 So I've got one from Katie Morton. I don't know who this person is. It says that they're a licensed therapist making mental health videos. So I imagine this is going to be a very general take of autism in general, not necessarily coming from the place of an autistic person. So it might be quite interesting to add the experiential angle on this topic. It doesn't seem like YouTube is very upset that we're watching this one. So I think we'll go for this one. Patron, eh? Hey everyone, today we're going to talk about high functioning autism. What is it and how does it differ from other parts of the autism spectrum? But before we jump into that, are you new to my channel? Welcome! Make sure you are subscribed and have those notifications turned on because I put out videos on Mondays and Thursdays and I don't want you to miss out. But let's jump into today's topic. First I think it's important to- Okay, just for context guys here. This video was made five years ago. There was not a lot of autism content on here five years ago. We'll go for it. We know that the language might be a bit kind of off to some degree, but I think it's- It'd be interesting to see what she has to say about the differences, I guess. Because I think one of the things that I struggle with in the autistic community is that we don't necessarily want to talk about the facts that people have very wide varying support needs, you know? A lot of autistic people- I wouldn't say even the majority of autistic people, probably just under half of people if I'm right, they'll quote me on that. They need full-time care. They don't necessarily have the level of ability to support themselves. They need full-time care. I've worked with a lot of autistic individuals who fit that criteria quite well. It's not coming from a place of supremacy, but a lot of these individuals, they very much struggle with basic life skills. They very much struggle in terms of understanding things, in terms of acting appropriate in a social context, just from my experience. So I think it's good to talk about this stuff, you know? Even if it's not the most favourable topic to talk about for a lot of people. Oh, that high-functioning autism isn't an actual diagnosis. It's not in the DSM, nor is it an official medical term. But people use this term casually when they're talking about someone on the spectrum who can speak, write, and handle basic life tasks, and they often are able to live on their own. People who fall into this portion of the spectrum often live lives just like anyone else. They're even said to be higher-functioning cognitively than others who are on the spectrum. But I also want you all to know that I am not a specialist. And people in general, average or above-average intelligence, you know? Special interests, focuses, lots of really good skills that I would say surpass in general neurotypicals in some areas. Other things we can find a lot harder, but there are definitely some positives, a fair amount of positives about being autistic from my experience from talking to other people. And they are highlighting here that they're not a specialist, so I imagine that this is kind of one of, if not, you know, one of a very broad amount of videos that kind of cover things generally. What do I pretend to have all the answers when it comes to autism spectrum disorders as a whole? What I did was I reached out to some colleagues of mine who graciously shared their tips and their own expertise and I also read many, many studies and parenting blogs. So it gives me kind of an overall idea of how people talk about it, how they treat it, and what we need to know. There is where you went wrong, Katie. You need to reach out to autistic adults. Parenting blogs, it's not really going to help you there. You can understand children, I guess, to a certain degree, but, you know, talking to autistic adults in my experience tends to give you the best representation of what it is like to be autistic, you know? Ned says I'm a senior software engineer, quite good at it. That is very good to hear. When did you find out that you were autistic, Ned? A thumbnail designer. You're very welcome to design me some thumbnails. That would be great. I don't know if I can pay you for it at this point in my YouTube career, but very, very welcome. A 50, wow. Well, hold that because we will be looking at unmasking after late autism diagnosis in a bit. Since the 1990s, medical and mental health professionals have been recognizing milder forms of autism. Prior to this, only the most severe cases were diagnosed and treated. So this is when Asperger's became a more well-known diagnosis as a whole. People realized that there was a spectrum to autism, and that's why in 2013, they grouped all of these diagnoses into one, calling them all autism spectrum disorders. And you may still hear people using outdated terms like Asperger's, but that's most likely because they either haven't kept up with the many changes to treatment or they're referring to someone who was diagnosed prior to 2013. Yes, and it's still on my record diagnosed Asperger's syndrome. It's still a diagnosis that is withstanding it hasn't been changed to ASD1 or anything like that. A lot of terminology here, milder, severe, obviously not the most favorable language, but five years ago, gotta remember. Now let's jump into the symptoms of high-functioning autism. Just like anyone on the autism spectrum, high-functioning people can still struggle with communication, making eye contact, and socially interacting overall. Since interacting with others can be so difficult, those who are high-functioning often report feeling really anxious prior to a social gathering and being wiped out afterwards because it just takes so much energy to engage with others. And there's a large difference between women and men when it comes to presented symptoms, but don't worry, that information will be saved for another video. They find that anxiety, OCD, bipolar disorder, and depression are the most common comorbidities with high-functioning autism. I would also add that things like epilepsy, definitely, you can pretty much type in autism and any other kind of mental health sort of cognitive disorder or neurodiversity and it will come up with something. There is quite a heavy crossover with a lot of things. I'd say the one that has the highest crossover, I would say, is anxiety is pretty high up there. I think it's like 40%, pretty common. But ADHD, very, very common. Ned, I hear that we, all these Aspies are good with computers, but I'm not. I'm okay with computers, but that's because I work on them all the time. Also, some struggle with making eye contacts and overall social interactions. I probably change that to most, just saying. Minor change there. Morbidity means is that they happen together at the same time. And research also shows that OCD and high-functioning autism commonly occur together because they are both affected by abnormalities in a person's serotonin production. Pretty interesting, right? And based on that information, we could conclude that all comorbidities can be caused and affected by serotonin changes. I also believe that because people with high-functioning autism are more aware of their differences from others, they could feel really anxious about interacting with people or even extremely depressed about their struggle to connect. I think that there is definitely that struggle to connect, which is very apparent, but like, Jesus Christ, it's definitely not the main thing. One of my favorite quotes is that, I don't suffer with autism, I suffer with people. And it's very common for a lot of us to have a lot of negative life experiences. Things to do with bullying, making it in the workplace. There's a lot of things that make being autistic really, really difficult. I will have to do a bit more digging into the serotonin aspect of things because we can kind of look at the outcomes of lives that autistic people have, but it's not necessarily because they're autistic that they have that outcome. We talk a lot about the biological versus social models of disability. The social model of disability being that we are disabled by the interaction of ourselves with the environment that we are presented. A lot of the time that environment tends to be very unfavorable for a lot of us and it can really kind of impact us in the long term. So there is some kind of research that I saw in terms of anxiety somewhat. I haven't heard much about serotonin production, but I will have to look into that. Sometimes having insight and awareness into our own conditions can really be hard to handle and it could lead to other mental health issues. People with high functioning autism may also struggle to understand jokes or sarcasm from their peers. Therefore, they can appear more mature for their age, but they're really just uncomfortable in social situations as a whole and don't really understand what's going on. Look, I get this was done five years ago, but jeez, man, like the stretches that are going on here in terms of why things happen, they are just monumentous, like they're massive. I don't know how this is something that... I mean, at the time they had 260,000 subscribers and now 1.2, 2.8 million. This is like... It's beginning to irritate me slightly, if I'm to be honest. I'm going to read some of the chat. Getting back into college is complicated for me with registering for classes, was that half of you too? I didn't find the actual academic side of things hard apart from examinations where there was very unsure questions, very open questions that they weren't asking for exactly what I knew about a certain topic. But I definitely say if you are getting back into college, try and foster some level of relationship with one of the higher ups. For me, having a student support officer who really understood me and who I communicated with on a regular basis really helped me out a lot in quite sticky situations. So I definitely highlight that as something good to do. What do you think is the likelihood that the work out that ADHD and autism are just manifestations of the same thing? Yeah, I think it is, you know, there is some differences. I know some people who aren't autistic and they are ADHD. I can very much tell that they aren't autistic. I'd say that it could be part of this kind of overarching umbrella, I guess, possibly. There is a very, very heavy crossover between the two. But I guess if ADHD was to be included under the autism spectrum then that would kind of make sense to some degree. I think it's a lot to do with the fact that a lot of diagnoses, especially for autism and ADHD kind of started off with kids, you know. So they look at what are the issues that these kids have. Do they struggle socially or do they struggle with attention during class? Could very much be the case. Jane says, yes, I was okay at school, but I mean bullied in most jobs. Yeah. And it says, I struggle with professional masking now that I work 100% remote. All Zoom calls and engineers are brutal. I'm a lead, so it's my job to be neutral. You're being bullied out of programming jobs. That's really tough to hear. Well, things are just not designed for us, you know. That's the real issue that we have most of the time. I call them autistic unicorns, but I have met some autistic people who don't have, who haven't had trauma from life. It's very rare to find to be asked very depressingly, but I know a couple of them. You know, they sort of have a little bit of issues in terms of socialising, anxiety maybe, but they have good lives, you know. You have CBD effect too. They have good lives and it just kind of stands to show that if the environment is crafted around us and we're supported enough that we can, you know, we really can thrive in life. It's just a lot of us just, you know, as you guys probably know, we do tend to face a lot of trials and tribulations, much I would say much more than most would. And they can even have delayed initial speech, but later develop functional communication. They can also have obsessive actions regarding appearance, cleanliness, fears and social situations and also shortened attention spans. Most high functioning people with ASD will still find comfort in routine and order. Their rituals or restrictive habits may seem odd to those around them, but having it can help them better manage any anxious feelings or sensory overload that they may be experiencing. Therefore, they are prone to tantrums or meltdowns when they're overly tired or stimulated or they can't go through their routine. Tantrums or meltdowns. Very much finds... I can tell that this has been very much, like, informed by a lot of the parenting spheres. Not that I've got anything about anything against parents, but like autism is not just a childhood thing, you know. And a lot of the time we do know a lot more about our experiences than outsiders. There's a lot of things here. Thank you, Ned, for joining the Auti Legion. I hope you enjoy your red infinity symbol. I really appreciate it. Really appreciate it. And hello, Zachary. How are you doing, man? If those are your pronouns, if I use someone's pronouns, which is wrong, just let me know and I'll try and change it. I just call everyone man. Like, my best friend, you know, they identify as female, they are. We're born female, still call them man. I don't know the actual cause of autism spectrum disorders, but research shows that those with ASD do have abnormalities in the social regions of the brain. These regions include things like the amygdala. If you remember, Alexa and I talked about this. She called it the fire alarm. It's really responsible just so you know, for emotions, survival and memory. But they also find there's abnormalities in the orbital frontal cortex, which is responsible for cognitive processing and decision-making. And these two areas would explain why those with ASD struggle so much socially and can be easily overwhelmed and have a hard time regulating their emotions. I have to highlight here that abnormalities does not mean bad. You know, I know some people who, you know, the things that Katie is talking about, they're really good in those areas. So it's not necessarily the abnormally bad, I would say. This is, I've got a level. It's not like the most well kind of all-encompassing thing. There's a lot of negative language that is kind of bombarding my ears at the moment. But we'll, we'll, we'll power for it, you know. If our amygdala is like firing all the time, it can be really hard for us to calm down, to soothe ourselves. I mean, just think about it for a second. But luckily there is- The amygdala very much so to do with emotions. It's kind of described in this book called the, I think it's called the monkey box or like the monkey mind. It kind of looks at the contrast between our emotional brain, you know, the thing that drives our behaviors, feelings and such, and our logical brain, which is to do with kind of higher cognition that humans and a few animals show. It's kind of logic versus emotion, basically. But I mean, Katie is right on the fact of regulation, you know. We do tend to be alexophymic, which is that whole difficulty identifying, categorizing emotions that we have. It's something that's very prevalent in a lot of autistic people. And also, we do tend to have higher quarters or responses on average than most people. Tends to hit us harder, tends to last a lot longer than most people. Makes sense that we might struggle a bit more of anxiety. But interesting thing, I think we can regulate things quite well. We're just taught out of it when we're younger. We regulate a lot through stimming, self-regulation, special interests, focusses, routines, things that make us feel safe. And if we are allowed to do that, we're generally fine. It's just when we aren't that it can sometimes be an issue. It's why I'm a very big proponent of people relearning stimming. You know, if it's something that has been taught out of you or has been negatively impacting you socially, so you stop doing it, I very much encourage sensory adjustments within the house, within your daily life. And also, exploring your sensory world is kind of wet as that sounds. I think understanding your sensory environment is very, very important. And stimming can actually be a really, really important way of us regulating our emotions. It doesn't have to be the typical autism stims that you see. For me, the biggest stim that I do pretty much every day is go to the gym. You know, that's a vestibular, proprioceptive, you know, you get the feel. There's a lot of different sensory experiences in the gym which are not the most favourable, but it definitely does help me a lot. Really nice to see you guys chatting in the chat. We can do to better manage our ASD. And so let's get into some treatment options because I think it's important that we talk about that and understand that ASD isn't something people grow out of nor is it something that needs to be cured. High functioning people struggle the most to get the care that they need because many who don't really understand that there is an entire spectrum associated with autism disorders, they say things like, well, your child or you don't really look autistic or, you know, like you have any special needs. It can make it even more difficult for people to get the care that they need, especially when proper care can allow you or your child to get the tools and strategies needed to succeed. Finding ways to make our unique view of the world work for us instead of against us can be so helpful and empowering. I know I would really agree with this. I think the idea of treatment, the use of treatments, not necessarily the best word for it, but I think what she's saying is pretty spot on, you know, making adjustments to environment is definitely the best way to go. And what she's saying also about the tools, yeah. Yeah, and also that whole issue of, you know, people not really taking your needs seriously. I experienced this a lot, you know. I'm very good in terms of speaking, in terms of creating things. So, so much so sometimes that people think that my skills in one area can be transferred to every single area of life, you know. I'm proficient in science and understanding literature and theory and things like that. Doesn't necessarily mean that I'm good at doing emails and admin and communications and things of that nature. You know, we tend to show a lot of spiky profiles as autistic people. And it's not something that a lot of people can wrap their head around, you know. Some things really, really proficient at other things, needing a bit of support with. Max says, I think people think autism is silly and they don't think it's real. But over time, I think they will come around. I think people understand that autism is real, but I don't think that people have much awareness or empathy or understanding around things such as ASD 1 and 2. You know, they think of autism as this kind of flat out kind of disability, something that has no positives to it. There's always negative that always is disabling and it lowers people's quality of life. And they have that very kind of strong outlook of it. And they don't really know how to interact with people such as myself or understand people such as myself I would find. But also on the flip side of that, people who would be considered to be low functioning in terms of this video, a lot of them have some really good talents that I think are very underutilized. There's a lot of people who come through the charity program that I work on. They have some real skills and some real potential in their areas, but because they're kind of labeled as this low functioning individual, they don't really get a chance to flourish. So there's one side, negative your struggles are not really supported. People don't really have much empathy for your struggles and give you much support. On the other side, people don't really see your strengths and the things that you can really offer the world. To get the tools and strategies needed to succeed. Finding ways to make our unique view of the world work for us instead of against us can be so helpful and empowering. And one of the first options for treatment is occupational therapy. An occupational therapist is there to help develop skills such as handwriting or find motor skills and activities of daily living. We talked about this in other videos where they kind of meet us where we're at and help us better manage all the things we have to do each and every day. The second type of therapy they talk a lot about is speech therapy. Now a speech therapist can help your child or yourself learn spoken language and or nonverbal communication skills because we know it can be really difficult as someone on the spectrum to fully understand different unsaid signals people are sending out and so it's really important that we work with someone who can help us better understand and manage. The next treatment option is ABA therapy or applied behavior. Okay. You know, to be honest, I'm a little bit ignorant around speech and language therapy. I didn't realize that they did include that nonverbal aspect to it which makes a lot of sense, you know. I think that's definitely something that we should learn as people as autistic people, you know. It's always good to enhance your positives, things of that nature but anything that can really help us understand or get on with the rest of the world I think it's always going to be very useful, especially in the workplace within relationships. Anything that's very important that requires you to interact with neurotypicals. We've got to put some effort into, not for other people necessarily but for ourselves, you know. I'd say that I wish the world, schools, workplaces had a little bit more emphasis on trying to understand us and work with us and communicate with us better but that's going to give me time, you know. Applied behavioral analysis for anybody who doesn't know not necessarily something that is very favorable to a lot of autistic people within the communities. A lot of people have some very bad negative experiences that they have attested to, quite a lot of people actually about the negative impact of this kind of behavior. It's something that I've seen firsthand, something that my mother has seen firsthand. The person that I respect, the opinions are very highly, very high up there in the sand world. Not necessarily saying that it's always bad, like always the people that are doing it are bad. I think a lot of people kind of get into it thinking that it's going to be this really great way to help some autistic children which I really empathize with and I think it's also something that's pushed very heavily so it makes sense that people would find that and think that it was a good way to go of things. But for anybody who is a parent I'd really have a look into neurodiversity affirming parenting. Very, very important thing. You can find, I think there's an Instagram account. If you search for neurodiversity affirming you'll probably find a lot of different accounts who quite often actually from autistic people themselves who have autistic children and how they sort of manage daily life with their autistic children. It's really good insight for anybody who is wanting to understand, work with their child a bit more and are not wanting to go through this very kind of controversial treatment. Now this focuses on techniques that help guide learning and bring out meaningful and positive change in behavior. So it's very behavior focused. And some people feel this type of therapy is too intense and it can be traumatizing to children because we're forcing them to be normal instead of celebrating their cognitive differences. But it is a highly research based form of therapy. Especially for those on the spectrum it's been shown to work miracles for them. So don't completely rule it out until you fully understand how it works if it's a right choice for you or your child. The next treatment option is social skill classes. Now social skill classes offer an opportunity for kids with autism to practice social skills with each other. When she says some people, there is a lot of people and a lot of them tend to be autistic adults themselves. Not really going to give my own personal takes on ABA just recounting things from people that I've heard talking about it, their testimonials. You can find a lot of this stuff online if you want to go check it out. Definitely. Social skills classes. All that stuff they might be learning in therapy or trying to do at home. This gives them an actual guided place to practice it all so that they can see what works and what doesn't and help them go from there. The next option is psychotherapy which is essentially what I do. Psychotherapy uses a variety of techniques as you know to help children who experience anxiety, depression, OCD or other psychiatric systems that can cause problems for the autistic child. So a lot of those comorbid issues I talked about before can be addressed in therapy with a licensed mental health professional. And this could also include seeing a psychiatrist if medication is something that can benefit you or your child. Mind you, there isn't necessarily much medication when it comes to autism because, you know, it's a lot of the time it is the mental health and the social ramifications are being different that causes the most stress, pain, difficulty in life. I would also like to say that for a lot of people, psychotherapy can be very useless a lot for a lot of autistic people because a lot of the time the people who are doing this they don't really understand you as an autistic person and it can be very difficult to get some advice that's really going to be transformative over the long period of time over the long term rather. It's definitely something that I've experienced I've been in therapy since I was 14 being offered it in adulthood, tried it many, many times given it lots and lots of tries very, very difficult. Winning strategy is not therapy, 100%. And so just to give an example because I realize that I'm talking very broadly a lot of the ways that psychotherapists, counselors teach you to deal with anxiety is to once you identify it to implement certain strategies, certain techniques in order for you to feel better to manage and regulate yourself. The only issue there is that as I said before a lot of autistic people struggle with alexifimium meaning for a lot of us especially during teenagehood, during childhood we can't tell when we're anxious until it's way too much and we have panic attacks and we have meltdowns so there definitely needs to be a lot more awareness of these types of things and if possible you want to try and find someone who is specialized in autistic people again, it's probably going to be a private thing so we're not quite there in terms of supporting autistic people with mental health we're not quite there in supporting autistic people to not develop mental health conditions it's definitely an area of life that needs a lot more improvement for the well-being of us The next treatment option is floor time therapy floor time activities derive from the idea that we as parents can help our children by meeting them at their level to expand their circles of communication so we're kind of meeting them where they're at playing the way that they want to play and they find that floor time can be really beneficial and the next treatment option, like I said there were so many which is wonderful that we have tons of options to choose from but this next one is called RDI therapy and that stands for Relationship Development Intervention Therapy and it's a family-based behavioral treatment designed to address autism's core symptoms by appreciating all perspectives coping with change and integrating information from multiple sources such as light and sound so when I was reading about this it really helps us or our child whoever is on the spectrum better manage some of the overwhelm that can come along with being in a really loud restaurant music going, people talking to us being at parties it kind of helps us better prepare for that and we get to practice it in that therapy I think the way that Katie is describing this very much just seems like sensory adjustments to me you know the floor time therapy thing is definitely something that I can attest to I think as well in terms of communication some of the best outcomes that I've come with that I've had with teaching autistic children like I used to was when I chose to step into their world and play their way of communicating sometimes these might be repeated phrases things and I would always try and socialize with them in the way that they interacted with me over time it is something that you can kind of build on or add on there was this particular individual that I worked with who liked to ask a lot of cyclical questions about Harry Potter so they kind of come up to me and said Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets was Dumbledore there and I was like yes Dumbledore was there and every time I was like started to ask them questions questions that they didn't ask me and it kind of very much built my relationship with them and I think it's definitely something to keep in mind I think especially when you're working with people who have quite high support needs that they really do notice when you're making an effort to kind of step into their world of communication Jane says I've been seeing a private therapist she has ADHD and I've been coursing herself I like to talk to her but I don't think it really works and I'm running out of money yeah, yeah I get that I do it and again there's so many things in the way of autistic people having a good life private therapy finding someone who actually understands you very very difficult but once you do, you've got to pay for it and what is the employment rate like for autistic people it's pretty bad so it's a loose situation for a lot of people in life and it can lead to us getting very very kind of negative and vindictive about society, people neurotypicals even I know and I've seen a lot of autistic people who very much have a very aggressive view of neurotypicals which is not something that I share but I understand something that I used to feel a lot and I suppose it's only natural when these people are basically determining your outcome in life often very very negatively so it makes sense it needs to be some big changes that happen next therapy option is PEC therapy and that stands for picture exchange communication and this is used with nonverbal autistic children to help them learn to communicate without words so then they can make choices and communicate their needs and overall minimize their behaviors so they can be a much happier child another treatment option is aquatic therapy using swimming as therapy can increase the effectiveness of all other forms of treatment by learning better balance, communication skills dealing with sensory issues and oral motor skills some people also report that equine therapy is a great option for ASD children it helps them focus, transition easier from task to task and socialize more easily overall just know that there are many treatment options available so finding the one that's best for you is what is most important we know that while some treatments have more research backing them, if it's not working it's so okay to try something else and as with any diagnosis everyone is going to be different some people with high functioning autism can hold jobs and have healthy relationships while others just cannot some may do well in school not just cannot they just haven't been given the tools to or the time or the patients to support to do so people in my age bracket teenagehood to early adulthood I would say later in life for some people we can often feel like we are very behind in life I'd say that a lot of the stuff that you might see online in terms of where you should be at a certain point in life what you should have achieved what kind of accolades you need to have by your name these are all standards that are set for people who aren't autistic it's always a really good thing to keep in mind that our life path is often going to be very different to most people there's going to be some things that actually we some real good assets and things that you might not even think of an asset as an asset that are going to help you out a lot in the future trying to get yourself in a good place taking it slow being kind to yourself and edging into the zone of discomfort now and again when you feel able others will struggle so before jumping to any conclusions make sure you listen and understand what the experience is like for that individual person this video has been brought to you by the Kenyans on Patreon that has been a video by Katie Morton not going to lie I'm not really much for providing negative feedback on things that I've watched or people on what they say and their opinions but there's a lot of room for improvement in this video and I would also like to highlight that again this was five years ago perhaps the autistic community had not matured to the level that it is nowadays so I imagine that there's a lot of things that have been missed out a lot of perspectives that could have really informed this video to make it a little bit more geared for autism in general not necessarily just autism in children which is what this video very much seemed to be like