The AUTISM SPECTRUM Thread (Now with extra rainbows!)

[kyriaki]

I found this great book at my library called The Mis-Labeled Child or something that goes into exhaustive detail on how one disorder can mimic another, and there's even a section on how being exceptionally gifted can mimic a disorder.

I have a feeling that the latter happened to me.

ooh thisthisthisthisthis.

i was lucky enough to be identified as gifted from an early age. unfortunately almost no one in the school district realized that gifted kids need special education too. "Smart kids don't need any help" is the conventional wisdom. So i coasted along, piling up easy A's on test, but every year or two i'd wind up with a low or worse due to poor work habits and effort. A succession of dumbass guidance counselors all concluded "hey, maybe if we challenge ky even LESS, he'll somehow learn to focus on it more!"

what i learned was that i could coast by with minimal effort, doing the bare minimum necessary. and that's what i've been doing ever since.

[Niklink]

The doctors can't really decide whether I have Asperger's or not. If I DO have it, it would be to such a slight degree that I really do not give a fuck.

[Whim]

"Smart kids don't need any help" is the conventional wisdom.

This attitude drives me crazy. I was recommended for a gifted program in elementary school, but my mom said no because "special programs teach smart kids that they're better than other people."

I don't even understand that. Anyway, regular school was fine and maybe she was right that the program would have been bad for me. I just hate the way it was put.

And kyriaki, I do not understand the thinking at all about challenging you LESS if you're already bored! The logics, they do not make sense to me.

[Anne Beeche]

That would explain why I put all my concentration into everything but school unless what I'm doing is just challenging and demanding enough of my creativity to draw me.

[Strider]

Bluh...someone is complaining at me that one of my rp characters are a little to touchy, even though the other person is totally fine with it, not that he's bothered to talk to her about it or anything.

[Anne Beeche]

Different people have different tolerances.

[kyriaki]

"Smart kids don't need any help" is the conventional wisdom.

This attitude drives me crazy. I was recommended for a gifted program in elementary school, but my mom said no because "special programs teach smart kids that they're better than other people."

I don't even understand that. Anyway, regular school was fine and maybe she was right that the program would have been bad for me. I just hate the way it was put.

That's bullshit. I already knew i was better than other people. What i didn't know was that being good at school did nothing to prepare me for real life.

mostly what the gifted program did for me was give me a place to associate with other gifted kids. It's where I met most of my friends. I also saw it help a lot of kids out with problems they were having with their normal classes, and I wish i had taken more advantage of that. I'm glad the normal school experience worked out for you, But it wasn't too great for me and without the program (which has now been cut down drastically) I don't know where i'd be today.

And kyriaki, I do not understand the thinking at all about challenging you LESS if you're already bored! The logics, they do not make sense to me.

what no one understood at the time was that my problems had nothing to do with the difficulty of the coursework but how it was presented. I could have easily skipped a couple years and probably gotten the same grades, but no one would have allowed that as long as i was getting D's and F's. The irony is that the challenge probably would have forced me to learn study skills and time management sooner.

wow, i didn't realize how much this was affecting me.

[Nimz]

Since the thread is going this direction, I'll throw in my two cents as well. I can't agree more with the senselessness of providing less challenge for the bored savants.

I was bored to tears in public school, and depressed. Like suicidal thoughts depressed by 5th or 6th grade. My parents had me take a high school assessment test, which indicated I could pass half the core subjects at a 12th grade level or better. So I enrolled at the local community college when I was 11. My study skills and time management skills still aren't nearly what they should be [/procrastination (if only it were that simple)], but I'm not depressed anymore. Well, more than just procrastination, I have a tendency to leave things almost done instead of finishing them.

Anyway, sorry for assisting in the hijacking of the thread. I'll go back to my lurking corner now. <_<

[Hamzman]

Ya know, I heard that it is far more likely for a guy to have aspergers than a girl. I am the only lady in my GLE class, so that furthers this thought.

Makes me think why there are so many girls with aspergers here? I guess the answer is obvious and that is that apsergers tends to equal nerd which tends to equal person who would want to go to this forum?

I don't have a good answer for the second question, but some scanning on Google says that Aspergers may or may not be a sex-linked genetic trait. That would mean that the traits causing the symptoms are located in the X chromosome. Males, since they only have one X chromosome, would automatically have symptoms, while females would be able to mask it with the other chromosome, which would be normal. Do you know if your father showed any similar traits? If he did, that would confirm this.

[MasterBlade]

My Aspergers was actually mistaken for retardation when I was 4. It wasn't until I started playing with legos and designing large, beautiful, symmetrical structures that they realized my lack of communication skills might be because of something else. :P

Then I was put into a special class because they deemed I was a genius at math. I hated it, and eventually sabotaged my own grades during the second grade to get me back into the normal classes. The school board didn't like that one kid had to sacrifice his schoolwork for escape though, and I think the special class was canceled soon after. :/

It took up until the 4th grade for someone to realize the reason I wanted to sit alone at lunch was because of a social disorder. Aspergers fit the bill, so they started sending me to "during lunch" sessions with other ADD and autism kids. It was nice hanging out with similar people, but it didn't really help getting over it at all. However, it was more pleasant than the special class, so I made no effort to escape it. I kept going to these lunch sessions until high school. :3

Pills; they shoved more of them into me than Louis in a game of Left for Dead. They helped to keep me focused but made me a complete social zombie. If anything it made my problems worse. I'm off of them now; didn't want to depend on them during college. They were in no way the right answer. >.>

So how do I function in school? Pretty well actually. Turns out being autistic has its perks, such as being able to turn your mind into a logic machine. Logic can stretch to cover both math and science, and memorisation can take care of the history. English was always meh, but I managed to mke up for it on the SAT's with everything else.

So do I ever wish I never has Aspergers? Hell no. Sure it caused a lot of problems growing up; and the social disorder part still gives me troubles to this day. However, its what makes me me, and I wouldn't trade it for anything.

[orngjce223]

It's odd to think that most of the core components of my personality are due to something people call a disorder.

You'd think there'd be philosophical consequences to people trying to develop "autism cures", or "autism screening tests". Those are valuable for the lower end of the spectrum. At the higher end of the spectrum, it's ultimately a tradeoff that I consider not really worth it. Other people would, but then again, I'm not other people.

[Milskidasith]

The thing is that plenty of people are smart, logical, good at school, etc. without all the negative aspects of autism (difficulty socializing, for instance) and there are plenty of autistic kids who are not smart or any of the good stuff, or are so nonfunctional they cannot use it. This gives the impression, possibly untrue, that you can overcome the negative while retaining the positive. That, and the fact that most talks of "curing" it focus on working on improving the negative aspects and helping identify it younger to prevent future problems makes it a good cause.

Nobody wants to take away all the good things, but many people are legitimately concerned about their children and believe that they can manage the bad while keeping the good; it's not as simple as a pill that makes you stupid but removes your social problems.

[Inconspicularity]

I think what makes em Aspergers is not that I can't make friends, but because I simply don't want any friends.
And all these annoying people at my school are telling me I need friends to get through life. Fuck them.

[Milskidasith]

I think that frequently assaulting people and repeatedly shouting how you hate certain people is a problem regardless of whether or not you are officially diagnosed with a disorder. And yes, good social skills and some people who have your back are, if not necessary, very very helpful for a wide variety of things.

You've also mentioned this before, so I don't think that it is really useful to post the same thing twice, even if the posts are a while apart.

[Avi]

They're giving you a reason why you should have friends ("you'll fail at life if you don't"), but it's not true. If you don't want friends you can get through your day just fine.
We don't need friendship for any specific reason. It's valuable for its own sake. Like music.

[Acey Enn]

Aspie here, formally diagnosed around age 12 if I recall correctly. Pretty high-functioning and definitely smart, but I don't really "get" social cues, like, at all, and I have trouble with sometimes coming across as angry (especially IRL) when I'm not. And I have a bit of a nasty temper. There's a lot more to it than that, obviously (Asperger's is really pretty complex, it's way more than just being smart and socially awkward), but those are my main issues. I think the reason I have more Internet friends than IRL friends is actually due to being on the spectrum--there aren't any subtle visual or verbal cues for me to miss, and I can think before I talk. Makes interaction a LOT easier.

Also, I have sensory integration issues--I get overwhelmed by crowds and noise (to the extent that I actually got physically ill at my senior prom...that was awkward!), and I'm very hypersensitive to touch. For the most part, I am n0t 0kay with being touched by people I don't know well. I was a lot worse as a baby--I wouldn't let anyone other than my mom hold me, not even my dad, and there would be times where I'd just have to be left alone in my crib to calm down because any attempts to soothe me would actually make things worse...my parents realized eventually that my problem was that I was getting overwhelmed and needed some space. I also have this weird thing about symmetry--like, if you touch me on one arm I have to touch my other arm or I feel all weird--but I'm not sure if that's entirely an Aspie trait, because my mom is probably neurotypical and she has the same problem.

Also, I have a quick question. I'm bipolar, and I think I remember reading somewhere that bipolar disorder is more common among people on the spectrum than among the general population, but I'm not positive that I'm remembering correctly. Does anyone have any info on that?

[Itakirie]

I was diagnosed with Asperger's when I was about 11. Nowadays though, all the psychiatrists that I see say that they can't see how I could possibly have it.

[Whim]

Also, I have a quick question. I'm bipolar, and I think I remember reading somewhere that bipolar disorder is more common among people on the spectrum than among the general population, but I'm not positive that I'm remembering correctly. Does anyone have any info on that?

Wikipedia says that bipolar disorder is commonly "comorbid" (I guess that means "combined") with autism spectrum "disorders". Sorry for all the quotation marks; I just don't like their terminology much, since I'm not sure that Asperger's is actually a disorder - it seems more like a condition to me.

Anyway. For what Wikipedia's worth, that's what it says.

@Itakirie - maybe you were misdiagnosed? Or maybe you learned to adapt so well that it is no longer apparent? I hesitate to play internet doctor though.

[Varkarrus]

I think what makes em Aspergers is not that I can't make friends, but because I simply don't want any friends.
And all these annoying people at my school are telling me I need friends to get through life. Fuck them.

But... You'll be friends with us, right?

[Flamerider64]

Oh I'm certainly autistic.
Not on the deep end of the spectrum but I'm on it.

[Mataku]

I have aspergers, was diagnosed with ADHD when I was like...8 then put on medication till I was 12. In those 4 years I was basically Karkat. And gog damn am I shy. I don't even know how long it took me to work it up to write this.

[llamamiah]

Hi people. I have Asperger's and a bunch of other stuff.

When I was 7, I was diagnosed with Tourette's Syndrome, and my doctor wanted me to feel 'normal', so he refused to even try to diagnose me with anything else. When I was 10, I was getting straight A's, so they took away my IEP and all the things I needed to fully survive school.

I was soon diagnosed with ADHD, as well as OCD. Around the same time, Asperger's happened.

I love the fact that I have all these things, because they make me who I am. I believe, if I only had three of those four, I wouldn't be anything like I am.

[toaster1]

Hey. I have Aspergers.

Well, actually, I was diagnosed with Autism at a young age but I personally feel I have overcome that level of the Autism spectrum to confidently self-re-diagnose[sic] myself as an aspie (I really have never heard this term before I came to this forum. It's almost liberating to apply it to myself.)

I find it difficult to make friends. I'm normal enough that I can function at secondary school enough to have a group of friends, but weird enough to be... shit, I'm really terrible at describing this stuff. I mean, I'm in that awkward position where I'm weird, but normal enough. It's hard to describe. I guess others are more aquainted with describing this sort of stuff?

Making friends over the internet is quite easy for me, as I can think before I type, and there's not really social cues as such - which is why I often spend upwards of nine hours a day on my laptop if there's nothing else to do. (I don't think it's too healthy, but I'm bored and have nothing better to do. Plus, Minecraft.) This led me to MSPA, which helps fill this time and sort of helped me become a better person I guess?

I have a minor problem in which whenever I make something I see as a mistake, no matter how minor or large, I will instinctively never stop saying sorry, except when pressured. Also, I am a horrible stutterer. I stutter so much, my brothers have actually recorded me trying to speak to them and made rap music on their iPhones out of it.

Reading through this topic, I guess I share many qualities with most of you. I'm quite good at logical school subjects, such as Mathematics. I suppose my only major difference is that I love nothing more than physical contact. I hug practically everything. My family have often complained about me crushing them with my strong!hugs and my friends, as few as they are, find it weird. But I guess I am just that kind of guy.

Thanks for reading.

[unrepentantCreeper]

Mild aspergers and ADHD here. Freaked me out when I first got diagnosed, but I got over it. It kind of explained a lot though; I like people, I'm thoroughly extroverted, but I was pretty bad at actually making and keeping friends until high school, where I managed to find a whole mess of people who were mostly as awkward as me. I've gotten a bit better since then, and I like to think it's from making myself go out and learn about people.

Honestly, I've found that a lot of people I know seem like they have symptoms or traces of Apsergers. Just learning that it isn't all that uncommon did me worlds of good on the self-esteem front. Since then it's become less "brain-disorder that I'm defensive of" and more "joking excuse for any social faux-pas."

[orngjce223]

I suppose my only major difference is that I love nothing more than physical contact. I hug practically everything. My family have often complained about me crushing them with my strong!hugs and my friends, as few as they are, find it weird. But I guess I am just that kind of guy.

Weighted blankets/vests/etc. are awesome. Something about deep pressure.