maybe just a jerk

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Hi all,

first let me say I'm really glad there is such a community as this! I haven't read much here but I think this could be a lot of fun.

I am some sort of maybe high functioning autistic person, maybe AS, maybe PDD-NOS, although I think the one thing we can all agree on is it's hard to define these range of "conditions". I've had long discussions about this with my therapist - who doesn't feel qualified to diagnose me. I argue with him that really people like us are far superior to normal humans and rather than label us, I have decided to label all others as inwardly under-developed, human-interaction addicts (IUD-HIA). He replied, a little exasperated, "Maybe you're just a jerk." He may be on to something. I don't mean to make light of serious disabilities, but I want to make the point that our particular constellation of traits can be thought of as very desirable.

I consider myself serially obsessive. I get really interested in things and that's all I can think about for months, and then in 8-12 months I completely change interests. I have gone through snakes and herpetology, dinosaurs, orchids, astronomy, beetles, ferns, stamps, coins, tropical fish, programming, linux, pokemon, learning Icelandic, Russian, Old Norse, Old English, German, cryptography, plasma physics, atmospheric physics, nonlinear dynamics, geraniums, communism, learning about the Amish, and many branches of mathematics, mainly number theory, group theory, topology and now combinatorics. Each time I think I have really found something to hold my interest, and I can convince anyone who will listen that it's true, except those who know me just laugh and know I will be on to something new soon enough.

Shifting interests has made it hard to find a career. Computers are something I can deal with well - computers and I have similar social skills. I got as far as a master degree in biology before I lost interest (I think the breaking point came when I found I had to host my outside committee member at my house and I was just horrified at having to interact with a stranger in my house for a few days) but I managed to get a great position as a network administrator (computer guy). I think academia is a good home for AS people, although most people here pick one interest and stay with it for life and that I just can't fathom.

As a kid I was lucky to end up in a gifted school - maybe it was more like an AS sanitarium. It was nice to fit in and feel a little normal, but being in a small school 30 miles from home meant not a lot of interaction with kids outside of school. This was fine of course for the most part, I preferred to be by myself. The difficulty arose in trying to find a girlfriend. The desire was there but the social skills were completely lacking. I don't like to make eye contact, I absolutely can't do small talk and I hate to be in large groups of people in party-type situations. The massive and complete lack of success in interacting with girls was a great source of pain, but I did find solace throwing myself into my "hobbies" and interests.

I was eventually introduced to someone when I taught high school physics and we were married for many years and are now separated. I do have two wonderful daughters who are healthy and well adjusted, and are a huge source of happiness in my life. When living with my wife we did a reality TV show called Trading Spouses. I think they picked us in part because of my anti-social self-absorbed tendencies - made for funny TV. Making the show was fun and I got a lot of email from people from all over but oddly no real friendships came out of it. Kind of depressing not to find one interesting person after such national exposure.

I fear this is too long and no one is reading anymore, but I wanted to introduce myself and maybe let people know, let the parents of AS kids know that their kids can have good lives out of this, in many aspects better than other people's lives. I have found great satisfaction in learning the things I have and visiting mathematical worlds that few have seen. I like when I get compared to the character from the TV show "Monk" - you should think of your AS traits as both a gift and a curse - but mainly a gift. It's great fun to find patterns in things and to notice things that others don't. If I could go back and trade my idiosyncrasies for a normal social life and social skills - I certainly would not. They are the things that make me who I am.

Finally I am hoping to meet other similar people. My therapist suggested this site and my assignment is to make friends. He agrees that AS is not something that needs to be cured but he thinks it would be good to find someone to relate to. I agree. Thank you for reading this self-indulgent introduction, please help me with my assignment. --rob

Last edited by manifoldrob on 03 Jul 2010, 6:02 am, edited 1 time in total.

I've been accused of that, too. I usually just shrug it off.

Anyway, welcome to WP, rob!



I agree...well, most of the time. It enables me to have a long attention span for stuff I'm really interested in, but can lead to feeling distracted otherwise.



Same here. When I finally self-diagnosed several months ago, the "it" that's made me "different" my whole life finally got a name. If anyone asked "would you want to be 'normal?'" I'd ask "what's that mean?" I don't want to change who I am, either.

I just got my Master's in Applied Criminology and am hoping to teach online courses. (Until then, I'm working as a cashier at a fast-food restaurant. Not great, but not horrible either, and it pays the bills.) I've been a TA four times--two for online--and actually enjoy teaching. I think I made more of a positive impact on the students in the online courses, but could probably teach in-person.

My Bachelor's is in Psychobiology. Before that, I was a Chemistry major. I understand what you mean about "shifting interests" (though probably not quite to the same degree).

You'll definitely find friends here. PM me if you like.

Again, welcome to WP!

Welcome greetings, fellow-traveler Rob, to the WP neighborhood.

To WrongPlanet!! !

Welcome

I usually just agree with them and proceed to prove I'm a jerk by taking a (verbal) jab at them.

I like the IUD-HIA concept and I'm glad you realized how long your introduction was and seperated it into fairly easy to read paragraphs and tried to keep it short enough for those of us who lack focus.

I've worked all kinds of weird jobs between school. I quit teaching high school and worked in a sub shop and then an orchid nursery and as a lab temp until I got a job as a quality control tech for a soft drink company.



I think you probably could too. Teaching seems to be much different than other social situations. I always got a little anxious before TAing a lab but once it started I was OK. My students did well and generally liked my labs. The hardest part teaching is gauging how well the students are following, but that's hard for everyone who teaches. Academia is a good place for AS people.



I'm glad to see I was not the only one. I managed to stay a physics major as an undergrad even though my interests switched from astronomy to plasma physics, it's all under physics. I ended up in a biology program and got a biology masters, which I don't really use for my job now. I knew people in grade school who wanted to be doctors and ended up being doctors. How uninteresting.

Criminology sounds very interesting. Interviewing people I probably couldn't do, but I'd love to have Abby's job on NCIS - I don't know if you know the show!

Welcome to WrongPlanet.

Welcome!