Published on 12, July, 2020
I prefer to use autism or ASD because I believe high and low-functioning autism creates a false perception of The Autism Spectrum. To me and I imagine many others, low-functioning and high-functioning create the image of a horizontal line with one side saying "most autistic" and the other side saying "least autistic", especially since I hear people say "end of the spectrum."
I see The Autism Spectrum as more of a circle divided with each section representing a difficulty, with the individual in the centre having a variation of difficulties with differing levels of severity to one another. Like someone described as low-functioning may be able to walk through shops with no oversensitivity while someone described as high-functioning can have a higher level of severity in sensory processing that it's too hard and not be able to.
Do you think we should avoid the use of high and low-functioning as they're not clinical terms anyway?
The only reason I'd use distinctions like that is to reassure other people e.g. I say me and my daughter have mild autism, so people don't think we're immediately going to start shouting or undressing or something. lol. People often don't know what autism is, they think it's an extreme behaviour so I say 'mild' to give context, hopefully.
yes people can overact based on previous bad experiences or something seen in a movie etc