Aspies For Freedom

While I've become significantly less skeptical about the AS/Autism link than I once was (fairly recently actually), I'm still curious about demonstrated genetic links between them.

In my family:

Father's side:
Father has Asperger's (undiagnosed but very clear).  
Grandfather has many traits including obsessive interests, rigidity, and talkativeness.  Not many social issues though.
Very eccentric uncle deceased, can't say.

Aunt has many traits, probably short of diagnosis.  Same applies to all of her children except possibly her daughter (see note on Maine below).

Third Cousin (I think) probably has Asperger's.  My mother also observed this in the few hours since we had met him.
His mother and sister have many traits, possible diagnosis.  I observed all this in several hours at the family reunion. I spent most of my time alone or with this family so I can't say any more about the rest of the descendents of the [last name]s of Millenoocket (sp?).

I'll also note that my father's family's from Maine, so it's not clear how much of what I observe as eccentric in my family members is a result of being from Maine.  The entire state is pretty eccentric.

Mother's side (my mother's parents were both from very small immgrant families so aside from her parent's five kids and offspring I have almost no extended family outside of Europe):
Both mother and one aunt have noticeable traits, not on their own enough to be noticeable but more than normal.  Other aunts and uncle not as clear.
Great-Uncle (Grandmother's brother) claimed by my mother as probably having Asperger's.  I don't know him well enought to comment.

Two of my three friends have Aspergers', with both of them both parents have traits.  With one of them diagnosis might be possible for both, certainly highly eccentric.  The other's parents do not go beyond traits.

In contrast, the only girl I know with LFA, as friends of my mother (PDD-NOS + Hyperlexia, but cannot communicate complex thoughts and parents do not ever leave her without supervision), her family, as far as I know:

Father perfectly normal.  He's not a beer-chugging sport-gut nor an elite snob, but he has no noticeable eccentricities aside from what seems to be a high IQ.

Mother has some traits, including rigidity, thin-skinnedness (she's more offended by more things than I am and that's saying a lot), argumentiveness and behaves somewhat differently than I'm used to seeing most people behave in social situations.  

My mother is convinced that she is completely normal though, so it could just be a Mid-western-cultural surt of thing.  Dunkirk, New York is near Ohio, from where my aunt's boyfriend originates.   This boyfriend has some of the same social peculiarities, though he's also a bit eccentric in himself.

My mother has met several family members of both these people and says that none of them have noticeable Asperger's nor Autistic traits.

So I'm curious.

Does anybody know of any examples with several incidences of both LFA and AS in the same extended family?

I've only started looking at family histories since I came back from the family reunion in Maine, and I don't know any LFA people or families very well.

I know of examples, but LFA is not concrete, children can be diagnosed as LFA and then develop and be classed as HFA.

I suppose I'm talking LFA that no amount of counseling teaches fluency in neurotypical.

I was fortunate to have mostly very good teachers thoughout elementary school who explained things to me (first grade I remember as being the only exception), and when I went to Montessouri for half-days in kindergarten they explained things to me too.  Same for Arcadia Nature Day Camp (much unlike the Y Camps my parents used to send me to).

I was always throwing tantrums when I either didn't get things or couldn't see what I wanted to say.

Even undiagnosed with AS I had psychological counseling, social skills groups, and speech therapy from a very young age.  

I still have immense issues dealing with social situations and sensory issues, and in many times have concluded simply that I can't.

I think that without all that, I might well have ended up significantly lower fluency than I am now.

I still think I'd have been diagnosed with AS though.

AS has the superior IQ/normal development and autism has the normal IQ/delayed development distinction, according to a chart showed to me by one psychologist.

Though my poor gross motor coordination does not fit into that chart correctly so it clearly has some issues.

And I've seen AS diagnosis signifcantly lower fluency than I am, often only diagnosed in the past year or so.

So I'm curious I suppose more about a genetic connection between AS and Autism in general.

I've never seen any diagnosis I know to be simple HFA (though I know of at least one case that may be, I haven't tricked an answer out of the paras yet), so when I think Autism I generally think Kanner's or PDD-NOS.

Also, since HFA and AS are often confused by amateurs and shrinks, clear links between those two would be less intertesting than between AS of any fluency level and LFA.

I've gone from wanting to disprove a link to wanting to prove one in a matter of six months or so, and now I want to see something that I can use to convince myself.

Bit confused about some of the things that you said.

I suppose I'm talking LFA that no amount of counseling teaches fluency in neurotypical.

Some dx'd with lfa doesnt become dx'd with hfa because they became NT. The difference is usually that they developed speech.

AS has the superior IQ/normal development and autism has the normal IQ/delayed development distinction, according to a chart showed to me by one psychologist.

AS has normal or high intelligece. It would not be diagnosed with low intelligence.
Autism can have low, normal, or high IQ.

So I'm curious I suppose more about a genetic connection between AS and Autism in general.


AS is HFA. Aspergers is on the autism spectrum. Autism is genetic in over 90% of people.

I've never seen any diagnosis I know to be simple HFA (though I know of at least one case that may be, I haven't tricked an answer out of the paras yet), so when I think Autism I generally think Kanner's or PDD-NOS.

I dont know what that means, or what a para is.

Also, since HFA and AS are often confused by amateurs and shrinks, clear links between those two would be less intertesting than between AS of any fluency level and LFA.

Who else is there besides amateurs and shrinks? They are the same.

There's a lot of proof on genetics, read the rest of this forum, and google, theres tons of info.

The bit that you said you never said, I know you never said it, it was what I said.

The problem with trying to determine if our ancestors or living relatives have autism is that we just do not have enough information about them: either trying to remember what they were like after their death and meeting someone at a family reunion once does not make an amateur diagnosis easy.  
Most people over 30 years old do not possess an official diagnosis anyway.  So we can only guess if someone has AS.

My family:  siblings:  one other sibling possibly with AS, another with some pervasive development issues (slow to develop speech)

nephew with developmental issues (also deaf) but I am not sure since no one seems to tell me anything.

mother:  must have some ADHD

father:  some AS traits

paternal grandmother:   definitely had AS but diagnosed with schizophrenia.

some paternal cousins:  one child diagnosed with AS, other relatives with different types of autism but I do not know them.

maternal grandparents:  one with anxiety disorder, one had AS traits

other maternal relatives:  one with AS traits.  


What really bothers me is my family's total ignorance about autism and AS.  My mother was telling me about my 6 yr old cousin with AS that "she can not do her homework and she always want to watch the same video over and over.  (most 6 yr olds I know will wear out the video).  
My mother seemed shocked that I knew about AS when I told her that she  would be surprised that some many adults had AS.  If I told her that I had AS, she would probably never recover from it (and she would be calling up everyone we know to tell them).

possibly there could be some autism or autistic traits in my husband's family.

Probably the most interesting point I have noticed is that family's that have some members with autism seem to be more accepting of other individuals with autism than families that are strictly NT.

There seems to be nobody in my family with LFA but quite a few with either Aspergers or borderline Aspergers or HFA. I know I'm the only one who has been officially diagnosed but I'm getting good at spotting features of the condition in other people. I won't normally give my opinion unless asked for it (but often speak with mum and ask her if she thinks I could be on the right track in my thinking and she usually says she has suspected it too).