AIBU to want posters to stop saying that someone 'is' ASD?

[JigglyTuff]

It's not a taat because it's across multiple threads. Someone can have an ASD or have autism or even, if you must, be autistic. But no one is ASD.

Sheer size.

I can picture two young people I know well ATM who are both on the spectrum, for example.

There is no way in hell I could advocate ileven vaguely effectively for both of their needs at once. It would almost be an adversarial situation their requirements and difficulties are so far apart.

Thank you for sharing your experience LauraMipsum that must have been extremely hard to cope with when you were young. It would surely be inconceivable in a school today for a child to choose to be mute and the teacher assume it meant compliance? At least I hope it would. You must have felt vindicated when you were assessed and diagnosed.

You're probably right that older people who should have been assessed have developed their own coping mechanisms over the years.

I wasn't able to have children so no experience of schools and classrooms apart from when i was a child. It's interesting you mention the sensory overload issues in modern classrooms - it must affect some children. Are schools able to provide a pared back environment for those who need it - I'm assuming not.

Thank you again and to the OP for allowing me to learn an awful lot.

Best wishes

Yes sorry I'm thinking of these two specific people. But yes generally more distinctions are helpful, I think. It helps people get a handle on ballpark profiles quickly.

I can't stand it when people say "I am OCD". Have to stop myself yelling "it's not a verb!!" and beating them soundly about the head

I'm aware that the lack of grammatical correctness isn't what upsets you OP. Sorry

I have 2 dcs with autism dxs, and neither states high or low or actually give any indication as to where on the spectrum they lie functionality wise.

Ah that's interesting because at least two of the diagnostic reports (out of three DC) that my DC have do specify as part of the key phrase.

Maybe it varies from clinician to clinician or according to whether doing so is felt to be helpful?

Yes that's how I tend to think of it Dixie

"neither states high or low or actually give any indication as to where on the spectrum they lie functionality wise."
A thousand times this.
I think that part of the problem is that people with only a dim awareness think of "low functioning autism" as the only kind of autism. I've actually heard it described as "classic autism". This isn't helped by differentiating between 'autism' and 'aspergers' - it leads people to assume that aspergers is an autism-type condition, only not as severe.

Maybe the solution to this would be to say "autism with additional cognitive delays" where that's the case. (I have no idea if 'cognitive delays' is the correct and currently used term, obviously if it's not then it wouldn't be the one applied.)

• a dim awareness of autism, that should say. Not a dim awareness in general.

I say "I'm Asperger's" because its easy. I don't actually belong to Asperger but I do benefit from Asperger's work because it provides me with a way of softening the blow for other people when they meet me.

A thousand times this.

What do you mean? People are diagnosed with HFA specifically.

I'm getting ever more confused.

Manumission I assume that one of us misread the original post that I quoted.
What I was getting at is that neither the designation 'high functioning' nor 'low functioning' have any bearing on the severity of autism. Nor, indeed, any bearing on the person's ability to be functional.

Ah yes I thought you were quoting something else. Sorry. I need to dig the tablet out.