Attwood's book

[Guest guest]

>

> Attwood's book should be in most libraries. It's in my local library,

> though it's usually on loan. It seems to be popular.

Question about this book: to what extent is it about children, and on the

other hand, how much of it is relevant for adults with AS who don't plan to

have kids?

Doug

[Guest guest]

Doug O'Neal dreamed lazily into the stars:

>Question about this book: to what extent is it about children, and on the

>other hand, how much of it is relevant for adults with AS who don't plan to

>have kids?

From the first two chapters, it appears to be a case of both. It does use

children as its reference-points -- for example, talking about how " a boy "

might be uninterested in talking to his schoolmates -- yet IMHO the

examples are easily translated into adult life as well. It is also useful

for exploring how our traits specifically manifested in earlier years.

I say that, Doug, from a hardcore childfree standpoint. Believe me, I'd be

terribly annoyed if the book wasn't translatable into adult terms or if it

failed to recognize that problems don't go away at age 18.

I'd say it's good for learning a range of technical " outward " signs of

Asperger's, at least from what I have seen. The one huge flaw is that the

descriptions are all from an outsider/NT point of view, so while it is good

for diagnosis/identification, it offers no explanation for *why* we show

certain behaviors and instead suggests ways to make us more NTish. Still,

since it's NT-centric, it is useful for teaching reluctant NTs in terms

*they* understand, and useful for people that are " new " to AS and still

used to translating from NTish.

[Guest guest]

Just checked -- if anyone wants to take a lookie, Amazon.com has the first

14 pages of Attwood's " Guide for Parents and Professionals " (the one I'm

reading) up for browsing on their website, including the external-behavior

" diagnostic test " ** and how to score it. (Sparrow, you might want to

print out the diagnostic test and ask your BF to score it?)

Here's a short-link to it, since Amazon's URLs are too long to fit on one line:

http://makeashorterlink.com/?I28A21651

**written with a child patient in mind, but not hard to translate into

adult terms IMHO

[Guest guest]

>

> Just checked -- if anyone wants to take a lookie, Amazon.com has the

first

> 14 pages of Attwood's " Guide for Parents and Professionals " (the one I'm

> reading) up for browsing on their website, including the

external-behavior

> " diagnostic test " ** and how to score it. (Sparrow, you might want to

> print out the diagnostic test and ask your BF to score it?)

> **written with a child patient in mind, but not hard to translate into

> adult terms IMHO

Except that a lot of those questions suffer from the same problem I've

talked about before: they address things that can be learned from

experience by any reasonably intelligent teenager or adult, even if they

didn't come naturally as a child. Thus if the subject is an adult, this

test must rely on his/her memories, or others' memories of him/her, from

when s/he was a young kid.

For instance: I didn't know there was such a thing as eye contact until one

case, which I remember clearly, when my mother took me to talk to my 7th

grade gym teacher in his office. Afterwards she chastised me for letting

my gaze wander all over the place instead of looking at him while listening

or talking. Now, at age 33, I'm *conscious* of eye contact during a

conversation, but I'd guess that I have to think about it more than other

people, for whom it comes naturally.

Doug

[Guest guest]

At 06:40 PM 7/23/02 -0700, DeGraf wrote:

> From the first two chapters, it appears to be a case of both. It does use

>children as its reference-points -- for example, talking about how " a boy "

>might be uninterested in talking to his schoolmates -- yet IMHO the

>examples are easily translated into adult life as well.

Is it male-focused? I don't mind when things refer to " boys, " " men, " and

" he " so long as the information is universal, but more and more I've been

reading that many professionals say that Asperger's manifests differently

in males and females so I've been wondering if the literature is missing a

lot of issues by mainly covering male manifestations of Asperger's or if

Asperger's really is more " universal " and information about males also

applies to females.

I found a long transcript of a workshop for NT partners of AS folks online

and it was very interesting and informative and gave me some insight into

some of the communication difficulties I experience in my relationship but

I noticed that only briefly did one person speak up and say that they were

a male NT with a female AS partner and many of the things that were brought

up about AS spouses were phrased in terms that made it really difficult for

me to understand if they applied to me or not (while other things obviously

applied even though it was an NT woman talking about her AS husband.)

I suppose that's a good question for the list: do you think that there is

any difference between a male aspie and a female aspie (beyond " plumbing " )

or do you think that pretty much there is no gender/sex based difference in

manifestation?

[Guest guest]

> I found a long transcript of a workshop for NT partners of AS folks online

> and it was very interesting and informative and gave me some insight into

> some of the communication difficulties I experience in my relationship but

Would you mind passing on the URL for that? I'm hoping to find some

resources to help my partner understand my AS traits.

> I suppose that's a good question for the list: do you think that there is

> any difference between a male aspie and a female aspie (beyond " plumbing " )

> or do you think that pretty much there is no gender/sex based difference in

> manifestation?

I don't have enough experience observing other ASpies to really say. I've

only known one other female ASpie and one male ASpie in " real " (offline)

life.

Iris

Iris Gray, Puff and Calli

Hope is the feeling you have that the

feeling you have isn't permanent.

--Kerr

Personal website: http://victoria.tc.ca/~rainbow/

Toastmasters website: http://victoria.tc.ca/Community/Bb/

[Guest guest]

At 06:49 PM 7/23/02 -0700, DeGraf wrote:

>reading) up for browsing on their website, including the external-behavior

> " diagnostic test " ** and how to score it. (Sparrow, you might want to

>print out the diagnostic test and ask your BF to score it?)

About a year ago, we had a conversation one day when we hadn't been talking

about Asperger's at all. I asked him, " do you think I do....? " and

mentioned one of the symptoms of Asperger's but put it in non-psychological

terms, just

everyday language. Not only did he say that I did that thing, but he gave

examples of me doing it and talked a little about how he felt when I did it

and how people viewed me when I did it.

Encouraged at how open he was being, I selected another symptom of

Asperger's. " Do you think I do....? " Again, he agreed and gave examples. I

went through most of the classic symptoms of Asperger's and each time he

agreed that I manifested that behavior and he had some little story or

observation about it. Then I sprang the trap: " Those are all symptoms of

Asperger's Syndrome. "

His response was that I certainly fit the profile as I'd presented it to

him, but that it wasn't a good idea to label myself and that telling other

people that I'm autistic would just make life harder for me because people

would treat me worse if I said I was autistic than they would if I just

" appeared a little strange " because of the huge social stigma about autism.

He also said that the misunderstandings about autism would make people

think I was nuts if I told them I am autistic but don't act like " Rain Man "

and he said it's better to keep your mouth shut and let people think

there's something wrong with you than to open your mouth and say something

that might convince them of it.

(For the record, I couldn't care less about telling " the world " that I have

autism. I just want my partner to understand and accept it. It's not easy

for him and in some ways, his experience with me having Asperger's is very

similar to the stories I read about parents who are trying to come to terms

with their child's diagnosis. I think that he is not accepting it because

he doesn't want it to be true and he probably doesn't want it to be true

because he doesn't understand it so he's caught in a vicious circle where

he won't understand it until he accepts it but he can't accept it until he

understands it. (And I'm caught in that circle with him until we can find

some way to break out of it.))

[Guest guest]

Sparrow Rose Cross dreamed lazily into the stars:

>Is it male-focused?

I don't think the book in general is male-focused as I believe (without

checking) that it uses girls/women in the examples fairly

frequently. However, whether the suggested criteria is gender-biased is

hard for me to tell, considering (like you) I'm almost gender-neutral

beyond the necessary plumbing.

>I suppose that's a good question for the list: do you think that there is

>any difference between a male aspie and a female aspie (beyond " plumbing " )

>or do you think that pretty much there is no gender/sex based difference in

>manifestation?

That's a good question... I think that there is probably little

gender-based difference in the traits once they're broken into basic

categories, but that hormone-linked gender behavior can alter the physical

manifestation of the trait. For example, two Aspies might have high

anxiety, but a very " feminine " woman might exhibit it by obsessing over her

fingernails, while a very " masculine " man might go into rages. (Just using

gender stereotypes to prove a point, not suggesting that men and women

actually are stereotypical in behavior.)

[Guest guest]

At 09:14 PM 7/23/02 -0700, Iris M. Gray wrote:

>

>

>

>> I found a long transcript of a workshop for NT partners of AS folks online

>> and it was very interesting and informative and gave me some insight into

>> some of the communication difficulties I experience in my relationship but

>

>Would you mind passing on the URL for that? I'm hoping to find some

>resources to help my partner understand my AS traits.

It's fairly long (It took me a couple of days to read it because my

attention wanders easily) but it's not bad. I was leery going into it

because so often I see a group of NTs talking about their AS spouses turn

into a huge bash-fest but the transcript looked more like it was a

concerned group of spouses trying to learn to communicate better with their

partners rather than the all-out poison festival I was prepared to read.

It's several pages long, but it starts here:

http://www.faaas.org/transcripts/coventry.html

One of those male/female things that gave me pause was this:

" Can I add one thing I've noticed is if there's been a father with Asperger

syndrome with a son with Asperger syndrome, invariably there's been

enormous conflict between them. You would hope that they both came from

the same planet that they would understand each other but in fact they

often push each other away. What is interesting though I've noticed is

sometimes with a mother with Asperger syndrome, with a child with

Aspergers, can have a good relationship, that's the experience I've had.

It's just that dads with Aspergers have great problems coping with sons

with Aspergers and there can be major fights between them, but if mum has

Aspergers with a child with Aspergers there can be a much better rapport. "

I read that and thought, " okay, you've told us that a mother with

Asperger's gets along well with a child with Asperger's and that a father

with Asperger's does not tend to get along well with a son with Asperger's,

but when you said " son, " did you mean " child " or did you actually mean

" male child? " "

I wondered that because I'm strongly convinced that my father also has

Asperger's so I'm naturally very interested in anything people have to say

about a father/daughter AS/AS relationship. My guess is that they meant

" child " rather than specifically " male child " because my father and I sure

had a hard time living under the same roof!!

The funny thing, though, is that once I'd moved out, I developed a pretty

good relationship with my father and now he's my favorite parent whereas I

keep seeing horrible yet subtle (to me) things that my NT mother did when I

was a child that make me like her less and less since I've been on my own.

>> I suppose that's a good question for the list: do you think that there is

>> any difference between a male aspie and a female aspie (beyond " plumbing " )

>> or do you think that pretty much there is no gender/sex based difference in

>> manifestation?

>

>I don't have enough experience observing other ASpies to really say. I've

>only known one other female ASpie and one male ASpie in " real " (offline)

>life.

I'm really curious about the potential male/female difference because the

same people who are saying that female Asperger's manifests differently are

also claiming that the male:female ratio is probably not 1:3 as has been

believed but more likely 1:1 with females radically under-diagnosed due to

manifestation differences. I have no idea how widespread these theories are

among professionals who work with Asperger's, though.

Like you, I don't have anywhere near a large enough sample size to even

begin to consider the answer empirically. And I haven't read Liane Holliday

Willey or Temple Grandin's books yet, so I don't even have a textual

introduction to a female autistic mind other than reading what Jypsy's

written on her page (and from reading that, I'd say it sounds like there

aren't sex-based differences, but again, I'm dealing with a sample of one.)

[Guest guest]

>

> I'm really curious about the potential male/female difference because the

> same people who are saying that female Asperger's manifests differently are

> also claiming that the male:female ratio is probably not 1:3 as has been

> believed but more likely 1:1 with females radically under-diagnosed due to

> manifestation differences. I have no idea how widespread these theories are

> among professionals who work with Asperger's, though.

Well, in my pursuit of a diagnosis I went to a psychologist whose

specialty was child psychology, and he told me that a) females do not get

Asperger's or autism and that if I had any kind of developmental

disorder, it would have been diagnosed while I was still in school.

>

> Like you, I don't have anywhere near a large enough sample size to even

> begin to consider the answer empirically.

I was excited to actually meet another ASpie since my only ASpie friend

left the country. There's a young man with AS in a club I belong to, but

he is even shyer than I am and doesn't talk much.

Iris

Iris Gray, Puff and Calli

Hope is the feeling you have that the

feeling you have isn't permanent.

--Kerr

Personal website: http://victoria.tc.ca/~rainbow/

Toastmasters website: http://victoria.tc.ca/Community/Bb/

[Guest guest]

At 09:37 PM 7/23/02 -0700, Iris M. Gray wrote:

>Well, in my pursuit of a diagnosis I went to a psychologist whose

>specialty was child psychology, and he told me that a) females do not get

>Asperger's or autism and that if I had any kind of developmental

>disorder, it would have been diagnosed while I was still in school.

Geez! That's just horrible!

As for b, I don't know when the dx of AS hit Canada, but it was the

mid-to-late 1990s down here so how could you be diagnosed with something

that didn't " exist " yet? (duh!)

And as for a, what? does he think it's like testicular cancer or something?

That's got to be the most ludicrous thing I've ever heard!

That reminds me...I've read a few places where people have speculated that

Asperger's could be called " a preponderance of masculine brain " (or

something like that. I'm paraphrasing from shaky memory here). I took that

online test that's supposed to tell you if your brain is more male or more

female and I scored way high on the male side. I've also noticed in the

roughly 15+ years that I've been chatting/e-mailing online that people

usually mistake me for a male if I am using a gender-neutral handle and

don't give any gender cues in my text.

What do you (and others on the list) think about the idea of a " male brain "

or " female brain " (I think that if there is such a thing it's more likely a

result of socialization than neurobiology but I try to keep an open mind

about the possibilities) and the notion that Asperger's is a " VERY male

brain " ?

(While I'm skeptical about the male/female brain theories, AS being a

preponderance of male brain might explain why it's more easily diagnosed in

males -- male brain plus male brain accelerator = undeniably male brain

which stands out in a crowd; female brain plus male brain accelerator =

more neutral brain that doesn't stand out as much.)

>I was excited to actually meet another ASpie since my only ASpie friend

>left the country. There's a young man with AS in a club I belong to, but

>he is even shyer than I am and doesn't talk much.

I had a chance to meet an aspie who lives in the next town but so far I've

been too shy to pick up the phone and call. Fortunately, I'm still in

contact with that person online so I still have time to get un-shy.

[Guest guest]

on 7/23/02 9:37 PM, Iris M. Gray at rainbow@... wrote:

> Well, in my pursuit of a diagnosis I went to a psychologist whose

> specialty was child psychology, and he told me that a) females do not get

> Asperger's or autism and that if I had any kind of developmental

> disorder, it would have been diagnosed while I was still in school.

Yeah, I had a psychiatrist say to me that if I was aspie, " you would have

seen psychologists in your childhood years. " When I mentioned it to my

psychiatrist, he just said gently, " autism is a rather specialized area. " A

psychologist I saw who specializes in AS was a lot more blunt. He said:

" that psychiatrist didn't know what he was talking about. " ;o)

Marria

[Guest guest]

Hi Sparrow !!! )

> As for b, I don't know when the dx of AS hit Canada, but it was the

> mid-to-late 1990s down here so how could you be diagnosed with something

> that didn't " exist " yet? (duh!)

We use the same DSM-IV here in Canada .. 94 was when AS first made it into

the DSM .. but one could easily have been dx'd with PDD-NOS before that. My

psychiatrist told me that's what he would have used with me if he had met me

as a child.

Marria

[Guest guest]

that if I had any kind of developmental

> >disorder, it would have been diagnosed while I was still in school.

>

> Geez! That's just horrible!

>

> As for b, I don't know when the dx of AS hit Canada, but it was the

> mid-to-late 1990s down here so how could you be diagnosed with something

> that didn't " exist " yet? (duh!)

I think it was first put in the DSM around the time I finished university.

I really don't know what to make of " male " brains and " female " brains. I

don't know how much is genetic/physical and how much is socialization.

Iris

Iris Gray, Puff and Calli

Hope is the feeling you have that the

feeling you have isn't permanent.

--Kerr

Personal website: http://victoria.tc.ca/~rainbow/

Toastmasters website: http://victoria.tc.ca/Community/Bb/

[Guest guest]

> Hi Sparrow !!! )

>

> > As for b, I don't know when the dx of AS hit Canada, but it was the

> > mid-to-late 1990s down here so how could you be diagnosed with something

> > that didn't " exist " yet? (duh!)

>

> We use the same DSM-IV here in Canada .. 94 was when AS first made it into

> the DSM .. but one could easily have been dx'd with PDD-NOS before that. My

> psychiatrist told me that's what he would have used with me if he had met me

> as a child.

1994, eh? That would have been three years after I finished in University.

I would have been in my mid-20s. Maybe the therapist thought I had a time

machine or something.

Iris

Iris Gray, Puff and Calli

Hope is the feeling you have that the

feeling you have isn't permanent.

--Kerr

Personal website: http://victoria.tc.ca/~rainbow/

Toastmasters website: http://victoria.tc.ca/Community/Bb/

[Guest guest]

> We use the same DSM-IV here in Canada .. 94 was when AS

first made it into

> the DSM .. but one could easily have been dx'd with

PDD-NOS before that. My

> psychiatrist told me that's what he would have used

with me if he had met me

> as a child.

Tell your psychiatrist thank you for thinking you are so

young... the DSM-IIIR, which was the first DSM to include

PDD-NOS, was published in 1987.

[Guest guest]

At 08:17 AM 7/24/02 +0000, ascaris1@... wrote:

>

>> We use the same DSM-IV here in Canada .. 94 was when AS

>first made it into

>> the DSM .. but one could easily have been dx'd with

>PDD-NOS before that. My

>> psychiatrist told me that's what he would have used

>with me if he had met me

>> as a child.

>

>Tell your psychiatrist thank you for thinking you are so

>young... the DSM-IIIR, which was the first DSM to include

>PDD-NOS, was published in 1987.

That answers a question for me! I was sitting here wondering why I hadn't

been diagnosed PDD-NOS since I started therapy when I was five.

My mother doesn't like to talk about my " childhood problems " at all. From

what I gather, I was a very stressful child for her. I was once snooping

around and found her diary and some of her papers and she had made a graph

where the x axis indicated times in her life and the y axis indicated

levels of happiness or sadness in her life. She had added brief notes at

the points where the graphed line dipped exceptionally high or low and the

graph dipped lower in the section that she had labelled for dealing with my

" problems " than it did in the section labelled for the death of my older

brother.

But I did get her to talk just enough about my childhood experiences with

therapy (and filled in the gaps with what I heard when no one thought I was

listening and what I read in her private papers) to learn that everyone was

really confused about what my problem was or what to do with/about me.

In 1987, I was twenty years old. That's probably a bit too old for a

therapist to start considering a pervasive developmental disorder (after

over a decade of previous therapy, as well) and even if someone would have

considered that option, PDD-NOS was probably a " cutting edge " diagnosis for

a little while.

Thanks for filling in that bit of history for me. It helps to explain to me

why I went undiagnosed and unrecognized for so many years.

By the way, has anyone ever read the book " Dibs in Search of Self " by

Virginia M. Axline? It's an older book (now in reprint) about a

genius-level I.Q. boy who was socially awkward, used " little professor "

speech and so on. My mother had a copy of the book and she had indicated in

margin notes that she thought I was similar to Dibs. I read the copy on my

mother's bookshelf when I was in fourth or fifth grade. I picked up a used

copy for ten cents last year and re-read it and was immediately struck by

how much the description of Dibs sounded like the description of a boy with

Asperger's syndrome. When I re-read that book, I understood a little bit

more of my mother's frustration because in the book, Axline uses play

therapy with Dibs and by the end of the book, he is completely normal

according to Axline. I remember going to play therapy. It must have really

deflated my mother to discover that play therapy didn't make a dent in my

" problems. "

[Guest guest]

From what I understand Attwood addresses the different ways in which being aspie

can present in girls as opposed to boys.

sandi

Re: Attwood's book

Sparrow Rose Cross dreamed lazily into the stars:

>Is it male-focused?

I don't think the book in general is male-focused as I believe (without

checking) that it uses girls/women in the examples fairly

frequently. However, whether the suggested criteria is gender-biased is

hard for me to tell, considering (like you) I'm almost gender-neutral

beyond the necessary plumbing.

>I suppose that's a good question for the list: do you think that there is

>any difference between a male aspie and a female aspie (beyond " plumbing " )

>or do you think that pretty much there is no gender/sex based difference in

>manifestation?

That's a good question... I think that there is probably little

gender-based difference in the traits once they're broken into basic

categories, but that hormone-linked gender behavior can alter the physical

manifestation of the trait. For example, two Aspies might have high

anxiety, but a very " feminine " woman might exhibit it by obsessing over her

fingernails, while a very " masculine " man might go into rages. (Just using

gender stereotypes to prove a point, not suggesting that men and women

actually are stereotypical in behavior.)

[Guest guest]

Sparrow Rose Cross wrote:

> >Tell your psychiatrist thank you for thinking you are so

> >young... the DSM-IIIR, which was the first DSM to include

> >PDD-NOS, was published in 1987.

>

> That answers a question for me! I was sitting here wondering why I hadn't

> been diagnosed PDD-NOS since I started therapy when I was five.

1987 was also the year that the term " Asperger's Syndrome " was born. Lorna

Wing translated and critiqued Hans Asperger's original work from 1943 or 1944

(I cannot remember which year was for Kanner and which was for Asperger).

Until then, Asperger's work had not received much attention in the

English-speaking world. Wing changed all that, and immediately following the

publication of her paper, some psychiatrists began to diagnose patients with

AS, even though it was not official vis-a-vis the DSM, and no criteria had yet

been established.

It was the recognition of AS, and the notable similarities and differences

between that and Kanner's early infantile autism, that led to the concept of

the autism spectrum. Prior to that, autism was thought of as being a single

entity; one either had the stereotypical presentation of autism, or he did not

have autism at all. That is what led Temple Grandin to conclude that she had

recovered from autism, as she described in her first book " Emergence: Labeled

Autistic. " Given the poor prognosis that was given to autistics at the time

(which held that they would be doomed to live in institutions forever, et

cetera), and the lack of awareness of what we now call high-functioning autism,

it is not hard to see why Dr. Grandin would have thought that she had

recovered. In the seven years preceding the publication of her second book,

though, she realized that she was not recovered... she was high-functioning,

and still autistic.

Although the concept of the autism spectrum is well-accepted by most, there are

still a few holdouts. I communicated with a woman in France, and she told me

that they are not on board with the autism spectrum-- her obviously autistic

child is not being diagnosed so, since he is not autistic enough to meet the

old stereotype. Her child's psychiatrists still think that autism is a

psychological thing... they keep trying to psychoanalyze the autistic-like

symptoms away, even asking what kinds of thoughts she was thinking while

pregnant with the boy.

Apparently, Italy is not any better... and my own experience with the Arizona

Department of Developmental Disabilities indicates that they are unaware of the

concept of the autism spectrum too. It is sort of amazing that there can be

geographical pockers where time stops, but only in certain fields.

[Guest guest]

on 7/24/02 1:17 AM, ascaris1@... at ascaris1@... wrote:

> Tell your psychiatrist thank you for thinking you are so

> young... the DSM-IIIR, which was the first DSM to include

> PDD-NOS, was published in 1987.

YIKES!!!

I'll have to ask him what he would have used if he had seen me in 1986! Do

you know when autism was first in the DSM? Maybe he would have just used

" HFA " ..

Marria

[Guest guest]

At 05:33 AM 7/24/02 -0700, Klein wrote:

>Sparrow Rose Cross wrote:

>

>> >Tell your psychiatrist thank you for thinking you are so

>> >young... the DSM-IIIR, which was the first DSM to include

>> >PDD-NOS, was published in 1987.

>>

>> That answers a question for me! I was sitting here wondering why I hadn't

>> been diagnosed PDD-NOS since I started therapy when I was five.

>

>1987 was also the year that the term " Asperger's Syndrome " was born.

I thought it was 1981, the year after Asperger died?

> Lorna

>Wing translated and critiqued Hans Asperger's original work from 1943 or 1944

What language did she translate it into? I read last week that it wasn't

translated into English until 1991.

>(I cannot remember which year was for Kanner and which was for Asperger).

>Until then, Asperger's work had not received much attention in the

>English-speaking world.

Part of the reason for that was because his Vienna clinic was bombed by the

Allies not long after his initial research.

>That is what led Temple Grandin to conclude that she had

>recovered from autism, as she described in her first book " Emergence: Labeled

>Autistic. " Given the poor prognosis that was given to autistics at the time

>(which held that they would be doomed to live in institutions forever, et

>cetera), and the lack of awareness of what we now call high-functioning

autism,

>it is not hard to see why Dr. Grandin would have thought that she had

>recovered. In the seven years preceding the publication of her second book,

>though, she realized that she was not recovered... she was high-functioning,

>and still autistic.

From what I was reading, some people/groups still use Grandin's first book

as evidence that autism can be cured even though she later changed her

mind. What a shame that her early writing is used that way.

>It is sort of amazing that there can be

>geographical pockers where time stops, but only in certain fields.

This is definitely the Land That Time Forgot here. When we first moved here

four years ago, I thought I'd stepped into the 1950s. I was amazed to find

anyone working with Asperger's out here, let alone someone qualified to

work with aspie adults. This area is so underserved when it comes to the

mental health profession that a local woman I spoke to who has bipolar

disorder has to travel 400 miles to get to the nearest person qualified to

treat her.

[Guest guest]

Sparrow Rose Cross wrote:

>

> At 05:33 AM 7/24/02 -0700, Klein wrote:

> >Sparrow Rose Cross wrote:

> >

> >> >Tell your psychiatrist thank you for thinking you are so

> >> >young... the DSM-IIIR, which was the first DSM to include

> >> >PDD-NOS, was published in 1987.

> >>

> >> That answers a question for me! I was sitting here wondering why I hadn't

> >> been diagnosed PDD-NOS since I started therapy when I was five.

> >

> >1987 was also the year that the term " Asperger's Syndrome " was born.

>

> I thought it was 1981, the year after Asperger died?

Hmm... It is possible that I am remembering it wrong. I'll have to check on

that. What you wrote strikes me as being correct-- it looks right, and now

that I think about it, I think 1981 is correct. I think I probably got my

wires crossed... again. Ugh.

> What language did she translate it into? I read last week that it wasn't

> translated into English until 1991.

That was probably supposed to be 1981, if the above is correct. The

translation, and the birth of the term AS, were definitely in the same article

by Wing... it is on the web somewhere, but I do not have it handy right now.

[Guest guest]

" Sparrow Rose Cross " <sparrow@... typed:

> (For the record, I couldn't care less about telling " the world " that I

have

> autism. I just want my partner to understand and accept it. It's not easy

> for him and in some ways, his experience with me having Asperger's is very

> similar to the stories I read about parents who are trying to come to

terms

> with their child's diagnosis. I think that he is not accepting it because

> he doesn't want it to be true and he probably doesn't want it to be true

> because he doesn't understand it so he's caught in a vicious circle where

> he won't understand it until he accepts it but he can't accept it until he

> understands it. (And I'm caught in that circle with him until we can find

> some way to break out of it.))

>

I've had the same problem with my partner, who incidentally is a female.

After 12 years' marriage through thick and thin - with innumerable problems

but until recently unaware of AS/HFA - last Christmas Stefania decided she

had had enough and wanted me to leave. She has repeated the threat on

several occasions since, saying if she had known I might be labelled with

Asperger's Syndrome she would not have married me. She seems convinced mild

bipolar disorders are a regular feature of AS/HFA and all aspies are

unbearably arrogant and self-centred. I have painstaking tried to persuade

my depression and occasional outbursts were a direct result of feeling

rejected, that I showed empathy in a different way and our recent problems

were mainly economic as my precarious employment situation meant I could not

meet her expectations. She has just returned from a 3 week holiday with her

Italian relaitives and now I've had two interviews with a vacancy in the

e-business team of a multinational company (I mentioned my neurological

diversity, but did not elaborate on my views about evil multinationals), her

attitude has changed, but I don't know how long it's going to last? Maybe

she has a mild schizoid disorder and I'm just plain autistic.

Neil

[Guest guest]

Sent: Wednesday, July 24, 2002 12:05 AM

Here is the link to Tony Attwood's website http://www.tonyattwood.com/

There's really a lot of good stuff there, although the music on his home

page drives me nuts!

> At 06:40 PM 7/23/02 -0700, DeGraf wrote:

>

> > From the first two chapters, it appears to be a case of both. It does

use

> >children as its reference-points -- for example, talking about how " a

boy "

> >might be uninterested in talking to his schoolmates -- yet IMHO the

> >examples are easily translated into adult life as well.

>

> Is it male-focused? I don't mind when things refer to " boys, " " men, " and

> " he " so long as the information is universal, but more and more I've been

> reading that many professionals say that Asperger's manifests differently

> in males and females so I've been wondering if the literature is missing a

> lot of issues by mainly covering male manifestations of Asperger's or if

> Asperger's really is more " universal " and information about males also

> applies to females.

>

> I found a long transcript of a workshop for NT partners of AS folks online

> and it was very interesting and informative and gave me some insight into

> some of the communication difficulties I experience in my relationship but

> I noticed that only briefly did one person speak up and say that they were

> a male NT with a female AS partner and many of the things that were

brought

> up about AS spouses were phrased in terms that made it really difficult

for

> me to understand if they applied to me or not (while other things

obviously

> applied even though it was an NT woman talking about her AS husband.)

>

> I suppose that's a good question for the list: do you think that there is

> any difference between a male aspie and a female aspie (beyond " plumbing " )

> or do you think that pretty much there is no gender/sex based difference

in

> manifestation?

Very good question. I've read a few articles that talk about the

differences between male and female aspie behavior. I've seen it postulated

many times that aspie females more often do not display the tantrums and

aggressive behavior that is often common in aspie males, and that aspie

characteristics are more " acceptable " in females than in males.

When I compare myself to my son, I see many similarities, although we seem

to have very different ways of expressing ourselves at times. But since I

don't really remember much about my childhood, it isn't a very accurate

basis of comparison.

>

>

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

At 06:31 AM 7/24/02 -0700, Klein wrote:

>That was probably supposed to be 1981, if the above is correct. The

>translation, and the birth of the term AS, were definitely in the same

article

>by Wing... it is on the web somewhere, but I do not have it handy right

now.

this is the article where I got my information (though the author's

information may be incorrect):

The Geek Syndrome

By Steve Silberman

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/9.12/aspergers.html?pg=1 & topic= & topic_set=