I don't think they kill off old disabled people, it's just that a lot of the conditions that cause mental retardation also tend to cause shorter lifespans (like Down Syndrome, as you mentioned). I had a great aunt who was mentally *** due to botched delivery causing severe hypoxia, but physically she was healthy for the rest of her life and she lived to be eighty-something.
She lived in a special "institution" her whole life, though (that's what they did back then), which leads me to believe that the third theory you have is most likely. Normal people go to normal old folks' homes, and *** people go to *** old folks' homes, or something like that. I'm not sure where Aspies would go, though. Seeing as how it wasn't even a diagnosis until 1994, they probably just got put in normal nursing homes, while LFA (who were often incorrectly regarded as being mentally disabled) went to the "special" nursing homes.
I don't really know.
Meh... As long as you don't show some severe disability (the majority of Aspies don't), then I'm sure you'd just go to a normal nursing home. A lot of old people have dementia and Alzheimer's anyway, so I don't think an Aspie would stand out as being too "different".
[quote]Hey guys less of the word ***, it is offensive and quite frankly hypocritical. I have (as has my sister) been called a *** again and again as kids. Sorry to be politically correct. The official term is Learning disability, I know many people with learning disabilities who prefer to use the term learning difficulty.[/i]
Mentally *** and learning disabilities are not the same thing. It's true that people who are *** might have learning disabilities as well, but by no means are all people with dyslexia, dyspraxia, dysphasia, etc. (which are all learning disabilities) mentally ***. My brother has learning disabilities, but he is quite smart and is going to be completing his degree in history at a nice university in a couple months.
Last time I checked, "mentally ***" and "mentally disabled" were both valid, medical terms for cognitive impairment. What's not considered politically correct are terms like "***" or just "tard", but neither of those terms were used.
Slightly of topic, but Autism has now become a term of abuse, I have heard that kids get picked on for being autistic now at school. I have read that parent's prefer Asperger's to High Functioning Autism as a 'label' as its more 'sociably appropriate'. I think the world has gone mad! There is a lot in a word.
If all that is ture, then why haven't I seen a single person with cerebral palsy in an old folk's home> Seriously, I want to know not just from speculation, but actual experience: have any of you known any old autistic people (HFA, AS, LFA, whatever the label) and where did they go when they got old?
Hi,
I work for an agency in Central New York. We have house for disabled adults and children starting at age 5. We have many residents with Autism, Cerebral Pasy,MR etc.....We have someone as old as eighty something and someone as young as 5. We have 30 or so houses that they live in. We also have schools for children and Day Treatment's for adults. We take them on vacation, shopping or for day trips.
Welcome to the Forums, FredWye!
Hey guys less of the word ***, it is offensive and quite frankly hypocritical.
When I was young anyone who had trouble learning was called an idiot or moron, then that became offensive so they were called dumb (if they could not hear they were called deaf and dumb). That became offensive so they called them ***. (our towns schools had an "Opportunity Class for the Mentally ***"). That became offensive so they called the developementally disabled or menatally challanged or something. No matter what they are called it will become offensive and a new word will be used.
It's the same here in Sweden. The terminology is changing but the people remain ignorant.
Up until the late 80ies there were huge complexes that housed people that were disabled in some way. They would have been placed there either very early in life or when their illness had taken the better of them. Inside these places they were wards of the state but as a result of a reform the responsibility was shifted to another level. This proved to be a problem for a lot of people that then, after decades inside an institution and cut off from family/society or just plain forgotten, suddenly should move to their own flat. Lots of them fell through the cracks and ended up as homeless.
Sweden has a long tradition of "exterminating the unwanted" and there was even an institute for racial hygiene that existed from around 1910 and was still in function until very recently. The whole idea of racial hygiene was a French idea from the beginning. So the nazis wasn't the first to think in those lines. Thousands and thousands of young women were institutionalised because they were of a lesser value as mothers. They were manipulated to comply to being robbed of their ability to have babies.
In the old days 19-20th century, eccentrics was more prevalent in the every day society than one would think and since they could take care of themselves and didn't want to be institutionalised they had their small businesses to live from. The reasons that resulted in that people and women in general taken to the asylums was that they had been deemed promiscous or had rebelled against some higher person;
or because of loose talk and slander...
Tomas
Slightly of topic, but Autism has now become a term of abuse, I have heard that kids get picked on for being autistic now at school. I have read that parent's prefer Asperger's to High Functioning Autism as a 'label' as its more 'sociably appropriate'. I think the world has gone mad! There is a lot in a word.
I knew it!
I'm glad to have graduated long before "Asperger's" became a popular word. (I'm not dx'ed, but I most likely would have been if checked around age 13.)
After reading one of HST&T's posts on another thread, I got the impression it was headed in that direction. All those little brats who always wanted to call the socially awkward smart kids "***" have been given ammo. It's amazing how kids catch onto stuff they have no business with, if it makes them feel superior to somebody else.
(Pardon the rant. I believe y'all were talking about old people, not kids.)
Maybe by the time people with AS/HFA get to nursing home age, they have learned to mimic NT behaviour so well that it is impossible to tell that they are AS/HFA anymore. I know that at the age of 25 my behaviour is a lot less obviously AS than it was when I was 11.
Old people have (usually) spent decades in the workplace, and many of the people with AS would have learned to assimilate NT behaviour in order to hold down a job (back in the days when being 'different' in any way was a sackable offence).
The other thing that occured to me is that in a nursing home where many of the patients have Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia, AS really isn't a big issue. Many AS person can look after themselves just as well as NT people, and the fact they even have AS/HFA will probably go unnoticed by staff who are far too busy bathing and feeding and otherwise caring for patients with severe dementia.
Meh... As long as you don't show some severe disability (the majority of Aspies don't), then I'm sure you'd just go to a normal nursing home. A lot of old people have dementia and Alzheimer's anyway, so I don't think an Aspie would stand out as being too "different".
I believe I read somewhere that those with Asperger's *may* be more likely to develop Alzheimer's. I think this was actually a question on the RDOS Aspie Quiz.
Hey guys less of the word ***, it is offensive and quite frankly hypocritical. I have (as has my sister) been called a *** again and again as kids. Sorry to be politically correct. The official term is Learning disability, I know many people with learning disabilities who prefer to use the term learning difficulty.
People with learning difficulties are usually under the Learning disabilities team in supported living or residential care. Old people without general learning disability come under the older person's team's and live in supported living, sheltered accommodation or resenditial homes.
Down's sydrome have a slightly shorter life expectancy, but that is also increasing now just as it is in the 'normal' population.
I am sure there are many 'autistic' old folk, look for the ones for memories like an elephant! and also think about those who are suffering from the early stages of dementia. There is something similiar in the brains of autistic people and those in the early stages of dementia. Don't ask where I heard that and don't take it as fact.
I have always had an incredible longterm memory, so has my father, come to think of it...
As for dementia, would this present in a similar way to Alzheimer's?
[quote]Hey guys less of the word ***, it is offensive and quite frankly hypocritical. I have (as has my sister) been called a *** again and again as kids. Sorry to be politically correct. The official term is Learning disability, I know many people with learning disabilities who prefer to use the term learning difficulty.[/i]
Mentally *** and learning disabilities are not the same thing. It's true that people who are *** might have learning disabilities as well, but by no means are all people with dyslexia, dyspraxia, dysphasia, etc. (which are all learning disabilities) mentally ***. My brother has learning disabilities, but he is quite smart and is going to be completing his degree in history at a nice university in a couple months.
Last time I checked, "mentally ***" and "mentally disabled" were both valid, medical terms for cognitive impairment. What's not considered politically correct are terms like "***" or just "tard", but neither of those terms were used.
What are the "tell-tale" signs of Dyspraxia? I believe have a mild form of it, but I'm not sure how "strong" it is, with me.
I don't think anybody here is meaning to be offensive. Remember we're Aspies and we know what it's like to be excluded and picked on; and a lot of us have friends with MR or at least have met people with it. I know I have... but maybe being an Aspie is good for that, because I don't really notice much is different until a few minutes into the conversation. Prevents me from forming any stupid prejudicial ideas about the person on first seeing them, because I'm too oblivious to notice anything's different right away!
Are you kidding me? I am uncommonly good about detecting differences in speech, mannerisms of others, etc, that might signify some sort of "neurological difference" (I will not use the other words, as I agree they are offensive, and so so.)
In general I know Aspies tend to frequently miss the obvious with people (as do I, sometimes), but I believe I have developed an intense analytical ability that I have extended into social observation. I am very "alert" in this way, but the problem is that my self-awareness (I am a very self-aware Aspie) makes me over-analyze.. and then I get into paranoia.
I broke down in social paranoia in 10th/11th grade because I think my concious analysis was overcompensating for lack of theory of mind, for indeed high school is when social information becomes rapidly more complex... does this make sense?
In general I have some abilities which might be unusual for Aspies... but not for a more observant Aspie. I am curious about the environment, and that includes people.
What are the "tell-tale" signs of Dyspraxia? I believe have a mild form of it, but I'm not sure how "strong" it is, with me.
http://www.dyspraxiafoundation.org.uk/
Yeah, I checked it out. I have a lot of bits and pieces of it, but I don't have any of them in the extreme.
What is most apparent is my problem with long sequences, and so on, remembering them. I clearly don't have any word/grammar difficulties, although I do have a strange "can't always tell left from right" problem.. I have heard this is common in Asperger's/ASDs... would this be an example of Dyspraxia?
I wonder if my "randomness" (I have lots of random thoughts throughout the day, often odd visual associations among them) and my creativity come from my Dyspraxia.. or more likely my ADD?
Or perhaps I'm just an imaginative/creative person, regardless?
Thoughts?
...but maybe being an Aspie is good for that, because I don't really notice much is different until a few minutes into the conversation. Prevents me from forming any stupid prejudicial ideas about the person on first seeing them, because I'm too oblivious to notice anything's different right away
I am the same, but I must add that I have noticed that a certain percentage of Aspies seem to go the opposite way, being hyper-aware of these things, not just of others being different but of others mocking them etc. That may be partly why certain types of problems like social anxiety are more common in more socially aware Aspies.
You've just hit the nail on the head, with me at least. This insight defines me to the letter.. the hyper-awareness. It comes in handy but it also causes a lot of its own problems.
There have been several mentions of elderly and homeless. Now I'm still new to the definitions; I've always just looked for a "certain type of human".
Associated with that search has been a life long (since adolescence) awareness of "the homeless" as those humans that other humans don't see...I called and continue to call them, gypsies.
I've found that 8 out the 10 people who were "that type", that I could find were found among the homeless. (And doesn't that get you into trouble with authority figures when they find the 12 year old chatting with the homeless!)
I know overseas (I'm USA) the term gypsy has a different connotation but here it is romanticized. It feels better on the tongue to describe some of my friends than "homeless" or "indigent".
Some of my friends (all elderly but their hard life might make them younger than they look, some don't know how old they are) are homeless by choice and do not seek the New York City services like mentioned earlier in the thread.
These are tough old birds. Hard to find, hard to know. A lot harder to find as an adult than as a child--don't know why; maybe I put off too many manufactured NT vibes.
Some I have helped navigate the system because age and skill made that their only option. I deal with really fringe people, often without "papers" so even finding those resources are hard, never mind safe.
They are very primal but different from a gypsy NT/primal. They usually have what are classed as delusions until you get to know them and find out they have a perfectly reasonable explanation.
(Usually one that equates with simming and/or sensitivity tho' neither they nor I were aware of the term until now.)
But I hate to say it guys, all of my friends of "that type of people", ARE old and depending on your perspective, aren't doing so well.
I've kinda taken to picking up pointers to living off-grid as a back up plan.