I think it might be a bit of a reach to lump "mental retardation, pathological speech delay, etc." as the only sources of mis-diagnosis of autistic children in a historical sense. We have come a long way in the last 30 years from when I first entered health care in the categorization of and appropriate diagnosis and treatment of various psychological and physiological disorders in children. I support your attempts at research and respect your tenacity.

Like I said, you've never lived with one. Surely, you've seen this by now?



And that, my friends, is a high-functioning autistic child. Seriously, think about it from the schools' perspective. Special Education costs much, much more than regular education. If a little discipline would keep these kids in line, they would do it. Or they would kick them out. When your child doesn't ever speak in words, that is not the same as a miscreant. If you'd like, get rid of the diagnostic labels all together: there is now a record number of children who are completely unable to function in a classroom setting, and must be in a special ed class. And the numbers are not holding steady, they are growing.


As I've said, every rational argument you can imagine has been made by plenty of people before, and they are all covered in the book I linked. All of them. Even the argument that California had a disproportionate number of autism cases because all the nerds had moved there for the computer industry and were inter-breeding. It takes the time to disprove that theory too. I am eagerly awaiting Undertoad's opinion of it.

My best friend's son, who I watched daily for two years and who has been a close part of my life, as my son's best friend, for four years, is autistic and he was in school, undiagnosed, until third grade. Many of his teachers refused to believe he was autistic and not just "weird" because he performs acceptably in class.

He is also off-the-charts brilliant, and extremely intelligent high-functioning autistic children are harder to diagnose because, while doing very poorly for them, they tend to function at a level that's closer to a "normal" child of their age. Highly intelligent high-functioning autistics are finally being recognized and diagnosed, when often they weren't before.

Also, I think you should watch who you're accusing of never having lived with an autistic child. :lol: My youngest is still in assessment at OHSU, but despite being highly intelligent and doing well in school, she has some clear neurodevelopment issues and a language delay, and has had three-hour screaming fits because it was getting dark and she didn't want it to get dark. Another good one was her hours-long screaming, choking, sobbing meltdown because she wanted me to get all of the water out of the house. :lol:

That clip wasn't very impressive, simply because I've never had a two-year-old who DIDN'T act like that. I have three.

I don't want you to think I am being a smart ass here but who has peer reviewed the book. The book needs to be peer reviewed to have that much validity to reverse decades of previously peer reviewed research. It needs to be backed up by some pretty big names or there is no way to prove that the authors observations and research is valid.

And as you say, she is "in assessment" for what is clearly abnormal behavior. You believe that 30 years ago, such a thing would have simply been accepted as normal? That 30 years ago, she would have fit in just fine, and no one would have suspected she had a problem?

Yes, and your children scream for three hours because they don't want it to get dark, too.

Martha R. Herbert, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor of Neurology, Harvard Medical School. She's listed on the back; I don't know who else might support it. But you have to understand, there is no new research here. It is itself a peer review of existing studies.

That is a peer review of one. Peer review in the field of medical research is done by a panel of peers who are not connected in anyway to the author. I would say that a good measure of what she may be on to is that others cite her book as a source for the stimulus of original research on ideas she puts forth, that is the ultimate recognition of of the general validity of her ideas. Maybe it is to new for that.

*shrug* I dunno. It's copyright 2007. This thread's given me a massive headache and reminded me why I was trying to stay emotionally detached from it in the first place. I've got other shit to do right now.

Ok, cool. I enjoyed it. I learn quite a bit from this thread. One of the better in a long time.

<shrug> I was exactly the same way 33 years ago, at least according to my sister and my mom. I was just thought of as "difficult" or "spoiled", and that was the norm for the time. Some kid were just "difficult" or "high-strung". If you don't believe me, look at old parenting books. I was not diagnosed with ADHD until 1990, because when I was little, kids didn't have ADHD... they were just "bad". Do you see what I'm getting at?

Even my smallest's teacher thought that maybe she just had a hearing problem. She is almost completely silent and very withdrawn when we are not at home. It was after we had her hearing tested, and she went to a language development specialist who said that her development is not delayed enough to be considered abnormal, that we decided to take her to the neurodevelopmental center. She is not "clearly abnormal" unless a context is offered other than "high strung", "spirited", or "difficult". I have those books. I decided to pursue the possibility that there is more to it than that.

My older kids acted like that at age two and three, but are very social and outgoing in school... they do very well socially and academically. I don't think there's anything wrong with them at all.

Absolutely. Thimerosal was removed from most vaccines on the childhood schedule in the US becuase Rep. Dan Burton's grandson developed autism.

Thimerosal containing vaccines were not recalled however, they were used up eventually.



Tiki, if you're interested, look up how Dr. Offit voted (FDA advisory committee) on the addition of Rotashield to the childhood schedule. Also look up how he voted on the removal of it after it caused several infant deaths.

I did a bit of searching but have been unable to find that information other than references on anti-vaccination websites.

And thus you have provided additional evidence that even today, kids who are a little "off" behaviorally, but not significantly developmentally delayed, are not diagnosed with autism when they shouldn't be. ADHD, perhaps. But we're not talking about the rates of ADHD, we're talking about the rates of autism.

Sigh. No, you're not reading. The language development specialist at the school said that her language is not significantly delayed, but that she thought there was something going on, nonetheless. We were suspicious because of her behavior at home, which in the past would have been considered "high strung" or "difficult", as I was as a child. Therefore, we took her to a neurological center, where they confirmed that there is a significant neurodevelopmental delay and sent us on for further testing.

We discussed it with her pediatrician and the next step is finishing the intake process at OHSU and getting her tested at the neurodevelopment center. The pediatrician suspects high-functioning autism. It's up in the air until after the testing at OHSU, other than the fact that she has a very high IQ and a neurodevelopmental delay of some kind. The high IQ helps to "hide" the delay. I suspect strongly that high-functioning, highly-intelligent children are being diagnosed now due to higher awareness and better diagnostics, when they would have slipped through the cracks in the past.

Anyway, the only reason I brought it up was that you stated that I have never lived with a high-functioning autistic child. The fact of the matter is, my best friend's son is autistic and I had him after school every day for two years, plus he spends two nights a week here because my son is his best friend, and it is very possible that my youngest daughter is also autistic, so your statement was inaccurate.

I can easily see, from my own experience, how these children would have failed to be diagnosed in the past. Greater awareness and more resources mean that they are being diagnosed and helped now, rather than living their lives at half-potential.

I have two other friends with high-functioning autistic children... perhaps birds of a feather flock together? But I have never spent much time with their sons.

Oh, and my sister who was recently diagnosed with Asperger's is 45. We grew up together and have always been very close. I feel like I do have a little personal experience with dealing with people who have autism-spectrum disorders to draw from, you know?