To understand that Autism is NOT a mental illness?

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Just that really, someone posted that autism is a mental illness.
I understand autism to be a different way of thinking/perceiving etc. Not an illness that one may or may not recover from

(My daughter is waiting for an assessment for autism & I would hate her to feel that she 'has a mental illness' & actually find that statement so disempowering. The world needs people to think differently, to challenge ideas that maybe set in stone & blur the idea that one size fits all.)

Teggun I think very, very slowly. The psychotherapist I'm seeing says that people with autism can have problems with executive function. That would be me.

Having said that Teggun I do struggle to understand/process what people are saying sometimes, or understand their intentions. So I guess that means yes?

Sometimes I feel a bit like I need a translator for the body language and facial expressions.

Teg I don’t think issues such as processing speeds can be considered key markets of ASC because whilst there are people around with slow processing speeds and an autism diagnosis, there are also very fast thinkers with the diagnosis. Some measurable cognitive elements have beeen loosely tied to ASC but never very tightly, I think. Executive processing difficulties is probably one of the stronger correlations, but I have a theory myself that that is to do with overload, and so varies with stimulus levels and sensory susceptibility.

Thank you all! No, not crap at all Sodding - thank you!

My logic in this discussion has been that the neurological differences created by autism have their effect on the workings of the brain including the way the individual thinks / reacts / interprets / experiences etc. These characteristics or functions are mental functions.

No-one has posted a definition of 'mental disorder' that explains to me why it excludes autism (leaving aside the whole debate about the term disorder/condition/difference)

I am really sorry that some posters have understood this to be me telling them about their own lives / experiences or displaying "ignorance".

I'm genuinely interested because of course it something DD and I talk about lots.

I am off to read more about the neurology 'vs' psychiatry debate. Thank you again.

It is a mental illness caused by a neurostructural deficit and is currently incurable

Would that neurostructural deficit be visible on MRI scans in ALL cases of autism?

Quote from the NAS - who really should know what autism is.
Autism is not a mental health condition

So there you go. More here
www.autism.org.uk/get-involved/media-centre/news/2016-07-24-autism-and-mental-health.aspx

Obviously there’s the hyper-rationality, rigidity of thought pattern, propensity to classify & strategise and tendency to literalism Teg but I kind of assumed we were taking those as read.

I don’t trust NAS an inch.

I’m off the very large charities generally. I think they almost inevitably become stymied.

Your theory makes sense to me too Battleax

Ooh you sound very like me staffie

The dichotomy is actually unhelpful because when people see you as quick, incisive and articulate it makes them hard to grasp that the open plan office is giving you an issue.

Makes it hard for them to grasp^

The nosology/classification of mental health and neurological and developmental conditions is largely the product of quite old categorisation, and often fails to take account of changing science/knowledge. The chances are that bipolar and schizophrenia have more in common with autism than they do with other (largely treatable?) mental health conditions.

It's just a neurological difference. Definitely not a mental illness. Those are an issue can be cured. Autism is just a different way of living and experiencing life

Obviously there’s the hyper-rationality, rigidity of thought pattern, propensity to classify & strategise and tendency to literalism Teg but I kind of assumed we were taking those as read.
I would struggle to describe ds in these terms, though he does have some needed-behaviours and habits

I don't recognise myself or my ds in that either or, indeed, in many autistic friends.

Obviously there’s the hyper-rationality, rigidity of thought pattern, propensity to classify & strategise and tendency to literalism Teg but I kind of assumed we were taking those as read

See I identify with these, order comforts me and things that don’t fit into an order upset me.

Teggun - Surely autism is a developmental disorder because by defintion it affects the way a person develops. Autism doesn't affect the way I think, it is the way I think. In that I don't know any different. By contrast a person who is schziophrenic for example will have at one time thought for lack of a better way to put it "normally." Calling autism a mental disorder doesn't really quite have the same meaning as developmental disorder, does it?"

But also having now seen several sets of diagnostic results, I think it’s like the ability is the same as an NT but it’s going through fewer channels, and that’s why the profiles of the sub scores are typically “spiky” on testing.

It's just a neurological difference.
Except being autistic raises our risk of epilepsy, autoimmune conditions and early death.

Definitely not a mental illness. Those are an issue can be cured.
Nope, bipolar and schizophrenia cannot be cured.

Autism is just a different way of living and experiencing life
No, that's minimising the struggles of many of us, and I say that as a fairly able, high-achiever (albeit having taken the scenic route), but it's particularly dismissive of those who are significantly disabled by their autism.