Adult autistics

[pepperbird]

A question for autistics or parents of an adult autistic...

 

 

Does your son or daughter accept that they are autistic? My oldest is autistic ( aspergrs, although I know that term isn't popular these days) and in university in a law program. She wants to practice either intellectual or small business law, as she wants to help the little guy stand up to big corporations.

 

She's intelligent, clever and very compassionate. She's also independent, and works really hard to meet her goals. She's on the Dean's List, doing well and excels at risk management. She joined Toastmasters to help gain some confidence in public speaking, and is also a published author and currently working on helping to judge a literary competition for kids in California, as she wants to help encourage other young people to write.

 

All of this is great. She's an amazing young lady, who won't let anything hold her back. The problem? She admits she's autistic, but won't acceptmit. It's kind of hard to explain. She tries to hide that she's autistic, but between her monotone, lack of eye contact, syntax and mannerisms, it's pretty easy to tell she's not nuerotypical. It's starting to become detrimental to her.

 

I can understand that she doesn't want to be treated differently than others. She wants to make her own accomplishments based on her own merits and not have them handed to her. She also doesn't want to be patronized.

 

I'm trying to support her as best I can, but I think she's making a mistake in not being more open that she's autistic. I don't mean she has to broadcast it, just that she shouldn't hide from it either. I do know that she's had some bad experiences in the past, but that was when she was much younger. I would hope that adults wouldn't give her such a hard time.

[elaine567]

...She tries to hide that she's autistic, but between her monotone, lack of eye contact, syntax and mannerisms, it's pretty easy to tell she's not nuerotypical. It's starting to become detrimental to her.

 

Is speech therapy an option to help her voice?

[nospam99]

Parent of a diagnosed Aspie here ...

 

Well, the last time I looked, while Asperger's is an Autistic Spectrum Disorder, largely because the behavioral manifestations are common to other disorders 'on the spectrum', it is NOT autism. People diagnosed with autism are (IIRC) unable to demonstrate their intellect (such as it may be) and might totally shut down neurological functions (don't listen at all, don't look at all, have catatonic episodes, do not retain what they've learned, etc). So I, personally, wouldn't criticize your daughter for not wanting to see herself as 'autistic'.

 

Because of the way the public school system (finally! after drawn-out legal battles with all the families) put the kids in a program, I got to meet my son's 'cohort'. BTW, once they had their Resource Room, they got told that Einstein and Gates were Aspies, too. Nothing like pumping the egos of kids/people who already had problems interacting socially with neurotypicals. Anyway, that said, what I saw of the problems this group of kids had was a) sensory issues and b) problems 'reading' non-verbal social cues. On the plus side, they might not have been Einsteins, but they were all super bright (120+ IQs) and 'high functioning' compared to what could be expected of kids diagnosed with autism.

 

Sounds to me a lot like you have described your daughter. In fact your daughter's intellectual achievements are above what my son has achieved.

 

My suggestions:

- accept whatever level of acknowledgement of her 'condition' your daughter is comfortable with. Yet be prepared to counsel her if she encounters situations where she is surprised at people's reactions to her actions. I believe it's fair to tell an adult child ''ya know, you might have put so-and-so off because you forgot to treat them as a neurotypical''

- encourage your daughter to find and socialize with supportive groups which may include neurotypicals (the specific example which follows probably does not apply to your daughter).

 

My son was not accepted by the 'smart' neurotypicals in high school. In his search for social contacts, he 'fell in' with some 'bad crowds' just because they were willing to put up with him. Consequences were 'bad'. In recent years, he has instead fallen in with a group of people who are way more religious than I am. Not proselytizing, but interested in studying the Bible. This looks 'good' to me: he has neurotypical social contacts, and by their behavior those contacts are encouraging him to behave in socially (and legally) responsible ways.

Edited September 7, 2019 by nospam99

[preraph]

I don't think she should be more open about it. I think that should be reserved for interpersonal relationships.

 

If she's able to do so much, such high functioning, I question why she can't control the things you mentioned like eye contact. Has she had therapy to teach her to just control that and use discipline and practiced it? Same thing with the monotone. Seems like special schools for autism would have done behavior modification on that.

[LivingWaterPlease]

pepperbird, it's great to read of your close interest and concern for your daughter.

 

I can believe from reading your post that your dedication in your daughter is one of the reasons she's doing so well in her life!

 

That said, as a parent to grown children, one thing I've had to learn is that most grown kids, in their early adulthood, aren't very open to their parents' advice.

 

My grown children are doing extremely well, yet there are still things I see that could be helpful to them. However, they don't want to hear it from me.

 

What I've done that has worked very well is to pray that they'll learn in other ways what I'd like to tell them. And I've found it's a definite way to influence them while allowing them the independence they seek while not putting a strain on my relationship with them.

[alphamale]

many things in this world depend on eye contact, she should probably concentrate on improving that

[pepperbird]

Is speech therapy an option to help her voice?

 

 

That's a really good suggestion, and she did have a lot of in all through her school years. I think part of it may be related to her sensory processing issues. Sher doesn't "hear" herself the way others do.

[crispytoast]

Also some communications studies could be very helpful too and they commonly have credits that are applicable to many business degrees.

[basil67]

many things in this world depend on eye contact, she should probably concentrate on improving that[/quote)

 

Someone with ASD who struggles with eye contact can find the experience ranges from being anywhere between uncomfortable to highly painful. It’s a sensory issue rather than a lack of understanding social cues.

[basil67]

Pepperbird, one of my BFFs is adult female aspie. Highly intelligent and top of her academic field. She’s has really bad experiences with disclosing her DX - people start to treat her differently and say thoughtless things. She saves the disclosure for a trusted inner circle.

[pepperbird]

Also some communications studies could be very helpful too and they commonly have credits that are applicable to many business degrees.

 

 

She's taken a couple of communication courses, and they helped her a bit. Before she went to university, she took a two year course at the community college. She thought it would be a good way transition between high school and full on university. It was a really great experience for her, and she was even able to do her co-op placement with our province's barrister's society in it's resource library.

 

The eye contact is especially difficult for her. I'm autistic as well, and I can understand why. She's like me, and can't "read faces". I tried to teach myself how to maintain eye contact. I thought I had it down until a good friend asked me why I keep staring at her face like that.

 

I'm not sure if she'll ever really find her feet when it comes to presenting in a courtroom. She excels at research, and when she had to do a risk management plan in one of her law courses, her prof said it was one of the best he had ever seen, and uses it as an example for this third and fourth year students. I'm not surprised. She's very detail oriented, so much so that it sometimes bogs her down.

 

She's also hyper-empathetic- so much so she's had to learn to dial it back a bit.

[pepperbird]

many things in this world depend on eye contact, she should probably concentrate on improving that[/quote)

 

Someone with ASD who struggles with eye contact can find the experience ranges from being anywhere between uncomfortable to highly painful. It’s a sensory issue rather than a lack of understanding social cues.

 

 

Exactly. It's also pointless. I can see a smile, frown, that sort of thing, but it's the tiny nuances that I can't interpret.

It used to make me panic when speaking to someone because I couldn't read them at all. It makes small talk excruciating.

 

My daughter's the same way.