Research confirms antidepressant-autism link

Rezlooper
reply to post by Mountainmeg

 

I believe in the antidepressants as a cause because I've witnessed it in my own family, but we didn't put two and two together until now. But, I also don't think this is the only cause of autism. I believe there are other causes, such as vaccines, and maybe genetics.

You ever consider that perhaps autism has always existed and is actually part of the neurodiversity that humanity can represent? I think the largest problem with autism diagnosis is that the presentation of it can be pretty different even amongst autistics. It wasn't diagnosed until I was 23 and it took persistent observation to realize that I was actually autistic (I was being treated for severe PTSD). My end diagnosis was that moderate to severe autism but high functional. I kept quiet about it for years and only informed significant others. Nobody ever guessed. At the most, when I opted to point out that I was actually diagnosed as autistic because of developing attitudes, people saw me nearly uniformly as being a shy, quiet, and kind girl who simply walked to her own beat of the drum. They didn't see my difference as a bad thing but instead, as a good thing. One even said that I couldn't possibly be autistic because I was "too normal", lol.

My point is this--yes, when things start skipping most obviously outside of the "neurotypical", such as in the case of autistic children who are near totally bound by their minds, humanity is wildly diverse in the presentation of brain function. Sometimes I think that the continual expansion of "what is normal" is really a tyranny of neurological conformity and if it is as such, then that could have dreadful implications. You remove all those who think differently in the world and what does humanity lose? Inventors, spiritual leaders, artists? Are you willing to risk parting with those to make it so that everyone thinks in the same way as everyone else? How is seeing autism as a disease or scourge any different then basically saying that thinking differently is somehow bad?