So this was brought up in an earlier post. Should Autism and Aspergers be separate disorders? There is a growing movement to make Aspergers Syndrome a separate disorder from Autism. I believe that at some point it will most likely happen. The logic behind it is that Autism and Aspergers may share similar traits they are profoundly different. I think it causes a lot of confusion and misunderstanding within the community. As a father to 3 boys across the spectrum I can honestly say that there is a HUGE difference between Autism and Aspergers. Parenting a child with Autism is so profoundly different from parenting a child with Aspergers. So we're clear, I'm NOT saying that raising a child with Aspergers is in any way easy....because it's NOT.
I think that the problem people have with the two being lumped together is the fact that they are so different. For example, raising Gavin (our oldest with Aspergers) in no way prepared us for Emmett (our youngest with Autism). I think there is merit to the idea of separating such vastly different disorders. Aspergers seems to be the more "public face" of the Autism Spectrum and that isn't an accurate representation of the Autistic community. Even if they separate the two disorders, it won't really change anything. So I'm not really sure if it's necessary but MANY people think it is.
So what do you folks think? Should Autism and Aspergers be listed as separate disorders?
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