 The Thoughty Autie podcast. And also like with that intrusive piece that you're talking about like, you know, before it was Asperger's and autism, right? They still were under an umbrella, right? But they were separated. Now it's autism spectrum disorder. So I'm curious from someone who has autism, you know, what that does for someone who's identified? I think it's an interesting question. I know it's a very, there are some trigger points within the autistic community and a lot of the trigger points tend to be around what we call functioning labels. Like high functioning autism or whatever, yeah. And basically the Asperger's label was created by Hans Asperger, who? So sort of a researcher in Vienna, they owned this really, really great children's hospital at the time and it was taken over by sort of the Nazis during the Second World War. And yeah, and basically he made the distinction between two groups of people. One which you called Asperger's syndrome, which were people he deemed to be sort of useful to society. Usually tend to be, obviously there's social awkwardness sort of on the outside to them, but more of the hyper fixation, the sort of the more intelligent ones. And sort of he boxed those people off so they weren't removed. I won't go into too much about that, but so there's a bit of history around that and we have a lot of issues in the autistic community like fears around eugenics, which has been, it's only in the last sort of 10 odd years where it's kind of been challenged in some sort of some organizations. So there's that kind of split. And I think a lot of people will respond quite drastically to things like that because they were very sort of quick to kind of identify that and sort of separate ourselves from the label. For me, it's quite a bit more complicated because I see the utility of having sort of set categories of people based on which needs they have. I think for a lot of people, it's just the terminology. It's like, it's not nice to be called like function. What makes you some in high functioning or low functioning? Exactly. It's not like you have high functioning ADHD and low functioning ADHD. It's like, it's not nice for someone to call you low functioning because what are you trying to say? Right. And it's not nice for someone to call you high functioning because you may have loads of issues but be considered high functioning and people don't take you seriously. You don't get as many supports. You don't get as many adjustments. So, you know, both of those terms, they kind of, they box people off based on, you know, what their needs and their functioning levels which is not something that people like to draw a lot of attention to. Sure. And you know, for me personally, it's something that I've thought about quite a lot. There's different ways of saying it nowadays. I think it's more about categorizations but whenever we try to, whenever I try to kind of think about or have a dialogue around sort of the utility of those kind of categorizations, it's almost always like a really hot point of, you know, people saying like, how dare you? You're enablest. You're saying that we're better than them and stuff like that. But then you have the parents of autistic people or friends or supporters of autistic people who have like intellectual disabilities. They can't manage a job. They can't live by themselves. You know, they have all these supports in place. They can't communicate sometimes. So, there's that kind of, there's that tension around making that distinction which can often kind of shut down a lot of conversations around those things. Which then I'm wondering like, now that people don't use the term Asperger's, right? So now. Mm-hmm. It's ASD one, two, and three. Which is basically, I think it's worse for the cause because you're literally saying like, what level of autism do you have in one, two, and three is which I don't think that's a good way of doing it, but. Right. Yeah. It's a very complicated word. But you know what, with ADHD, there's mild, moderate, and severe. So I guess that's your one, two, and three. But it's not indicative of intellectual ability. Yes. It's just the amount, like, how prominent the ADHD is. So. I think for me, I tend to make the distinctions because I tend to make the distinction based on if or not they have an intellectual disability. So I just say they're autistic and they have intellectual disability. Which kind of, you know, it's not, we're not talking about levels of autism, but we're talking about autism and a different diagnosis. Mm-hmm. So it's kind of hard work in that line. I think, you know, one thing that I'd be really interested in knowing is around the sort of the particulars around identity and language before we sort of wrap up. Mm-hmm, yes. I find it really interesting because I mean, for you, you've been sort of using that person- Individuals with, yep, and in the UK it's opposite. And if you say that in the US, it's offensive. Yeah, well, it's, you know, for, I think in terms of autism, the consensus is for autistic adults is that a lot of us like, well, I just said it, a lot of us like to be identity first. Like, and it's weird because people who prefer one use of a language versus another, like they both have sort of positive intentions with it. Like the person-first language, it's like, oh, person-first. Like, of course we want to put the person-first. That's great. They're different from this. They're better than this. Whereas when you have the identity first, it's like, well, you don't wanna box someone off into a category. But I think that the real sort of difference is the attitude in terms of identity because if you view autism in sort of a neutral to positive way, and you see it as part of your being and you don't feel like if you went autistic, if you feel like you wouldn't be your same person if you didn't have an autism diagnosis. And it's something that I feel for myself. But then I do understand sort of, it tends to be sort of with the more person-first language, it's something that's being used quite a lot in the word of education and parenting. So it's kind of been adopted for a different reason, but it's all in the positive intentions of using that. So it's interesting that like crossover between but what about ADHD because I know that there are some- Individuals with ADHD. Yeah, it's the same difference with the UK and the US with autism and ADHD. So I had this conversation with another podcaster in the UK and coming from a school background we had to be very careful how we identified someone with a disability. So even on an individual education plan, which is a legal binding document with services and accommodations, it's an individual with autism, an individual with ADHD, an individual with depression, an individual with anxiety. It's not an anxiety person or an ADHD person or an autism person, right? I think it's interesting there's crossovers, like I've talked to people with like physical disabilities and they don't want to be called physically disabled. Person. They want to be a person with a physical disability. Disability, right? But in terms of like the ADHD community sort of outside of education, outside of those kind of systems, do you think that ADHDers sort of prefer that person first language or that kind of identity first language? I think it depends where they're from. That's fair enough. I think from the UK, they're used to doing the identity first. So from the US, they are used to doing the, but yeah, I mean, and some people are more sensitive to the labels than others, you know? Just like ADHD and autism, it's a spectrum, right? So everyone responds differently to labels, I think. Yeah. I think it's generally consensus that identity first is preferred by a lot of autistic people, but... Yes, and some people don't understand labels, too. Some people without the diagnosis or even with the diagnosis, you know, they'll say, why do you need to label it? Yeah. Nothing happens in vacuum, which is true, right? So everything is nature and nurture. However, you know, it helps individuals, usually, to be more self-aware and be able to come from a place of strengths within their diagnosis as well, right? Like everyone has strengths, just human strengths that they have based on their core strengths and their core values. But then there's also typical strengths of individuals with autism and individuals with ADHD. So knowing those and knowing your boundaries with weaknesses can help you thrive with a diagnosis, too. It's very interesting. I mean, it's, for me, it's, you know, I like to be referred to as an autistic person, but I'm also, like, but only in the case of, like, you know, someone was to put a media piece out. I would prefer that they say, Thomas is an autistic person rather than Thomas has autism, Thomas with autism. Just as a personal preference, but I know that a lot of people can be very... They can find that kind of difference in language and they're very, very difficult to navigate for themselves. They can get quite upset if people use the wrong sort of terms for it. So, to be honest, the majority... That's interesting. So as someone... Sorry. It's okay. You go. I think the majority of people, they don't mind either way. They saw it. Most people that I know use it interchangeably. It's just kind of what fits with the sentence that you're saying. But I know that it has been a talking point in the past. Definitely. So, yeah, I'm curious, right? So you have autism, I have ADHD. So you're from the UK, I'm from the US. So when I identify you in a conversation, right? Would I say you're an autistic individual? Because, right, you're autistic. And then when you talk to me, are you going to say... I have ADHD. That's why I was kind of like, do I call you an ADHDer? Do I say... Right, right. Yeah. PC. I don't know. I don't know if it is a... I don't know if it is a sort of a regional thing. Meanwhile, I call myself an ADHDer all the time. It's just easier for me rather than dragging it out an individual with ADHD and in my social media and in my newsletters, I very often use ADHDer. And I've had some people even from the US or the UK who've been offended by the word ADHDer. So you just don't know. It's interesting, isn't it? Yeah. I think the consensus is that... I know a lot of people like the identity first for autism, but I think it's always just good to go by what the individual wants to use. Exactly. Like, if I want to change my name... Exactly. If I want to change my name from Brooke to Beth, you're going to call me Beth, not Brooke. If you want to be called, you know, an autistic person, then I'm going to call you an autistic person or autistic, right? Yeah.