Everything about ASD is far more complex than most give it credit for. Whether this is from laziness, apathy, stupidity or something else entirely intrigues me, but for whatever reason, that is how it is at the moment. Thankfully a few adults with ASD are starting to speak out (technology has been GREAT for us 🙂 ), and perhaps in another 50 or so years, things may change. People like Anne will always be around however – they need to “blame” something because they can’t accept the idea that ASD is a difference and not a deficit until NT’s make it so, and vaccines are an easy target.

This was a great read. Thank you 🙂

I agree. I didn’t have the opportunity to go into all of the many problems with assuming that autism (or any condition) is a static phenomenon. As with any condition, nothing remains the same — sometimes things get better, and sometimes they get worse. The problem with diagnostic categories, of course, is that they hide the variation that happens in a day, a week, a month, a year, and a lifetime. It’s as misleading to compare autistic children and adults as it is to compare non-autistic children and adults. Most people change from childhood to adulthood, even if their developmental trajectories are different from what is considered normative.

Additionally, my grandmother (who is Autistic) has a partner who worked in institutions starting during the time period specified- she worked around 30+ years primarily on the men’s Autism ward. Trust me, the numbers from when she started were much higher than when she left.

Additionally, my grandmother (who is Autistic) has a partner who worked in institutions starting during the time period specified- she worked around 30+ years primarily on the men’s Autism ward. Trust me, the numbers from when she started were much higher than when she left.

In both California and West Coast Canada, I had significant interaction with children with disabilities in and out of class, visual and not. It was part of the way I thought but also the attraction of not speaking for days, just communicating, which drew me into the deaf community (when sound=pain, you know you aren’t deaf, but there is no name for it. I went to four different schools and had a consistant level of exposure (about 6-8% for visual disabilities).

‘Retarded’ students were sent to another school. One I was unable to attend beyond the first day due to the noise in transport and school. At ‘regular’ school teachers kept me in, due to the pain of noise during the lunchtime. I also would simply walk out of class and stand in the hall – I’ve talked to several who also did this growing up. It isn’t a metastudy but they do exist Ms. Dachel.