Tony Attwood on autism in females – my thoughts.

This video is just over 30 minutes long. 

It’s worth every single minute if you have any interest in understanding how autism plays out in women. It’s very different to how it plays out in boys. Very different. Get a cuppa, we’ll meet back in half an hour to discuss.

Sadly, the original video appears to have been removed. There are shorter versions of it on the Healthed channel on Vimeo, including this one.

Professor Tony Attwood – Identifying ASD in Girls from Healthed on Vimeo.

If you click through to the Healthed channel, you can find other bits of the video too. I’m leaving this one here in case it reappears!

Professor Tony Attwood – Autism in Females from Healthed on Vimeo.

Honestly I have just sat and nodded my way through it. Yes, all of this, yes. 

(Well OK, most of it. No, I don’t have fairy dresses. (Although, ooh, wings!) Or 100 barbies lined up in hairstyle order. I *did* have a horse, and I do still read obsessively and extensively. And yes, social exhaustion. I can do a couple of hours. Even a day, and I’ll glow and talk and be energetic and everything. And then I’ll collapse in a heap somewhere where no one can see, and just be.)

Hermione! Hermione is the quintessential aspie girl. JK, I know you’re not reading, but if any of this describes you, welcome to the tribe.  

If you don’t have time right now to watch it (and therefore you’ve no idea what I’m going on about, bookmark it and watch it later. Understand that autistic women aren’t rainman. We pass as normal so very much of the time, but it costs us. We pay in worries, fears, tears, anxiety disorders, eating disorders.

Do you have daughters? If they aren’t the ones with autism or aspergers, do let them know that it’s OK to be friends with the girl who does have it. That just because she’s a little different, they don’t have to leave her out. That autistic girl, included, will be your best friend ever. Honest, true, loyal to a fault. 

Don’t let her be lonely.

(I am beyond cross that he ran out of time to do the parenting slide. Especially as the bottom line said “distrust of school system, may advocate home schooling”. I don’t know ANYONE like that at all! *whistles innocently*)

Further reading.

The most recent instalment of my experience of autism past diagnosis “Getting up, going on”