Do you think AS is really autism?

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Ultimately, does it matter whether or not AS/HFA/LFA are all variations of the same disorder? As the saying goes, "if you've met one aspie then you've met ONE aspie." The same can be said for people who have an autism diagnosis. We're all unique and will all have different needs and experiences. My autism is not the same as your autism, but that doesn't mean we're not both autistic. Conversely, you and I may have a lot of problems in common but that doesn't mean those problems have the same cause. At the end of the day, a label is only good for statistical and educational purposes. It's unfortunate that the governments use those labels to determine elegibility for services, because they invariably exclude people who really do need assistance in one area but don't qualify in other areas.

I often see threads on here where people say "I have this problem. Does it mean I'm autistic/aspie?" What it means is you have identified that you have a problem. That's the first step toward solving it! If you really are looking for a way to solve your problems then it probably doesn't matter whether you're autistic or not because the solutions you need to find are the ones that work for you. I often think the "am I autistic?" question has more to do with fear and togetherness than it does with autism. The question really means either "someone please tell me I'm not autistic because I don't want to have to deal with autism" or "someone please tell me I'm autistic because I'd feel better if I had a peer group and some easy answers".

Whenever I discuss my state of mind with NT people I find it easiest to just say "I'm somewhat autistic". That conveys two pieces of information: (1) I'm not NT, and (2) I'm not like the Hollywood stereotype. People who are already familiar with AS will understand exactly what I'm telling them, but I get to avoid the "what's ass-burgers?" discussion when I'm with someone who's unfamiliar with the term.

Jetson, it matters to me but that's mainly because I'm interested in the brain, it's neuroanatomy and chemistry, and want to know what makes everyone tick.

But it could also potentially eradicate difficult diagnoses and just make everything Autistic Spectrum Disorder and then they could simply work on drawing up individual profiles. Right now there's too much focus on the labels and not the individual person's strengths/weaknesses profile, which is unfortunate because this is what could really help kids in their development.

But having Regressive Autistic Spectrum Disorder (with or without Language Delay and/or MR), Autistic Spectrum Disorder with Language Delay/MR, ASD with Language Delay, and ASD without Language Delay, might be far more beneficial and would stop all these debates. These would be how I'd break down the ASDs which seem definitely genetically and/or neuroanatomically related. And of course one would have to redefine "MR" to simply be a measurement on an IQ test with a big red post-it note attached saying that it isn't necessarily an accurate reflection of intelligence but that language and communication or even desire to perform said tests might be getting in the way.

Recent postmortem brain studies suggest we're all on a continuum, with Aspies showing less severe expression of minicolumn abnormalities in the cortex than someone with Autistic Disorder, and those with a Regressive form of Autistic Disorder showing more severe symptomology than those without. But still enough to suggest the disorders are very much related but only differ in severity and sometimes in course.

Learning more about these and defining them more clearly by neuroanatomy and more precise sympotomology (i.e., behaviors which are less easily misinterpreted by observation) might help eradicate the stupidity which is inevitably inherent in much of the psychological community. Make the instructions more detailed and exact so that it's harder for inexperienced (or ego-laden) psych professionals to screw up when it comes to diagnosis and treatment planning.

I am not really sure. in my case alot of the things i do when i am not acting are considerd to be autistic, however when i am acting i can get quite close to being normal. however, somtime i sort of chose to be less normal. i will stop correcting myself in area i am aware i am doing and i dont mind it. when i am on my own it os fine for me to stim and flap, but somtime it is not okay.although somtime i find that i cannot stop myself from ding a still (for example when obbsessing over the internals of a macbook.)

so, to me this raises the question of it As autism or is AS a=somthing different that looks the same. and on that note i am not sure, because although i do alot of autis things i would not be (most of the time) what someone would consider autistic. although sometime it can be quite obvios.

Do any of you ever find it hard to moniter engery levels?

jammie

One of the practical reasons for lumping AS with the rest of ASD is for services. As it is now in the States, Asperger's isn't covered necessarily as a developmental disability. Schools may treat it like a learning disability and choose whether or not to provide adaptative aide to the student.

The problem is that if the student is introverted, the schools don't consider that a handicap to learning. They focus on extroverted, "aggressive" behavior. The same is wrong with "high functioning" autistics. They focus on negative behavior and the quiet ones fall behind. This happens to my son who for the most part is extroverted and is "disruptive". The school focuses on that behavior and barely on the adaptive aspect of why he is disruptive. If he is passive and quiet, they exclaim what a great day he has had. Though that is indicative of something massively wrong. (frightened quiet, one time he had pneumonia)
I have heard IEP horror stories mostly from parents of AS kids or the introverted "HFA".

Autopsies and brain imaging show that Asperger's syndrome and high-functioning autism have the same brain anomalies as low-functioning autism but to a lesser degree. Hower, autistic people tend to have lesser verbal ability than aspies and are often very visual thinkers. I am, on the other hand, a very verbal thinker and have deficits in visuospatial reasoning.