Is aspergers really just the same as autism?

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It is interesting that you bring this up---because it never made sense to me either. I see things like you do.

I definitely agree with you on this.

Wouldn't have said it quite so bluntly, but this is my take on it too, more or less.

My diagnosis is "Asperger's Syndrome" (official wording), the British Government's Autism Act prefers "Autism Spectrum Disorder" to encompass all types and manifestations.

In all honesty, male Asperger's and female Asperger's people are different. But then, Asperger's is different between every person who has it, because we have different interests, different strengths, different weaknesses etc. I can't do restaurants but I work in public service on the front desk dealing with people every day. I can't find my way from a to b very easily, but there's a guy who comes into where I work who's fine with mapping things out. He just can't deal with people.

Autism is not what or who you are, it's just a section of your brain chemistry. If you let the outside world label you and tell you what you can and can't do, you won't ever do anything.

Whilst it's helpful to have a 'name' for it that we can use to try and explain to people OUTSIDE the spectrum, what that name is is not as important as being able to live a fulfilling life. What that means for each of us is different and shouldn't be compared from one to the other.

In short, "Autism" is a word in NT speak. To understand how we think, they need to know it. WE don't need it. We know how we think already, so why do we need to label?

AS is supposed to be the mild version of it because we have some characteristics like sensory issues, difficulty with change, difficulty with socialization and relating to people and having friends, taking things literal, but the only difference is there is no speech delay or cognitive delay or other impairments except in social skills. Aspies reach their mildstones on time or early while autistic kids are late.

That's the difference I see there.

Thank you for this insight by stating it this way. I have found that my son who like me has Asperger's, relates well to the classic autistic kids in our autism support group. But, he often complains about the NT kids in his classes. His best friend more than likely has Asperger's too.

I relate more to people with classic autism than I do with NT's. Most of the things they do make sense to me. Things the latter group does hardly ever make sense to me.

They certainly must be the same thing. If they aren't, I would like it explained how people with autism in their family have members without speech delays yet are autistic and family members who are autistic who do have speech delays. Obviously it probably has the same cause, likely genetics, and they are so similar except the development of language... it just seems like different presentations of the same thing.

First---I like your new avatar.

Second---you mention the cognitive delay and language delay as deciding factors, whereas I applied them to just one of the many criteria used to diagnose autism. I can see why you seperate them---since they are important milestones in the development of children.

I was just going by what the DSM-IV AS criteria says about it.

I have noticed this too.

It makes me wonder if there are multiple genes responsible for autism---where each autism gene causes different issues (language, sensory, interests, etc.)? And if enough of these genes are turned on, then it renders a diagnosis of autism.

That's interesting because when I was diagnosed as an adult (on DSM-IV and Gillberg) I was told I could possibly be labelled HFA rather than Asperger's. But I would need more extensive testing to determine that---and there really was no need to since I was an adult.

I got to thinking about the language delay. What is it really? I have heard that it might actually be a delay in speaking correctly (without the need for speech therapy). But then we have so many children who don't speak at all.

When listening to my speech on tape as a child, I definitely talked differently. I took the tape to a specialist in speech therapy and let her listen to it. She said, "That is the typical speech of a child with Asperger's."

I am so confused on this combining of the labels into one with the new DSM-V. I almost don't know what I think about it anymore. I think it is one autism label, but then again, I don't know. I see kids at my school and WOW!! !, they are so different than I ever was, but then again, I relate well to them as does my son with Asperger's.

I keep thinking of that quote I heard a long time ago, "You've met one person with autism, and you've met one person with autism."

What's funny is no one else in my (blood) family is autistic, I got my autism from my bio mom abusing drugs. Then again I have an uncle who is sycophantic. You know I have a friend who's Asperger's, and I hardly can relate to him. Its kind of cool I can understand both people who are under the autism spectrum and NT's. My friend with aspergers kind of drives me up a wall though, he will sit and play video games and I just have to watch and he will show me the same photos over and over again. While I understand what his going through I just have an urge to try and teach him how to snap out of his autistic world and experience more. Although I don't because I don't want to try and be a bad friend but he does drive me up a wall.

Kinda.

You can draw two clear boundaries, which most fall on, until you get to the middle where people started off as one but moved "up" to the other (in reality, they just didn't have impairments across most intellectual areas, rather just a couple).

Hence, "spectrum".

(Yesterday, I had another doctor say I clearly had AS [even though I didn't speak till around 5 1/2], as I was highly intelligent (albeit, I was very slow on the same cognitive test; my processing speed, verbal memory, and several others parts were very low, whereas others were very high, but he said that's a part of it), and I had great social impairments.

I've had more say I have AS than AD [even though I meet the AD criteria over the AS one retroactively], and the one who said AD in the end wouldn't have guessed it in his words. I have no friends in person, and I wouldn't be able to make them in person (socially isolated), plus I can only focus on that one interest.... AS with a verbal delay, that's still there to some extent. Breaks the DSM-IV-TR, as I don't have the super aloof behaviour, yet I had/have some cognitive delays. I grew up to AS.)

My AS son doesn't really have AS friends because unless they have exactly the same stims and obsessions that he does, their stims and obsessions drive him up a wall.

When I say Aspies and Auties understand each other better, that does not guarantee they will enjoy being in the same room

Parents with AS seem to find it both a gift and a curse when it comes to raising AS children. On the one hand, they understand their AS children's motives and needs better. But, on the other hand, those needs can clash big time with those of the AS parent.

What could complicate a bit more is that we have at least 3 different "Asperger's Syndromes":

1 - Gillberg Asperger Syndrome - who is virtually identical to "autistic who talks"

2 - DSM/ICD Asperger Syndrome - no speech delay, no mental retardation and don't meet the criteria for autism

3 - "DSM-adapted-by-clinical-practice" Asperger Syndrome - same as above, but with the hierarchy of diagnosis autism-asperger referted

[The difference between 2 and 3 - in 2, you can be autistic even without a speech delay and mental retardation; in 3, people with this profile are diagnosed as AS]

Obviously, the similarities between AS and Autism will be higher if we are talking about AS-1 than about AS-3, and higher to AS-3 than to AS-2.