I want to be cured.

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Isn't Bipolar and Schizophrenia genetic? Almost no one is trying to end the cure for that.

I think it's sad that in the early days of the so-called "autism epidemic", there were legions of quacks who said that a "cure" was just around the corner, that within 10 years kids could be made to be not autistic, that parents had nothing to worry about, and the parents actually believed them. In an era when The X Files was TV's most popular show (in the USA), who couldn't say that the government wasn't withholding a cure, or injecting something awful into defenseless babies to give them autism. Paranoia was everywhere, Trust No One, The Truth Is Out There. So parents pinned all their hopes on not having to worry about autistic 3 year olds being autistic 23 year olds.

Fast forward 15 years. The little kid is now an adult, and still autistic. Parents are wondering what happened to that cure that was promised. Some stopped vaccinating their kids only to have epidemics of measles break out. So far, we haven't had a cure, yet the desperate still line up for a cure. Given how deeply autism is woven into our brains, we might as well be asking for somebody else's brain to be inserted into our craniums. That's part of the problem a lot of aspies have with the curebies, they want little Johnny without his autism, but autism is part of what makes Johnny Johnny. Without autism, Johnny wouldn't be Johnny but another kid.

Autism Speaks is acknowledging this by focusing on prenatal testing and abortion, which is a "cure for autism" in the same way that Nazi gas chambers were a "cure for Judaism". Some geneticists worry that humanity will destroy all the (fill in the blank-gays, Jews, auties) and then discover too late that nature had a damn good reason for their existence and that now that they're all gone, humanity is headed for extinction. Ultimately, seeing any deviation from a narrow norm as defects to be eliminated runs the risk of making nature so brittle that the slightest push could send the ecosystem off the cliff. Already agribusiness's tendency towards monocrops is putting humanity at risk of mass starvation should some unexpected blight come along, like how Ireland starved when the potato crops failed. The slightest hiccup in food prices causes global food riots as it is, what happens if the corn, rice, or wheat fails?

What happens if humans eliminate autistics and then find that nobody can fix all the wonderful technologies of modern civilization or invent new ones, so now humanity is headed towards eternal medievalism, like in SM Stirling's Dies The Fire novels? Or like Zimbabwe, where the farmers were killed because they were white and society immediately collapsed? The inner circle imports their food, everybody else starves. That option might not be available on a global scale.

Schizophrenia isn't a very good comparison in spite of the fact that they think it has genetic causes in common with autism... people with schizophrenia have an unfortunate tendency to think that god or the devil is talking to them, and often that they're being told to kill people. It's hard to argue with curing a disease that makes people want to kill and has no perceived benefit to the sufferer.

^ There are plenty of normal people who can create technology and make scientific discoveries all the time. Not everyone who does such things have autism in them. The autistics who made those discoveries probably could have done so if they weren't autistic.
You could say, "What would happen if we eliminated retardation? That must exist for a reason!" Do you think retardation has any evolutionary benefits? Is cancer beneficial because it has been around for centuries? Isn't high blood pressure genetic in some cases? Should we aim to keep that too? Schizophrenia is genetic and has brain chemistry too, let's give up on that as it might have some benefits that we haven't discovered yet.

'Normal' is a very relative term with respect to people.

^ I meant people without autism. I don't agree with "there is no such thing as normal" There is. That's why such distinctions are made in the first place. Have you never thought that something or someone was out of the ordinary or strange? Seriously?

They have already used stem cells to grow a windpipe for transplant in one woman. They will eventually be able to grow more sophisticated organs, and do much more with them. Till then, I am happy with using ones from another person. As for artiificial organs, they are not artificial, they are as real as you and me, the only different is they are grown in a lab. We do however have artificial hearts that operate mechanicly, they are not intended for long term use.

Was that in response to my saying that Schizophrenia isn't a good comparison?

^ No, that was the person before your post. We posted at around the same time. I mean, just because a lucky few have benefited from autism does not mean that most people will.Creativity has been linked to Bipolar, should we stop trying to find cures for it because of that?
BTW, Correlation does not equal causation just because autistic people have succeed in certain fields doesn't mean it had anything to do with autism.

Last edited by the_enigma on 03 Jan 2009, 7:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Again, a windpipe is relatively simple. They AREN'T as real as you or I! They are made of similar cells, and can, within reason, do the simple duties, but they are VERY different. LUCKILY, the body doesn't care if a windpipe is made of heart tissue, skin tissue, etc.... It only requires that the proteins match a certain base pattern. A HEART, however, must have some heart tissue, and be created close to a certain model. If it doesn't have the right chambers, for example, it won't pump the blood properly. If it is too large, it could tax the body, and not fit. If it is too small, it won't last. and that is just the BASIC stuff! A SLIGHT difference in ONE valve can cause MAJOR problems.

I almost died by a condition caused by a SLIGHT defect in a valve caused by slight endocarditis. NOW, because my valve is artificial, I must be on blood thinners to prevent stroke! AGAIN, BASIC STUFF! They haven't come CLOSE, last I heard. If they DID come close, wouldn't it be on house, and in the news? You YOURSELF spoke of mechanical hearts. They wouldn't exist if we had a natural replacement, even an INFERIOR ONE! HECK, they do not even have REAL natural valves! Not even a VALVE!! !! !! !! The "natural" valves are PIG valves(made artificially of porcine tissue), and can only last 5-6 years, and that is why they gave me a Mechanical one! It is a nuisance, etc... but it is expected to last 100 years. A REAL natural valve has lasted as long as 120 years! People have DIED of SEVERE old age before they gave out.

I have a lot of the positive traits of AS, but some of the negative ones as well. Anxiety is one of the traits I could do without. I believe I would be able to do a lot more and accomplish more of my goals if I didn't get nervous.

I have to agree with Gary---I can't imagine it being any better as a NT.

So no, I do not want to be cured---and I would not take the magic medicine if it existed. For me, to take away my AS would take away my talents and gifts. It would take away who I am, and have always been. I would feel like I died to become NT.

Now for those of you would take the cure, I can kind of see where are coming from provided that AS has done nothing for your life in terms of offering you such gifts. So I think you are wanting to be better able to socialize. For me, I don't like socializing anyway---due to the awkwardness.

I personally don't see AS as a defect. All people need to adjust---even NTs have areas to work on. My best advice is---learn to love who you are---AS or NT.

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as an older person with AS i must agree. Everyone - NT or ASD or whatever - has ups and downs in life. all human beings have strengths and weaknesses. For me, the key, in the last decade or so, has been the understanding and acceptance of the reality of my particular issues and a willingness to work with the strengths and weaknesses i have, regardless of the label. I know some so called "normal" people and i use that word facetiously here - who have many difficulties in life. it is such a dangerous assumption to think that being "cured" of an ASD will make life rosy and dandy. I like many of the things AS gives me. I have learned to be better at communication than when young, even though i prefer a quiet life with minimal direct contact with others.

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I don't see why you think being autistic is only preferable if it gives you some sort of talent. Even if you don't have some kind of savant skill or useful special interest, doesn't it make sense that to be non-autistic would mean not really being yourself? And isn't being yourself preferable to being somebody else?

It should be possible to fix whatever goes wrong in a schizophrenic's brain during an episode, leaving him the way he would be before or between episodes, without messing with his personality. Same with bipolar; that's also episodic, with some euthymic times in between the swings. We should be able to prevent flare-ups without actually altering brain configuration or genetics. For some schizophrenic and bipolar people, who respond well to medication without suffering severe side effects, we've already been mostly successful. So yes, continue the research. We could do with some antipsychotic medications that didn't cause sedation or carry a risk of movement disorders.

BTW. Schizophrenia that actually causes someone to kill is few-and-far-between; I doubt it has happened more than a handful of times. (Command hallucinations to kill don't result in murder, except possibly in the aforementioned handful of times; and they don't make somebody want to kill. The illusion that one is being ordered to kill is very disturbing, though, to say the least.) To assume that any given schizophrenic is going to kill somebody is a little like assuming a low-income person is going to kill somebody; the rates are a little higher, but not by much, and don't say anything about a specific person. The elevated rates of violence among schizophrenics actually vanish when you control for their socioeconomic status, which tends to be low thanks to an increased rate of unemployment.

^ What if being yourself is the problem? Some people really do need personality changes and would be better off different.
For most autistics, being autistic has no more evolutionary use than being ret*d does. I'm sure there are ret*d people who accomplished beyond expectations too, like Chris Burke the actor with Downs Syndrome.

If I hear one more person use the term "evolutionary advantage," I'm going to scream.

Who knows what conveys evolutionary advantage. It could be anything. We all wander around with things in ourselves that don't exactly help us with "survival," but we survive. As Gary said, everyone has problems. There is no special state of being where everything is wonderful, and if only one had the right "mad skils" or the right personality, life would be sweet.

My family is overwhelmingly NT, as most people's are. And some of them are the most screwed up and tragic people in the world. Literally. I would not want to be anything like them in the world.

Yeah, I wish I could read people better, but I've learned to deal with it. I wonder if early dx is so great if so many young people with ASDs feeling worthless and depressed and dreaming of a life less afflicted. As painful as my early life was, not knowing what my problem was, I learned how to deal with people and how to accept myself for who I am. I think part of Enigma's situation is her youth. Life sucks for most people in adolescence, and Aspies and Auties are emotionally adolescent into their twenties. Shoot, for some of us, into our thirties.

And I agree with Callista and others: it is so important to live now, with what we have now. Hoping for something that is going to be so far off is postponing what's happening now. There isn't a person who has things they love, they enjoy, they want to participate in in life, things they are capable of now.

And if a person claims they don't have any of those things to live for, then I would say that person is depressed, and needs help for something other than autism.

I'm not against treatment and therapies, and in some cases, medications. Cure, that I'm wary of. I worry about unintended consequences. What will be the side effects. A virus has a set course of illness. Infections can be killed off with antibiotics.

Autism is not either of those things. It is not poisoning, it is not trauma in the overwhelming amount of cases, it is not something missing. I suspect it is a family of disorders with different treatments, all to do with slow maturation of certain brain tissue, less of others, and defect of others. To cure autisms is going to be a very complicated issue.

So, a person can hope for treatment and possibly a cure, but I think like many here, we're alive now, so live now. Get therapy if needed. But live now.