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BigSnoopy126
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05 Dec 2011, 8:33 pm

I've been legally blind my whole life, have only 75% hearing in one ear, 25% int he other. My vision is 20/800 from Choroid coloboma brought on by Dandy-Walker Syndrome. I'm a mild Aspie, and have enough of the characteristics - though not all - that I fit in all but it being a certain clinical impairment.

But why I'm asking is, stimuli just don't come at me like other Aspies have them.

So, my question is, if you are getting older and have impairments, does it help? Or, if you are younger, do you think you would hve more if you didn't have sight or hearing impairments?

Because, I've learned through research that visually impaired peoples till pick up a lot of cues that I don't,a nd likely others on here don't. And, I just wondered if others have the same thoughts I find myself coing to lately - that it's looking mroe and more like I am an Aspie for sure, albeit still a very mild one.



fantomeq
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08 Dec 2011, 11:31 pm

I think my answer is not quite on topic with your question, but I wanted to get the conversation going, out of curiosity.

I think it's hard to guess how things could be different without disabilities. People are so different. My husband and I have Asperger's. He has no hearing in one ear. This has made his prosody problems more pronounced and has resulted in him having little interest in talking to people, so his social skills aren't very good. His poor hearing has made his social skills worse. He uses no eye contact, mostly because he turns his good ear toward the speaker, so he doesn't have much of a sense of facial expression. He does have a good career, but in many ways I am his caretaker, or a gateway to the outside world. However, he rarely gets sensory overload from sounds and noises do not wake him up at night. He is very sensitive to vibration though, moreso than I am.

I once had a boyfriend who was legally blind. I am fairly certain he also had Asperger's. It seems to me that with his noticable, easily detectable disability, his quirks were more forgivable. People understood that he didn't like crowds and had messy clothes and hair and were more accepting of his lack of conversational skills.



BuyerBeware
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09 Dec 2011, 5:05 pm

The major sensory processing problem I have is intermittent auditory hypersensitivity (well, major from my point of view anyway).

I don't know if other sensory disabilities would help or hurt...

...but I have often envied my stepmom's method of dealing with the kids making too much noise: removing her hearing aids!


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Atomsk
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17 Dec 2011, 5:32 am

My girlfriend is extremely blind, from genetic defect. No amount of vision correction helps, she has to use Braille, cane, etc. She can see some light, but can't see well enough to really tell the direction of the source. She has no ASD disorders, but still has strong light sensitivity, even with lights that I myself (having Aspergers and plenty of problems with oversensitivity to sound and light) do not find irritating.

My point here is, impaired senses do not always equate to less problems with sensitivity in those senses, even in people without Aspergers or Autism.



BigSnoopy126
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20 Dec 2011, 9:31 am

Wow; thanks, everyone, that's interesting.



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01 Mar 2012, 12:50 am

I have AS and a severe vision impairment. I can see people and things, but not their eyes, facial expressions etc. I can get overloaded with auditory information, and my social skills are exactly nil.

The upside to this? I'm excused from making eye contact. XD