Question what more intact social skills means

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I remember Wikipedia said that people with PDD-NOS, like me have more intact social skills, but I wonder what that means, because I have trouble interpreting the context of some social cues.

The Wiki writer has an odd way of phrasing things.

"Intact" means "not damaged". As in "The tornado flattened my house, but left my next door neighbors house intact".

And what does that "more" mean? More "intact social skills than..." whom? Some other group theyre being compared to?

Also the word "intact" is like "pregnant", or "virgin". Its all or nothing. Something can be intact or its isnt intact. There are no degrees of "intact". If your car is scratched then its not "intact".

What I THINK the writer meant was that: If you have PDD-NOS then you are less impaired in social skills then are other folks on the autism spectrum. You might not be the equal of NTs in social skills but more like them than ...whomever the other folks he is comparing them too (aspies or autistics or whomever).

That makes sense. I am sorry that I asked, because I have some symptoms of ASD, but I don't fit exact diagnostic criteria of DSM-5 and ICD-11 for ASD.


My symptoms of ASD:

* Trouble interpenetrating the context of social cues and mixed messages, but can understand most social cues
* Trouble with adapting to new environment
* Sensory issues
* Tend to only learn things that interests me, and some repetitive behaviors


I did have severe problems understanding both verbal and nonverbal social cues and had speech delay in my early childhood, and did not understand the consequences of my actions until I was older.

Which is inaccurate, because PDD NOS actually didn't mean anything at all. It just meant that you're autistic but don't fit into a more specific category.

For example, I've got a diagnosis of PDD NOS, and so did this one girl I met. But we have very little in common:

I'm high functioning, with a mix of social impairments and social strengths, and with strong verbal skills and a high IQ. My biggest areas of impairment are executive functioning and independent living skills. I stim and have intense interests, but can mask pretty well if I chose to. I tend to prefer a routine, but don't freak out if my routine changes.

So, I sound like that description, right? I'm high functioning, and I have some social strengths, but I also have autistic traits, and I'm impaired as a result.

This other girl had a multiple diagnosis of PDD NOS combined with moderate cerebral palsy and profound cognitive impairments. Her receptive language seemed to be limited to recognizing a few key words, which she'd respond to regardless of the context. (TBH, my dog seems to understand speech better than she did.) She had no speech herself, communicating solely through gestures, mainly the manipulating other people's bodies that's often cited as a particularly autistic way of communicating. She had very autistic body language and pretty much constant stimming. She was completely dependent for basic self-care skills. And taking her into the family change room instead of the women's to go swimming was enough of a change in routine that she had a full-blown meltdown, including banging her head, biting herself, and biting me when I tried to stop her from hurting herself.

For her, PDD NOS didn't mean "more intact" anything. It meant "she's so disabled by other things we can't actually tell if she's got poorer social skills than expected for her cognitive ability, but she definitely has autistic traits".

PDD NOS was a "not otherwise specified" category. It's where the ones who don't fit the stricter definitions got put, no matter why they don't.

And I know both me and that other girl didn't fit for social interaction reasons, but PDD NOS is also where the people who DSM-5 terms as having social communication disorder used to get put. In their case, they have just as much social impairment as someone who met criteria for autism, but don't stim, have intense interests or need to stick to a routine. And they'd get given the same diagnosis as me, who has sorta the opposite profile.

It's so painfully obvious that the only reason autism sticks around as a diagnosis, rather than being split into categories that actually make sense, is that there are a lot of people who have built their careers on its existence, and they get to decide whether or not it's an actual thing.

TBH it would be far better to lump everything under learning/social/developmental disorders, and then have a fine grained individual explanation of *what* exactly the difficulties are. This current system is useless.

It's just so confusing, Autism Spectrum Disorder and communication disorders are a form of Pervasive Developmental Disorder, too much focus if a person has restricted interests and repetitive behaviors or not.

It would be better if DSM-5 and ICD-11 called it 'Autism Spectrum and Other Pervasive Developmental Disorders', that way you can get help with social skills, even with lack of thereof restricted and and repetitive behaviors.

And the difference between ASD and communication disorders is not helpful, because females present symptoms of ASD differently than males, and there is such thing as autistic masking, and you can have restricted interests and repetitive behaviors during developmental stage, but not have it as you get older.