Can people get rid of Autism?

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People really believe they can. There videos on YouTube, one is reversing Autism.

Autism as you know is on a spectrum; hence I am High Functioning or Aspie. I love being Aspie and I would not want to get rid of it. If I had a choice to remove some 'items' from ASD, they would be just two. Social anxiety and lack of communication skills.

Much love .............. Bob

If everyone in the world actually DID get rid of autism, what then?

I'd say probably not. There may be people were were diagnosed with autism when younger but now show only sub-clinical traits. But I don't think there's a way for someone to deliberately get rid of their autism.

That's me you're talking about... I still think I was misdiagnosed. (no joke)

If one never had it in the first place there is no Autism to get rid of.

Everybody matures and learns things and that could be enough to make one subclinical. The true test is time, can one keep up with the coping mechanisms for decades on end?, will stressful situations bring the Autism "back". If the autism traits come back the autism was never gone in the first place.

And that is the whole problem with the I cured my autism or I figured out a way to be almost NT claims. Autism understanding is too new and the desperation for a fix to strong to have any significant long term information.

I got rid of anxiety overall. It's actually very 'tricky' and difficult to figure it out, not 'hard' like through willpower and exposure by 'getting used to it'.

But I still have executive functioning issues, short term memory and working memory issue, unfiltered senses that still interferes with many things if kept unregulated, multitasking issues overall, and some communication and language difficulty.
Still no social 'instinct' or drive, and still perceiving normal environment as 'chaotic' -- still autistic.
Only difference is that I don't 'panic' or stressed out on daily basis, and I don't have to be sheltered to accomplish that.


What I really don't have to begin with is clumsiness or lack of bodily control, low abstract reasoning, and most of all -- a less favorable culture that NTs follow. That's where I have no real answers to give to except to determine which is 'human', which is 'NT', and which is 'cultural'.

I am torn on it, personally. I was diagnosed at 15, and when I got the diagnosis, it really seemed like a good fit. Ten years later, things look very different and I'm either looking at a misdiagnosis, or I did in fact "outgrow" ASD.

When I hit college, I had a very distinctive change. All of a sudden, I didn't feel awkward. Socialisation made sense, and moreover, it felt natural. Things like flirting became something I was good at and had an instinct to do.

So I'm not sure if I was an awkward kid/with ADHD, or if I've outgrown ASD. I no longer fit the diagnostic critera, but I still have the diagnosis.

Well, this 46 year old has some days when he would willingly get rid of Aspergers, because it is in no sense fun. However, in a culture where some parents seek a diagnosis of Autism, to better explain their children's eccentricity, it is not surprising when some grow up and apparently lose their Autism, because they simply never had it in the first place. Not every shy kid is on the spectrum, though I'm sure many end up with the diagnosis. It would be nice to think you could outgrow it, but I really don't see how. This is a genetic inherited condition for most. It's a bit like saying you can learn to change your eye colour or how tall you are. These things are out of our control.

For me I had a few different stages in my life. As a little girl I had pretty bad sensory issues, tons of anxiety, and zero interest in other kids, but I was "gifted" so I was left alone. When puberty hit everything changed for me. My sensory issues mostly disappeared, my anxiety decreased quite a bit and I started to have interest in other people. I made friends, had boyfriends and girlfriends but I was still shy, and had my own odd social ways. I would have the odd bought of extreme anxiety around certain situations like group dinners, being in large crowds, dealing with my parents, but I would usually just have a few drinks and that would be enough to get me through. Now in my 40's things seem to be going back to how they were when I was little. My sensory issues came back, my anxiety came back and my interest in other people disappeared. I functioned ok for 25 years and then started struggling quite a bit. I have a couple of female hormone issues and was estrogen dominant for those 25 years. I'm sure missing that estrogen now. I was never diagnosed but if I had been diagnosed as a kid it would have seemed like my autism went away with puberty and is now returning in perimenopause.

I also think it's possible for some people to improve some of their symptoms. I've had gut issues since I was a kid and finally found a doctor who is treating me successfully. Now that my digestion is better my sensory issues and anxiety have decreased but I still have a lack of interest in people. With PCOS ( a female hormone/metabolic disorder ) some women present as having PCOS but are really just deficient in specific vitamins. When they take the vitamins their PCOS disappears. Did they ever really have it? I don't know. Maybe the same thing happens with autism. Maybe some other health issue makes someone appear autistic, or they are autistic and this other issue makes them more severe. Then when they sort this other issue out they're able to function much better.

Autism is a neurological disorder meaning that it has to do with the shape and chemistry of someone's brain and nervous system. It's not like a mental illness.

The only way to "get rid" of autism then would be to somehow cut open the persons brain and rearrange it.

Oh wait, they have a name for that... lobotomie. And last I checked that's generally considered bad.

-The cause of autism is unknown, whether a psychiatric illness, chemical, digestive, endocrinological, genetic , or neurological .....

-That's why the DSM defines autism as simply a set of behaviors that originate in childhood. The cause can be anything: psychiatric illness, chemical, digestive, endocrinological, genetic , or neurological ...

-I have seen users here who say changing their diet has cured their autism.

-Other have posted that correcting their thyroid hormone has improved their functioning.

-Others take psychiatric medicine to improve their functioning.

What is the difference between "getting rid or your autism", and "curing autism"?

If you found a way to "get rid of your autism" you could then make tons of money marketing the cure. And you would win the Nobel Prize in medicine as well.

Like some people, I believe autism has genetic causes. I know gene editing is highly controversial and part of eugenics, so getting rid of autism would cause controversy, too. I also believe that autism is hereditary, so autistic people will probably have autistic children.

I don't everyone's story, but in my own case I would say that the challenges I face because of my autism come and go, but the autism itself, the way my brain works, stays the same.

I think it is like wearing glasses. If I wear my glasses, I can see fine, but my myopia has not gone. If I take the glasses off, things are still blurry.
I think that the strategies we use can help us to get through life more successfully. Pre-planning converations, studying non-verbal signals, learning a set of rules to navigate social situations, having supportive people around me. But without those strategies in place, or if I'm tired and having a bad day, things get blurry and difficult again.

I think that we can get to a place where we do not feel anxious, worried or awkward, and that comes from accepting ourselves and other people accepting us too. I have a sense of ease with other Aspie friends which I do not have with NT people or people with whom I work.

I think that people with autism can learn to communicate and express themselves and to understand others better, and that this may result in reducing their diagnostic level. But I don't know if this means that they have been "cured" or that their autism is gone- just that they have learned how to live with it.

Not quite true. There is a way to get rid of almost any inherited characteristic, and it's called artificial selection. The only way to eliminate ASD's would be to have the entire population assessed for the condition, and then forbid those individuals from having offspring. Within a dozen generations, ASD would be gone -- until mutations bring it back that is.

All in all this approach is more trouble than it's worth. If you want to eliminate disorders by artificial selection, start with something much more dangerous, i.e. cystic fibrosis, scickle-cell, etc.