Living with autism. How to help adults with autism? Life difficulties of patients with autism

My Asperger's. Provoked in a year and two months. DTP vaccination. After vaccination, there were convulsions many times. Asperger's began to develop.
Lined up cars. Strictly. I was only interested in their wheels.
Very fastidious in nutrition: if something floated in the broth - that's it. Refusal. Only transparent. No wrestling. Only mono-kind of food. Don't mix anything. Everything is separate. Everything is geometrically correct on the plate.
When he began to speak, he spoke only in numbers (that is, the first word is not "mother" or the like, but the number five). Those. I saw numbers everywhere - on houses, on signs, on transport, somewhere something similar to numbers. I thought it was brilliant in my mind. Added, multiplied, raised to a power, geometric progression. It's already four years old.
Encyclopedia walking, because. unique photographic memory (later exposed as a result of numerous tests in the int-those of the brain).
Another feature of Aspergers is that they show a strong interest in knowledge that is of little use in life. For me, such a field was knowledge about space: planets, all the names of satellites, locations, distance from the sun and earth, orbital speed, tilt angle, surface temperature, speed ratio to other planets, entry and relationships with constellations. This reached its peak by the age of 7.
Tested at the Institute of the Brain. Repeatedly annually (sometimes three times) underwent MRI. Always epileptic (but there was no epilepsy, although indirect signs were present up to 15 years old - for example, a sharp twitching of the whole body, as if from cold).
In everyday life, he experienced difficulties: i.e. a multi-level task with screwing shelves causes a problem (make a hole in the wall, pick up a drill, take fasteners, etc.), because. considers each item separately, without linking them into a single process.
Socially closed. Those. It was difficult to make contact with others. It was very hard to understand what people were talking about. The logic is completely different. Special humor - your own. Jokes, anecdotes did not understand at all. Own world. Closed.
I made eye contact, but I could not stand a long look.

"Treated" by contact (called Asperger's adaptation). Numerous attempts to explain the logic we are used to, as well as the recognition of HIS logical system. Recognition of his uniqueness, not disability (well, this is an attitude, not "pretending", rather). Showing a keen interest in his needs and experiences. Their legalization and discussion. Maximum support with reciprocal real emotions by naming them. Those. literally: my emotional response- if I'm angry, I call it anger out loud. If I'm happy, I call it. If I'm surprised, I call "I'm surprised." With all the emotional reactions on the face, body, in actions. Prevention of a long-term aggressive social environment (that is, so that there would be no persecution for "dissent"), unfortunately, this was encountered in a Moscow school .... But not growing in a greenhouse. Don't know. So many things have been done. Long, painful and, at times, with a drop of hands and despair on my part. There were many mistakes too.

Now the young man is 21 years old. From what was, and remains in a modified form: picky eater (just picky, without the requirements of geometry on the plate and objections that something floats besides water). Contact with people without fear, but with the usual, not alien to everyone ordinary person, anxiety. Understanding everyday humor (although it seems to me that a well-trained reaction is more often than a real desire to laugh). Information is also easy to swallow. Languages ​​memorize very quickly. Thank God I got lazy transitional age. Therefore, the extra slag does not drag into the head. Although it is impossible to invest something useful. Only by him own will.
Now working with huge amount people in the sports club.
Thanks to the mathematical mindset, as well as the learned view from his spatial universe to the universe of ordinary bipeds, he is studying and VERY successfully as a psychotherapist in two universities at the same time (he left the prestigious academy with the faculty of programming - he didn’t like the lack of people (hohoho!)). He is already starting to practice and practices in such a way that some clients fall into a stupor from interest, surprise and insights. Naturally, he began to work in Gestalt therapy (analysis of emotions and feelings, vision of the figure and background of the client's problem, work on the border of contact), although he is already interested in psychoanalysis.

Of course, I understand that this is my son, and I am his mother .... but, IMHO, I assume that he is a genius and this is only the beginning of his flight.

But modern medicine and science in this matter has gone further. And society, thanks to the dissemination of information, today understands the characteristics of these people more. Strange and unusual, gifted, talented, and at the same time lonely, asocial and not adapted to life - these are some of the main descriptions of people with ASD.

The main factors of autism that can affect life expectancy

Two years ago, Swedish scientists and employees of the British charitable foundation Autistics was interested in the question: “Does the presence of autism affect life expectancy? How many people live with autism? The study involved about 27 thousand Swedes with autism, of which 6.5 thousand subjects had learning disabilities. The scientists also analyzed about 2.5 million neurotypical people in parallel.

As a result of research, scientists came to disappointing conclusions:

• ASD patients are 40 times more likely to die as adults ordinary people due to the development of neurological conditions (for example, epilepsy);
• people who have been diagnosed autistic disorder live 30 years less on average;
• Suicide among autistic people is 9 times more common.

The reduction in life expectancy of patients with autistic disorders, according to scientists, primarily depends on the following factors:

• metabolic disorders and adherence to a restricted diet;
• minimal physical activity;
• social imbalance;
• depressive states.

Examples of centenarians and famous personalities with ASD

Leo Kanner first described autism almost 75 years ago, in 1944. Prior to that, it did not exist at the medical level, and therefore its official prevalence was zero. There were obviously people with autism, but they were simply considered insane or scatterbrained.
Who is the most a famous person with autism? Einstein is on a list of historical figures who are suspected of having autism. It is believed that he had ASD because he had language and educational barriers. Other historical figures thought to have had autism include Charles Darwin, Isaac Newton, and Mozart.
Here are a few famous people diagnosed with ASD today.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

It is said that Mozart repeated facial expressions and needed constant movement of his arms and legs. His hearing was very sensitive. By studying letters between the musician and his family, historians have learned that one day Mozart was a little bored, so he jumped up on the table, mewed like a cat and did a somersault.
James Durbin

James was the hero of many when he competed on season 10 of American Idol and was open about his Tourette and Asperger syndrome.
Daryl Hanna

The actress said that the diagnosis of Asperger's Syndrome nearly ruined her career in Hollywood. "I've never been on a talk show, I've never gone to premieres," she says.
Tim Burton

Tim's wife, Helena Bonham Carter, became suspicious of her husband's Asperger's diagnosis after watching the acclaimed film Rain Man - many of the symptoms of the disorder began to line up with the traits she loves in her husband.
Helena says: “We were watching a movie about autism and he said he felt like a child. Autistic people have application and dedication. You can say something to Tim when he's working and he won't hear you. But this quality also makes him a fantastic father, he has an amazing sense of humor and imagination. He sees what other people don't."
Andy Warhole

A simple repeating pattern defined an entire era of art. Dr. Judith Gould, director of Eliot House, host diagnostic center UK on Autism and Asperger's, suggests that Warhol's love of repetition was actually a symptom.
Dan Harmon

Dan is the creator and writer of the hit TV show. While developing one of the characters on his show, he began to research ASD and realized that he was also connected to the pathology of the character. In a fantastic interview with Wired Magazine, Dan shares his self-diagnosis of autism: “I started looking for these symptoms to know what they were. And the more I looked at them, the more familiar they seemed.”
Lewis Carroll

Did Lewis Carroll have Asperger's Syndrome? Historians are not entirely sure. Professor Michael Fitzgerald of Trinity College Dublin compared the behavior of his patients with Asperger's Syndrome with the facts described in the biographies of several famous men and decided that they also apply this syndrome. Lewis was on his list.
Temple Grandin

“The thing is, when you're autistic, you gradually become less and less autistic because you keep learning, you keep learning how to behave. It's like a game. I'm always in the game," says Temple Grandin.
Dan Aykroyd

According to a 2007 article in The Guardian, actor Dan Aykroyd was expelled from two schools as a child due to behavioral features, and a psychiatrist diagnosed him with Asperger's syndrome with signs of obsessive-compulsive disorder.
And that's not all famous people who have lived or continue to live full, albeit peculiar, lives with autism.

People with autism live in a completely different world. Sometimes their behavior is so different from the generally accepted that one can only guess what they may be experiencing.

A person with autism usually finds sudden loud sounds unpleasant or shocking. Credit: LIU JIN/AFP/Getty Images Autism is a relatively new disorder that is becoming more prevalent. Its exact causes and methods of treatment remain a mystery at the moment. Experts believe that autism is the result neurological disorders that affect brain function, development, communication and social interaction skills. In other words, it is a disease of the nervous system.

People with autism have problems communicating and understanding other people and events. Their ability to instinctively sympathize with others is much weaker than that of ordinary people. it main reason why they often look insensitive. They have difficulty understanding jokes and sarcasm. Sometimes they take established expressions literally. Some people with autism also have a hard time talking. They often just repeat what they hear (echolalia).

They are poorly versed in generally accepted rules and local etiquette. They can do things that are not accepted in society. For example, standing in front of a mirror in a store for a long time or approaching a person too close. Autism deprives them of the concept of the dangers of certain actions. It is also difficult for them to predict the results of some actions.

For people with autism the world seems to be a chaos that is very difficult to sort out. Therefore, they are afraid of him and try to have less contact with others. Due to the fact that the world is becoming unpredictable, routine becomes the only way out. People with autism often repeat the same movements or actions. For example, a child with autism can jump from one corner of the room to another for ten minutes (or more).

A new event that interrupts an exhausted mechanism can lead to a general failure. Even the idea of ​​change itself can lead to difficult experiences. For example, if a person with autism walks along the same road to the store, then the blocked road can lead him to a dead end, and he will simply return home.

A person with autism usually finds sudden loud noises unpleasant or shocking. The same thing can happen with some smells, temperature or light. Many believe that this is the result of unforeseen changes. So if a person with autism is aware of previous changes, they can cope better with them.

A child with autism in various fields may develop in different ways. For example, his cognitive skills may develop rapidly, while social interaction and speech lag far behind. A child with autism, unlike his peers, may not catch the ball thrown to him, but he knows much more words. Autism interferes with harmonious development.

There is also a form of autism called Asperger's Syndrome. In this state, people tend to have higher than normal intelligence, but have some difficulty understanding and perceiving speech. As a result, they become closed.

The modern world is subject to strict rules of life, which are characterized by success, beauty, health, grooming. Today ideal members of society are those who look young, always smile, are sociable in any situation.

But what if you yourself or someone close to you do not fit these criteria? Of course, you need to take care of your health, your image, visiting sports sections, going to the pool or tennis, paying attention proper nutrition. But what about adults with autism, who are turned only to themselves and cannot establish emotional contact in the field of communication? How can they live without interacting with other members of society?

Living in your own world

Back in 1910, Eugen Bleiler, a famous Swiss psychiatrist, introduced the term “autism” into science, by which he denoted a person’s inability to distinguish some important objects in the world around him and emotionally contact with people around him, even with relatives.

Usually, when we talk about autism in adults, we mean classic autism. But statistically, these patients also include people of the autistic spectrum, which are characterized by sparing forms of the disorder, manifested as strange habits. Some psychiatric scientists perceive people with "Asperger's syndrome" as autistic, and they attribute the syndrome to high-functioning forms of autism. Asperger's syndrome, indeed, is characterized by normal or high intelligence, closely associated with genius. But with all this, “Aspergers” are characterized by non-standard or underdeveloped social abilities (it is assumed that the great genius scientist Albert Einstein and the writer Virginia Woolf suffered from Asperger's syndrome).

Studies by British psychiatrists have shown that autism is inherent in every hundredth adult person to varying degrees.

Conditional classification of autism in adults

The first group includes practically incurable patients with an extremely severe form of pathology, far from perfect. They are completely self-renounced from the outside world, do not lend themselves to adaptation, live in their own closed world, not allowing even the closest and closest people into it. They can't speak at all. intellectual development- very low. They do not know how to take care of themselves and cannot do without extraneous attention and help. They should never be left alone.

The second group of autism in adults includes patients who are closed, they are capable of contacts with people, but in a mysterious, understandable way only for them.
They have speech problems, but they talk, communicate with others, strictly adhering to specific topics. Ordinary people are not able to understand the logic of their thinking. It seems to them absurd and illegal, like a fantasy.
It is typical for such people to do their favorite monotonous business for a long time, forgetting about food, sleep, and even natural needs. They do not accept innovations, actively, occasionally aggressively, protesting against any changes in the situation and the usual way of life. They are specific monotonous and monotonous movements.
Such patients do not tend to feel hunger, cold, they have no desire to take a walk or sleep.

The third group included autistic patients who learned certain skills and developed certain abilities. They are alien to the views of those around them society. They willingly contact with others, while not paying attention to anyone. It is difficult for them to do without the help of relatives, although they have individual skills that no one knows about.

The fourth group of autistic patients are people who are not easily seen in the usual mass of people. They are smart, obedient, but dependent, overly touchy, cannot freely make a decision, retreating before any problem. They are always obedient, follow certain rules. Among ordinary people, only a psychiatrist can see such autistic adults.

The fifth group of autism in adults includes people with intelligence high level whether above average. Genetic failures in such people create the appearance of a genius gene. Psychiatrists around the world have proven that it is autism with high intelligence that leads to genius - these are talented people. It is easy for such autistic geniuses to realize themselves in the field of mathematics, physics, programming, and creative activity.

Autism should be diagnosed in a timely manner and treatment and rehabilitation should be started as early as possible, preferably at lullaby age. But even if the time is missed, it is necessary to work with adults with autism. People with autism need socialization, knowledge to overcome shyness and anxiety, to control their emotions and behavior.

Used to treat adults with autism behavioral therapy, homeopathic methods, as well as adherence to the recommended diet.

The sooner the fight against this disease is started, the easier and faster a good result will be achieved.

Autism is one of mental illness , which occurs develops as a result of disturbances in the functioning of the brain. Often the nature of such disorders causes a long course of this disease. For this reason, autism, the first signs of which are already noticeable in childhood, lasts throughout life and patients have to put up with autistic disorders not only in childhood but also in adulthood. An autistic adult has all the same difficulties in interacting with others, lack of emotions, stereotyped thinking, narrowness of interests, and other primary and secondary symptoms.

In adults, as well as in children, there are various forms autism, combined in common group autism spectrum disorders. The degree of complexity of the disease depends on its symptoms, the nature of therapy and the degree of socialization of an autistic adult. The defining features of autism are the so-called triad:

• problems with social interaction
• impaired communication skills
• a narrow circle of interests of the individual and ritual behavior.

A characteristic feature of an adult autistic that distinguishes him from the rest is isolation. Regardless of the form of the disease, an adult with an autism spectrum conduct disorder finds it very difficult to establish social contacts and stay away from society throughout his life. Primary autism should be distinguished from secondary, or “autism involuntarily”. Often people with pathologies of speech or hearing aid, congenital dementia and other ailments are rejected by society. They withdraw into themselves, being outside of society. Fundamental difference"Autistics reluctantly" in that they experience acute discomfort because of their conflict with others, congenital autists are not interested in contact with others. These people, by their nature, cannot be included in society; ordinary communication is an irritant for them.

Another characteristic autism symptom – impaired communication skills, is a consequence of closed behavior. Typically, autistic children begin to speak later than their peers. The reason for this is not so much physical abnormalities how much lack of the very motive for communication. Such a child simply does not want to talk. Over time, most people learn an "unnecessary" speech skill. However, this situation leaves its mark on adulthood. speech of an autistic adult different from speech healthy people its scarcity and underdevelopment.

Third major symptom- constancy inner peace autistic. Autistic adults have a strong need for consistency, in some cases it may resemble ritualism. This can manifest itself in strict observance of the established daily routine, gastronomic habits, systematization of personal belongings. Any violation of the usual way of life causes excitement, panic attacks or aggression.

In general, the character of an adult autistic can be described as closed, isolated, replete with constancy. Due to the inadmissibility of any changes in the current way of life, autists have a very narrow circle of own interests. The methodical repetition of the same thing often allows them to bring their favorite skill to perfection. This leads to the prevailing opinion that autism is characteristic of geniuses. In fact, real geniuses rarely come from autists. Moreover, very often autism is accompanied by mental retardation and behavioral abnormalities. In this case, the leading skill of an autistic adult will not be a virtuoso game of chess, but picking up a pyramid of children's cubes.

Autism itself is general concept. AT modern medicine General autism is divided into several areas:

• actually autism ( kanner syndrome)
• asperger's syndrome(mild form of autism)
• Rett syndrome(female neuropsychiatric disease)
• atypical (combined) autism

The most complex form of autism is kanner syndrome or autism itself. In people with Kanner's syndrome the full range of symptoms of autism is observed. Such a person is absolutely asocial, speech skills are weak or absent due to atrophy of the speech apparatus. The most important nervous structures are not developed, the intellect is at the level of moderate or severe mental retardation. An independent life of such a person is impossible. A person with Kanner's syndrome should be under constant supervision, especially severe cases isolation in a specialized medical facility is required.

A syndrome described by an eminent psychiatrist Hans Asperger, is a milder form of the disease. Despite tangible problems in communication and socialization, such people are fluent in speech and cognitive abilities. They can be closed, strange, somewhat awkward, but quite independent. People with Asperger's Syndrome often work and become full members of society.

Rett syndrome is chronic disease transmitted only through the female line. The disease manifests itself not earlier than 1 year, after which the patient begins to rapidly regress. Therapy helps improve big picture. There are few adult women with Rett syndrome. The illness usually ends lethal outcome up to 25-30 years.

When it is not possible to identify a specific form of autism, one speaks of atypical autism which is a combined set of different symptoms.

Of all these forms of autism, Asperger's syndrome and atypical autism are the most common.

Despite the fact that autism has been studied in detail since the first decades of the twentieth century, its causes have not yet been unraveled. Today, one of the main ones is the theory of gene mutation. Scientists have been able to identify some genes that affect the development of autism, but they have not been able to figure out how and why the mutation occurs.

Autism treatment should start at early age as soon as the disease is diagnosed. In this case, treatment is reduced to rehabilitation measures. Only in this case does the little autist have a chance to grow into a more or less independent adult. The primary role is played by therapy (behavioral, speech therapy). Regular visits to a psychotherapist are also recommended for adults with autism who have managed to adapt to society. Often, patients are prescribed medications (psychotropic and anticonvulsant substances). It can be antidepressants, antipsychotics, various stimulants. They help to stabilize the patient's condition, relieve symptoms, but psychological disorder are not eradicated, and it accompanies the autistic throughout his life.

The Invamama autism forum has a special section for adults with autism to communicate. This online forum allows adults with autism to discuss various issues that are relevant to them.