Doctors are ‘failing to spot Asperger’s in girls’

magicmage:

Expert says many more girls have autism than was thought, and failure to diagnose them can lead to misery



So, basically, what this article is saying is they discovered the way that boys present with autism, went “well that covers 100% of the population surely!” and then didn’t bother figuring out how autism presents in girls.

Girls slip through the diagnostic net, said Attwood, because they are so good at camouflaging or masking their symptoms. “Boys tend to externalise their problems, while girls learn that, if they’re good, their differences will not be noticed,” he said. “Boys go into attack mode when frustrated, while girls suffer in silence and become passive-aggressive. Girls learn to appease and apologise. They learn to observe people from a distance and imitate them. It is only if you look closely and ask the right questions, you see the terror in their eyes and see that their reactions are a learnt script.”

WOW.

Tony Attwood, founder of the first diagnostic and treatment clinic for children and adults with Asperger’s, and author of The Complete Guide to Asperger’s Syndrome, agreed with Gould’s estimation of a 2.5:1 ratio of boys to girls. “The bottom line is that we understand far too little about girls with ASDs because we diagnose autism based on a male conceptualisation of the condition. We need a complete paradigm shift,” he said.

WE FIGURED OUT HOW TO DIAGNOSE BOYS AND BECAUSE WE FIGURED THAT WOULD WORK FOR EVERYONE BECAUSE BOYS AND GIRLS ARE SO EXACTLY THE SAME (child psychology would DISAGREE WITH YOU IDIOTS) NOW WE’RE REAL SURPRISED THAT WE FUCKED UP.

This. This is a feminist issue. This is an issue like holy shit there are doctors out there who will deny a female patient who is referred to them because ‘lul girls don’t get austism’. They didn’t think to do any more research because, whatever right? We figured out how to solve the male side of the problem.

This is so wrong on so many levels.