Comment Appreciated

maria has left a new comment on your post "Autism Food Issues":

I'm writing a book about an autistic teen and I came across your blog. I consider myself to have asperger's syndrome.
I must say while your writing is interesting and very helpful, it's also very antagonistic. How can you expect people to understand autie's when they've never been inside your head? It seems like you resent people for not understanding you (and rightfully so I guess). Just give people the benefit of the doubt in not knowing how autie's function and maybe help us understand.



From Rich Shull,

Dear Maria and Reader's:

Trust me I have heard these comments before. I'm not apologizing for my comments in any way but perhaps the shocking part of them and indeed my "attitude" is Autism really was understood at one time. Autism was (as I see it) highjacked by Rain Man Era politics and self elected autism experts that have never had an autism thought in their lives. By the time they homogenize Autism to a MR/DD condition and force us in to that ideal the hope the promise autism used to know just dried up and blew away. Honestly, before Rain Man took over people had autisitc's pegged as little profesiors,our splinter skill learning was (absently) the ticket we had to break autism's grasp.(even socially!) NOT being diagnosed forced us into real life and our stories and those of our parents and tutors all prove Autism worked every well at one time. Granted were not perfect but most of us do some sort of normal life and most of us hold real jobs and drive. Our odd stories unintentionally deflate the modern version of Autism. How can they explain our Anthropology and not have to admit they got a hold of the wrong end of the stick?

I always write Autism is BOTH MR/DD and Einstein and the thought process we have figured out to connect the two has never been in a text book before and it hasn't. I'm sure if Autism Research did the right thing and admitted to all of us in the spectrum it would come to the conclusion they missed a few points. All of us that do so well build on the work of Temple Grandin and Autism research will NOT look beyond her ideas and until it does, the Di Vinci Code of Life is lost in the muck we know as Autism.

Good Luck on your Autism book venture and thank you dropping me a note. I appreciate all reader comments and I appreciate your candor. No progress in any subject is ever made sugar coating things. Autism really is two different worlds these days.

Sincerely Rich Shull