Has my sister a neuropsychological disorder?

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My sister is above 24 years old now. I would say that she has a kind of what was considered "schizoid (eccentric) psychopathy" by Sukhareva nearly 100 years ago. "Schizoid (eccentric) psychopathy" appears to be and old, obsolete term for what would be considered "relatively mild" ASD, "Asperger syndrome" or mislabeled as NVLD now. It is not a learning disorder or a personality disorder, but different way of feeling and functioning which is "constitutional" condition. I would say that my sister is de facto autistic, even if I can suppose than her chances for meeting official criteria for a PDD/ASD are about 50 - 70 percent. I read that some girls with AS do not show strong autistic symptoms until puberty.

"Schizoid (eccentric) psychopathy" described by Sukhareva is a constitutional condition. I think that it should differ from schizoid personality disorder described by ICD and DSM. Schizoid personality disorder is not constitutional, a person with it appears to be "unemotional loner" with lesser functioning problems than someone with "mild" ASD. People with "milder" forms of autism rather feel a lot and often desire social interactions, but on own rules, I suppose, are not generally "unemotional", may have tantrums and meltdowns, may be verbose.

I would say that she'd have to be assessed by qualified mental health professionals , such as a psychologist , or at the very least a licensed social worker , to be able to say for sure . From the sounds of it though , she seems to be no different than the stereotypical subgroups of high school aged girls . Are they autistic , and or PDD , and if so , what does it matter ? So long as she's not causing problems to others or herself , her individual idiosyncrasies should be of no concern .

I read and heard about autism, also about female autism, a lot and my sister appears to fit neatly to certain kind of autistic presentation for me. I may look at different aspects and things but I see somewhat numerous patterns suggesting that she is genuinely autistic even if she would not meet official PDD/ASD criteria.

Now she is 24 years old and she does not look good in her functioning. Personally I would say that she has a PDD, but I know her pretty weak despite she lived just behind the wall of my room. There are to many similarities to other autistic persons IMHO. Some of them are "coincidental", intriguing. I have "schizotypal autism" (not "mere, common" autism with high IQ and good speech) and my brother is neurotypical and my sister appears to be 50% me 50% my brother so it would give something like "quite slight" autism, not "creepy", schizoanankastic PDD like me and not lack of atypicality like our brother. It correlates with birth parameters and "hypotrophism" level - I had marked asymmetric hypotrophy, my sister was somewhat on the border of mild hypotrophy (I read that I wrote that her birth weight was 2650 g but the largest weight loss was quite large, about 7,5%, to 2450 g (if I wrote it correctly earlier)) and my brother had clearly correct birth parameters, without trace of hypotrophy (3600 g, born on time).

She's 24. Does she have a job? Education? Romantic relationships?

I do not know if she have a job with contract or merely something like intership, probation, practice since May 2025. She was registered as unemployed since late February 2024 and in May 2025 (when she was 24 years old) she started to go somewhere to job or intership/practice/probation using public transport such as buses and trains without assistant (which does not rule the possibility of having moderate level of disability - I did the same when I was about 18 - 23 (I studied that time)). Maybe she might lose free health insurance when she would have not accepted job/intership/practice/probation offer from the institution which is associated with her unempoyment status giving her free health insurance.

She has no higher education unlike me and my brother, she had paid higher education via the Internet in weekends possibly since October 2020 to June 2021 (two semesters) but she did not finished it despite the fact that the studies costed some hundreds of PLN (Polish currency) monthly. She have general secondary school/high school (Polish: liceum ogólnokształcące) and final high school exam certificate (where she had 96% in basic English and 80% or above in advanced English which are good results, she had only written exams in 2020 because of SARS-CoV-2 pandemic).

I do not know for sure if she had ever had a romantic partner. I suppose that she may be asexual, aromantic and aplatonic despite talking via Internet a lot (often in English). She was active on DeviantArt maybe even when she was just about 10 years old. It may helped her having good results in English on final school leaving exam.

Well she's not thriving and could probably benefit from some kind of help. If it appears she might be on the ace spectrum and isn't fussed about lack of romance at age 24, then I would say the likelihood she's on the spectrum is high because I think it unusual for NT women to be ace but it's extremely common for ASD women. So if you want an opinion that's mine.

Of course that doesn't mean she should seek a diagnosis but I would be curious how she feels about her life, so maybe she's just typical of women her age nowadays, consider this recently created thread:

https://wrongplanet.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=428181

I think that old, obsolete Grunya Sukhareva's terms schizoid (eccentric) psychopathy and autistic (pathologically avoidant) psychopathy better describe me and my sister than the term autism spectrum disorder. In the times of Sukhareva and Asperger, the term "psychopathy" meant something like "personality disorder" in general, not (precisely or merely) "antisocial personality disorder" and "constitutional psychopathy" could be considered to be something like "a personality disorder, but with childhood onset".

Many people diagnosed with Asperger syndrome using DSM-IV-TR or ICD-10 (or even some people diagnosed with ASD using DSM-V or ICD-11) im my opinion in fact have something closer to (or something which could be conceptualized as) "childhood-onset personality disorders" like schizotypal, schizoid, obsessive-compulsive, avoidant or even cluster B personality disorders instead of having brain similar to brains of people with the classic autism described by Leo Kanner. Some Asperger-diagnosed people may be considered as having nonverbal learning disorder with social awkwardness and they almost certainly are not neurobiologically on the one spectrum with people who have sets of symptoms like ones present in Donald Triplett's (Kanner's case one person) or Temple Grandin's cases.

I think that she may have just a sensory processing disorder and (or) schizoid personality disorder (both have abbreviation SPD ). She may not have systemizer-empathizer split and she may be just hypersensitive without hyposensitivity. She appears to have better facial expressions than me and she was not mobbed or bullied in schools, at least from what I know. She might not have special interests, routines and rituals and stimming in childhood, but I am not certain. Her empathy and systemizing skills may be both average. She had no speech delay and, if I remember it well, she did not start to read early, but in average time, like typical children (I read well before my sixth birtday, although I started to write later, when I was about six years old).

Many years ago she told to me that she considers herself or feels like an "observer" and she may not consider herself a "normie" in late teens, when she was about 13 years old, she told me that pne of her schoolmates told that my sister is "a bit weird" (Polish: trochę dziwna). She had DeviantArt account when she was 10 years old and as a child she posted some visual material on this site. She once told that she do not understand why someone "cuts oneself" (why someone practices self-harm), why someone is gay or homosexual or maybe also why teenagers are so interested in sex.

Taking into account family and birth factors and case reports of other women with autism (such as those with "typical" Asperger's syndrome with a high IQ and ADHD or its features, or with schizoid or schizotypal features (not necessarily diagnosed with autism, but with symptoms clearly suggestive of pervasive developmental disorders)), I would conclude that my sister has autism with schizotypal and schizoid features, perhaps even with co-occurring schizotypal disorders. She may have cognitive disengagement syndrome (CDS), some visuospatial-motor disorder, and possibly ADHD (if so, it would be more likely to be predominantly inattentive than mixed). I would assess her as having a female form of Fritz V-type autism, with a milder course than mine due to better fetal growth (half a kilogram higher birth weight for the same gestational age, same Apgar score, and same body length).

From ChatGPT (with slight modifications) after providing information about my sister and me:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schizoid_ ... y_disorder - my sister appears to fit better to description of schizoid personality disorder than to description of autism spectrum disorder while I may fit better to the description of schizotypal disorder (maybe with co-occurring schizoid personality disorder) than to description of autism spectrum disorder despite being diagnosed with Asperger syndrome when I was 16 - 17 years old.

Here film in Polish about a woman with typical ASD instead of schizoid PD or schizotypal disorder or other SSD: CICHA - autobiografia. It is obvious that this woman has ASD instead of SSD (tiptoe walking in childhood, severe prosopagnosia, literalness in childhood, rigid routines or rituals in childhood, severe sensory issues with crying and (or) stimming alone due to overload), her siblings also have ASD. In our case, I have diagnoses of Asperger syndrome, schizotypal disorder and OCD, my sister appears to have generally milder condition similar to mine and our brother is "normal". I had the poorest fetal growth (marked fetal growth restriction with low birth weight despite being born on time) while my brother had completely proper fetal growth. Schizoid appears to fit to my sister better than ASD, I conclude. Once my sister said that she feels like "an observer" and she may have diminished social drive to be like other and to "fit in" (just like me). My sister might have never had special interest, rituals and routines, more visible stimming despite appearing to have hyperacusis (sound hypersensitivity) for many ages to which she often "complains".

It's funny how everyone on the internet suddenly turns into a licensed psychiatrist when someone mentions odd or unusual behavior in both real and fictional people.

But I'm not a licensed psychiatrist. So I'm not the one who should be diagnosing your sister.
I was diagnosed with Asperger's in 2001, but I don't have nearly as many traits similar to your sister, even as a kid. For example I loved baths as a kid because I loved water. I would often sit in the tub playing until I had to get out because the water got cold. Ponies are okay and all, but I have always loved cats, and developed a thing for guinea pigs after getting two as pets as a teenager.

I suppose that my sister has not as severe as mine version of my complex disorder - I was diagnosed with Asperger syndrome, but not only with that, I have also schizotypal disorder and obsessive-compulsive disorder and I had marked asymmetric fetal growth restriction with low birth weight (2150 g). I have PDD plus OCD with schizotypal. My sister looks rather schizoid than schizotypal and appears to not have OCD. I am a male and a firstborn child. My sister had better fetal growth than me, because her birth weight was 500 grams larger and we were both at similar gestational age (about 38 weeks) and with similar body length (53 cm in Polish method of measurement, according to WHO standards it would be some centimeters smaller, maybe about 48 cm) and we both had 10 points in Apgar scale. Me and my sister had head circumference 32 cm, but her chest circumference was 32 cm and mine was 28 cm - I had marked asymmetric FGR and my sister appears to just be about borderline FGR rather than moderate or even mild FGR. Our brother weighed 3600 g, measured 57 cm (in Polish method of measurement) and also was born on time with 10 points in Apgar scale.

Better fetal growth appears to be associated with less striking developmental and psychological anomalies in my sister's case comparison to me and with neurotypicality and good functioning in our brother.

I read about a case of a girl and woman some years younger than me but older than my sister who also had marked FGR and had similar birth weight to mine who was diagnosed as having childhood schizophrenia at the age of six and who was not diagnosed with a pervasive developmental disorder at least to about 24th birthday who in my opinion had "schizotypal posthypotrophic autism" in childhood and adolescence which turned into schizophrenia, mania, depression and BPD in early adulthood in her case (one of her parents had antisocial personality disorder, a cluster B personality disorder) and in early adulthood she was severely medicated due to serious mental health problems. I do not know if she was finally diagnosed with PDD or autism spectrum disorder and I do not know what diagnosis or diagnoses she now has.

I experienced something striking some days ago. I met two women younger than my sister who are diagnosed with a pervasive developmental disorder. One, younger, was diagnosed with Asperger syndrome and had very good results in education and looked similar to one od my classmates from the studios. Second, older, was diagnosed with childhood autism and looked quite like a double of... my sister! Her interests and behavior were somewhat similar to my sister's. It is shocking. I could suppose that it is a sign from someone who is much more intelligent than humans which says that my sister has autism spectrum disorder too. This woman was diagnosed with childhood autism when she was 2 - 3 years old, started to talk when she was 5 - 7 years old, but she had no disability pension and she had merely ruling of moderate level of disability (probably due to pervasive developmental disorder) and care allowance (about 215 PLN, which is not so much). She even worked as a cashier (maybe for a very short time) thanks to a temporary job agency despite being before her 24th birtday. She had serious fetal growth restriction - she weighed about 2500 g at birth despite being born at 40th week of gestation or at the end of 40th week of gestation. She has older brother who is not autistic, as I heard and who may be at similar age to my sister. My sister went to her first internship when she was after her 24th birthday, about four months ago.

I feel that my sister behaves like a person with intellectual disability despite her educational achievements (which sometimes were above average) and I suppose that her full scale IQ is above 100, so well above intellectual disability values. She regularly "stalks" me with questions like "do you understand?" and I have to say "yes" (sometimes more than once to her repetitive question) to cause her to stop "stalk" me by annoying remarks.

My sister may have stronger NLD character than me, her handwriting may be poorer than mine and her mathematical abilities appear to be worse than mine. If I remember it correctly, my sister was not an early reader, she may learn to read only in early elementary school, on average time. I started to read well before sixth birthday, maybe even when I was about 3 years old.

The behavior of my sister is severely annoying for me she "bullies" me and behaves irrationally, in often verbally vulgar and childish way. It occurs every day last times She is above 24,5 years old and might appear to behave like a preschooler I think that she has disability similar to mine. I am "engulfed" by my special interests and concerns and "can't think about what to do for earning money". I feel no interesy in occupational career. Hyperfixation about autism may be very absorbing and the topic of autism is fascinating.

I want to compare my sister to some people from Poland who wrote at least thousand posts on this forum, especially women with nicks Irulan, Valoyossa and Kiriae. I have impression that my sister looks clearly worse and different than them (for example less enthusiastic and less passionate, although I do not think that my sister has depression) and I suppose that my sister has pervasive developmental disorder comorbid with schizophrenia spectrum disorder, although probably without OCD (I got diagnoses of PDD, OCD and schizotypal together when I was more than a year younger than the current age of my sister). My sister appears to be semi-hikikomori and NEET, but I would not say that she is not atypical. I suspect that her disorder may have mostly genetic cause. Our brother had something similar to "learning disability in reading and writing" in my opinion because he was tested for dyslexia and/or developmental spelling disorder and had not do good handwriting when he was in elementary school, he made a lot of spelling errors, but he is not disabled and was not diagnosed with a learning disorder.

I would say that my sister is autistic... Despite the "subtleness" of her symptoms, especially before finishing education, she looks to be pretty disabled functionally in my opinion. Her behaviors are very irritating for me and I hate many of her behaviors. These behaviors are "obstacles" in my life. They are unpleasant and make me angry I can be in bad mood from time to time because of them.

The attitude of my sister towards her condition and functioning may be especially "infuriating" for my "mentality". I think that she has a pervasive developmental disorder and that she should have disability pension at least for some years because of her poor functioning caused by what appears to be a pervasive condition similar to mine. I do not want to be rude to her. I do not want to offend her. Even some autistic or psychiatrically disabled women who received disability pension for some time could function better than her in my opinion! So I concluded that she should be even more elligible for disability person than these women.

My sister may appear to avoid diagnosis and support profoundly. Maybe she thinks that if she has autism then she would be worthless, worse and good-for-nothing? Maybe being autistic is considered something very humiliating and shameful for her? Her behavior appears to be very similar for some years in early adulthood. She functional in some areas worse than me in my opinion and I have disability pension since when I was younger than her current age. But she has no diagnosis of a pervasive developmental disorder and I received that diagnosis when I was about 16 - 17 years old, before my 18th birthday. She probably never had any psychiatric diagnosis. Her functioning and behavior may look strikingly autistic in certain aspects in my opinion.