So I've never had it diagnosed, but I think I have some mild form of autism. I was wondering if any other lovers have similar things or know more on the subject.

So I have some interesting reactions to sounds. I've looked up echolalia, a form of autism where a person repeats sentences or sounds verbatim unconsciously. While I don't repeat people's sentences... when I hear a chime of some sort of a noise like a car alarm arming I often unconsciously mimic the sound out loud. I didn't notice until a friend told me to shut up after we were working together in a small room for a day... and I kept repeating the computer sign on sounds, car alarms, etc.

I also can be made physically uncomfortable by some sounds. Like at my gym the lockers have little keys that can be attached to your hand towel and taken out around the gym... some people clip these keys onto their shorts and if somebody is running on a treadmill next to me I can't run with the sound of the jingling keys. It bothers me to the point where I'll either go work out on the other side of the gym or sometimes I'll just leave the gym.

Anybody have similar reactions to sounds?

Did you exhibit echolalia before you were three years old?

My brother has a mild form of autism called Aspergers. He doesn't repeat things, but he reacts to certain sounds in a similar way. One time I know of, in computer class, he couldn't stand being in the room because of all the clattering keys. And he wouldn't go in a certain restaurant because of all the noise and they served food that freaked him out.

Also D, check out Hyperacusis.

Did you exhibit echolalia before you were three years old?

I'm not sure... I'll have to ask my parents. How does before 3 relate?

I worked with a child (he was 5yo)with some mild Autism. He was very good at numbers, games like "memory" ... he had the habit of lining up all of his toys according to size and did NOT like to color. For some reason the process frustrated him and he would end up scribbling all over the page and "freak out" -- which involved throwing things around the room, yelling, and would not sit back down to do the exercise. He also tended to quote dialogue from childrens programs that he watched (Dora the Explorer was one of his favorites). It wasn't so much as just mimicking the sounds, but something he would do instead of using his own words in a conversation. If something you said to him was similar to something said in the show, he would rattle off the lines and one line would spur on another. It was very hard to break that habit.

The reason why it would matter if you had these symptoms when you were a kid is because I don't think one can "become" autistic over time. There aren't any 2 cases of Autism that are alike, but one thing that is in common, a defining factor so to speak, is that having Autism affects the way you interact with other people and the world. As it was explained to me, there is a key ingredient missing in autistic children to understand things on a more emotional level. Think of it as maybe color blindness for emotions -- they can pick up when there is something going on emotionally, but sometimes they can't tell the difference between the two, or when two are together, it's just very complicated to them. And really, it can be complicated for anyone, but it is especially so in the Autistic.

Also, Autistic people tend to not be very creative -- they can be highly skillful, such as, in music because music relies a lot of math, counting, etc. And, Autistic people tend to be good at mimicking & have good memories -- so they could play by ear or play by notation very well, but they could not compose their own pieces. They wouldn't know what to do if they tried, and that experience would probably frustrate them because it is not percise and logical, and so they would probably recluse.

BUT there is a lot about it that nobody really knows yet... and maybe some of this information I've given is outdated. I stopped working with this child about 2 years ago and I haven't done much with the Autistic since.

The problem with Autism is that its spectrum of related disorders is broad and poorly defined. It includes Asperger's, which is often defined as Autism without speech delays, and one can be classified as Low-, Mid- or High-Functioning Autistic.

Clinically, Autism has to start before one is three years old. To be full-blown, it has to include impairments in communication ability and social interaction, as well as restricted ranges of interest and repetitive behavior.

In High-Functioning Autism (I now know someone with HFA), it can mean just a stutter, avoidance of eye-contact, a very narrow array of interests, and needing to be reminded to change one's shirt every day. People like that can function more or less normally with the support of loved ones. Low-functioning Autistics, on the other hand, can be bound to an infant-like level of care for a lifetime, never speaking a word, walking, or responding to emotional stimuli.

Traits often present in but not necessary to diagnose autism include echolalia, tics, hyperacusis, and other hypo and hypersensitivities to environmental stimuli, and just generally missing social cues or lack of ability to read the emotional expression on others' faces. Ingero is right, though, that autism usually precludes any sort of right-brain abstract or artistic sensibilities and usually leads to very pedantic, rote and rigid behaviors.

I have no idea how mild the symptoms can be on the highest-functioning end, but it's also possible to suffer from echolalia and hyperacusis a la carte, so to speak. I know I myself sometimes freak out over loud noises, bad smells etc to the point of just shutting down until the stimuli is corrected. It's difficult to say.

This is most interesting - one of my colleagues - actually the head of the department I teach in - seems to display quite a few of these traits. He is unusually, incredibly bright, and typically "scans" books rather than reading them - he sort of absorbs them after paging through them, and is very good at quickly internalizing the logic of an authors argument and relaying it again much more accurately than most people could after much study.Typically he cant sense the emotional "temperature" of a conversation, and will respond very literally to the actual words one says or writes, and not sense the context at all. It can be very disconcerting. Many people really dislike him, but I wonder if much of this is as the result of something like Autism.

Klip, that does sound like some of the typical Asperger's traits. Being overly-literal is a hallmark symptom. Also, savant-like brightness in an area of interest, usually a left-brained one, is very common. I bet it's difficult suffering from it, though.

I see this is an old thread, but had to comment :) I agree with others who recognized it as Asperger's Syndrom. My little brother has this. I wouldn't be surprised if you do have this... Mozart, Albert Einstein, and Thomas Jefferson were all Aspies :D You can find out more about it at wrongplanet.net.

I added a pallette for the Autism Awareness puzzle piece logo

My brother has Asperger's Syndrome. I love him to death, but he can get annoying. I'm glad he's starting to actually behave like a little nine-year-old boy should. :D
He's also incredibly talented when it comes to word searches. That boy's fast. Fer'real. :)
And he can memorize an entire movie, recite each and every sentence and sound effect with outstanding precision. It's amazing.




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Oh dang. Old thread. :o

So I have some interesting reactions to sounds. I've looked up echolalia, a form of autism where a person repeats sentences or sounds verbatim unconsciously. While I don't repeat people's sentences... when I hear a chime of some sort of a noise like a car alarm arming I often unconsciously mimic the sound out loud. I didn't notice until a friend told me to shut up after we were working together in a small room for a day... and I kept repeating the computer sign on sounds, car alarms, etc.

Oh, God, I do the same thing-- sometimes I even repeat what people say! I do it in enough of a quiet, subconscious way, though, that I'd never even considered something like autism-- I just always thought it was a nervous tic!

I'm already on this freakout phase where I feel like I have no right-brain processes firing at all lately, so God forbid I read too much deeper and find out I might be damned by genetics to be uncreative!

EnaBean wrote:

My brother has a mild form of autism called Aspergers. He doesn't repeat things, but he reacts to certain sounds in a similar way. One time I know of, in computer class, he couldn't stand being in the room because of all the clattering keys. And he wouldn't go in a certain restaurant because of all the noise and they served food that freaked him out.

I have Aspergers. It's not really a form of Autism, more a sister. He sounds like he's hypersensitive to noise, I am to light. Sometimes I can't be in the computer room cause I see all the screens flickering and it drives me insane! I get a headache too.

I have a few Autistic friends (and a brother with it too), and also a few friends with Aspergers. I get upset if they're bullied. I mean if we were seriously less than anyone else how would we achieve the things we do? I mean I run a very successful forum which helps people a lot, and cures boredom. The others run successful radio stations (one's on my site as a DJ), software programs and stuff. It REALLY upsets me when articles say things like "Some people with Aspergers even marry and have children" like it's hard for us. That's cruel and shallow.

I cant eat certain foods, literally, I just cannot swallow them. Like beef, if it's roasted and dry I cannot eat it. I cannot eat any white meat from a chicken, I need the moister stuff. I have some weird reactions to other textures too...Like if you put tape on the end of your fingers and let about 2cm hang off the end, then move your hand through the air....Yeah I'd rather cut my hands off than spend a minute doing that. It's torture. I can't stand it. I get the same feeling with socks that go above my ankle or squeeze my toes...and plastic gloves (not the rubber ones or the stretchy ones).

But all the symptoms I have arent usually hindering. If anything most of them help me. I edit manuals and stuff because the context and spelling errors JUMP out at me and I cannot go on with the rest until it's fixed. It makes it easier.

As for sounds, I don't have any weird reactions, though some sounds (high pitched) will make me gag or dizzy or give me a headache. It's weird, but it's me and I love it :D.

codename_gimmick wrote:

I'm already on this freakout phase where I feel like I have no right-brain processes firing at all lately, so God forbid I read too much deeper and find out I might be damned by genetics to be uncreative!

Marko, you are one of the most creative people around here. wherever did you get the idea that you aren't?

Not being able to stand certain sounds can also be a form of seizures. Certain sounds will cause seizures, and those seizures can appear in many different forms. I have Lupus and it has caused seizures and other unpleasant problems. The best thing to do is if you think you have a medical problem is to find a good doctor and get a proper diagnosis. It took me years to get the Lupus diagnosis after many misdiagnosis.

Sorry for the ramble, it's late where I'm am and I need to get to bed.

I personally do not have it and neither does anyone in my family, but I had an autistic boy in my choir the last two years before he graduated and he was the pride and joy of everyone in the class. He came back to visit us on Friday. (: he could remember every word to every song we had EVER sung. he had just about perfect pitch. he had a tiny speech impediment, but was still one of the best members of the choir and we LOVE him. he's the most sincere individual I have ever met and he is always perfectly polite.

he's currently studying to become a history teacher [at I believe the high school level] and he's going to be great because he's so good at history. he retains well and if you ask him a year he'll tell you what happened. (:

I really really love Mark. (:

EDIT: I'm sorry if that's off-topic, I just wanted to be positive here, and Mark is really a ray of light in my life.

Very interesting (old) topic. What really got me was the repeating of sounds.. I do not do it out loud, but if I hear a distinctive sound (especially if it is quiet after I hear it), my brain will repeat it over and over again. It's really weird.

I know someone who's autistic. He has a speech impediment, and you can tell that he's a little different just by the way he acts. Extremely bright though. ;)

COLOURlover wrote:

I've looked up echolalia, a form of autism where a person repeats sentences or sounds verbatim unconsciously.

I also can be made physically uncomfortable by some sounds. Like at my gym the lockers have little keys that can be attached to your hand towel and taken out around the gym... some people clip these keys onto their shorts and if somebody is running on a treadmill next to me I can't run with the sound of the jingling keys. It bothers me to the point where I'll either go work out on the other side of the gym or sometimes I'll just leave the gym.

Anybody have similar reactions to sounds?

Well.
My younger brother's teacher approached me and told me my brother wouldn't sit down, and repeated quietly to himself what he had already said. He has no recognition of it, but I suppose everyone is autistic in some way.

I, on the other hand, can't stand rapid movements. My brother has this huge ball he'll bounce on, I can't stand seeing him, even if it's out of the corner of my eye! I just hate it. I can't stand sounds either. Everything must be as it should be, which is funny because I am very unorganized. My brother has to eat with his fork, and he MUST sit down.

Funny, eh?

I think that a lot of people have an issue with repeating sounds, myself included. That's a trait that everyone who speaks developed at a young age. To learn to speak, we repeated sounds that we heard. Therefore, in my opinion, it's most likely just a psychological quirk basically everyone has.

On the topic of Autism, my cousin has Aspergers, but not like those of you who are typing do. He has a..mild-functioning form of it. I won't get into details much with him, as it is his own issue (He just turned 16) and it's not my business really, but I will say that his savant-esqe trait is with automobiles. You could ask him about basically any car and he'll tell you all about it. But he does not do well with people at all. And has general life-functioning issues.

I use to think that I had some sort of mild Autism because of my repetition of sounds as well, which I thought was funny reading this. But then I came up with my own theory.