Levels of AS

Post Reply New Topic

I know asperger's is spectrum disorder where do you think you fit in?

I Dont Know P.S. Its Autism Thats A Spectrum Disorder

I'm level three.

If AS has a "spectrum", it's because the DSM has been deliberately broadened. There's the further complication that they don't actually test for autism (hence the polarised outlooks evident on the various AS sites) so if they actually phase it out as an official category in the next edition (as is rumoured) then all the better.

Then perhaps "Aspie" will once more be applied as it was originally; "intelligent, and otherwise seemingly normal people, who lack the usual instinct for picking up non-verbal communications and similar social cues..."

The Spectrum model was devised by Lorna Wing shortly after she coined the term 'Asperger's Syndrom'. It was only meant to explain that Autistics vary in their ability and character, not taken as a literal explaination for there being 'degrees' of Autism.

Lorna Wing has since expressed some regret for seperating Autistics by dividing catagories. It served no purpose and confused many people.

I like that definition.
I really don't see myself as falling anywhere on an "autism spectrum." I do consider myself "high functioning" compared to other persons I know (mostly children) who have been given official diagnoses of AS. Their dx confuses me, because the children I know have far more co-morbid issues than I ever did. It seems to me that there is still a lot of confusion, perhaps with the Asperger label being assigned to "higher functioning" autistics for lack of something better? Yet many "higher functioning" Aspies (like myself - according to the definition above) go undiagnosed because they've learned how to adapt. Surely no one who doesn't live with me would dx me as AS. Over the decades, I've managed to perfect my public persona to such an extent that, when necessary, I can appear quite NT. Once I retreat to the safety of my home, my public persona evaporates and my AS nature can breathe again.

"seemingly normal"

I'm far from being "seemingly normal", so I'd be in need of a new diagnosis if they defined it like that.

Where I live the official position (of the people who decide whether you can work or not, and give you money if you can't - how do you call those?) on Asperger's and work seems to be that AS poses no problems with finding or having a job; which means if you are too disabled to work but happen to have "just" the AS label you have a big problem. So probably they already use a definition like that, for their convenience.

Why the Asperger/autism division? Kanner and Asperger described pretty much the same thing, if you ask me. The way they're classified now, with speech development as the dividing line, some Asperger people end up more disabled by their condition than some Kanner people, so it would make more sense to throw them together and call it what K. and A. both called it, autism. If you then need a name for the "seemingly normal" people, call it shadow autism or something.

I've never had any problems with connecting the word "autism" with myself. It was the people who diagnosed me who had a problem with it.

I'm not quite sure on the exact position,

but I know i'm lower level. (don't have it very badly) I've worked very hard to get this far, and some of it went away naturally as I got older.

but I also know alot of people are higher up on the spectrum and aren't as fortunate.

I've heard it's more common for males to be higher up (have it more servere)

Regrettably, getting and keeping a job can be excruciatingly difficult for us "seemingly normals" and I've been unemployed for most of the last ten years. The problem is that, as our only "problem" is this body language thing, we are generally regarded as weirdos, by people who assume we are being deliberately difficult! As such we can neither get work, nor get any kind of allowance for not being able to, because no one considers us disabled (and we're not: the disability is in those managers who can't/won't tollerate those who don't behave as they expect!).

This is why I plug this situation as "Aspie" as the ineptness with social clues was central to Asperger's observations (the morbidities were only incidentally noted because his subjects happened to be patients at the institution where he worked; recent translations try to downplay this) because people who are "disabled" due to obvious morbidities will get recognised as such. Our problem is largely "invisible" at a conscious level (people tend to react instinctivelly to our difference without giving it any real thought) and so needs recognition and publicity, if we are ever to get out of this hole. Regrettebly, segments within both the establishment, and some of those who are currently diagnosed with AS, would prefer we didn't acheive this.

As for "autism", it was in use well before either Kanner or Asperger borrowed an aspect of the phrase, and referred to a sub-category of temperament, nothing more, nothing less; it had no direct correlation with any morbidities.

I think I'm mid-level. I know when I was a kid (up to 7 yrs. old) ; doctors were trying to dx me LFA. So I'd think I had it majorly when I was younger.

Great posts in this thread!

I'd say high-functioning - if you lived with me (I live alone) you'd know it; other people, like at work, instinctively react to it but don't consciously know there's anything really different about me.

But it was worse when I was a kid - more like full-blown autism partly because it was badly handled - and worse at the beginning of my adult life because I didn't understand it. When I figured out I have it I'd largely learnt to adapt.

I'm hanging on but still haven't made it compared to normal people.

To me the big difference between functioning levels and Kanner's vs. AS is how pervasive and interfering stims/meltdowns are - I mean, for example, when I get really stressed out my perceptions change I tend to rub my fingers together and I am very much aware that I am having problems - I will try to escape that situation if I can, but I can also deal with it for a while if necessary . . .
To me, the lower functioning a person is - or closer to Kanner's - the more obvious their meltdowns/stims are - and the less able they are to control them . . .

It is interesting to me that you hear a lot about children with autism but much less about adults - except the most extreme cases - could this be a learning curve? That people with autism learn to control their meltdowns and are gradually less obviously autistic, thus moving from the Kanner's type end of the spectrum to something more like AS? This is very much what Temple Grandin and some other authors seem to describe in their writings . . .

I actually tend to forget about Asperger's being purely a "temperament" problem for some people; I'm so used to thinking of sensory difficulties and meltdowns and stuff as inevitably part of the picture. What I meant about my situation is that I do have all these "comorbid" things, and it is for that reason that I can't have a job. So here, even with more obvious autistic symptoms you can get in trouble because of your diagnosis.

By the way I don't really understand it when people with the "temperament" version of Asperger's don't want to have people call it a disability. There's nothing wrong with having a disability. It usually means having some kind of limitation (e.g. not being able to interpret body language, and not being able to give people the "right" impression through one's own body language) and getting into much more trouble than is logically necessary because the majority who are in control refuse to adapt a little. You're really in a much stronger position politically if you can call it a disability.

i agree, echospectra.

me too - if people are going to treat you like s**t for being different, at least by calling it a disability they have to pretend to accomodate you...

dunc

When I first started working (long, long ago) it was common place and okay with society if your boss or a co-worker gave you a little pinch or slap on the behind and handed you their coffee cup so you could "run along and grab them a cup of coffee." As you left, they would say very degrading things about parts of your body. This was the way it was. You would have been called a trouble maker to complain about it.

It was common place also to not be allowed into some places much less considered for a job if your skin was the "wrong color"....this I remember seeing when I was a child of maybe seven or eight. You didn't rock the boat about this or you were also pegged "trouble."

I don't believe you can harrass someone anymore on the job if their sexual preference is not the "norm" either...but when I was young this was done all the time and without a second thought about it.

Just because it's the way a business does things does not mean it should stay that way. Things can change...I've seen it happen in my lifetime.

I feel that the only reason aspies and high functioning autistics seem disabled is because we just don't "fit in" with the neurotypical way that things are done. We have much to offer the business world but we haven't really been given the chance to "show our stuff." It's time that things change. Things can change with education and intolerance of harrassment in the workplace. I am working right now on a project that - hopefully - if things work out, will give us the Advocacy we need to keep our jobs while also educating managers so that they can see the many benefits of hiring someone that can truly "think outside the box." We have so much to offer....it's time they give us the chance. I'm hoping that other autistics will look into starting this sort of program for their own state. The UK already has started a national campaign named, "The Undiscovered Workforce Employment Campaign" and I truly hope it is a success. I feel a change is needed.