People with FAS(Fetal Alcohol Syndrome)

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Has anyone ever had any personal experience dealing with people with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome? Do you think they are similar to persons with Aspergers?

Don't know, I never looked into FAS, and I don't drink. The doctor did give me a book on pregnancy that adviced using wine to numb false-labor pains. 0_o I stopped reading it at that point -_-;; dumb book was written thirty years ago.

I believe FAS affects executive function which is also present in ADD/ADHD and autism. So, whatever similarities exist there would be shared among FAS and Asperger's. It seems that I have heard they have poor problem-solving issues and low rage/impulse control. I think they have lower IQs and physical markers (facial features) that show they are FAS.

No, but I have Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.

The largest difference is that people with FAS have significant structural, neurological, or functional impairment, i.e. more like mild to moderate autism.
ASD and FAS do have a lot common symptoms--basically anything that can go wrong with your brain during development.

FAS is the classic type-the most profound and least aspieish,other FASDs are closer to having milder ASD like traits though.
the bbc did a good documentary about FAS and FASD,it featured a boy with it going to get tested,getting diagnosed and how he acts,worth having a look for,can't remember what it was called though.

I live and work on an Indian reservation where, unfortunately, FAS is common. I've noted that some of the sensory issues are similar, as well as the organizational issues, but, in other areas, they don't share many Aspie characteristics. I realize I'm no professional expert, but my teenage son is an Aspie, so I do have some idea of what to look for.

From what I have read, people with FAS and the milder variant, FAE (Fetal Alcohol Effect) have traits that are quite the opposite of AS. They tend to be superfically hypersocial, but have even less ability to read social cues than people with Asperger's. Michael Dorris, in his book, The Broken Cord, said that some children with FAS/FAE tend to be highly social and gregarious, but don't really know what they're talking about. His own adopted son was far more severely affected than that and two of his other adopted children had learning disablities as a result of FAS.

There was a nanny in the waiting room of my son's therapy session that was saying that autism could be caused by the mother drinking during pregnancy, which really offended me because I didn't drink at all. Then some other woman in there whose son had down's syndrome said her sister in law drank the whole time she was pregnant and has three kids who are completely typical.

I guess she must have heard about similarities between the two or whatever, but that really made me mad.

There was a nanny in the waiting room of my son's therapy session that was saying that autism could be caused by the mother drinking during pregnancy, which really offended me because I didn't drink at all. Then some other woman in there whose son had down's syndrome said her sister in law drank the whole time she was pregnant and has three kids who are completely typical.

I guess she must have heard about similarities between the two or whatever, but that really made me mad.