Vulnerable

Bunny said:

With the benefit of knowing that I’m autistic, a look back at my life has revealed many, many instances where my unrecognised vulnerabilities, coupled with a lack of appropriate support, has ended very badly for me.

Me too.

VLD said:

Is a reasonable adjustment a support need then?

This is interesting.

I personally think that asking for adjustments at work is a support need - I think I've had lots of 'support needs' during my life but they haven't been met, which has led to stress and breakdown.

Level 1: Requires Support

Level 1 describes autistic people who require support but have low support needs. They may have a hard time communicating with neurotypical people, including their peers. For example, they may not say the right thing at the right time or be able to read social cues and body language.

They may also have trouble moving from one activity to another or trying new things. It may be a struggle to organize and plan their lives, and independence for them may differ from neurotypical expectations for people their age.3

Support needs for autistic people with low support needs may include:4

• Group or individual therapy designed to boost communication and social skills
• Support at school or work, including help with environmental factors like lighting or noise
• Independent living skills, to build confidence with managing a home or planning a schedule
• Identifying any mental health needs and appropriate treatment

It's not uncommon for autistic people with Level 1 support needs to mask their autism fairly well, and this can lead to challenges accessing the care they do need.5 They also may have their autism diagnosed later in life, or exhibit similar traits without a formal autism diagnosis.

https://www.verywellhealth.com/what-are-the-three-levels-of-autism-260233

Is a reasonable adjustment a support need then? Being allowed time out from long meetings was a reasonable adjustment but I would nit see it as a support need,neither would I see myself as vulnerable. I think the fear I would have is having someone speak for me when I am more than capable of speaking for myself. If someone in police custody is represented  by an autistic lawyer does the lawyer then have the right to have someone speak for them. Surely vulnerability is seperate from Autism and someone might be either or both autistic and vulnerable.

Are you saying that if I have never required support then I cannot be autistic? 

With the benefit of knowing that I’m autistic, a look back at my life has revealed many, many instances where my unrecognised vulnerabilities, coupled with a lack of appropriate support, has ended very badly for me.

Just for example, that includes a failed marriage to a manipulative, lying, cheating spouse. If I’d known I was autistic, and if I’d had the kind of support that I unknowingly needed, it would have been pointed out to me - both long before I married them, and throughout the (thankfully very short) course of the marriage - that they were a person of bad character, with dishonest intentions.

Yikes! They should address that. 

It’s also fair to say, certainly in my experience - and I know also in others’ - that the NHS often falls woefully short of providing the support that it should do, as a matter of course, to newly diagnosed autistic people. It perhaps rather suits them to make that false claim. 

Bunny

The NHS website clearly states that some autistic poeple do not have support needs. 

Bunny said:

The extent to which we, as autistic people, are each aware of our needs, or willing to acknowledge them (to ourselves and/or others), can of course vary from person to person. But they exist regardless.

This includes you, along with the rest of us :)

Bunny said:

if a person doesn’t have support needs, then, per the DSM criteria, they’re simply not autistic.

I agree but having support needs does not mean you are vulnerable in the way that Star is talking about (ie open to being taken advantage of).

I take objection to being considered vulnerable this way and I scored very highy on the scales used for autism assessment. I should therefore be a highly vulnerable individual but I am not.

With the nature of the spectrum of autism there will be plenty of people who score lower on the scale and are not therefore given a diagnosis but by your definition we are all vulnerable.

Every autistic person will have their own ways of coping and managing their vulnerabilities - some with more success than others but it does not mean we are all open targets for con artists for example.

It would be unhelpful therefore to lump us all in the same boat with such a pendantic approach.

Lotus said:

I agree with Iain - it depends on the individual.

I personally don't want the "vulnerable" label, but it's useful for others who need support .

Please forgive me if this seems pedantic, but if a person doesn’t have support needs, then, per the DSM criteria, they’re simply not autistic. Having support needs is a prerequisite for a formal diagnosis. And a formal diagnosis (under any recognised classification system) means that, legally speaking, we’re all recognised as being vulnerable.

The extent to which we, as autistic people, are each aware of our needs, or willing to acknowledge them (to ourselves and/or others), can of course vary from person to person. But they exist regardless.

The neurodevelopmental nature of our differences also means that we’ll continue to suffer difficulties even when we know that we have these vulnerabilities. For example, my partner regularly points out how I continue to take things literally, and to act accordingly in response, until I’m corrected. This fact has been a source of great disappointment to me! :)

On a related note, I also personally disagree with describing our vulnerability as a “label”, but that’s a separate conversation for another day. :)

PS. I’m offering this reply as much to help others, who might read this thread and not know about the diagnostic criteria, as in reponse to you. ️

I agree with Iain - it depends on the individual.

I personally don't want the "vulnerable" label, but it's useful for others who need support .

Star said:

Do you think having ASD  we deserve to be termed vulnerable adult s

I definitely do, due to the core nature of our differences. By definition (due to the diagnostic criteria), these include, for all of us, significant difficulties with social interaction and with communication.

This is why the law in the UK already treats us as being vulnerable.

For example, every autistic person has the right to have an Appropriate Adult present if and when they're being interviewed by the police.

The National Police Autism Association go even further and recommend that an Appropriate Adult should be provided automatically for every autistic person. I very much like and agree with their explanation of why:

"Most autistic people would rightly feel that a condition which is part of their identity is not a mental disorder, and would probably hesitate to describe themselves as ‘mentally vulnerable’.

And yet, there are sound practical reasons why an autistic person of any standing in life would need an AA in police custody.

No matter how intelligent, independent or successful an autistic individual may be, or how well-trained the officers dealing with them, the difficulties with social communication inherent in the condition may lead to a detainee missing the nuance of a question, or feeling obliged to make disclosures which could have far-reaching consequences.

For this reason, the NPAA’s position is that all autistic people brought into police custody should be routinely offered an AA." 

Star said:

Do you think having ASD  we deserve to be termed vulnerable adult s

I don't think it should be a case where all people with autism should be labeled as vulnerabe as the nature of the spectrum is that we all have different traits at different intensities so we are all literally different to one another. just with the same brain development issue in common.

The criteria needs to be assessed very much on the individuals situation and needs as it is with neurotypicals.