Hi everyone, I'm new here ; but I have known Wrong Planet for several years, and read many topics. In France (yes I'm French!) Asperger Syndrome is not well known (euphemism), even though associations work hard in order to change the situation ; there are a few websites about AS, some with forums, but nothing like this one. I found here many tips and advices that have helped me, and I wanted to thank the community of WP for that .
My firstname is Julien. I'm twenty. I live in Bordeaux (one of my favorite cities) where I study literature and humanities. I think I have Asperger. I haven't been diagnosed, but it seems so clear to me now that I cannot be wrong - not after all the accounts that I've read. I felt relieved when I saw that I was not the only one to have landed on this strange social planet, when I was able to put on my problems a name, that was neither "madness" nor "debility", when I understood that there were others like me.
I love writing and reading. The only thing I'm sure about me and my future, is that I want to become a writer (I'm writing several plays [yes, in the same time, I know, it's odd ], poems, an unclassifiable text, a kind of autofiction [so not really an autobiography, and not really a fictionnal narrative], its narrator being an Aspie of course (since he looks like me)... in French, but I like writing some texts in other languages too (in English, and even... in Latin - and, of course, in my imaginary tongues ). What else? I've always been a great Tolkienist. I'm in love with poetry. My favorite series? Above all science fiction (mainly the new Battlestar Galactica [I like a much Bear McCreary's music too], Star Trek, Doctor Who, Star Wars, Stargate [a little less]). Music? "Savant"/"Classical" music, but also everything else, with no biases, in so far as it is good - but I must admit I cannot bear loud music or metal etc. Otherwise, I have special interests that vary from time to time. It can be fairly random, sometimes good and beneficial, sometimes not. For example, when I got focused upon the USA, it was not bad - as a contributor to the french Wikipedia, I added a lot of things there about the USA, and, as a student, it was well welcomed ; but when it's more like a fixation upon a movie, or a fictional universe, it's less cool, because the obsession is not very work-friendly...
What would I add? Like many Aspies I have not a great social life. I am lucky in so far as I have a loving family and have been kind of shielded during my first years from several issues many Aspies are tormented by. But now I'm supposed to be an adult, and "there's the rub", because it's hard for me to live on my own, away from home, and without proper friends. I had "friends" last year, but ever since I arrived in university (I had been for two years in a "prépa" where students were nice, and professors nice too), I feel alone and unhelped. I've no more energy for social interactions, even though I want it (I mean, reasonnably). There are too many people, professors are distant, organisation is not really good (which is so much tiring for someone who likes stability!). So I've no friend at all, since october (I keep contact with two old friends, but I can't see them)... I've never had a girlfriend and I have no selfconfidence, so... I wouldn't be able to understand if someone was interested by me, if it happens one day (what's more, I'm not the kind of man girls would date ; I'm really skinny (52 kg for 1,79m) and I have a Pectus Excavatum). - Furthermore I'm 35-40 minuts away from the campus while I was intern last year ("promiscuity" was evil , but having a place to rest and relax 2 seconds away from the classroom was really goooood! ), and the overcrowded tramway is like a rolling Pandaemonium for me (I actually wrote many pages about my feelings on trains and buses. I've even a text that is called "Le purgatoire sur rails" in French, Purgatory on rails in Badly-translated English of Frenglish if you want )
To put it in a nutshell : I've lost a great part of my motivation, I cannot work as much as before, I'm more and more anxious, and my results have become average (while I used to be at the top of a class of 40 selected students, and while this was, by far, a lot harder than at uni!). It's a bit enraging. But I know that you are many here to have problems like that, and often a lot harder than that, which puts things into perspective (I'm not sure this expression is good English, excuse me).
Yes, you've noticed : I complain. A lot ; and this post is never going to end if I don't restrain myself ! So that's it. I'd like to contribute here sometimes. For I deeply think that helping and comforting each other is one of the most important thing (I'm idealistic, also) and I would fell less useless if I could make an Aspie feel less alone.
Edit: this is quite a long post, indeed. And I clearly don't know how to put my ideas in a nutshell