At the heart of autism: Clear guide and personal experiences

When a person receives their autism diagnosis, they have two options: to tell or not to tell the people around them about the outcome of their particular condition. Most of the time, they will choose to disclose only certain relevant information about their condition to a limited number of people.

Why this choice? Because autism is very difficult to explain clearly to a non-autistic person. For this reason, revealing only certain aspects of one’s condition is often simpler and more effective.

When an autistic person wants or needs to share their strengths, weaknesses, or needs with others, or when they want to explain their autistic traits, they must find the right words, the right comparisons, and the right examples to avoid any misinterpretation. Their explanation will also serve to dismantle the prejudices that many people have about autism.

Autistic traits are not exclusively reserved for autistic people; they can also be experienced by non-autistic people. However, an autistic person will not necessarily have the same trigger as a neurotypical person. That is exactly what the autistic person must manage to explain: they must describe precisely what is happening in their mind and why they react in a certain way so that the people around them fully understand their difficulties or their motivations.

The right words or the right examples are often difficult to find when explaining a trait of our personality. That is why I created this book. The goal is to provide you with relevant information that will help you better understand the reasoning of an autistic person compared to a non-autistic person. Presented in the form of compilations, explanations, and testimonies, the information below will help you clearly understand different aspects of the autism spectrum.

I decided to keep the anonymity of all the people who participated in creating this book for several reasons. People under the cover of anonymity are much more honest and tend to reveal themselves more deeply. The objective is also to avoid judgment or being categorized by a person or an institution.

• Introduction
• General information
  • Neurodivergent / Neurotypical
  • DSM-5 (The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders)
  • Rett syndrome (RS)
  • Autistic disorder or Autism (AD)
  • Childhood disintegrative disorder (CCD)
  • Pervasive developmental disorder-not otherwise specified (PDD-NOS)
  • Asperger’s syndrome (AS)
  • Social (pragmatic) communication disorder
• Autism spectrum disorder
  • Autism spectrum disorder (ASD)
• The three levels of ASD severity
  • Level 1 (Requires support)
  • Level 2 (Requires substantial assistance)
  • Level 3 (Requires very substantial support)
• Diagnostic criteria
  • Social communication and interaction
  • Restricted, repetitive patterns of behavior, interests, or activities
• Comorbidities
  • Intellectual disability (ID) / TDA/H
  • Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
  • Mental health (Anxiety, Depression, Bipolar disorder)
  • Physical and neurological (Epilepsy, Dyslexia, Motor skills, Prosopagnosia)
• Daily and Sensory Life
  • Food rigidity
  • Sleep disorders and fatigue (muscular or mental)
  • Sensory hyper- and hypo-reactivity
  • Repetitive patterns (Echolalia, Tics)
• Cognitive Functioning
  • The brain (Efficiency, Focus, Pictograms, Imagination)
  • Memory (Concept of time, Learning, Distractions)
  • Routines (Managing novelty and anxiety)
• Emotions and Social Life
  • The workplace (Need for withdrawal)
  • Emotional regulation (Joy, Anger, Meltdowns and Autistic burnout)
  • Social, romantic, and friendship relationships
  • Honesty, solitude, and social rules
• Sensory Exploration
  • Touch (Clothing, pain, physical contact)
  • Sight (Lights, visual processing)
  • Hearing (Ambient noise, conversations)
  • Smell and taste
• Miscellaneous Topics and Diagnosis
  • Technology (TV, Video games, Phone)
  • Connection to the world (Animals, Plants, Space)
  • The diagnostic process (Why and whom to tell?)
  • Psychic abilities (Clairsentience, Clairvoyance, etc.)
• Conclusion