Autism: In 1992 in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, autism was defined by “abnormal introversion and egocentricity, acceptance of fantasy rather than reality, and infantile behavior.” By 2000 the same dictionary noted autism as “ a psychiatric disorder of childhood characterized by marked deficits in communication and social interaction, preoccupation with fantasy, language …” the dictionary moved to language that denoted autism as a distinct disorder, and as a childhood disability. Today we have a wider autism spectrum, it is widely known that autism is not just a childhood disorder.

Before 1975 however, while autistic individuals from across the autism spectrum existed the lack of a framework for autism that included those people meant being for example a “late diagnosed autistic person” or someone with “psychological demand avoidance autism” was not ‘way to be a person’ because that wording and that framework did not exist. People had the traits but did not experience themselves in this way.