I also agree that whatever other parts of my autism fruit salad I have addressed and balanced out and managed, I remain, essentially an autistic person by nature. There are environments where it is endangering to be what others would abuse and so, in those pathological environments I have desperately hidden as much of my autism and autistic nature as possible. These days, however, I avoid such pathological environments in any ongoing way for they are a path to true despair, and that is deeply deeply unhealthy.

Choosing to not fight persistently at every turn to act non-autistically (and we have enough TV shows to mimic all that by adulthood if we are in enough endangerment to be highly motivated to do so) is not the same as choosing to act autistic, it just means one hides less of one’s systems, one’s adaptation and strategies, one’s autistic nature.

I am holistic in my thinking, and very fluid… do you know Einstein had the Idiosyncratic trait and is listed as an archetypal example of it… this trait is the one capable of complex holistic and fluid thought…anyway thinking this way is not necessarily any form of avoidance or denial but those without this trait may puzzle at why I avoid boxes. The idiosyncratic trait is also be nature stressed by expectation to conform, motivated by non-conformity, perhaps this feeds the fluid, seemingly aloof, nature of my replies. I certainly don’t mean to be frustrating, nor am I avoiding facing truths, its just my WAY in which I do them is frustrating to those without this trait who may work n a far more black and white reality where my thinking is more like labyrinths and confetti.

On my website I have some art in a category called Neoteric… it may interest you.

yes, in the 60s and 70s the personality range for autism was narrowly defined and being inherently solitary was an essential part of that. But since them we have found many things can exaccerbate such a nature… chronic depression in early childhood for example, being chronically ill, lethargic and cognitively overwhelmed or having sensory perceptual chaos contributes to low levels of expression and withdrawal in many people.

And whilst gut, immune, metabolic disorders don’t apply to most ‘high functioning’ people with ASD, they are relatively common in more impaired younger children with autism…some of whom physiologically recover without treatment as part of a strengthening immune system… but others may have diets which contribute to their challenges (no kid living on flavored potato chips and sugar drinks to the exclusion of all else can remain healthy after 18 months on such nutritionally deficient and often allergenic crap)…and some have inherited dispositions to gut, immune, metabolic disorders.

Also, whilst the rate of those with cellular disorders among those with autism may be low, if you look instead at the 1 in 4000 children with cellular disorders, most will present with developmental disorders, including, in some cases autism.

Since the 1990s, personality traits figure less and less in the diagnosis of autism…. so it has changed. I have met very sociable children diagnosed with autism in the last 5 years due to their cognitive, sensory perceptual and neuropsychiatric range of challenges.

Also, although I was always fiercely solitary, mania also meant that I sang and ran and squealed and jumped so being fiercely solitary can still have a very sociable presentation, although once people approach the person may either avoid, divert or retaliate against the interaction or try and interact but appears to do so in a highly solitary manner. The idiosyncratic trait for example, can be sociable but is highly solitary…. if you go to socialise with them you end up sitting with someone who may struggle to stop drifting off into their own world chatting to themselves obliviously. So some forms of solitary can also have a relatively sociable presentation too!

if you haven’t seen The Jumbled Jigsaw, it gives you examples how various PIECES of ‘autism fruit salad’ can interact in the overall diagnosis of one world which has underlying ery different combinations in very different people with the same diagnosis.

“I have a personality which includes almost exclusively solitary traits (solitary, vigilant, idiosyncratic, artistic and self sacrificing) which could easily appear more ‘autistic’ than many though I don’t confuse it with my autism.”

To me, that’s far more *autism* than gut, immune and metabolic disorders (which aren’t actually proven to even be more common in autism), and about equally part of autism as meaning blindness, meaning deafness and compulsiveness. (Note: I left out mood and anxiety disorders as they are in between, proven strongly associated but not considered diagnostic of autism). A sociable person with gut, immune, metabolic, mood and anxiety issues would certainly not be considered autistic, if they also had meaning blindness, meaning deafness and compulsiveness they might be considered autistic or might not, depending on who was looking. But a solitary person, like you, with those traits, is clearly autistic.

So this is purely a sociological exploration not of my views, but for people to explore how THEY distinguish condition and personhood. The reason is that once one has a label, unless specifically told which parts of one’s functioning and behaviour are particularly ‘autistic’ one can label any part of it as ‘part of the autism’.

This is fine, its a choice, but in proclamations of pride in being autistic, versus pride in being a person with autism, then it’s a useful forum for people to safely explore that hopefully without fear of crusades, witchhunts etc.

Personally, I think it’s hard to draw distinctions between “self” and “condition” for conditions that affect the mind / brain, and I don’t think there is an essential distinction to be made. So I can understand why people get nervous when lofty terms like “cure” are flung around, even if those same people wouldn’t mind relief from a variety of unpleasant mental and physical symptoms of their condition.