Autism and ADHD

I've done a LOT of self-directed research here, if anyone is interested. 

I think the easiest way to understand the "Link" between Autism and ADHD is Monotropism.

We both experience difficulty with executive function and we both have difficulty with a linear time stream. We both have lower "Inhibition" in the brain and difficulty filtering out sense-perception. We both can process at a particularity fantastic speed. 

We're VERY similar to our ADHD friends. We even team up well. But key differences are quite specific. Does a stimulant make you feel calm, collected, grounded? That's ADHD. Does it feel impossible to interpret and not be misinterpreted N-Typcial society? That's Autism. Do you need to do one thing at a time and finish it or you become hazardous? That's Autism. Are you who we should all rely on in an emergency? That's ADHD. 

While there's a good deal of research now on the similarities at a biological level, I've found it important to me (personally) to work out if a thing is a genuine difficulty/difference or if I just need to make the extra effort and do the thing I'm too lazy to do which will feel great tomorrow and keep me awake if I don't.  

JuniperFromGallifrey said:

I've done a LOT of self-directed research here, if anyone is interested. 

Interested??

You just explained to me, succinctly, a shedload of stuff I've been really, really struggling to comprehend.

I've always found your posts to be "coming from a place I am trying to get to" and very wise, but you just hit gold there for me, thank you very much..

I have all of those qualities you listed, particularly the "useful in an emergency" thing.

I actually USED to think I was useful in an emergency. It's because I do have a sense of inner calm when others are externally expressing the same chaotic mess eternally happening in my mind. This is different than having actual skills which would be good for an ambulance unit. Put an ADHDr there, and they might work well so long as they're not expected to handle too much paperwork. 

This is the Monotropic brain-type which both ADHD and Au share and why we make great friends. A sense of incoming signals all at once and often mislabeled 'over-thinking' (which means the opposite of problem-solving). 

I actually USED to think I was useful in an emergency. It's because I do have a sense of inner calm when others are externally expressing the same chaotic mess eternally happening in my mind. This is different than having actual skills which would be good for an ambulance unit. Put an ADHDr there, and they might work well so long as they're not expected to handle too much paperwork. 

This is the Monotropic brain-type which both ADHD and Au share and why we make great friends. A sense of incoming signals all at once and often mislabeled 'over-thinking' (which means the opposite of problem-solving). 

Very entertaining! And well done on the piloting skills!

But this deserves a bellowing wow:

I Sperg said:

Did I mention the sensory input of it being 46 DEGREES at 10:30 that evening??   

I think I've travelled enough to move to the top of Scotland and never leave. This is how I feel about warm-ish weather!

JuniperFromGallifrey said:

Put an ADHDr there, and they might work well so long as they're not expected to handle too much paperwork

100% me. 

"Useful in an emergency" in my case mean that occasionally this sort of thing happens.

You might be standing in Dharhan International airport at 03:40 in the morning having just learned that your 450Km flight to Rhyad has been cancelled, along with all other flights and be shouting away at the staff along with everyone else in your own language. 

Suddenly a little man speaking a foriegn language gets your attention 'cos he's pointing at you and giibbering in his language but you hear him saying Rhyad? Rhyad? As you nod, he points at another guy, says "Ryhad!", points at himself, says "Rhyad", draws a circle in the air after pointing at each of us and says "TAXI!". After a bit of negotiation, (the odd little foreign bloke even haggles the price down) you are in a huge old cheverolet taxi heading towards Rhyad, whilst everyone else is still probably shouting at the airport staff at a cost of 40$. 

The little bloke who was useful in that "emergency" turned out to be two years away from getting his ADD diagnosis an 19 years off his Autism diagnosis, completely out of his depth, stranded in a foreign country with no functioning contacts, and 450 KM and 8 hours late for his next connection, but he got you out of the airport and on the way to Rhyad "ahead of the crush" whilst solving his own problems, on the fly. Then pretty much never spoke or communicated again during the whole 450 Km drive to Rhyad...      

MY client had sent me out on one of their holiest bank holidays! B.A. got me to Dharhan late, which screwed up my connecting flight, and the given phone number just rang out.. By the time I'd turned dolalrs into a functiong phone card at 10:30 at night in a seemingly derelict airport in a foreign country where every so often soem wailing happened over the tannoy and people LITERALLY stopped to perform a "Quirkafleeg" on a mat on the floor for a while.

Did I mention the sensory input of it being 46 DEGREES at 10:30 that evening??   

I finally got to my company accomodation at around 11:00, and the guy hearing of my previous 27 hours of travelling and surmounted disasters expressed his sympathy that I'd be needing a rest, as they were planning to go quad biking in the desert after lunch... Later that afternoon I had my forst ever digital photo taken of me in the desert on a quadbike.NOTE to readers, quadbikes are uniquely dangerous!

Ask Rik Mayall or the off duty nurse who broke her arm hitting a burried part of a culvert that day in the desert. OR for that matter me, becuas ein that picture I look happy but my chest is aching form that moenet earlier where the sand dropped way unexpectedly and when I landed my chest hit the effing handlebars.

OH and of course I, and most of the other contractors were sent home after two weeks, due to some corproate shenanegans. Everyone else seemed pannicked and the one "friend" I seemed to have made said "you seem to be taking this very well" with the subtext being "not like the rest of us".  In truth, I was already adapting to my new situation and already working out to get upgraded to the promised business class...

And perhaps another example of "Good in an emrgency" is that on the way home, when I was awoken frm my slumber (in my very nice business class seat. my client failed to deliver the promised upgrade, so I MADE the poor B.A. people at Rhyad give it to me at the airprort instead, to compensate me for my previously botched journey) with everyone around me screaming, I calmly evaluated my situation in a few milliseconds, and decided I prefered sleeping to whatever was going on with the aeroplane, and went back to sleep...

I later found out we'd plummetted violently throwing people around the aeroplane, and presumably I'd been awoken by being thrown against my straps. As a passenger In a moving vehicle if I can find a way. I always sleep strapped or wedged in place.  

In the same situation now, of course, I'd have elected to stay awake as I have since aquired some aircraft engineering and piloting skills, and thus could possibly take useful action, but back then I had no good options except to (potentially) die in fear or in my sleep, so I made a quick judgement call and went straight back to sleep...

I hope that's as entertaining to read, as it was to experience.