they don't.

I used to do things like count the holes in the soundproofing tile.

All of THAT stuff still happens. I have an encyclopedic memory, good analysis, and good event driven memory.

Of course, I had a mother that wanted to hug me, etc.... What is it with mothers thinking they should, or even CAN, teach you to love through hugging, etc...

Steve

Many, many children need touch to connect with others... I used to try hug kids at school because my parents never did, and got freaky reactions as a result..

I was told by my mum I was an almost perfectly behaved baby until about 3 when I started having tantrums and losing it..

I had pneumonia at about age 6-7 but I really don't think that has anything to do with it..

My dad has AS and so did his dad from most signs.

Remember the autism twin studies: With identical twins, both usually have some form of autism--but not always; and the severity differs.

Twin studies are great for finding the influeince of heredity and environment... So I think you are born with a predisposition towards AS/autism, but it may or may not "activate" depending on early environment. They probably will activate; but they may not.

Anyway, maybe the oxygen deprivation was the "trigger event" that activated those genes for you?

Scintillate,

I didn't mean touching PEOPLE! It is things. Like OCD people that almost look like they are counting things. Maybe it has to do with what causes the pattern. But with OCD people, the pattern usually MUST continue. If something breaks it, they restart, or go back.

Callista,

Sounds logical, but it really isin't! Mono Zygotic twins inherit identical weakness. They have very similar environments later in the term. They have absolutely IDENTICAL environments early in the term. They may be taken around in the same way by the same vehicle/person. They may be fed the same thing, and subject to the same environment later. The may even react in a similar way to brain damage. If the damage is due to impact, it is almost certain to be different. If it is due to some other influence it would logically be identical but you never know. I HAVE met monozygotic twiins that weren't very identical. Size, "orientation", voice, etc..... could be different. GRANTED, that could be explained by environment, even before they were born, but it still shows differences that can happen.

Steve

Like I said, with the twin studies, most pairs of twins did both have autism; and the rest had one autistic and the other Asperger's... Only a minority have one autistic and one NT twin.

So, like you say, there's a lot of similarity between their environments; but it could be a tiny little thing like one twin getting a cold and the other not getting one. Granted, I got this info from wikipedia, among other sources (quote, from the article on Autism: "Although the specific causes of autism are unknown, many researchers suspect that autism results from genetically mediated vulnerabilities to environmental triggers."). So it's an opinion, not a known fact--wikipedia is notorious for those sorts of things. And of course the article lists many other possible causes and triggers.

Regarding the similarities of environment between identical twins:
I am an identical twin; however, our prenatal environment was greatly different--so much so that my sister died at 5 months gestation, and I was born relatively healthy and mildly premature, with a crooked spine and a heart murmur. I strongly suspect twin-to-twin transfusion, caused by sharing a placenta that sent me too much blood and her not enough. Had she been born alive (rather than as a sorry near-unidentifiable remnant), perhaps she would have been fully autistic or completely NT. Of course, had she been born alive, I might not have been: With TTTS, if one child does not die early on, they may both have such severe problems as to not survive at all.

I'm not sure how common such disparities in environment are, and I'm well aware that one testimonial does not make a case... Still, if autism were 100% genetic, all pairs of identical twins ought to have it, shouldn't they?--and since it isn't 100% genetic, something has to determine whether the "Aspie" genes will find expression, and how strong they'll be, in a child whose twin is an NT?... I'm just assuming it must be something about the internal or external environment in early life.

I was born almost totally black because my mother's placenta broke away from the wall of the womb and i had to be induced. However, I am absolutely sure that my dad is an aspie and even my mum thinks he has a lot of the symptoms) my uncle Neil does eccentric things (like, one day, changing his clothes in the middle of a street in daylight for a wedding, much to the families mortification) and although their father, my paternal grandfather, died when I was 12, I do recall that he had an obsession with UFO's, egyptopgy and earth magic, plus, a lot of collections. (stamps, nespaper clippings In fact as I recall I was told he would "start a collection and then lose interest. There were loads of half-complete collections when we had to clear the house." Am I right in thinking that this is a common aspie trait? But back to topic: yes, I did have oxygen starvation, but I think there is a heavy genetic contribution on the paternal side of my family.

JulieArticuno