Help...

Post Reply New Topic

I need help getting my head around the new paradigm associated with the idea that I may have an ASD. This is a bit of a brain dump (Interestingly I am prone to very long unnecessary explanations).

I have been struggling for years with mental health issues, and no diagnosis ever seems to fit completely. I have been treated for (in order) ADD/ADHD, Anxiety/Panic, Bi-polar, and complex PTSD. I have at times been medicated, and in all cases the medication failed to do what the doctors expected it would do. None of them seem to. I have also pushed on the notions of narcissism and anti-social PD with therapists, and while I show some traits, the diagnosis doesn't fit in part because I seem to have some empathy and concern/awareness for other people though this wasn't always the case. I can't hurt other people physically for example, and I have awareness of when my words hurt people's feelings - though sometimes I am not fast enough to see what the effect is in advance, and I seem to have a lot of "I guess I shouldn't have said that" moments. If I have enough time I seem to be able to manufacture empathy. I have to work hard to be "nice" to people, but I want to do so because I feel love for people and I want them to be happy.

I went back to school to get a masters degree in psychology in an attempt to better understand what I am dealing with. I graduated in December.

I have a brother who most definitely is on the autism spectrum. I came to learn recently that being on the spectrum is a heritable condition. One or both of my parents is on the spectrum essentially. I am digging at this because my daughter has been going through some tough times in elementary school, and it looks like she is going to get a 2E (twice exceptional) designation from our school district. She seems to be on the spectrum, which also means that one or both of my wife and I are also on the spectrum given the heritability aspect. Further, in exploring the subject I find that many undiagnosed adults (I am 51) go through the psycho-industrial complex extensively and to their detriment, before landing on Aspergers. So, ultimately I took a test, a measure for Aspergers and the result was basically "call your doctor right away." I have an appointment tomorrow with my therapist.

This is a potential game changer as i find myself refactoring all of my relationships back to an early age. So many were difficult, and some even left deep scars. Looked at through the lens of an aspie so much now makes sense, and I find myself having a lot of regret* and wishing things would have been different.

* I often feel incredible sadness and loneliness...deep emotions. That is one reason I still have some doubt about a positive ASD diagnosis. Popular sentiment portrays an aspies' emotional range as including rage or "un-emotion." Along with feelings of sadness, I feel love, attraction, anger - of course, jealousy, I get horny and I enjoy sex...a fairly wide range of emotions that I have thought are counter intuitive for an aspie. I also do have a S&%tload of anxiety and have since I was 18 or so.

Otoh, I am often dispassionate in the face of loved one's getting hurt, or feeling bad themselves. I hurt people's feelings because I am an impatient "blunt prick" who seems to not be able to take other peoples feelings and emotions in to account when I offer constructive criticism. And often if not always the criticism is warranted. I can't understand why I make people angry when they need this information to be better at what ever it is they are doing... I am incredibly sensitive to certain tastes and textures, and loud unsettling noises. I am also - ironically, very sensitive to criticism and judgement from others, especially when they are explaining why my ideas are wrong. Otoh, some music I can listen to at high volume an not really have trouble.

I really struggle with conflict and stress. The greater the level of either the more dysfunctional I become - the harder it is for me to "wear a mask" and the more likely I am to go in to an aspergers type of mode. When I get agitated, I escalate, and then naturally engage in repetitive movement as a way to dissipate "bad energy" and to get myself calmed down. I can also get really angry if I can't get relief. I chain smoke cannabis at times, and I used to be an alcoholic but have been in very good control of that for a while now.

My IQ is 158. My dad earned a Ph.D. in atomic physics from Harvard. His dad earned the first Ph.D in economics from a top Big 10 university. I have many family who have advanced degrees in medicine and in physics, and we are all very similar in our personalities and behavior.

I am pretty upside down, because I had been going through life thinking I had a condition that could be cured and that at some point I might be "normal." At this point I don't think that is true. Maybe it means I can stop what has become a decades-long obsession to understand myself. Maybe for once I can relax and just accept myself for who I am, because I can't change it apparently.

Thanks for listening. I guess I just needed to get this out in the open so I can deal with it...sorry it is so long and wordy.

...oh, and I suck in relationships as well at times. Nothing like being married to a man who gives brutally honest feedback...

Welcome to Wrong Planet!

Welcome, from one wordy aspie to another!

That was a rather eloquent description of what sounds a lot like autism. I related to a lot of what you wrote. The sadness can be crushing at times.

Some autistics are emotionally flat, others, like me, have trouble regulating their emotions. You'll very often find autistics who are extreme opposites in terms of personality, who are for example very extraverted or introverted, hyperlexic or dyslexic, or who are either extremely organized or disorganized. For an illustration, watch the My Little Pony episode where Applejack goes to visit Pinkie Pie's family. Yes, seriously. Maybe you'll identify some family members

Some mental health professionals have a hard time distinguishing between instinctive social skills and intelligence. They might overestimate your social skills because they don't realize how much can be learned by analyzing social situations and by practicing things such as music, sports and public speaking.

If your daughter is autistic, it doesn't mean that one of the parents has to qualify for a diagnosis.....it just means it's likely that there will be more autistics in the family. As far as I can recall, about 50% of autism cases seem to be inherited and the other 50% no one can explain.

Welcome, and thank you for your post. Please update in regard to the results of your scheduled visit with your therapist if you'd be so kind to do so.

In my opinion, I believe it's a common myth that people with ASD are robotic and without a range of emotion or without empathy. Trying to process and deal with the myriad of external stimuli our world throws at us means we internalize things more than NT people do. At least that's the case for me. I would have to admit that outwardly I may appear to show less emotion than many other people do. Left to my own devices (ie not making an conscious effort) I will speak in a monotone to those I'm not familiar with. I may be amused at comedy but rarely laugh out loud at it. I don't believe that diminishes the feeling of amusement I experience. I can be happy, sad, mad, etc.

Regarding empathy. I can truly empathize with someone's misfortune if I myself have previously experienced the same type of misfortune or something similar. Empathizing with someone if I've never experienced such an issue is hard for me only because, in a literal sense, I can't relate. Empathy, the act of "putting yourself in someone else's shoes" if you haven't experienced the same thing, philosophically, is a contrivance and therefore not particularly genuine?

Welcome Boulder, hope your appointment goes well! I agree with Magna that it's not that Aspies don't feel emotion, it's just we tend to internalize them so people don't find them outwardly obvious. In my case, I also find that I have no problems feeling negative emotions such as anxiety and sadness, it is only with more positive emotions that I find myself lacking, such as pride, joy and excitement (thus sloth). Everything else you describe: the anxiety, the bluntness, the masking, etc. sound very very much like Aspie behavior, but I suppose the appointment will answer that for you. Hope you find the answers you are looking for!

I want to replay to everyone who responded by saying thanks for the warm welcome. Wrong planet is the perfect name for a forum in this context. I feel like I am on a completely wrong planet. I apologize for the delay.

Hello Underwater, I wanted to reply to you specifically because you touched on the heredity aspect. I think I misspoke in saying it means that parents have it as well. I have gone back and done more reading, and it seems there is certainty about autism having an inherited genetic origin. However, this does not mean that the parents have autism, only that parents contributed genetically to the circumstance. And it also seems that some parents do have it and they do also pass it on down the line. As you indicate there is much that is not known.

THere is so much that I want to write - writing seems to relieve some of the anxiety tho that is eroded by the worry over what people will think, but at the same time uncharacteristically I don't have the energy. I did go see my therapist, and I did get some validation, but he also essentially punted, and referred me to an autism specialist. He did say the measure I used to initially determine the presence of autism was based on a well-vetted, peer-reviewed methodology, and the results do indicate that I am on the spectrum. He did offer that corroboration. However, he also said that I am looking at potentially challenging times ahead until I can really come to grips with this. I would be best served by a specialist.

At first I was incredulous, because I have been me for over 50 years with all of my coping methods and tricks that I use to pass myself off as an NT. To me - as a psychologist, this is fascinating that I evolved a series of tools for myself that have allowed me to manage the perceptions of the people around me, so that I can live a somewhat normal life. Living said life unfortunately takes a lot of energy to maintain that front.

It takes energy to be nice - for lack of a better word, to my wife and daughter. It takes energy to go shopping and to be out in the world Being social is incredibly hard and I often have panic around going to parties and getting together with groups. Friendships take a ton of energy and I have lost a lot of budding friendships without a lot of understanding on my part as to why. Only after realizing I am on the spectrum that I started thinking about those friendships and how at some point in all cases I essentially get "ghosted." I have had an especially hard time on the job front for about 15 years now. I generally make it about 3-2 years at a job before the situation disintegrates. I come in and kick ass for a few years. I seem to have a genuine intuition for strategy and trajectory in business, and I have done a lot of good for companies, but unfortunately, business is a "what have you done for me lately" culture, and I always end up on the outs. I have realized that I can be rolling along in a job until a new personality joins the mix that stresses the infrastructure. In each case the stress and dysfunction builds until I have completely wiped out any good will I have built over the previous few years, and I end up getting let go.

The f-ed up thing is that I have been in sales and marketing the whole time, and the anxiety around contacting strangers, and trying to sell them or set up appointments was off the charts bad; but this is also a skill I have developed as an entrepreneur. All I have ever wanted to do is start and run successful businesses, and in an attempt to do that, I have learned a tremendous amount on the subject. I am legitimately I high level expert on the subject...I just can't do it (sell) effectively for myself. I ultimately did figure out that I am likely hard-wired for roles other than in sales, and in an attempt to change careers, I went back and completed graduate certificates in both systems and software engineering. I job searched for a long time, and I am guessing that because I am not a digital native, not many tech companies are going to hire a 50-something greybeard. I was finally hired on by a friend at his company as a "project manager." Because it was a friend, I was lax on the details - I didn't insist on a formal offer letter before leaving my old job for example...I was just way too trusting and naive, which is another barrier to business success unfortunately. So, after I had quit my other job and joined the new team, I received my offer letter and my title was not as a PM but was instead "Business Development Manager." I was doing some project management, but my main job was to bo going in to troubled customer accounts and in helping turn the relationship around. ur core market is law enforcement, so my job was to try to convince a lot of pissed off cops that they should come back and do business with our company. At the time my daughter was young and I was very stressed about keeping my household together, I had no other prospects so I had to forge ahead, and it was a nightmare. To my credit I was very successful for a while, but they hired a new sales rep at some point who was all about confrontation, and challenging convention. She was the flavor of the day, and I was cast out because the stress started to make me act oddly. I went to my friend and told him the situation was causing a ton of anxiety, and his next move was to basically let me go. At the same time that all of this was going down, my dad became sick, and passed away. I have not worked since. I have burned through my meager retirement savings trying to figure out wtf is wrong with me.

That is basically where I am at now. I come to this forum with friends, but none who understand what it means that I have an ASD. I love my mates, but they are fairly powerless to help. My wife just thinks that I am crazy, because every year or two it is a new psychological disorder. New diagnosis, same result...some things fit, others don't and the drugs absolutely do not work. I feel incredibly alone, broken, and all I want to do is sit down and rest. All I can do is go back through past relationships and through a different lens, see my role in the dysfunction of the relationship...over and over and over. All these years feeling like I was a victim, that I had something I could "get well" from, now I am left with the reality that this is who I am for as long as I am who I am, and those failed relationships?...it was me. All this time thinking I was the normal one in the room. What a joke...

In any event, thanks for reading. I do appreciate that there may be people here who can nod in understanding.

Also, I mentioned that I think my daughter is on the spectrum. She has started having brief spells of catatonia in the face of anxiety, which is very terrifying.