An Aspie from Facebook, Augie, recently read Nobody Nowhere.  I offered him the opportunity to send me 5 questions.  These are his questions and my answers:

Augustus Johnson wrote:
1. Do you like kaleidascopes?

Donna Williams wrote:

hmm, well I used to like them a lot but mostly I prefer ‘fly eyes’ where you can see one thing a hundred times.
I like looking through colored glass more than I like kaleidascopes.

Augustus Johnson wrote:
2. Is there a difference between waffling and wonking?

Donna Williams wrote:

I think they both mean the bigot using the terms has no understanding of Semantic Pragmatic Language Disorder 🙂

Augustus Johnson wrote:
3. Do you still have sleep issues, and do you see a prevalence of these on the spectrum?

Donna Williams wrote:

I’m mostly ok since being GF/CF/low salicylate/low sugar/on supplements/low amount of Seroquel.
Sleep issues are really common in those with bipolar, anxiety disorders, health issues… I think its wrong that we presume them to do with ‘autism’ as those with autism who don’t have these other issues likely don’t have sleep disorders.

Augustus Johnson wrote:
4. What is your take on genetics vs vaccinations?

Donna Williams wrote:

well, it’s possible there’s a subset of people with autism with cellular or immune disorders who don’t respond well to overwhelming levels of vaccination regimes but who equally will be extremely disadvantaged in a progressively unvaccinated world as its those people who also won’t stand a chance with the full blown viruses either.

There are those who have inherited tendencies to dyspraxias, dyslexia, agnosias, ADHD, bipolar, OCD, Tourette’s, anxiety/neurosis or have high levels of more ‘autistic’ or ‘aspie’ personality traits who will tend to appear ‘genetically autistic’.  A percentage of those people may ALSO have health issues which are dormant until significant environmental assaults bring their impact to the fore, where we may see a significant worsening of the extremity of that person’s developmental issues.  It is important to separate out those with these predispositions from those without them and to also challenge the presumptions that just because a collection of fruit salad presents as ‘autism’ that they are all the same ‘autisms’.  I also think the political possessiveness and hatred about who has ‘pure’ or ‘real’ autism reminds me of Nazism.

The fact is if it looks like a duck and sounds like a duck and walks like a duck then until it has no features whatsoever of being a duck, it is probably some version of a duck.  It’s also true that if we call fruit salads ‘the autism’ then we’ll never address the pieces of the fruit salads properly then flag waving someone’s ‘severe autism’ is silly.  What do they mean by it?  Severe speech aphasia?  Severe dyspraxias?  Severe untreated co-morbids?  Severe learned helplessness or personality disorders?  Severe untreated health issues.

Of course if the whole fruit salad is called ‘the autism’ and some guesswork ‘autism approach’ is applied, the person’s fruit salad goes actually unaddressed.  So, I think the vaccination thing is sometimes because people don’t get the fruit salad model.  I’ve met kids who appear to have had infant stroke (which can go undetected) which can cause agnosias, aphasias and progressively frustrate and disturb the child and its environment to the point we see what we call ‘autism’.  And these are common in prem babies but can also occur as vascular incidents in non-prems and even in some infants with metabolic disorders, so imagine if a child is, say, age 2 and unknown to the family is salicylate intolerant (around 60% of those on the spectrum are, and wouldn’t have had salicylate intake until around 18 months), and gets its vaccinations at the same time as moving onto fruit juices and swallowing toothpaste (the fluoride in which strips the gut lining and increases salicylate toxicity) and next thing we see a kid who’s neurologically losing it and whose gut function has gone to the wall… do we blame the vaccinations?  See there’s a mountain of other possibilities.

Augustus Johnson wrote:
5. What is your take on ‘cure’ vs acceptance?

Donna Williams wrote:

I think people with significant untreated co-morbids and health issues or significantly disabling agnosias, aphasias, dyspraxias need treatment.  I think people who are merely neurologically different or have ‘autistic personalities’ need insight, advocacy and training in maximising their opportunities in a world bound to misunderstand oddities.