POST2: Women and Autism; Past and Present
Women and Autism: Past and Present Being a woman on the autism spectrum can be incredibly difficult. Not only do they have to face all the challenges and difficulties that every person with autism experiences while interacting with a world that doesn't understand them or the way that they think, but they also have to deal with the fact that, historically speaking, autism has been perceived as a predominantly, if not exclusively, male phenomenon. The disorder was usually described in terms of how it presented in males, and girls tended to have to be more noticeably autistic than boys to even get diagnosed. As a result, understanding and acceptance of girls and women on the autism spectrum lags behind that of boys and men even today. A Brief History of Autism However, in order to truly understand the history of how women with autism have been treated, we must first look at the history of autism in general. The condition that we now recognize as autism was first des...