Autistic Traits in a Neurotypical Person.

Of course you can have autistic traits and not be autistic.

Thats why it can be so difficult to diagnose, especially in girls who typically mask them.

I have worked with autistic or potentially autistic people and when they first come we do a mini diagnostic test.

I am not qualified to give an actual diagnosis but the questions are the same as a professional asks and then if they get a high score, they go on to have a proper assessment.

All of the staff have done one and every single staff member (and learner) gets at least one.

There is no such thing as normal or fitting into a box and this is true with ND people but also NT people.

To the PP who said issues with socialising from a young age is an indicator - that would be DD to a tee!

We've just had DD (11) finally diagnosed as ASC and ADHD. Although I have seen traits since a baby, I didn't think she would meet the impairment part to get a diagnosis. Even the school SENCO didn't think she would get a diagnosis- as she doesn't particularly mask at school, just glides under the radar. She isnt super sensitive or seeking on a sensory profile.

We first had the referral for ADHD and they said she didn't meet the threshold but when we went back for ASC they said they would diagnose as ASC and ADHD. She didn't have an educational psychologist visit her and was just on the forms the neurobehaviour team sent!

Going to your original post - I think we all have our own sensory profiles and preferences that is normal, and traits which could be deemed as 'autistic' and I think a lot of grown ups are probably undiagnosed autistic, however its the impact these traits have on the person which impacts the diagnosis or there struggle to cope in a 'NT world' . However neurodivergent was meant to be like biodiversity and highlight the natural differences in people.

That’s a proper term used in the autism ‘world’

Totally agree with you and find this fascinating.

My DCs are mainly undiagnosed but they both have a lot of traits, I’d say DS’s showed at a young age - he ‘grew out’ of a lot of the behaviours but has suffered from anxiety since childhood and is diagnosed with OCD as a young adult. He thinks he could be autistic but is not sure if he wants to go down that diagnosis route. He’s very intelligent and self-aware though.

DD has a ‘working diagnosis’ of adhd and was screened as dyslexic. Would identify as ND, but is an expert masker. Not really shown traits from a young age unless you count being v shy/awkward. Has never been great socially but is better now as has found others like her and is doing something she likes at uni/part-time work.

For myself I have def got traits -
socially I’m quite good (have a lot of friends but the close ones are all a certain type of person themselves!). I do find social niceties a pain esp at work / I am blunt and to the point by nature but know I need to keep it in check (my manager is like this too - she can annoy people with it but not me cos I understand!).
I am also v anxious about time and timekeeping (mine and others)
Hate some noises esp eating ones - def got a touch of misiphonia- have always been like this.
very rejection sensitive

I spoke to dd about this when she was telling me her issues I was saying, yes but that’s how I think too. She said, mum that’s not normal 😆

But I have been around a lot of autistic people and I still find it hard to see DCs in that category because they don’t quite fit there either, nor do they fit in NT so I would say they’d be in the borderline for diagnosis. They both get DSA at uni so their needs are being met and that’s what’s important really.

And I absolutely have depressive traits/tendencies. I have to work at not spiralling into depression.

The fact I haven’t been hospitalised or had ECT doesn’t mean I can’t say I have depressive tendencies.

Perhaps it would help if we stopped policing other people’s language.

To be fair, as parents we are obliged to observe and consider our children’s behaviour in case they have support needs. It’s the job.

When those behaviours subside with age and experience children are considered NT.

When they persist to a problematic degree they become diagnosable with something.

They're only Autistic traits if you're Autistic. Otherwise they're just your personality traits. It's like saying I'm sad so I have depressive traits, no Im just sad. Or I like to organise so I have traits of OCD. No I just like to organise things. No one's a little bit OCD or a little bit Autistic, you either are or you aren't. So yes you may have some traits in common with someone who's Autistic or has anxiety or OCD but if you aren't Autistic or you don't have those MH issues, they're just your personality traits nothing else. Someone getting anxious sometimes is absolutely nothing at all like having an anxiety disorder like I do. Language is important and we shouldn't minimise people's struggles by making it sound like they're things lots of people have to deal with.

I think it’s often the degree ie whether the fear of hand driers continues for years and years rather than just the preschool years, or whether it stops you visiting a particular building at all rather than just using the toilets, that is the key thing, and also whether it occurs with many, many similar things or just that specific thing.

Before my DS has a diagnosis (which he got at 4yrs) I can remember having discussions with other parents about the things he did. Many of them would tell me their children did what I’d just described. Many thought he couldn’t possibly be autistic. The things he was doing are just human behaviours, after all. It is the reason he does them and the extent to which he does them which is key. (His autism affects him enough that he is in a special school and only accesses extra-curricular activities for disabled children.)

I think when people meet my son they don’t try to pretend they are like him because of the degree his ASD is so obviously disabling that they don’t want to identify themselves with it. Those with the emotional maturity of an amoeba and the subtlety of a tonne of bricks tend to go straight towards pity 🙄.

But definitely when people haven’t met him or they meet my DD who is more what would have been Aspie in the past then we are all a bit of the spectrum can come out from those types. It’s all just ignorance and emotional development deficits in them.

Of course people in the general population can have autistic traits. You can have traits of a condition without having it. Perhaps they misunderstood your post or you theirs. Were they perhaps telling you that you can’t be on the autistic spectrum if you aren’t autistic?

Whoever told you it's not possible is wrong. It's called Broad Autistic Phenotype and refers to people who have traits of autism but don't meet the threshold for diagnosis.

When people empathise with me in similar ways, just for being a parent of an autistic child, it annoys me too. I think unless you are an autistic person or, to a lesser degree, been very close to an autistic person, you wouldn’t really have a clue what it is like. To people removed from it they probably do see their experience as similar, even if it isn’t. But people always try to form connections with others through shared experience. Whilst in this case it is frustrating at least people are trying to connect. I don’t know what the answer is to help people appreciate the depths of the autistic experience though.

I believe I have some autistic traits in the way I interact (or don't interact) with other people, and a few times in my life others have noticed and suggested this too. But I actively dislike routine and don't have any obsessive interests that I can think of, so I would never get a diagnosis of autism. If my tendency to not get social interactions quite "right" is not an autistic trait, then I don't quite know how else it could be described. My brother used to call me "socially inept" but that's not a very technical term!

PS: I never describe myself to others as having autistic traits and am absolutely not trying to get some kind of special treatment or hijack autistic people's experience. I'm just trying to make sense of my personality in my own mind. I've muddled through life reasonably well for nearly 60 years. But I don't think of myself as being quite like most other people.

I think some people would say they are prone to low moods. The terminology is different, granted, but I think it is as much terminology as anything. I think with autism it is also so pervasive across many, many areas of life, whereas depression, say, is more focused which could why the language used is different. Yes it can severely affect your whole life, but the root of the difficulty is in one particular area. With autism there are specific things across many, many areas of functioning, so I think it is possible for people to see that they have similarities in those specific areas.

I say this as a parent to an autistic child. I think it would be slightly odd if I wasn’t similar to him in many ways. We are very closely related, after all. He is wonderful but also has real difficulties. The traits I have that are similar to his are not to a degree that cause me significant issues let along anything like the difficulties he faces, and is some cases they are actually positive, yet they are definitely there.

@Baaliali I'm sure you'd be more sensitive then, but unfortunately your children might end up dealing with situations like I get all the time - like my work colleague 'empathising' with me by telling me that she's a bit autistic because she doesn't like hotdesking. Or continually talking about how we're 'all a bit on the spectrum '

I know she means well but it doesn't help!
(And yes I have tried politely challenging it but she doesn't get it and it comes from a good place so I try to let it go)

No I wouldn’t do that but with two autistic children and a third with traits I’m pretty sure they did not lick their personality traits off the pavement. Both DH and I have plenty of ASD traits and lots of ASD up the way in our families hence why we have ND children.

The issue is people using 'autistic traits' to minimise the experience of being autistic.

Would you feel the need to say you or your child had 'depressive traits' because sometimes you felt a bit pessimistic?

I definitely wouldn’t get an autism diagnosis, neither would DH, but I see traits in us both. Some are very useful.

There is a school of thought that the genes that result in autism have remained in the gene pool because autistic traits can be very beneficial to individuals and society, when at a level or in combinations where they are not (too) disabling.

Anyone can have asd traits but the issue is when people start saying 'oh I'm a bit autistic me I have to put my clothes on in a certain order' whilst successfully leading their life. It minimises how autistic people experience life and the challenges and discrimination they face .

Yes there may be a small handful of people who are impacted who for whatever reason didn't meet the threshold: but the people who typically say stuff like that are usually ignorant to what asd is

DD has just gone through a full ASD assessment. Didn’t meet criteria for diagnosis but does have some ASD traits. It’s not triad of impairments for diagnosis anymore, it’s the DSM 5: https://www.autismspeaks.org/autism-diagnostic-criteria-dsm-5

Son of a friend has “adhd with autistic traits” diagnosis

YANBU

I saw a thread on here about parents talking about their kids’ autistic traits the other day. Many of them were traits of NT kids as well - like being scared of hand dryers and watching the same tv show over again.

As well as being "neurospicy". 🤮 Yeah it's so quirky and fun struggling to live with my partner, leave the house, be in the house, exist in my body whenever it changes or feels something, interact with any human, overthink every interaction for months or years, not feel safe anywhere, be dependent on other people for money to live, feel suicidal regularly, etc.

I guess people who need wheelchairs are just limb-spicy.

Autistic traits are human traits and we are all human we will share traits.