Does Asperger's syndrome really exist?

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Personally, I tend to refer to being on the spectrum as opposed to AS or HFA. As HFA is purported to have a language delay vs. AS, based on that criteria I would be considered AS - my initial language was somewhat confusing, but once I started reading heavily, most speech challenges were less severe (save for my pronunciation of "r" and "s" sounds). Given that it is a spectrum condition, that in any one individual there will varying strengths and weaknesses that result in pronounced difference in exhibition, it doesn't surprise me that there is a grey area between to such similar diagnoses. However, I really wonder why there is such furor over the definitions... it seems a somewhat self-serving topic to me.


M.

88BK wrote

In the interest of informing the younger generation, I will take a stab at answering this.

The proliferation of psychologists is a relatively new phenomenon. When and where I went to school there were no psychologists in the whole school district, let alone employed by the school board. So no student was diagnosed with any condition, including HFA, and there was no special ed.

Moreover, at that time, autism was not a separate diagnosis in the DSM, but LFA was considered childhood schizophrenia. If I recall correctly (I read about this at one time), autism didn't enter the DSM on its own until 1984, although the term was in use before then. This means that the window between when autism (not HFA per se) was recognized and when asperger's was recognized is relatively narrow, so it is safe to assume that there were relatively few diagnoses of HFA. Since there has been a proliferation of articles about Asperger's over the last several years, many older AS learned about AS before learning about HFA.

My personal experience is a bit different. As a teen, I worked for a while in a small institution for "emotionally disturbed" children. It was a safe environment since victims of violence or sexual abuse were not accepted, so Social Services sometimes placed other special cases with us for a time. One of these was an adorable six year old non-verbal autistic boy. I was eerily drawn to him, and always "knew" that my behavior at his age resembled his, except my flapping was more continuous and pronounced and I was verbal. Over the years, I sometimes wondered if my "eccentricity" could be attributed to a neurological condition, but knew that I wasn't bipolar, schizophrenic, etc., and always came up empty. The FIRST time I read the words "high functioning autism", a shill went up my spine, and I immediately started seeking information and also found out about AS, as well. I never felt comfortable about the AS label for me because I was never the "little professor" type.

Now, I have a question for the younger generation. I frequently read here on WP of young people who have been diagnosed between the ages 15-22 years, and this puzzles me. There have been psychologists in all school districts for the past 25 years, it seems to me. How is it that so many are not recognized as autistic in the earliest grades, but are in later years? My autism was far more apparent when I started school that it was when I finished.

At what age are aspies supposed to be showing signs by?

I was showing signs by age two. I am not sure about before. Doctors thought I was autistic.

Well, my mom basically kept me from getting a diagnosis, though she knew it would have been simple for me to get one. We switched schools every year; and I don't remember being taken consistently to the same pediatrician, either. I was simply labeled rebellious, badly-behaved, (by the schools) spoiled, and either slow or too smart for her own good. My mom was frightened of the label, because to her autism meant a child who was non-verbal and in diapers and would never be capable of independence or a "normal life".

Actually, I think that's part of why the Asperger's diagnosis exists--to accommodate people who fit the symptoms, but not the stereotype, of classic autism. A specialist can feel comfortable diagnosing Asperger's in a child when a diagnosis of Autism would seem, thanks to that stereotype, to be either false or unwanted catastrophizing. Asperger's has a stereotype of the intelligent socially-delayed child. People are afraid of the stigma of autism; so they hedge their bets, say Asperger's, and never stop to realize that their problems would be solved if it became commonly known that autism is a spectrum, with a wide range of phenotypes.

Don't FLAME me for this, but I think people with AS have better speech than those with HFA, HFA speech can vary form childish to monotone like those with AS, that's an easy way to figure out if you have HFA or AS, but I can't recognize myself in anyone i've met with HFA, they either act like standard or happy 6-year-olds, almost copying their interest and behaviour pattern, when it comes to those i've met with AS, they show more interest in the world around them and act like christians, thye hardly smile, but act like a stereotypical poet or christian, or in a special case, rude.

No, there's no flames for that; that is in the official criteria--Aspies have no speech delay. The problem is, Is this a fundamental difference; or are people just picking on one difference out of many to divide autistic people in an essentially arbitrary way? I think the latter. The differences between autistics with speech delays and autistics without are not great enough to justify an entirely different category. It's gotten to the point that it's based on nothing but stereotypes--lots of kids with speech delays are getting Asperger's diagnoses because they seem smart, so it becomes a self-perpetuating stereotype.

yes

I think it does, and is a form of HFA. HFA and As are very close together. and tend to mix.

I am, definitely an aspie. I had abnormal speech, but not delay. I learn to talk in my first few months, and scared the s**t out of people.