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Title: How would I have been if I had Lafora disease? I have autism and OCD Post by: AshKetchum95 on Aug 21, 2015 I heard that autism (or some biological types of it) can protect from Alzheimer's and some other types of dementia. However, when I was studying biological diseases identical to their genes, I came across Lafora disease, and I was shocked that a teenage dementia existed.While looking at Cheslea's Hope, I read a story abo a mother wrote about her daughter with Lafora, she said, "What if this, was your child?" It freaked me out because I am 19 and I just about got out of the woods. I, myself have high functioning/regressive autism and OCD. I developed normally until I was like 2 1/2 years old, and then regressed into autism. I did not speak again until i was 6 years old. I was scared to imagine me in an alternative universe a few years ago, me having Lafora on top of my autism. I know that Lafora disease is caused by Lafora bodies clogging and flooding up the nerves. Autism has a different pathology in the brain from a human brain. So, just thinking, would autism protect me from Lafora body disease? would it have gone the same way? Or would the autism accelerated/aggravate the process of Lafora disease or vice versa?
Title: Re: How would I have been if I had Lafora disease? I have autism and OCD Post by: bio_man on Aug 22, 2015 Hi!
First, let's tackle this statement: Quote I heard that autism (or some biological types of it) can protect from Alzheimer's and some other types of dementia. Where did you hear this from? Is this a correlation, i.e. people with autism are less likely to develop dementia later on in life? -- if that's the case, remember that correlation isn't causation, and so we can't use this statement with any merit. So, just thinking, would autism protect me from Lafora body disease? would it have gone the same way? Or would the autism accelerated/aggravate the process of Lafora disease or vice versa? Hard to tell. Very few people develop Lafora disease. Not to be biased, but the only other time I read about it was on here a year ago! Given my background in science, I wouldn't fear for this. There are much bigger fish to fry than to fear about this disease impacting you. Title: Re: How would I have been if I had Lafora disease? I have autism and OCD Post by: AshKetchum95 on Aug 27, 2015 https://www.sciencenews.org/article/autism-may-carry-benefit-buffer-against-alzheimer’s
The article saying Autism might protect against dementia is above. Title: Re: How would I have been if I had Lafora disease? I have autism and OCD Post by: bio_man on Aug 30, 2015 The link you provided is more of a search, so if anyone else is reading along, I believe this is the link: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/autism-may-carry-benefit-buffer-against-alzheimer%E2%80%99s
I don't think there is any biological connection between the two. I think one of the commentators put it best that: 'The symptoms of Autism and Alzheimer's are so similar that Autism might simply be masking Alzheimer's symptoms.' Like I advocated in my first post, I wouldn't put much thought into it given that it's simply a correlation without a cause. |