the physical signs of aspergers

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ok so ive wondered this for a long time . i seem to be able to spot a child or adult who i think maybe aspie , this is not based on conversations or any physical contact at all , it just an outsiders view from behind or in front i can spot those who i think may have aspergers. now obviously since i havent spoken to many of these people there is no way for me to verify it, its just a gut instinct . i have spoken to parents of these children tho and in all cases the child has either been diagnosed as being on the spectrum or is being watched, or has special needs.

why do i see little mention of the physical characteristics ? are there none and i am imagining or does everyone else already know what they are and so its not up for conversation.

what ive noticed is a distinct way of walking , how they hold there hands, move there arms etc , ive seen it in adults who i know and who havent had a diagnosis but certainly show some traits that i would consider to be aspie.

does anyone elsee see this ? there is so much said about the mental functioning and the way we see the world and communicate but to me the visual expression could be something thats easier to use as a red flag or a starting point for investigation.

so are there aspies who look completly normal , who can walk down the street and nobody not even me ( lol) would think they were anything other than completly normal.

do u have a physical way or thing that you notice about yourself that * normal people dont have or do * i do but of course thats just me i dont know if others have it too, it may not be an aspie related thing i may be weird for other reasons that im not aware of.

asperger syndrome is often referred to as an "invisiable" disability so i don't think one can tell who has the disorder and who hasn't. of course some aspies might have more noticeable physical traits such as tics and stimming but they are not restricted to aspies (people with Tourettes for instance have them).

wide, innocent eyes. in the smarter ones, a look of bookish seriousness. Stiff posture,

Personally, my head is disproportionately large for my body. I have been told I look intense.

A number of aspies look younger than they are. (I look older than I am, though.)

nope its not tics , its something more subtle , i cant explain it , overall way they carry themselves ? i only realised i looked different when i saw myself on video . it was a shock to be honest .

agree with natty. i partially close my eyes in photos to make my smile look genuine and I look sleepy.

Then I started to open my eyes because I look ugly in those photos. The photos now come out intense or blank, as if I am shocked.

My son who has been diagnosed as PDD/NOS/possible Asperger's has balance issues. He is almost 5, and it is improving, but sometimes he walks a bit unstable. Sometimes when he runs, he waves his arms around instead of running with them by his side. My son has low muscle tone, and sometimes he just seems tired and walks like he is a little drunk. I don't know if this is what you are describing or not, but this is my experience. I think it has something to do with a weakness in a certain area of the brain, but not sure.

I think that we have something about us that seems to "tell" other people that there's something not the same about us. I used to call it my invisible weird tattoo. In my job, I deal with alot of people on the spectrum, sometimes they don't even know. So, I see alot of spectrumness swimming around. I'm not sure what it is about them, I just seem to know. My boss calls it my Aspie-dar. I think we are naturally drawn to people like us, so maybe that's all there is to it.
There is something to our look, but I dunno what. We tend to have traits, but they are subtle. We also have tics that we're not always aware of. So, there's prolly something to it, but who knows what?

villete i do that with my eyes too , unintenially always made my photos look like i had my eyes closed . my smile looks horrible, id go so far as to say i actually just cannot smile for a photo , doesnt matter how i try it just doesnt look like a smile .

my photos to me look emotionless , i dont know if thats normal or not or how other people percieve my photos.

angelbear this is the kind of thing i was wondering about , i have a wobbly gate too, i seem to tip to one side and walking does make me very tired . i definatly look like im drunk and cannot walk in anything approaching a straight line i also cant stand on one leg or i fall to one side. out of interest does his head tilt to one side at all

the other thing ive noticed about my self is this weird thing i do with my hand or hands ( usually just one at a time) i will try and explain it you may have to do what i describe to see what i mean .

when my arm is down at my side i bend my wrist down so my fingers are either pressing into my palm or are at my wrist. i do it quite hard so it feels like its a subconscious thing i can feel the muscles pulling and my nails sticking in my hand. i catch myself doing it a lot now but definatly when im more stressed.

liverbird its that spectrumness ... it must be a physical thing , or how else can we see it and other people see it too.

invisible disability doesn't mean that it's impossible to tell. It just means the average person wouldn't notice because the characteristics are not well known. A paraplegic may be visible in a wheelchair but not in bed.

See:

http://www.ragged-edge-mag.com/0301/0301ft1.htm
http://www.disabilityhistory.org/dwa/qu ... omery.html

I am fairly good at spotting neuro-atypical people with supposedly "invisible" disabilities. It's there in posture, walk, sound of voice, lots of other things. I have an online friend who would autie spot and run up to people and cheerfully ask if they were autistic and go "cool!" if they were. She was usually right.

When I was a kid and could often hide my stimming in public, a neighbor says I "walked as if my arms and legs were too heavy for my body" and a bunch of other stuff. And other kids could spot it as they would come up and call me a ret*d or a spaz or a psycho.

I have been told that I am easy to recognize because:

1. I walk faster than most people that just walk casually.
2. I walk with my head down most of the time.
3. When I do look up, it is at a level higher than peoples' heads, like at the sky, trees, tops of buildings.
4. I bump into things a lot.

Nena

http://www.glaucoma-eye-info.com

Natty and others who may be interested---I have been reading a book by Dr. Robert Melillo called Disconnected Kids. His theory is that autism, adhd, dyslexia, and other neurological disorders are caused by a disconnect in the brain. He calls it Functional Disconnect Syndrome. He believes that the right and left side of the brain are not integrating properly thus all of the manifestations of these disorders. He has developed a program called Brain Balance and he has centers set up around the country. It is very expensive, so I bought his book and am thinking about trying some of these exercises with my son. I don't know if this will "fix" things, but was thinking it might improve his functioning in some areas.

My son does physical therapy at school and they are working on his balance by trying to walk on a balance beam and doing obstacle courses.

Thought I would put this out there in case someone was interested.

This is what Kim Peeks, one of Dustin Hoffman's research studies for Rainman suffered from. It's effects extremely severe and quite obvious physically, but it's not related to Autism.

Most of our functional problems appear to be stemming from ret*d development in the Prefrontal Cortex:

There are some physical signs that you'll see mentioned in posts on here, for instance "toe walking" and "awkward gait" (which may include walking without swinging the arms.) People on the spectrum also may slouch and keep their head down, due to low muscle tone and the desire to avoid eye contact. There are other little giveaways, too, but by no means do all people with AS exhibit physical signs.

Well, there are certain slight give-aways. Like large heads for example (mine is like Jimmy f*****g Neutron's ) And there's something about the eyes as well, they either look youthful or serious with a bit of a daydreamy look to them. And the overall posture of the person.
I can usually pick up vibes off other aspies without really speaking to them, I just get a feeling like I'm drawn to them.

Aspiedar!

I know it when I see it but have never figured out why. I can modulate posture and gait and eye contact well enough to pass as neurotypical if I make an effort, but other Aspies see me and can tell.