Older parents and autism/aspergers

hi
i am in the same boat . My daughter is 17 months and highly likely to be autistic. She on track with all her milestones but recently she developed food aversion . No one in my family or DH’s family has ASD . I am feeling extremely alone

Even undiagnosed ND people might plausibly take longer on average to find a partner, become established and decide to have children.

I think the risk of almost all conditions increase with parental age don’t they. I think people are generally aware of this risk though.

@MermaidMummy06 - That is a really goof point. Very young parents are possibly not as likely to be able to recognise, research, advocate and even pay for a private assessment, in comparison to older parents who may waited until later in life because they were concentrating on building careers and carefully selecting the right person.

As I mentioned, they are working on polygenetic studies for autism. It should become clearer as time goes on.

Re: age, the best way to control for "ND people may be more likely to have kids later" would probably be to look at men who have children in a first and subsequent, later relationship, and see whether autism rates are higher in the second union.

Or else more than one condition? Until we have a medical test, it’s all quite subjective.

Maybe neurodivergent people are more likely to have children at 40 than at 20?

There are also higher rates of autism in children whose mothers had febrile symptoms (high fever) during pregnancy. Autism rates also vary by time of year, being higher for those who were gestated at some times of the month.

Definitely not just genetics; probably a mixture of (complex) genetics and some environmental factors.

Type one diabetes resembles type 2 diabetes. It doesn’t make them the same condition.

It's definitely not purely genetic. Autistic behaviors have been noted in individuals who have suffered birth injuries, coma and the like.

I'll ask again - why is it only autism that requires a different diagnosis for people who have a comorbid LD and not epilepsy, ADHD, asthma, cancer etc.

It sounds like you're advocating for the exact opposite of the social model of disability tbh.

I wish some posters would stop saying it's purely genetic as it's not. It's not helpful.

I thought we were describing levels 1-3 in accordance with DSM 5

"And this is why the definitions of autism need to include functioning labels."

But so many of my DD's peers from her SEN schools and including her, who would have been put in the box 'LF-MF' have found job roles that suit them. She's 25 now and the SEN provision was much better and we had a bigger range of schools. I don't trust the people in charge today with what they'd do, or what funding etc would be given to those children. My DD is achieving more than the average person in the deprived area that I live in. It's the same for many of her peers. I'd rather support needs identified, than hanging on a label. My DD still needs enough support to qualify for PIP. But as said works full time.

Also I'm high functioning, but the way my Autism presents in regards to friendships, socialising, being comfortable in classrooms/workplaces etc has had a massive negative on my life.

"It’s a fallacy that only autistics with LD’s are low-functioning."

Which is who HF/LF isn't necessarily helpful. My DD has S&L issues and is classed as having moderate LD's. But she works full time in a NHS catering role. My friend's little boy is non verbal and needs a lot of support. But he could do the alphabet and spell words at three years old. He has LD's but does some curriculum work three years older than his age. My DD recently went on holiday. Part of the group had never been around people who have LD's and autism, or who had gone to a SEN school (that they know of). They were incredulous at the life my DD leads. It took them a couple of days to not over fuss her. Luckily she finds it funny.

"And once identified, they'll kill us, neuter us, or kill our children in the womb. We need to unite, before this happens. There are more of us than they think."

That's what makes cross cultural studies difficult, people/families don't want to be identified, out of fear. My Nigerian friend won't visit her family in Nigeria because she fears that her son will be killed. There's really interesting articles about autism in Nigeria. I'm autistic, so is my adult DD. I'd picked up that her son was when he was around eighteen months. It was such a terrifying prospect to her that it took his Nursery, at four, insisting on getting him intervention. My friend describes herself as having OCD, she says that family members also have it. I think that they are on the spectrum. Two of her son's half siblings have since been diagnosed. She said that when he was getting recurring chest infections, she'd be encouraged to not get him treatment and let him go. It's still the same in many parts of the world. As well as people being tied to trees/chained in sheds. But they are the families that would probably tell us more about the hereditary/generic link, as well as the older father stats.

It’s a fallacy that only autists with LD’s are low-functioning.

Posts that refer to ‘risk’ and ‘family planning’ when talking about children being born with disabilities or differences are contentious and not helpful. The discussion will inevitably lead to upset and/or comments about terminations and eugenics. Perhaps adding lessons on diversity to the national curriculum would be a better approach so we are all better informed. Rather than waiting til a woman gets pregnant then bombarding her with overwhelming terms such as ‘risks’ and ‘red flags’ to look out for during and after pregnancy.

Please also remember that people who read or comment on a thread about autism are likely to have lived experience. If they are autistic themselves they may also have social and communication difficulties. So if someone then shares their diagnosis with you, they are likely bravely sharing this in the hope you will at least try to understand how difficult this can be.

Going back to the OPs question, there is ‘risk’ with all pregnancies, however, autism is generally considered as being down to a range of genetic factors and not parental age.

Because the only thing that matters in daily life are needs and presentation. The social model of disability. An individual’s own experience of being autistic. (All experience is lived BTW. If it isn’t “lived”, then it isn’t experience. So that’s an inane tautology).

Lots of autists don’t even consider themselves disordered, but for some reason people like you are hellbent on telling them that firstly, that they’re disordered and, secondly, that they should have fellow feeling for a group of people with learning difficulties that they have next to nothing in common with. It’s an assertion with little real world relevance.

I've just seen someone else has already made me point in a far more succinct and scientific manner 😁

Might it be that undiagnosed ND parents are more likely to have babies at an older age, this the link between parents' age and likelihood of autism. It does seem that the more we learn about neuro divergence, the more evidence there is that it's often genetic.

They need to be two or more discrete diagnoses, TBH. Lumping the whole spectrum together isn’t helpful. I’m not even sure I believe in this spectrum concept anymore.

Why though? Someone with an LDs lived experience of epilepsy, cerebral palsy, asthma, cancer, ADHD, etc is likely to be different than those without an LD but there's no question they are the same disorder.

Exactly.

Because the aspie-positive community will want to address it, and they don’t have much common cause with those who call autism a disorder or who would terminate for a positive prenatal screening.

There will be a debate and a schism, hopefully not an excessively vitriolic one. Certain other disabled groups have already been through this discussion.