Been lurking, now time to try posting!

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Like the title says, I've been hanging around and reading, but it's only recently that I decided I should participate to even a small degree.

I'm in my thirties and am interested in fiction, computers for the most part. I like to write prose and do high-level coding in a specific game engine. I'm not much of a serious programmer at the moment; I tend to learn these sorts of concepts at a slow pace that requires a lot of time and patience, which I don't always have.

I was diagnosed with aspergers 18 years ago. At the time, I did not take it seriously. Being a kid, I had what must be the common reaction: "ha ha, ass burgers." After that, I just went on my merry way. I wasn't always the happiest or most successful kid in school, but my grades evened out well enough. My parents tried to put me in various kinds of therapy in those early years, but I didn't pay much mind to any of it. I didn't believe I truly had a problem, so therapy never lasted long.

Fast forward to today at age 30. After so many years letting the 'syndrome run amok fully untreated, my life is a bit of a mess. Friendless in real life, jobless and somewhat isolated in a rural area, depression and anxiety have utterly conquered me in the past few years. It's only been in recent months that I've finally started therapy. We are making progress, but as you can probably imagine for someone in my circumstance, it's a very slow and gradual process.

Whether it be due circumstances or other things, I am having a hard time seeing any positive to having aspergers. It has done me few if any favors, but I'm trying to remain positive. Even with an understanding and patient parent, it's been difficult.

Anyway, nice to meet you all.

Hi. 18 years ago, huh? You must've been among the first group of people to be diagnosed with Asperger's. And now the term is gone!

Feel free to join in the discussions here. You'll find a lot of similar-minded folks. I, myself, am a musician, photographer and writer of fiction and poetry.

Welcome. I don't know if this helps at all, but I try not to categorize AS as positive or negative. It can encompass both depending on your circumstances.

Welcome

Hans Asperger identified the disorder in 1947.

You must mean since it was added to the DSM in 1994.

As for its removal, professionals I've spoken to say they are mostly ignoring the new DSM and expect it to be revised multiple times. The US Government has already announced that they are going to stop using the DSM, in favor of other diagnostic tools.

@givemestr: Welcome! Personally, I don't have a lot of faith in Therapeutic Techniques when it comes to Autism, because I don't believe its possible to change your neural wiring. You can be forced to learn to fake "normal" behaviors (to a limited extent), but it won't change your natural impulses and inclinations. We all tend to do that on our own over time - create 'coping mechanisms' to navigate the NT world without being spotted so easily. But perhaps you'll get something out of it I don't, or maybe you've found a program I've not heard about. I wish you good luck!

As for whether there's anything positive about AS...well, it seems to make some feel better to think so. Its a disability - a set of handicaps. That sucks.

OTOH, I've come to realize that I wouldn't be the person I am today if I hadn't had to deal with those obstacles every day of my life and I refuse to think of myself as a bad person. if Neitzsche's observation was correct, it hasn't killed me, so it must have made me stronger.

Nobody told me my condition had a name until I was well into middle age, so all those years my parents, teachers and employers were loudly asking me "What the f**k is WRONG with you!?" I had no answer. I knew there was something very different about me that others were not having such difficulties with, but I had no frame of reference for determining what it was. In spite of the problems it caused me and the abuse I took for it, I still would not change it even if I could - its who I am, and my point of view may be different, but it is not wrong. I've seen how the rest of the world thinks and behaves and they can keep it, they are mostly idiots and I would not want to be like them.

In some ways, I think I've developed a healthier sense of compassion because of it. I'm no bleeding heart, mind you and certainly nobody's nursemaid, but I hate to see others being bullied, sidelined, ignored or mistreated for being different. I think people with AS and High Functioning Autism frequently develop better than average analytical skills BECAUSE our brains have trouble processing the incoming sensory data stream. Details and subtleties that the NT brain processes, deciphers, assesses and automatically prioritizes effortlessly, our brains have to scan individually and process consciously in order to determine which are important and which ones irrelevant. That causes us to be more thoughtful, more discerning and more introspective because we have to be. Otherwise, we would miss and/or misinterpret signals and meanings even more frequently than we do.

Just one example of how our disabilities shape and form our personalities and dispositions, making us not less than our NT brothers and sisters, just different. They need us in their world, because most of them are incapable of paying attention to the details. They're too busy talking and trading nonverbal signals. What I find lonely is the fact that we are enough of a minority that its difficult to meet others who think like us. Good news is we aren't so rare that it never happens.

welcome. I hope you get your life on track

Thanks for the welcomes and insights, all.

I initially didn't feel motivated to post because even the prospect of participating on a message board can carry a lot of weight in my mind. I definitely see I shouldn't have worried about it so much.

I just spent three days at an autism conference, and - bad news - autistics over thirty don't even exist at autism conferences. The rest of the world, forget about acceptance. Just getting to the point where our existence is feasible is going to take more years than I have left.

So over thirty and you are no longer present in the community? Are you serious?

There's such a high percentage of adult autistics who know nothing of it. The work's been done with children, and where autism is recognised children, and children who've grown into young adults, are the target community. The money's there to help children and there's not much we know how to do to help adults.

I was diagnosed at 52, and nearly a decade later there might be two or three other autistics I exchange limited words with a few times a year. It's not for want of trying. I suspect that the default assumption is that in half a century or so we'll be gone, and the children we've worked hard to help will be the well known face of autism.