I though about getting a diagnosis of Prosopagnosia.

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As I understand it, the area of the brain that processes faces is a distinct area and any trauma, such as bleeding or a blood clot, or external trauma such as a car accident or being punched, can damage that specific area, causing acquired prosopagnosia. The same is true of the areas of the brain that process language, whether received or expressed. For that matter, you can even have localized trauma that allows you to "see" objects in the right side of the visual field while not recognizing objects to the left, or vice versa. Other kinds of brain injury can make you unable to move your muscles, or unable to plan and execute activities.

So it is clear from this discussion that prosopagnosia is a symptom, but not a whole syndrome. You can have it from differing causes. In non-NT people (autistics etc) it may be present from birth, but possibly yielding somewhat to targeted therapies.

Prosopagnosia is not a “developmental disorder” on its own.

Psychological, psychiatric, neurological and neuropsychological disorders can be caused after birth as well. And it includes brain injuries that can be caused by any age. In that sense NT becomes ND.


Developmental disorders are psychological, psychiatric, neurological and neruopsyhcological disorders that is caused by genetics or environmental factors, where the symptoms appear from early childhood, but could be masked and it depends on the person.

Neurotypical:

not displaying or characterized by autistic or other neurologically atypical patterns of thought or behavior.
"neurotypical individuals often assume that their experience of the world is either the only one or the only correct one"


But I think the term for NT should be this:

Not displaying or characterized by developmental disorders, psychological, psychiatric, neruopsychological and neurological atypical thoughts or behavior.

I however don't like to use the word NT, because people can have mental health and developmental disorders that are diagnosed later in life or was never diagnosed. The only difference is that if people have a diagnosis of mental health and developmental disorders or not.

Evan according to CDC, more than 50 percent of people will people diagnosed with mental disorder, including developmental disorders as well.

Even the whole world have similar statistics of people being diagnosed with mental health and developmental disorders.

https://cdc.gov/mentalhealth/learn/index.htm

Last edited by FranzOren on 10 Mar 2021, 1:09 pm, edited 2 times in total.

I agree, it can be caused by other factors as well.

I did not know either. When I mentioned it to one of my doctors as I found out that a very high percentage of pwople with prosopragnosia are on the autiam spectrum so it almost goes hand in hand (I think it was 85%), I said this first and the doctor said "So what?" as if prosopragnosia was not a problem! I actually lost an unknown amou t of marks in college with it as I kept giving the wrong work to the wrong lecturers and kept having 0 marks which I found puzzling (I did not know I had it until college years though I knew my Mum had the condition). I found out I had it when one day one lecturer nipped in to speak to the one that was teaching me and I suddenly realized they were two different people! (Is one of the reasons why I first gave up all hope of passing the course I was on because I was failing no matter how hard I tried in my work because I could not tell these two people apart).
Since I realized I had it, I started to work out one reason why I kept loosing people as friends but also why I would loose people if I dis not have regular daily contact with them (And even then I had moments when I just did not recognize them... Example, I was working a train and came back to my home depot and nipped out to the town and back for a break, and on the way back someone started talking to me, and I assumed it was a passenger so I answered "Oddly" to this gentleman. It turned out he was the driver I was working with and he said "It's me... The driver. You were working with me 20 minutes ago!" Oops!
I have upset many people without knowing it as some people refuse to believe me that the condition exists.
It is wierd though in that it is a condition where it is only when someone asks why you ignored them (I used to smile and say "Hello" to everyone INCASE I upset someone I know and I did not know that it was them!)
One of the most terrifying things about prosopragnosia when as a child is one is always homesick and hates any situation where one looses sight of ones parents. If I was in a shop or walking through town as a child with my Mum I was in sheer panic if just ONE person walked inbetween me and my Mum because I could very easily loose her and I would not be able to get back home (Town was around 6 miles away). Even as a teenager and an adult every time I left home for college or work or a course, my constant thought was of getting back home. I would not have a problem relocating if my Mum or a significent other was there. I would need the familiar person to be there foe me to feel safe. It is because prosopragnosia... Or the not being able to recognize someone makes one feel entirely cut off and it is as if one is picked up and randomly teleported to an entire different country where the area looks the same but everyone looks a stranger and the only familiar patterns are the landscape and buildings and vehicles etc.
Strangely, I have the opposite with vehicles. Somehow (Though it may not work if put to the test as things like this are wierd things how I can do it and other times I can't) I can have several identical bicycles the same make, model and colour and size, and I can identify a single one and know it as unique, and the same goes for cars, railway locomotives etc, but I don't know what it is I am looking at to be able to do this as when I closely try to find out the differences, often there aren't any. Strange isn't it!
But going back to prosopragnosia. It can be quite terrifying when young, and the strange things about it is it can switch on and off with certain types of people or in certain situations, though when it switches on so I do not recognise someone, I don't realize it is happening, though sometimes I get a feeling I know them but I can't think where I know them from.
But I have learned (And this is awkward foe me as I hate eye contact), if I stare at a persons face enough times I can learn what they look like and it sticks, and these few people that for some reason I have learned their faces and no matter how they try to hide themselves I know them. It is wierd.

I don't see people as blank faces, BUT, I do see what looks like to me many strangers and I often pick up on who they are by their accent or their mannerisms etc.

With me, I have had it since birth, and my Mum has too as we were comparing the tell tale signs of prosopragnosia from a very early age. Children from a young age upwards will be very much overly clingy and will do anything they can to avoid situations like spending a night in hospital or going on a school holiday with an overnight stay etc. They will want to avoid any situation that will take them away from their parents.
I was terrified going to school and the first school which I went to from the ages of 4 to 11 was only about a quarter of a mile away from home.
A classic trait of prosopragnosia will be that the children will behave ordinary around parents where they may be loud on ocxasions while they have fun, but remove them from the enviroment with their parents and they become dead quiet and appear to be shy, and they will withdraw to try to stand or sit in a familiar corner of the school yard or classroom where they fear leaving that familiar corner or place. (I am talking about when the child is very young for standing alone in a corner of a school yard, but the not wanting to stay overnight anywhere without their parents being there can last right into young adulthood).

We're missing an important question here:
What do we call someone diagnosed with prosopagnosia?
A prosopee?
A sopagnist?

That's a good question.