Challenges Faced by Teens and Adults with Aspergers
Despite the rapid growth of interest in Asperger disorder in kids, there continues to be a lack of awareness of the diagnosis and its implications for teens and grown-ups. The reasons for this lack of awareness lie in the history of the disorder and in the historical development of mental health services. Because, as Santayana wrote, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it,” this article reprises some of the history given elsewhere in this volume, but in a highly partial way, to bring out what the author believes to be the historically grounded prejudices that are the first challenge to anyone wanting to help teens and adults with Aspergers. The diagnosis of Aspergers (AS) is more than 50 years old, nearly as old as autistic disorder. The year of 1943 saw the publication of Kanner's description of autistic disturbances in kids [1], and 1944, Aspergers paper on autistic personality disorder [2]. Asperger, like Kanner, worked with kids, and his paper, lik