Neurodiversity

[Richey Edwards]

Are there any other neurodivergent people here?

I am severely Dyspraxic and am also on the spectrum. I knew this for most of my life, but pretended that there was nothing wrong with me. This was partially self-denial, and partially not wanting to be judged as less than other people.

Unfortunately denial is counterproductive, because my day to day life is affected. My time keeping is terrible, and I hate busy and noisy places and avoid going to them. Also, I'm not very good at social cues or saying and doing the right thing in social situations.

You may have seen me posting in the depression thread sporadically over the last decade or so. Unfortunately a lot of people with Dyspraxia also have poor mental health too. I am one of them.

Dyspraxia is part of who I am, and life has been better since I embraced that I have it. I was able to come up with solutions to some of the drawbacks, especially the bad timekeeping. Bad timekeeping affects other people, so I felt that was important.

However, it's not who I am. I am a person, and not my conditions. 

 

 

[Hedgecutter]

5 minutes ago, Richey Edwards said:

Are there any other neurodivergent people here?

neurodivergent

adjective

differing in mental or neurological function from what is considered typical or normal

[Granny Danger]

8 minutes ago, Hedgecutter said:

 

 

There’s very few people I like.  Don’t know if that counts.

In fairness there’s probably very few people who like me, but I don’t care as there’s very few people whose opinion matters to me.

[Thorongil]

My son has dyspraxia but fortunately it seems to be on the mild side and he is now able to do almost anything and is happy and relaxed. He’s about to turn 9.
He met all his milestones but when he was small he was more likely to fall over and at primary 1 and 2 he wasn’t quite physically as capable as his peers. 
He struggled with cutlery and writing, mostly fine motor stuff. 

Over the last year though he has really come on and there’s not really very much sign of his dyspraxia at all now. He sometimes struggled with the noisy classroom but seems to be over that now and certainly doesn’t seem to have any issue with noisy places like busy trampoline parks blaring techno music or laser quest with the strobes etc. 

There was some chat that he might be on the spectrum at one point and my wife has been keen to run with that but I honestly truly don’t think so. He’s just a happy and well adjusted kid who copes well with dyspraxia with the help and support of us and the school. 

[BillyAnchor]

I have worked with neurodiverse populations in colleges. More on the high functioning end although in my current gig much more developmentally disabled. A very high number have intersectionality (multiple disorders) and yes mental health issues with depression and anxiety are common.

 

Planning to move back to Scotland in 2024 so I am hoping to find work in this area.

[pub car king]

It's a very nuanced thing and a lot of people have it to an extent most just don't notice or put it sown to character traits. 

For the most part we ask population have been ignorant to things like autism. The link to mental health in particular depression and anxiety sometimes to a crippling extent. 

In terms of neurodoversity and mental ill health we now recognise it but have nowhere near the infrastructure to deal with it. 

[Raidernation]

I just started teaching at a school here that specialises in high school so S3-6 students with neurodiversity conditions. So far all is good, biggest class I’m involved in at the moment is 6 students.
Looking at the staff I’d say there’s probably as many therapy staff as teachers (all all teachers are LBS1 certified (I will be too in the near future)) and not too many admin.
Certainly going to be a different experience for me to focus on this rather that trying to “get through to” (apologies, not the best choice of words maybe but you get the idea) one or two that get lost in general education classes of 30+

If you have personal experience please feel free to suggest what approaches have/have not worked.

[RH33]

Great to read a few speaking about dyspraxia. Two of my kids have been diagnosed with it. One also is severely dyslexic. I'm fairly sure I'd be diagnosed if tested. Effects each of them very differently 

[SweeperDee]

I have Dsycalculia but I’m very good at advanced statistics…also Bipolar, which amazingly makes me better at my job, I feel.

[coprolite]

Never thought i'd see a thread stared by @Richey Edwards and think "good thread".

I consider myself to be probably a bit further along the spectrum than most but not to the point where it causes real problems or harm for me. But i absolutely sympathise with people who have more significant difficulties reading other people. I don't mean i feel sorry for them i mean i think I get it, a bit. 

"neuro diversity" is a great phrase. As a species we need to diversify to evolve. "disorder" is a shite word. It implies a fault. Not thinking in the same way as the majority is not necessarily a fault. Maybe if people were led less by emotional reactions and more by reason the world would be a better place. 

[Hedgecutter]

10 hours ago, SweeperDee said:

I have Dsycalculia but I’m very good at advanced statistics…also Bipolar, which amazingly makes me better at my job, I feel.

and potentially dyslexia. 

Eta: in all seriousness, I suspect that I have mild dyscalculia.  I seem incapable of remembering numbers (they just seem so arbitrary), still have to count with my fingers as I can't keep the numbers in my head, and subtraction is an absolute non-starter if double figures are involved.  Never managed times tables, except the 9x one, simply because of the finger trick.

The big one though, which might fall under 'neurodivergent', is temporal lobe epilepsy.  It's well controlled with medication (otherwise I'd occasionally get dizzy with a fear of dread associated with severe deja vu), but it still clearly affects my short-term working memory.  Whatever I'm thinking about can easily be wiped if I'm distracted by something else.  Gets quite annoying when folk say "aye, but I get that too", but not nearly to the same degree.  My main 'tell' is when I forget what I was talking about mid-sentence.  I often feel a strong desire to reorganise the face of a serial interrupter.

Edited June 24, 2022 by Hedgecutter

[Boo Khaki]

My diagnosis is what used to be labelled 'Aspergers'. I still use that because most people have some inkling of what it means, and the trendy term 'High Functioning Autism' is somewhat misleading IMO. I don't have any of the comorbid learning difficulties that are sometimes present with Autism, so I don't meet the expectation a lot of people have that you have to be non-verbal, badly behaved, etc etc, so I'm frequently met with 'you can't be autistic?!?!?!?".

I don't really struggle with social interactions and social convention because I've been able to pick up the cues and learn what's what down the years. I mask a lot, and I will ask things like 'oh,  how are the missus and bairns?" during polite conversation, but only because I know that's what I'm supposed to do and not because it would occur to me to ask out of genuine interest. The reason I deny 'high functioning' is because there are a lot of other areas in which I don't 'function' at all. I live like a hermit, my house is completely minimalist as I can't cope with clutter, so no things like ornaments or wall decorations. I can't do any sort of work activity that involves 'team' as I find it totally impossible to cope when other people would do something in a way that seems completely absurd to me, and I get ill very quickly trying to work in an environment where human beings are less than 100% dependable and predictable. I've deliberately distanced myself from other people down the years as I just find other people completely infuriating, and any benefit I get from friendships, is, I feel, completely outweighed by the hassle of actually having to deal with other people. I also have no contact whatsoever with my immediate family for similar reasons. I do have the 'special interests' that are common in autistic males, see the 'tanks' episode in the 'Ukraine' thread, and I'm aware that sometimes I do actually miss the context and nuance in things and I'm prone to monologuing well beyond the point of reasonability.

So yeah. Because I'm not Raymond from Rainman people assume I'm neurotypical, but they don't see the areas I struggle with and never see the weeks where I'm essentially housebound because I've hit saturation point and I'm in the midst of a complete meltdown. Relationships are difficult. Ex couldn't cope at all with the fact I have no interest in material gain and I'm not motivated by pecuniary things, so no real career ambitions etc, no designs on a bigger house, two car family, etc. Current is much more in tune with what I feel I need in a relationship and sees the world in a similar way, so we're far more able to give each other the space and consideration I feel I need in order to be happy in a relationship. We don't live together, never have, and never will, because that suits us both. She has admitted that there are parts of her that would like to share a home with somebody, but she's well aware I wouldn't cope, so we restrict it to overnights and the odd long weekend.

'Disorder' is a shite term. I don't know how something that occurs entirely naturally and at a consistent rate across the population can be 'disordered'. Thankfully, due to activism it's a term that is slowly but surely making it's way out the door, but it's still highly stigmatising and used far too frequently. I think that, generally speaking, there is still an enormous degree of general ignorance regarding Autism, and terms like 'disorder' don't do anything to help because it reinforces that idea that autistic individuals are so completely different to the norm that they all must be as obviously, visibly different as Dustin Hoffman's character, or the small, non-verbal children who stim and tantrum constantly and can't be consoled by reason/bargaining in the way most small children can. I always say to people that if you've met one autistic person, you've met one autistic person. It's a bit banal, but it's to get the point across that neurodivergent people are just as distinct and individual from each other as the neurotypical population. You can't make assumptions based on a label, because that label is really just blanket that they throw over a whole gamut of behaviours, some, or none, of which might be simultaneously present in two people with the same diagnosis. 

I suppose from the viewpoint of a parent with, say for arguments sake, small twins who do display all the 'difficulties' of autism, then I'm relatively unaffected and have it pretty 'easy', but again, they won't see how autism has tempered my life and created barriers and obstacles that aren't immediately obvious. I've had the depression and anxiety that is commonly present in autistic adults, and it's hellish to deal with due to the fact that the underlying cause isn't something that is going to go away or resolve itself. Basically, I had to entirely rebuild my life and reshape it in a way that meant I had to exclude absolutely anything that caused me anxiety associated with my autism, so that meant no real career, deliberately winding down friendships, distancing myself from family, placing limitations on what I would accept in a relationship etc, so although I have enormous sympathy for them, I wouldn't agree with that parent that I'm 'unaffected' just because I'm verbal and socially adept enough to get by. Not all the effects of autism are visible, and I do still stim and have meltdowns, I've just adapted my life to the point whereby when it happens there's nobody to witness it, and I can go and do what I need to do to recover in private, and in my own time.

[Thorongil]

12 hours ago, pub car king said:

It's a very nuanced thing and a lot of people have it to an extent most just don't notice or put it sown to character traits. 

For the most part we ask population have been ignorant to things like autism. The link to mental health in particular depression and anxiety sometimes to a crippling extent. 

In terms of neurodoversity and mental ill health we now recognise it but have nowhere near the infrastructure to deal with it. 

I think the term “autism” has been rendered meaningless. It used to mean a particular condition but it’s now used to apply to just about any development or character quirk, passing or otherwise. 

 

[SweeperDee]

and potentially dyslexia.  [emoji14]
Eta: in all seriousness, I suspect that I have mild dyscalculia.  I seem incapable of remembering numbers (they just seem so arbitrary), still have to count with my fingers as I can't keep the numbers in my head, and subtraction is an absolute non-starter if double figures are involved.  Never managed times tables, except the 9x one, simply because of the finger trick.
The biggie though, which might fall under 'neurodivergent', is temporal lobe epilepsy.  It's well controlled with medication (otherwise I'd occasionally get dizzy with a fear of dread associated with severe deja vu), but it still clearly affects my short-term working memory.  Whatever I'm thinking about can easily be wiped if I'm distracted by something else.  Gets quite annoying when folk say "aye, but I get that too", but not nearly to the same degree.  My main 'tell' is when I forget what I was talking about mid-sentence.  I often feel a strong desire to reorganise the face of a serial interrupter.

Simple arithmetic can sometimes just escape me. I’m not bad with times tables, but when it comes to answering questions off the top of my head about simple percentages, fractions, bigger multiplications and word/number problems I’m hopeless. Look like a diddy sometimes when I ask about certain calculations. Give me a spreadsheet and I’ll be able to work out the standard deviation of all the numbers without using a calculator though; can do it by hand.

[Hedgecutter]

8 minutes ago, SweeperDee said:

Simple arithmetic can sometimes just escape me. I’m not bad with times tables, but when it comes to answering questions off the top of my head about simple percentages, fractions, bigger multiplications and word/number problems I’m hopeless. Look like a diddy sometimes when I ask about certain calculations. Give me a spreadsheet and I’ll be able to work out the standard deviation of all the numbers without using a calculator though; can do it by hand.

I can remember having separate calculator and non-calculator maths papers at school, and there was always a big difference in the results.

Managed fine with equations in physics etc, and I even started uni on an engineering course, but only because I remembered the equations using words (whatever that term is called, which escapes me for the moment).  Given a calculator, it's fairly straight forward from there.  Always had to struggle much more with maths concepts compared to other modules, which is partly why I ended up changing to another science subject.

That said... I often wonder if it's not dyscalculia as such, but the epilepsy affecting the working memory required to remember number combinations.

Edited June 24, 2022 by Hedgecutter

[Boo Khaki]

7 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

Or maybe we'd turn into every other species and abandon the sick, the old and weak to die.

A civilised society really needs both characteristics.

I agree, but personally I do find the majority of NT people to be overly prone to making decisions based on emotion rather than logic or common sense, which is a big part of the reason why I struggle to cope in any situation where I'm either reliant on them, or my tasks are dependant on other people doing their bit. I don't understand sentimentality, romance, or why people get emotional looking at a piece of artwork, listening to a piece of music, and so on, so a lot of the things people do in life that are driven by emotion I just can't get my head around at all. Religion baffles me, as from the outside it appears to me that you would have to suspend every single power of logic and reason you have in order to be an adherent.

I suppose the reason I'm in agreement with your statement though is that I can absolutely grasp the need for compassion in order to benefit the greater whole. That's logical in most respects, because no matter if you are in fine fighting health, you are only ever one accident or illness away from being rendered incapable and dependant on the good will of others. While I struggle with some esoteric concepts, I am still a human being living the same human condition as anyone else, so I do feel a sense of comradeship and fraternity, even if that's founded in logic and reason rather than anything 'spiritual'.

[oldbitterandgrumpy]

1 hour ago, Boo Khaki said:

My diagnosis is what used to be labelled 'Aspergers'. I still use that because most people have some inkling of what it means, and the trendy term 'High Functioning Autism' is somewhat misleading IMO. I don't have any of the comorbid learning difficulties that are sometimes present with Autism, so I don't meet the expectation a lot of people have that you have to be non-verbal, badly behaved, etc etc, so I'm frequently met with 'you can't be autistic?!?!?!?".

I don't really struggle with social interactions and social convention because I've been able to pick up the cues and learn what's what down the years. I mask a lot, and I will ask things like 'oh,  how are the missus and bairns?" during polite conversation, but only because I know that's what I'm supposed to do and not because it would occur to me to ask out of genuine interest. The reason I deny 'high functioning' is because there are a lot of other areas in which I don't 'function' at all. I live like a hermit, my house is completely minimalist as I can't cope with clutter, so no things like ornaments or wall decorations. I can't do any sort of work activity that involves 'team' as I find it totally impossible to cope when other people would do something in a way that seems completely absurd to me, and I get ill very quickly trying to work in an environment where human beings are less than 100% dependable and predictable. I've deliberately distanced myself from other people down the years as I just find other people completely infuriating, and any benefit I get from friendships, is, I feel, completely outweighed by the hassle of actually having to deal with other people. I also have no contact whatsoever with my immediate family for similar reasons. I do have the 'special interests' that are common in autistic males, see the 'tanks' episode in the 'Ukraine' thread, and I'm aware that sometimes I do actually miss the context and nuance in things and I'm prone to monologuing well beyond the point of reasonability.

So yeah. Because I'm not Raymond from Rainman people assume I'm neurotypical, but they don't see the areas I struggle with and never see the weeks where I'm essentially housebound because I've hit saturation point and I'm in the midst of a complete meltdown. Relationships are difficult. Ex couldn't cope at all with the fact I have no interest in material gain and I'm not motivated by pecuniary things, so no real career ambitions etc, no designs on a bigger house, two car family, etc. Current is much more in tune with what I feel I need in a relationship and sees the world in a similar way, so we're far more able to give each other the space and consideration I feel I need in order to be happy in a relationship. We don't live together, never have, and never will, because that suits us both. She has admitted that there are parts of her that would like to share a home with somebody, but she's well aware I wouldn't cope, so we restrict it to overnights and the odd long weekend.

'Disorder' is a shite term. I don't know how something that occurs entirely naturally and at a consistent rate across the population can be 'disordered'. Thankfully, due to activism it's a term that is slowly but surely making it's way out the door, but it's still highly stigmatising and used far too frequently. I think that, generally speaking, there is still an enormous degree of general ignorance regarding Autism, and terms like 'disorder' don't do anything to help because it reinforces that idea that autistic individuals are so completely different to the norm that they all must be as obviously, visibly different as Dustin Hoffman's character, or the small, non-verbal children who stim and tantrum constantly and can't be consoled by reason/bargaining in the way most small children can. I always say to people that if you've met one autistic person, you've met one autistic person. It's a bit banal, but it's to get the point across that neurodivergent people are just as distinct and individual from each other as the neurotypical population. You can't make assumptions based on a label, because that label is really just blanket that they throw over a whole gamut of behaviours, some, or none, of which might be simultaneously present in two people with the same diagnosis. 

I suppose from the viewpoint of a parent with, say for arguments sake, small twins who do display all the 'difficulties' of autism, then I'm relatively unaffected and have it pretty 'easy', but again, they won't see how autism has tempered my life and created barriers and obstacles that aren't immediately obvious. I've had the depression and anxiety that is commonly present in autistic adults, and it's hellish to deal with due to the fact that the underlying cause isn't something that is going to go away or resolve itself. Basically, I had to entirely rebuild my life and reshape it in a way that meant I had to exclude absolutely anything that caused me anxiety associated with my autism, so that meant no real career, deliberately winding down friendships, distancing myself from family, placing limitations on what I would accept in a relationship etc, so although I have enormous sympathy for them, I wouldn't agree with that parent that I'm 'unaffected' just because I'm verbal and socially adept enough to get by. Not all the effects of autism are visible, and I do still stim and have meltdowns, I've just adapted my life to the point whereby when it happens there's nobody to witness it, and I can go and do what I need to do to recover in private, and in my own time.

Quite a long read there (I read it 3 times actually), but I think you've summed up the life of an Aspie pretty well. I was diagnosed with Aspergers in my mid 50's although it was hardly breaking news to me. There had to be a reason why the weird kid who didn't talk much and couldn't hang on to friends grew up to be the weird adult who couldn't make friends, I had my suspicions, and had my theory rubber stamped 8 years ago. 

I totally get the relationship thing. My wife (my long-suffering, ever-tolerant wife), has accepted me for who/what I am. I also totally get the need for space and solitude at times, it's easy to find ordinary everyday situations overwhelming but not so easy to 'take stock' and just generally get a sense of perspective whilst surrounded by action and noise.

I'm from a generation where mental 'disorders' were very much a subject of ridicule. Have things changed that much? There's certainly more awareness now, but is   there more understanding? Christ I hope so, but the more you delve into mental health the more you realise just how much we're scratching the surface.

[Boo Khaki]

2 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

I have no idea what a NT is supposed to be. I don't think there is any such thing.

I'm partly in agreement with this, but I think asking what an NT is supposed to be is coming at it from the wrong direction.

The only reason people are officially diagnosed with an ND condition is because they meet the threshold of diagnostic criterion, usually defined as having a significant impediment on 'normal' life function. In a medical sense, if you don't meet this threshold then you are NT.

I'm not sure if what you are implying is that 'everyone is a bit ND', which if you are, is something that I can understand and think is generally reasonable, but it's also something that is oft repeated from a place of total ignorance i.e. "Haha! yeah, I'm a bit on the spectrum me!", simply because they collect vinyl Pop! figures. Avidly collecting/obsessing over something is common in ND people, but in and of itself it's not a significant impediment to normal life, so that alone is no indicator that someone is 'on the spectrum'. 

Some of the other examples you've given in the previous post are also sometimes present in ND people, but they're also present in people who are simply shy, or self-conscious, or egomaniacal, or depressed, or anxious, or self-obsessed, or stupid, and so on. When you have sufficient number of these traits that you meet the threshold for a diagnosis then you are considered to have a neurodivergent condition, but the important part is that they must be sufficient that they cause significant impairment to the individual with regards to living a normal life, which is why someone like your lecturer who can't look at their audience wouldn't be considered ND on the back of that quirk alone.

[Boo Khaki]

2 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

OK that's a reasonable enough description of NT.

I wonder if the phrase ND isn't commonly understood then. I won't lie. I didn't know it meant a diagnosable condition.

Any confusion on my part stems from the comment you made on the previous page:

"Disorder' is a shite term. I don't know how something that occurs entirely naturally and at a consistent rate across the population can be 'disordered'.

If you are describing ND as something diagnosable which causes significant impairment then the word "disorder" is probably appropriate to be fair.

 

I suppose that depends on whose perspective.

A bunch of psychiatrists defining DSM entries? Sure. Medical professionals trying to treat someone with a condition? Sure.

Me going about what is 'my normal' life, that, for the most part, I'm content with? No, there's nothing 'disordered' about my life from my own perspective simply because it doesn't mesh with what is typical for the majority. 'Disordered' is stigmatising from my perspective, but I would have no issue whatsoever if that was replaced with 'atypical'. That seems a perfectly reasonable request to me, since Autism is a difference, hence the 'divergent', and not a physical or mental illness. It's other people who have decided my life is 'atypical' or 'disordered', not me. My life is all I know and it's normal for me, so as as far as I'm concerned, I might as well look at everyone else and label them as 'disordered'.

Sometimes you get asked 'if you could do over, would you rather be NT?'. My answer to that is invariably 'No', because what you are asking is if I would like to remove a fundamental part of who, and what, I am. I would cease to be 'me', and that's not a very enticing prospect. Who knows what I'd be like? My life might be comparatively worse than it is now, or even completely insufferable. It's not like NT people breeze through their lives with no problems or issues caused by their personalities, or societal or environmental factors.

To put it into perspective, things like homosexuality also used to be labelled a 'disorder'. That's now accepted as merely a difference, and since it's the minority, it's 'atypical'. All I'm asking is that it would be good to reach the same place with Autism, ADHD etc, although I can understand why the aforementioned parents of really dysfunctional autistic twins might completely disagree, however we're back to that place of mistaking comorbid learning difficulties for the actual condition itself. 

[oldbitterandgrumpy]

32 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

If someone can explain what a neurotypical person is, I'd be all ears. In my many years of life I have never come across a typical person. Ever. Everyone is "weird" in some way. Absolutely without exception.

I've seen:-

• Academically brilliant people who can't walk down a corridor without their left hand constantly in touch with the wall.
• Lecturers who present their entire lectures at the ceiling because they can't cope with looking at an audience.
• Grown men and women in tears and blow out decades-long friendships because the birthday present they were given wasn't what they wanted.
• Grown men come to blows over which football team they prefer.
• People using gifts as a way of punishing "friends and family members" by letting them know exactly how that person ranks them socially.
• People who can't leave the house because they can't decide which shirt best goes with their new shoes.
• People who sit in an hour long traffic jam on the motorway but won't take the parallel and empty A road beside it because "I don't know that road".
• People who walk up Ben Nevis with sandals on and no food or drink supplies.
• People who put up "Live, Laugh, Love" signs all over their house and then proceed to live lives which are anything but.
• People who think there is a "season" for what clothes you wear.
• People worshipping Z-list celebrities.
• People pursuing their 15 minutes of fame all over social media.
• People photographing their food and posting it on social media.
• People who criticise others for their lifestyle choices which don't even affect them personally.
• People consumed by hatred for people they have never even met.

Blimey I really could be here all day.

So please someone explain to me what neurotypical is. I don't think it exists and it's just one of those things that humans like to do to make sense of the world - they create convenient boxes to put people in. Funnily enough, if we stopped trying to crowbar people into boxes and accept that everyone is completely and utterly different, maybe we wouldn't see so many people struggle with issues such as gender, sexuality etc.

Imagine the inside of your brain as an intricate circuit board, millions and millions of connections constantly firing signals to each other, all working in perfect harmony. With Aspergers, some of these connections are missing. They're not broken awaiting repair, they're just not there. You're born without them. This results in certain natural skills, which most people take for granted, being strangled at birth.

A relatively trivial example of this (at least in my case) is small talk. NT's can be naturally shy or self-conscious but still have it in their power to take the steps to gain confidence and engage socially. Aspies can try to do that, but they're born without the basic tools to engage socially. Signals like voice inflection or body language sometimes go right over their head. Sarcasm is another potential landmine when you take things that are said too literally. 

Having said that, coping mechanisms are the Aspie's best friend. It's a condition after all, not an illness, therefore there's no 'cure' as such. 

In the examples you give above, there may well be neurodiversity in some of these people. Then again, some people are just stupid/shallow/inconsiderate c***s. It's a wonderful world.