HOW DID YOUR FAMILY REACT TO ASPERGER'S?

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my family doesn't know yet, because i'm waiting to be diagnosed, although i'm pretty sure i have it. my parents said about my not having friends and pacing back and forth in the schoolyard and i was "like that" and called my flapping my fingers "weirdness". i was asked to keep my wierdness to myself and not do this in front of strangers.
my parents screamed at me to be like everyone else and commanded me to make friends. i was seven and went with my mother to the grocery store and there were two girls from school i barely knew. they walked ahead of me and talked to each other and my mother hollered at me, "those are your friends, run after them, RUN", and pushed me. i ran, but deliberately slowly and missed them.
another time i was at my parents' friends house, age eleven. their two girls went to the basement and my mother ordered me to follow them like a puppy, even though i didn't know them and they obviously didn't want to have anything to do with me.
my parents put me down a lot because of my syndrome, that includes my father, who is an aspie himself but doesn't know it, and has a milder syndrome than me.
they even got angry because i love animals and tried making me afraid of dogs as a child.

My mother flatly refuses to believe that there is anything at all wrong with me.

Mom: I need to get to Borders. (to get books on Aspergers/HFA)
Dad: She doesn't have autism, she just has a bad attitude. (what a jackass)
Sister: Is she gonna die? (in her cute 9-year-old voice)
Grandparents: How did this happen? (glares at my father)

makayla, this is real funny. sounds like something my father would say. at least your mother had the right attitude.

I haven't discussed the possibility of AS with anyone, least of all my family. My parents are big on their kids being normal.

I don't think they even realize they do it, but my whole life they've held up my little brother as something for me to aspire too. Conventionally funny, adorable, and extroverted, if perhaps too high energy. Keeps up with conversations. Loves to be the center of attention. Impeccable style sense. Relatively neat. Reliable with eye contact. Relatable and understandable.

I tried to explain to my dad how I feel trapped when I'm the center of attention, even with my family, and he told me it was a horrible thing to say. The reason I don't share much with my family? They won't even make an attempt to see things from my worldview. (Also, it took about thirteen years for me to get a word in edgewise around my perfect, outgoing Brotherling.)

I love my family, I just wish they were okay with me being who I am. It's exhausting constantly having people trying to force you into a mold you'll never fit into.

My family breathed a sigh of relief, for at last I had been diagnosed with something that they could agree on rather than the symptoms that the medical profession could never quite get.

It took the education authority to seek a diagnosis which at first they thought was dyslexia, but turned out to be aspergers and dyspraxia. I got told I was highly intelligent, something I could not agree on, but apparently my intelligence was such that for the purposes of fitting in to society at large, I had created many coping mechanisms, which when asked why I did such and such as a mask, I could explain my exact reason.

The trouble is though, when one has this kind of thing and has accepted it, one can then see it in others and with that I believe my father has it, but he doesn't want to know, because, well, he's retired after a successful life in business.

The topic title should be re-worded....its not like you're coming out of the closet to them or something(not a gay hater)


My parents took it pretty well, although my mom pisses me off on a regular basis cuz she won't let me access my f*****g paycheck(she set up my account under her name cuz thats how it had to be even though I'm over 18(23) for me to receive my disability check(I'm working now)) even though I put my gas bill, truck insurance, rent for living with them(even though I watch their brats, do their AND my own laundry, cook 5 days a week for supper and go get us stuff for lunch as well as do the 3 loads worth of daily dishes in addition to my 2 jobs) and utilities that I use(including when I do their f*****g laundry and dishes) and college tuition and book prices(they take it out of my account)

Seriously, all I wanna do is finish up the rest of my gaming collection(so a few DS games, get my Vita paid off and the games I pre-ordered paid off, and buy 2 new controllers for my N64, cuz I already have all the other systems and games I want, as well as accessories) and then start saving to buy a car with decent gas mileage, no matter how long it takes(17 miles to the gallon in this truck does NOT feel like 17 miles to the gallon...maybe like 12) and then buy myself a new HD TV(selling my SD one cuz its on its last leg for gaming) and then have enough for a decent offering at church every Sunday(I feel guilty giving less than $15, if not $20)

That, and when we move to Seattle, my real dad will still be down here and so will all my friends, so I'll be coming down here to visit(TX) so I need to have the TV out of the way so I don't have to wait an extra month or 2 to come visit cuz I had to wait til I could move out to buy a f*****g tv that doesn't make games and some channels look like s**t.

EDIT: Oh, and just a little more dirt on her: She won't give me my paycheck, right??? Well each year for Christmas(I've stopped expecting birthday gifts from them, my friends usually take me out to eat or something now and Starbucks afterwards) they(her and stepfather) give me a f*****g card(as in "Holiday Greeetings!! !" or something to that effect, nothing inside, basically no effort) and tell me I need to stop spending my money on "stupid s**t" yet they have so many f*****g antiques around their house they just f*****g up and buy throughout the year that we have what is essentially a 5 car garage filled with them that they can't fit in our current house and plan to move into the bigger house in Seattle(and this house we live in now is just shy of 3500 sq.ft without the garages) and they're saying this to me as they give all 3 kids like $300 toys(a "Christmas special" since they NORMALLY buy them a monthly $100 or near toy pretty much)

The ONLY time I buy even GBA games(pretty much the cheapest thing at GameStop) is when I get a lot of change back from a large bill that my real dad will send me on occasion to help pay for lunch(a couple of burritos and a coke from Taco Bueno) and even then it has to be like less than $7 for me to consider buying it cuz I know I'll get bitched at.

2nd Edit: Uhm.....Sorry for the rant. This is just one thing of many, many more I needed to get off my chest. =S

well my mother was relieved because she knew there was something wrong and now i could get better help. my dad knows and is not in denail but is uncomfortable talking about it. my brother is amazed at how much it explains

hi! if you are from the UK, you can get all the books on Aspergers and many other topics in a library. I was amazed how much literature is available. you can even order it online to be delivered to your local library. xx

They were neutral and didn't care one way or the other. They researched it very little and just focused on the problems I have.

Unfortunately, I live in the USA. So I had to either research it online, or buy books.

Really? There's stuff at the little library and I haven't even looked for it at our main library yet and I'm American. (though the internet is much easier to research on).

This is exactly the problem I am having with my Aspie boyfriend now.

I am an Aspie too, but everyone is trying me to force him to change, and it is like trying to fit me in a square peg when I am a circle.

I can't do their bidding for them anymore, and I feel if they can't let us be ourselves then I will never stop suffering....

I've only tried to tell my brother. My family is big on being nromal as several have stated, much to the degree of, no such thing as mental instability unless it results in some form or retardation or facial disfigurement, or happens duirng old age. I just wish he would learn past that, at least.

"I think I have Asperger's"
"Why?"
"Because AS is defined like this, and I'm like this."
"Everyone feels that way sometimes / That's common human experience / I've felt that way before / That doesn't mean what you think it means / Is the reliability of the reliability of your reliable source reliable? / You believe the first thing you read"
"Forget it."

Either he pissed off a lot of college proffessors when we went to school, or he only treats me this way. I think as my younger brother he can't accept information from me until someone else verifies it, like I threated his intelligence or something.

Gonna try a few other family members, and then yea more of this means jettison the whole thing. Associating with them seems to be maladaptive for me.

yeah, with most of my family, it is all about "them"..... how dare I tarnish their higher than a God image of themselves by exsisting as less than perfect and them |knowing| someone who isn't some superstar.... if I am related to them I only have the right to be like them.... above the rest of the world...... "barf"...

To answer the OP:

With Denial, denial, denial.