|
Fuschia tude posted:What exactly does this mean? There's a different brain structure than in other people? It's not a super well-studied area yet but probably. One of the theories which has some support is that autistic people maintain high levels of neuroplasticity, the ability of the brain to react to new stimulus or circumstances by changing its structure. Typically this drops off as people age, because it's cognitively pretty expensive. This is why people can learn languages quickly as children, but it takes a lot more effort as adults. Some research has demonstrated that autistic people keep more neuroplasticity into adulthood, which has benefits (it's great for creative problem solving and learning about new things), but also costs (reacting to new stimulus is exhausting, which may help explain why we often get overwhelmed by sensory input and why routine and structure are so helpful). There's another branch of research purporting to show the opposite thing, that after a "critical period" in childhood our brains stop growing as much as those of our peers, but this tends to come from the thriving industry of "selling diets, supplements, and therapies to moms who are deathly afraid of their kid being autistic."
|
#
?
Jul 6, 2021 11:39
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 3, 2024 15:17 |
|
|
pandy fackler posted:Have you ever taken psychedelics and if so, how did it go? Frustratingly, any ingestible drug doesn't do a thing for me. Oxycontin, mushrooms, weed edibles. Nothing, not a single thing. I ate an entire bag of mushrooms hoping for something but instead I just had to sit around while everyone else had a fuckin time of their life. Never tried acid or dmt or anything like that, yet, though. Also, cannabis barely affects me, but at least it does something. Oh, well, weirdly, alcohol does intoxicate me, though. I seem to have like twice the tolerance of anyone I know, though, but it does work. credburn fucked around with this message at 22:51 on Jul 6, 2021 |
|
#
?
Jul 6, 2021 22:49
|
|
|
Or you’re still tripping to this day and have adjusted to your new reality!
|
|
#
?
Jul 7, 2021 20:19
|
|
|
Thank you all. This thread has been wonderful. What do you do if you suspect you might be on the spectrum? What do you do? I can't seek professional mental help except for strictly marital/family/grief reasons, at least without risking my job. I've always been the 'weird' guy, so I mostly avoid unstructured social situations, but the isolation is starting to get to me. What can one do outside of therapy/counseling?
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2021 04:14
|
|
|
I mean what do you want? If you want a diagnosis, then you have to do that through a professional. Otherwise you do whatever anyone else does to achieve the thing you want and it doesn't matter whether you're autistic or not, it's just a label that gets applied to certain personal characteristics. It's not like there's medication or something.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2021 05:09
|
|
|
Can you get a better job that doesn’t discriminate against people with mental health issues? Because that’s lovely regardless of whether you officially have ASD or not.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2021 11:32
|
|
|
MarsellusWallace posted:Thank you all. This thread has been wonderful. Like Organza Quiz noted, ASD isn't like other conditions (like ADHD, for instance) for which effective, well-studied pharmaceutical treatment exists that requires a diagnosis to access. As an adult, unless you're planning to request official accomodations through an institutional process at your job or the government, the only reason to seek a diagnosis is if you personally want one for educational or peace of mind reasons. Unfortunately, autism in adults is extremely poorly studied, and even more poorly studied from the perspective of autistic people themselves, so it can be hard to find useful resources. I like The Complete Guide to Asperger's Syndrome, by Tony Attwood. It's older, as the name suggests, but covers things pretty well.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2021 15:21
|
|
|
Oh yeah but what about booze
|
|
#
?
Jul 16, 2021 03:40
|
|
|
Klaaz posted:Oh yeah but what about booze
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2021 03:49
|
|
|
MarsellusWallace posted:Thank you all. This thread has been wonderful. Look for autistic communities on social media. There are many that explicitly include self-diagnosed people or people who are trying to figure things out, since getting a diagnosis can be very difficult. Plenty of FB groups, a few subreddits like r/Autism and r/AutisticPride. Also there is #ActuallyAutistic on Twitter/IG/Tumblr/TikTok ("actually" autistic to differentiate from Autism Moms posting about how much they hate their children). insert "also the Something Autistic forums" joke here
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2021 13:13
|
|
|
MarsellusWallace posted:Thank you all. This thread has been wonderful. Two big things I changed in my understanding have helped me immensely 1- Actively paying attention to what I say and do, and what the response is. Every new social context is something I have to intentionally feel out to see what is acceptable, what the norms are in that group or with that person, etc. If it's with a doctor, autistic people often appear to be in less discomfort than they're actually in, so don't feel bad about playing up your pain a little bit because if you use a flat affect for "yeah it hurts a shitload doc" then they might just not believe you. If that's a problem you experience then it can take some getting used to to see what looks believable and what looks fake. In any case it's just actively thinking about those social interactions until you're comfortable enough with whoever it is to let loose a bit more without stepping on toes. 2- Understanding that it's okay to say or do something that's a little weird, and to not think it's the end of the world if you make what you think is a mistake. You can let it go, and also some people suck and will never accept you anyway. That's not just some autism thing, that's just regular life and you won't please everyone. It's not always you being weird, it's often someone else being a shithead. A lot of people with autism take on the responsibility of getting along with others so much that they remove all of the responsibility from others, and trying too hard at point 1 above can make you feel like you don't get to have your own personality if you wanna get along with people. That's not true, you just won't be getting along with everyone anyway, so it's okay to simply foster the good relationships you have and avoid people who you aren't going to have a good relationship with. That's just life, same as it is for people who aren't autistic. In short, the most important thing for me with autism is recognizing when the social problems you're having are actually typical.
|
|
#
?
Jul 24, 2021 23:23
|
|
|
signalnoise posted:In short, the most important thing for me with autism is recognizing when the social problems you're having are actually typical. Why do I feel this so hard
|
|
#
?
Jul 29, 2021 18:24
|
|
|
Violet_Sky posted:Why do I feel this so hard If you knew what was typical from the start then you wouldn't have to deal with social problems from neurodivergent poo poo in the first place. That's why.
|
|
#
?
Jul 30, 2021 04:32
|
|
|
Right now I’m doing an LP of Katawa Shoujo, a game about what it’s like to live with a disability. Is it okay if I cross-link it with this thread?
|
|
#
?
Jul 30, 2021 16:26
|
|
|
It has nothing to do with autism, and most autistic people don't consider autism a disability at all
|
|
#
?
Jul 30, 2021 19:23
|
|
i like nice words
|
Falconier111 posted:Right now I’m doing an LP of Katawa Shoujo, a game about what it’s like to live with a disability. Is it okay if I cross-link it with this thread? That's a yike from me. Deeply uncomfortable sounding game. I'm not autistic, but neither is anyone in that game.
|
|
#
?
Jul 30, 2021 20:34
|
|
|
Isn't autism a social disability? That's what I've been told.  Anyway, lots of people in the let's play thread talk about their disabilities and that included a bit of autism. Pixelante posted:That's a yike from me. Deeply uncomfortable sounding game. Poil fucked around with this message at 22:07 on Jul 30, 2021 |
|
#
?
Jul 30, 2021 22:05
|
|
|
Poil posted:Isn't autism a social disability? That's what I've been told. The whole spectrum thing makes it difficult to talk about autism in broad terms as a disability, particularly because there are big issues with normativism in what is considered a disability relative to a disorder. There are definitely people who can be called disabled due to their autism, but I have autism and I'm able to express myself and explain the issue to you. The term "disorder" is often used for things where your life has some additional difficulty because of the context you're in, but it can be managed through various coping strategies and/or accommodations. For the social problems experienced with autism in people who can otherwise live independently, those problems would go away in a more understanding society, not because they would disappear, but because they would cease to be problems. "Disability", on the other hand, is often used to describe problems that can't feasibly be solved through coping. There is no solving quadriplegia, for example. You can cope with it, and you can have lots of specialized equipment that enables you to do the stuff you want to do, but you'll need some kind of assistance to live otherwise independently. Consider how someone with autism could feel when they're called disabled, but they don't qualify for any assistance. I would love to have a job doing something that fits me, and to have some kind of financial assistance otherwise to make up for it, but I won't be getting that. I have done jobs that require me to routinely interact with new people in highly stressful environments, and I've been fired from them, but I won't be getting any accommodations for it. If I tell a hiring manager my brain problems, I just won't get hired. Just like if someone shows up to a job that needs you to lift 50 pounds or more and they're stuck in a wheelchair, they won't get hired because they can't do the job, I won't get hired if the manager knows these issues and can tell I'm not cut out for it. I can pretend for a while, but eventually I will be rejected. So, how should I address the issue of whether I'm disabled? I can express myself, and I can have friends and good relationships, but I am not suited for the society that I live in. It's not something where I can't get a job, but I can't keep the jobs that suit my education, and honestly every decent job I've ever had was something I got by sheer chance. I don't understand what it is a manager wants to know, and because every interview is a new person to deal with, I have to figure them out on the spot. If there is a meeting with people from multiple different organizational cultures, that compounds the difficulty because I have to figure out what the common ground is for all of them at once. For the social aspect alone, that could be solved by accommodation if everyone else changed their way of thinking, but they won't, and it's not reasonable to expect that of people. I can perform well in a given moment, but the anxiety and stress from jobs that require me to deal with new people all the time wears away at my productivity as what management academics call withdrawal behavior. There are non-social issues as well, but those too could be solved by changing my context to be something that doesn't penalize me for those issues. The form and severity of autism I have will never go away, just like how it will never go away for people whose autism can easily be called disabling. The question is whether this kind of autism, where it presents a difficulty that is dependent on who I'm talking to and how much they're willing to meet me halfway, is a disability. For me, I can't simply say yes or no because I recognize that no matter what the answer is, there is no help coming from my society. I have multiple diagnoses, but they don't qualify me for assistance. I'll accept a categorization of disabled if that gets me some help, no problem. I would gladly accept accommodation and be called disabled. I simply won't be able to be unbiased in my view of it though because I know the hardships I've dealt with and will continue to deal with forever despite a lack of assistance, and with the stigma that is still attached to mental health problems these days, telling someone else that I'm disabled is a tough pill to swallow because despite the difficulty of expression, we still feel our emotions just as hard as anyone else.
|
|
#
?
Jul 31, 2021 00:59
|
|
|
Poil posted:Isn't autism a social disability? That's what I've been told. Autism is considered a disability, some Autistic people just don't care for that framework. It's problematic that the way we have in our society to affect change is through this disability model which interprets us as lesser instead of different, no doubt. Just that, in my experience, autism has functioned like a disability. I don't know that any kind of environmental change would stop a speech regression in a toddler, for example. All the comorbidities aren't necessarily Autism, but they do come with the territory and it's hard to separate out what is what from an internal perspective.
|
|
#
?
Jul 31, 2021 01:55
|
|
|
lettersnumbers posted:All the comorbidities aren't necessarily Autism, but they do come with the territory and it's hard to separate out what is what from an internal perspective. A lot of comorbidity and the lack of real knowledge of brains has me wondering like, so I'm diagnosed with autism, ADHD, and dysthymia as far as permanent stuff, and I've dealt with a lot of depression and anxiety as well. A big part of my childhood was an environment that drilled those things into me and I don't really know how someone would come out the other end without dealing with that kind of stuff. However, I don't know how much of my permanent diagnoses and other poo poo are really rooted in my experiences. Like, if someone who didn't have my diagnoses experienced the same poo poo, I imagine it'd gently caress them up just the same. When you ball all this stuff together and they compound on one another, stress that supposedly can be handled by neurotypical folks just wears me away, and if I had to say whether or not it is disabling when taken together, I'd say yes. However, I think I could probably be okay with one of them individually. I'll never know for sure though. Something that bugs me about how autism is treated is the stigma alongside the big name examples of success. Most of the times I hear about autism in media is either showing off a big name like Anthony Hopkins or some other old person and talking about how it's just neat that they are autistic or something, or when I see TV shows, games, or movies showing an autistic character and how it's so very difficult for them, no matter how it affects them. There's this "so an so very successful smart person was probably autistic" combined with autism being shown as making you super hosed up in other examples, and I don't see how any of this is supposed to set expectations anywhere close to reasonable. None of this normalizes anything.
|
|
#
?
Jul 31, 2021 06:07
|
|
|
Pixelante posted:That's a yike from me. Deeply uncomfortable sounding game. It's actually really good. And me and a few other autistic people are active in the thread, and talk about our problems.
|
|
#
?
Jul 31, 2021 08:23
|
|
|
Dance Officer posted:It's actually really good. Me too! That’s what got me interested in disability theory and advocacy in the first place. Pixelante posted:That's a yike from me. Deeply uncomfortable sounding game. The reviews are in: Hellioning posted:Yeah, I followed this game and was really into it for a while. Nice to see it again, I really enjoyed it. I'm also really enjoying both the personal stories and the more scientific discussions on disability activism. As someone who is mentally disabled, as well as someone who's just involved with other activism, I love reading and learning more about this topic. Frijin posted:So I've never heard of this game, but after reading the thread title and first few posts I went from "That sounds like a train wreck" to "Huh, I should look at this sometime". Violet_Sky posted:I wonder if any of the team behind this were PWD. A lot of stuff in here feels authentic to the PWD experience. HerpicleOmnicron5 posted:It's a heartfelt YA romance novel with pictures and a soundtrack about disabled people living life at a high school, and handles its subject matter with sensitivity and grace. It originated on a web forum, but the end product has nearly nothing to do with said forum. Sexual content is optional. It is available for free. Part of what I’m doing is collecting the stories of disabled people on the neuro and physical side (scroll down to the block of links). If anything, we actually have more neurodiverse posters. I figured the people who post in this thread might appreciate the chance to read what’s been said and share their stories there, too.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2021 17:59
|
|
|
What are neurotypicals incompetent at compared to people with autism?
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2021 05:25
|
|
|
Nirvikalpa posted:What are neurotypicals incompetent at compared to people with autism? Nothing, if you wanna stick with "incompetent", because that would imply that autism elevates people at whatever aptitude to a degree that neurotypical people are rendered unsuitable for the task. Even with the things that autism commonly augments, it's not in a way that is necessarily beneficial. For example, a lot of autistic people have a very keen sense of hearing or other hypersensitivity, though hearing is the most common in my experience. That's not something to envy though, because it comes along with extreme difficulty in tuning sounds out. Like I have a very clear memory of being in the back seat of my mom's car when I was like 10 or 12, and I could hear her scratch the leg of her pants with her fingernail. I asked her to stop, and she kept doing it softer and softer to test me, but really it was just loving annoying. Despite all the road noise and air conditioning, I heard a fingernail on her pants from the back seat, and it was driving me nuts from misophonia. Can't tune that out, can't tune out people chewing, and all that leads to not being able to pay attention to the sound you want to listen to, like a specific conversation in a crowded area. It took me decades to get a handle on that.
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2021 05:53
|
|
|
I don't know I'd say incompetent given that there's a huge continuum of people and ability and personality, but I think on average neurotypicals are worse at seeking out and retaining large amounts of specific information about a topic.
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2021 15:15
|
|
|
Neurotypicals often don't have experience dealing with people who don't think like them and haven't developed the skills necessary to do so.
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2021 15:27
|
|
|
If you combine all the stereotypes it makes autistic people the gods of playing poker based purely on being unreadable and being able to remember all the percentages but reality isn't so kind
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2021 15:36
|
|
|
I was once told that autistic people are way better than others at reviewing footage from security tapes and stuff, and much better at getting information from them. I guess it's a niche?
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2021 17:36
|
|
|
Dance Officer posted:I was once told that autistic people are way better than others at reviewing footage from security tapes and stuff, and much better at getting information from them. Sounds like maybe gross generalizations aren't reliable and contribute to stereotypes as well as unreasonable expectations
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2021 17:44
|
|
|
signalnoise posted:Sounds like maybe gross generalizations aren't reliable and contribute to stereotypes as well as unreasonable expectations I mean, obviously and unfortunately. Some level of generalization is necessary in order to function, but it’s impossible to tell when your generalizations have major issues and attaching value judgments like “better” is asking for trouble. That said… Organza Quiz posted:I don't know I'd say incompetent given that there's a huge continuum of people and ability and personality, but I think on average neurotypicals are worse at seeking out and retaining large amounts of specific information about a topic. I understand a lot of people memorize things as points and connect them later. I can’t do that. My memory works like a giant network of information and trends that I fit points of information into. When it comes to general information, everything from trivia to understanding worldviews, I can just slot it into that network and retain it for years at a level that baffles neurotypicals. But when it comes to fine information, stuff that I have to form impromptu associations for, the sort of thing a lot of jobs require, I have to be taught multiple times. That isn’t great for employment. I never have to worry about openings with spoilers because by the time they become relevant I’ll have already forgotten every random disconnected image I saw.
|
|
#
?
Aug 7, 2021 17:59
|
|
|
Falconier111 posted:I mean, obviously and unfortunately. Some level of generalization is necessary in order to function, but it’s impossible to tell when your generalizations have major issues and attaching value judgments like “better” is asking for trouble. Oh that's a really interesting way of putting it! It would explain why I'm good at my job which involves keeping in mind a massive interconnected web of information, but just simply awful at names even when I'm trying as hard as I can to memorize one.
|
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2021 01:07
|
|
|
I don't mean to be anal in my uhh... political correctness? But while I do believe it's true that autistic people are particularly good at retaining a greater-than-average volume of information about a particular topic, that itself is just an average, a statistic. I don't think it's wrong, but I feel it's really important to distinguish between the kind of generalized all-encompassing characteristics and the fact that neuroatypicals are not the same as one another. In other news, I'm doing a stand-up comedy set tonight and want to make some jokes about being autistic. Anyone got any zingers I can use? The only real joke I have is that since I'm autistic I'm the only one allowed to use the R word. zing
|
|
#
?
Aug 11, 2021 08:50
|
|
|
Superpower: fantastic memory. Downside: for historical facts nobody gives a gently caress about. Superpower: great visual acuity. Downside: crippling social anxiety. Autism does not give you gifts. Rather, you were born with those gifts already, and also with the the genetic components necessary to have your brain develop in such a way that riding the bus with some dude who cannot stop loving WHISTLING is a traumatic experience. It's neither a curse nor a blessing, just a different perspective that eventually you learn is somewhat unique.
|
|
#
?
Aug 11, 2021 09:07
|
|
|
credburn posted:I don't mean to be anal in my uhh... political correctness? But while I do believe it's true that autistic people are particularly good at retaining a greater-than-average volume of information about a particular topic, that itself is just an average, a statistic. I don't think it's wrong, but I feel it's really important to distinguish between the kind of generalized all-encompassing characteristics and the fact that neuroatypicals are not the same as one another. You can talk about how autism makes you way more observant than other people when it comes to pattern recognition in the little things, but also gives you little obsessions based on that. Like how you've been searching for a toothpaste that doesn't turn pink when you use it.
|
|
#
?
Aug 11, 2021 15:58
|
|
|
People say “you’re autistic? Does that mean you take everything literally?” And I’m like “nah, that’s kleptomaniacs” Zzzing
|
|
#
?
Aug 11, 2021 18:25
|
|
|
During the pandemic I've noticed that my fits of overstimulation have fallen off almost completely, whereas a ton of presumably non-autistic people are copping to poor mental health from understimulation. Disability/neurological advantages exist within the context of the environment, I suppose
|
|
#
?
Aug 11, 2021 18:38
|
|
|
That much is certain. A lot of people seem to be coping with loneliness; not me. I barely have friends and social interaction and I'm fine.
|
|
#
?
Aug 12, 2021 11:53
|
|
|
credburn posted:I don't mean to be anal in my uhh... political correctness? But while I do believe it's true that autistic people are particularly good at retaining a greater-than-average volume of information about a particular topic, that itself is just an average, a statistic. I don't think it's wrong, but I feel it's really important to distinguish between the kind of generalized all-encompassing characteristics and the fact that neuroatypicals are not the same as one another. “If you know one autistic person, you know one autistic person.” Also, make sure to get some digs in on Sheldon Cooper. I got told to my face by my parents I wasn’t autistic and was told I “wasn’t Sheldon” and I was like “thanks for making the gold standard of my existence a character even the showrunners say isn’t autistic and whose actor has denounced him.” Tjadeth posted:During the pandemic I've noticed that my fits of overstimulation have fallen off almost completely, whereas a ton of presumably non-autistic people are copping to poor mental health from understimulation. Disability/neurological advantages exist within the context of the environment, I suppose I will always feel somewhat bitter that COVID has directly improved my life; I’ve gone from unemployed, isolated, and lacking prospects to someone with an established internet presence and a job that gives me everything down to dental, both specifically because of the opportunities being trapped at home afforded to me. I know the same didn’t happen for everyone, of course, but I cannot deny it happened to me. I owe my future to pain and suffering on a grand scale and I’ll never be able to forget that.
|
|
#
?
Aug 12, 2021 14:14
|
|
|
Falconier111 posted:Also, make sure to get some digs in on Sheldon Cooper. I got told to my face by my parents I wasn’t autistic and was told I “wasn’t Sheldon” and I was like “thanks for making the gold standard of my existence a character even the showrunners say isn’t autistic and whose actor has denounced him.” Don't you know? Autism means you're a dickhead
|
|
#
?
Aug 12, 2021 16:10
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 3, 2024 15:17 |
|
|
Falconier111 posted:“If you know one autistic person, you know one autistic person.” Is that the guy from Big Bang Theory? Before I was diagnosed people would call me Sheldon.
|
|
#
?
Aug 13, 2021 21:56
|
|