I don't know I am on the spectrum or not.

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Hi folks,

For about a year, I've been internally debating as to whether or not I have Asperger's syndrome.
I've watched YouTube videos of self-proclaimed "aspies" describing what they experience, and sometimes what they have to say is more or less a description of what I experience, and with others, I cannot at all relate.
I have taken the Autism Spectrum Quotient (AQ) questionnaire multiple times, my scores range from 38 to 40, however, with tests such as these, I am never sure if someone who is neurotypical might also score around this range.

I constantly struggle as to whether or not to pursue this and seek diagnosis, but there is one major roadblock in my way:
In this day and age, people are desperate to assign themselves labels, particularly mental health and spectrum related labels, when perhaps they don't actually have a disorder or a "real" problem. It is fashionable to view oneself as something of an introvert, a nerd, or a loner. I do not want to be a person who assigns himself a label without actually being certain of it - I strongly believe that that would be morally wrong.

Therefore, the assessment I have made is that I must come here and discuss my experiences to deem whether or not it is worthwhile to seek an assessment or if it would be better if I sought an answer to my problems in a manner appropriate for a neurotypical individual. The reason why I feel an assessment could potentially help me is that I struggle dealing with social situations in my life, again, not that that is unusual for many neurotypicals, but I feel there is a chance that if Aspergers is indeed the culprit of my issues, that then I can search for Aspergers-based solutions to the challenges that I face on a daily basis.

The following is a list of traits that I have found which appear to be related to ASD and how or if I relate to them:

SOCIAL INTERACTIONS

Let me begin by saying that I am not intimidated by social interactions, nor would I say that I find them confusing; however, my experience is that I believe that I am very good at socializing until my interactions go wrong. Very, very frequently, I will have what I consider to be a pleasant conversation, to find that the person I am talking to is suddenly enraged, upset, hurt, or offended. This always catches me off guard because I have been dealing with this for over 20 years and I have been collecting phrases and things to say so that I won't offend people, and despite the great effort I have put into this, it still happens regularly. I love talking to people, asking them about their lives, and getting to know them, but there is no greater hurt than when somebody considers me to be a bad or malicious person, and for some reason this is the impression I give to people. This even happens with immediate family members, who have known me for nearly my entire life.
Co-workers and friends have told me I have "no filter" but for the life of me, I can't understand how everyone seems to understand what is appropriate or what isn't. I try to keep track of the times I make these social mistakes, but no matter how much data I collect, I just keep making mistakes that cause problems with my family, friends, and co-workers.
I believe I can understand someone's facial expressions to some degree, and I try to remember to smile. I'm pretty good at eye contact - I can withstand staring at the eyeballs of the person I speak to like it's a staring contest to save my life... but people who are certainly neurotypical have unanimously expressed to me that eye contact is a learned behavior, so I doubt I am atypical in this regard. I think I make normal hand gestures when I speak.
Tone of voice is one of the most frustrating parts of social interactions. In my head, my inner voice goes up and down, and is very expressive. However, people always mis-interpret what I say due to my "tone." When I hear myself on a video or a recording, it sounds flat and continuously sarcastic, even though I try to sound expressive like the other people I talk to. I can't get my tone of voice to match what I want it to. I worked in customer service for years and customers constantly complained to managers because of my "attitude."
Volume is another thing I find frustrating - I think I'm whispering, only to look around and see the entire room (in a theatre or library) staring at me. My wife constantly asks me to "stop yelling" thankfully, she knows now that I don't know when I'm loud, and she can communicate this to me. In my head, I am being very quiet, but in reality, I'm disruptively loud. I clearly cannot control the volume of my voice and it causes me all kinds of problems.
I try to stop myself from interacting socially, but the truth is, I love it, and when interactions go well, people really like me. I particularly enjoy communication via writing or on platforms such as Discord, as when people cannot see me, they respond more positively to me. The problem is, I forget that I don't understand some "rules" or common knowledge of social interactions, and I get excited at the chance to meet new people and learn about their lives, and then something goes wrong. It would be easier if I could remember to just avoid engaging with people unless necessary.

SMALL TALK

I really like small talk, as I mentioned above, I love interacting with people. I don't find it intimidating or difficult. I can talk about the weather, or, work, or something. I notice a lot of people with Aspergers and neurotypical people both claim intimidation or difficulty when it comes to small talk, but I sometimes enjoy it, and I'm certainly not afraid of it.

IMAGINATION

It's hard to make up stories, and I don't enjoy being particularly creative, but, I think a lot of people are this way. The world is pretty interesting the way it is, and there's so much to learn about and explore, I don't feel any desire to invent or explore an alternate reality.

FINE DETAILS

This one depends. I'm very bad when it comes to missing details most people notice (I "zone out" a lot and have been referred to as a "space cadet") however, I'm very good at locating fine details within my interests (referred to as my "obsessions" by my family and friends.) I have no idea how I relate to this in terms of the ASD spectrum but I think I may be typical because many people cite that they notice fine details in everyday life and I don't think that describes me.

FOCUS

I think I have really good "focus." or an ability to zone into something. This is really a gift, I can happily perform repetitive monotonous task to the awe and wonder of the people I work with. I take pleasure in data entry, for example. It's just that it's very safe and I like being helpful. I don't worry that I will screw it up, and the people around me are thrilled they didn't have to do it. If I get to mail out hundreds of letters at my office, for example, I consider that to be a great day. This seems to be something people on the spectrum relate to.
However, when I get started on a task it is a bit painful or aggravating to pull myself away from it. In writing this post so far, I have had two interruptions and each time all I can think about is getting back to writing this, I feel irritable the entire time I am kept from completing my task which I set my focus on. I don't know if this is normal or not.

OBSESSIVE INTERESTS

One aspect of Asperger's syndrome I strongly relate to is special interests or obsessions. My life has been a series of obsessions, and I almost only want to talk about my interest/obsession. I steer my conversations towards them, but I have to consciously remember to let other people in my conversations speak and talk about their interests too. When I was a teenager, I had not yet learnt this - a common occurrence growing up was that I would just talk and talk and talk until someone finally started screaming "SHUT UP! JUST SHUT UP! YOU NEVER STOP TALKING ABOUT THE SAME THING!" eventually, I learned to consciously pause, and ask a question, or let the person I am talking to introduce their subject of interest, but it took many years to learn this.

MAKING FRIENDS

It's never been hard for me to make friends, people have often reached out to befriend me. However, keeping friendships is what I find difficult, and people are rarely worth the effort to keep as my friend. I have to try to keep track of their personal insecurities, so that I can avoid unintentionally hurting their feelings. The friends I keep are open minded and aren't fragile as a result. I can get more than enough social interaction in a day if I require from things like discord, where I don't have to make the effort to see people in person. The COVID-19 pandemic has been a blessing to me because I now have an excuse to get out of all kinds of social obligations.

READING/WRITING VS PROBLEM SOLVING

I believe I am gifted when it comes to reading and writing, not extremely so, but I'm sure I'm better at it than most people. Reading is easy, I love learning languages, writing is much less effort than speaking. I am annoyed that most information is on YouTube now, whereas before I remember most data online being accessible in the form of posts or text, which was much easier to access. Now, I often have to wade through somebody talking to a camera and that's annoying. I often watch television by turning off the sound and just reading the subtitles. I do like speaking, but if possible, I greatly prefer to read and write. It is way easier to avoid social errors, because if someone interprets what I say incorrectly, they are at fault for not understanding the literal definitions of the words I have written and constructed my sentence with.

However, problem solving is something I struggle with. Math isn't easy or enjoyable. I can't figure out how things work or how to put them back together when they come apart. I have read that people with Aspergers are gifted in math/problem solving and struggle with literacy and that people with Aspergers are gifted in literacy and struggle with problem solving. Which one is it?

So, I understand that many people are put off by walls of text, but, preference for communication in reading and writing is one of the traits that primarily define who I am. So, I thank you for taking the time to read this. I just don't know if I am a neurotypical who unconsciously wishes to have a label to describe his problems or if I legitimately should be seeking a diagnosis.

Thank you for your time, help, and input - and please - I'm not offended easily. Don't be afraid to tell me what you really think here... nothing anyone can say to me could possibly be worse than what I say to myself.

Welcome to Wrong Planet!

Welcome to Wrong Planet. It is difficult to tell for sure but you do have traits. You could do with being assessed from the point of view that you can go for years asking yourself the same questions over and over again.

I did not even realized that I had autistic traits as I believed my wierd character was to do with my unusual upbringing. I hit a few crisis issues known as burnout (Which seemed to hit me severly) and I did not know what was happening to me through the last time it happened I did because I was able to ask in here.

What had caused me issues nearly all my life was a mystery health condition which I was never able to make sense of and doctors could not either and I later found out through some clever people that it was all to do with autistic shutdowns. (See below the link on my signature about shutdowns if you want to know more).

I do not know if I am on the spectrum or not as I am on a list waiting, but I know that I have plenty of traits.

Welcome to WP. It seems to me that you are probably on the spectrum. The main thing that sets you apart from most aspies is your extroversion, but doesn't mean you're not autistic. Most are introverts but there are autistic extroverts and introversion is not part of the criteria for diagnosis. You are NOT good at socializing if you unintentionally offend people all the time, and that you would still think you are is more evidence that you're autistic, as is the fact that this is enough of a problem for you to want help for it. I relate to the stuff about reading and math. Part of autism is that different types of intelligence do not correlate with one another in the way that they do in NTs, so its common for autistic people to have high intelligence in some areas but average or lower in others. Aspergers is stereotypically associated with math but plenty of people on this site including myself are exceptions to that.

It took me until I was 64 years old to even suspect I might be on the Autism Spectrum, per the DSM, which is used in the U.S., or, outside the U.S.--have Asperger's Syndrome--so I am clearly not qualified to make an assessment.

I can tell you that you are getting about the same score I did on the Autism Spectrum Quotient test.

And that, whether you have a touch of Autism, or not: Welcome to WP!

Welcome to the Wrong Planet .

Your AQ score is quite high for an undiagnosed aspie. If you really want to add up traits and self diagnose, you should look at the DSM criteria because traits like imagination are not part of the diagnosis DSM-5 Criteria. The 4 autistic types that Lorna Wing described explain the common sets of traits seen in ASD Lorna Wing Types.

I want to thank you all for taking both the time to read my long-winded post and for taking the time to reply. I really value your input and advice.

A good argument for assessment was made in that in may be worth it just to stop asking myself; I hadn't thought of that!

As for my extroversion, I don't know how to define it, exactly. Some people in my life know me as an extrovert, capable of launching into a conversation with anyone at any time. Some people know me as an introvert, who will go to great lengths to get out of going to or attending social situations. This has cost me a number of friendships, and if I'm being perfectly honest, I'm happy with this in retrospect as it's less people I have to consider in my life. That might just be because I'm a selfish jerk. Even when I do engage in socializing, and I do do it of my own accord often, it is something I would describe as "draining." It's fun for a bit but ultimately without being able to go home and have a minimum three hours without any social activity before bed, it can ruin my entire day, throwing my routine off. It's definitely more fun to meet new people for the first time than it is to try and keep a conversation going with familiar people. I will say that conversation doesn't feel natural, not that anything really does, I guess. It's a string of questions I can ask someone about themselves to get them to talk and the result is that I learn about them and sometimes that they like me, unless, I somehow ask a question that I am not supposed to ask, in which case, a problem arises. It seems almost impossible to tell where this line is, and I feel frustrated to the point of occasional outbursts that people are too sensitive or easily offended, though these outbursts are usually reserved for long time friends and family, as I often forget that they don't know "better" by now. I'm highly analytical and I do not feel offended by my own faults and it's very difficult to understand the perspectives of other people, and I'd really like to know how they go about their daily lives if they can't even assess themselves in a logical or "brutally" honest manner. How are you supposed to live a good life if you cannot consider both your positive attributes and negative attributes, after all? Do they just lie to themselves about who they really are? I'm sorry for going off topic a bit here, but I must say it's rather freeing to be able to express this, please forgive me. I hope this adds clarity to the nature of my extroversion. I'm just fascinated by other human beings, what their passions are, and I want to dig into their experiences and perspectives... but they can make it difficult for me to extract the information I desire sometimes.

So, it can be that someone can have high problem solving skills but low verbal/language skills or vice versa. That's good to know. I would say my "intellectual skill set" is rather unbalanced, but I play to my strengths as much as I can. My coworkers refer to me as highly intelligent, and they don't seem to believe me when I have expressed that my math / problem solving skills aren't really up to par. One of my favorite moments was when I was having a conversation about how the education system is not well suited to most people and one individual chimes in and tells me "You know, not everyone is good at school like you are, some people have to find other ways." I didn't know how to respond to that, especially because I did not do well in school. Is it that most people generally have balanced skill sets between problem solving and literacy/language skills/areas then?

There are definitely some factors in the DSM-5 criteria I can relate to but it's not universal or across the board. For example, I strongly identify with B.2, insistence on same-ness and inflexibility in routine, but do not at all identify with B.1, repetitive motor movements.

However, I identify 100% with "Social (Pragmatic) Communication Disorder" and after reading it am considering that this is something I should consider looking into.

The "Stilted" Lorna Wing type is pretty close to how I would describe myself, in particular:
- Polite and conventional. Manage well at work. Sometimes pompous and long-winded style of speech.
- Problems arise in family relationships, where spontaneity and empathy are required.
- Poor judgement as to the relative importance of different demands on their time.
- Characteristically pursue interests to the exclusion of everything and everyone else.
- May have temper tantrums or aggression if routine broken at home, but are polite at work.

In regards to this "This group almost appears neurotypical. They are often actors and have perfected and practiced the art of passing. They share the same idiosyncrasies as other Autistics and may appear to be slightly “off”."
I will say that I was thrown head first into customer service jobs in my early teenage years and worked face to face with the public for sixteen years; this forced me to modify my behavior and reactions but after sixteen years of dealing with the public still managed to be "offensive" and had issues with enraged customers, ect. Sometimes I think that if I were seen by a specialist before entering the workforce, or even in my early 20's, there wouldn't be much problem with a diagnosis, but that may be wishful thinking, as I must be cautious to avoid a "wish" for a diagnosis for my problems when the possibility remains that it might just be me.
After all, ultimately, it's about being able to keep a job and live out the remainder of my life.

Thanks again everyone, and thank you for the warm welcome. It is good to know that I am welcome here even if I am not on the spectrum.

This might interest you: https://www.myersbriggs.org/my-mbti-personality-type/mbti-basics/extraversion-or-introversion.htm

I think I was wrong about you being an extrovert. The stuff about how you enjoy small talk threw me off. You sound more like an introvert who's very interested in people.

On IQ and other intelligence tests the scores of NTs in each area tend to be clustered together, while the scores of autistic people are often uncorrelated. You may want to look up Nonverbal Learning Disorder.

RE Myer Briggs introversion vs extroversion: The only point in extroversion I relate to is that some people call me an extrovert. I relate to most points under Introversion, however, i’ve only met a few people who fall under the true extrovert category. In my experience if you speak to most people they will claim they are actually introverted even when it appears otherwise.

Thank you for telling me about nonverbal learning disorder. I certainly do relate to that strongly. It appears there is a ton of overlap between that and aspergers syndrome, so it’s understandable if nonverbal learning disorder is the culprit why i would relate to aspergers symptoms. I wonder how does one tell these two apart?

Just for clarification RE small talk, the questions I find are phrased as "do you enjoy/like small talk" my answer to that is "yes." I do not find it intimidating, I have over fifteen years of practice. If the question was phrased more like "When you engage in small talk, do you sometimes find that people are put off, confused, offended or upset by you and you don't know why?" My answer to that would be "yes" as well. My life has been a constant string of screw ups and failures, to the point where I can get over it pretty easily. I know to just stop the conversation by saying "well, I'd better let you get back to it, you seem busy." I think this is the challenge of trying to assess myself at 32 years of age, after having years of experience which I had to drastically adapt or change my behavior for in order to survive. The frustrating part is, I can't seem to land myself in a position where I solely talk to people via text (a job where I communicate by email would be the dream) and no matter how much I add to my list of appropriate phrases I always say something inappropriate or offensive. It's easy to get comfortable and I go "off-script" or my auto-pilot turns back on, and I forget that I cannot trust my instincts.
I enjoy small talk and all conversation really because it doesn't bother me when I screw up. I have screwed up in social situations, sometimes severely so, so many times I cannot possibly count. Most errors I make are laughable compared to some of the errors I made 10 years ago, and I'm not interested in keeping a lot of people in my life. That's how I can be bad at this and still enjoy it. I'm the kind of person who doesn't get upset when he loses at a video game or performs poorly. I'm just in it to play the game... and I want to be able to keep playing the game, despite the fact that I'm not good at it.
So, here I am, at a point where I have decided that perhaps I am not going to be able to resolve this on its own, and also that a magical job where I get paid enough to live and don't have to magically understand what my boss says to me when he doesn't mean what his sentences literally say isn't going to just appear out of thin air. I think "If I had an Asperger's diagnosis, I could just show them my diagnosis when something goes wrong" but if Asperger's isn't me, that's morally wrong to be diagnosed as such. Also, if it isn't me, perhaps whatever I am legitimately may have a solution. It's hard not to envy those who carry a diagnosis and have the ability to just produce a label for their issues when they run into social problems, of course. No offense meant there, I'm just expressing how I really feel.

Apologies for rambling on about myself even more than I already have, but in trying to recall and summarize details about my life and experiences I forgot about one of the most significant and long-lasting challenges I've had and I wanted to know if people who are on the spectrum or have surrounding issues or disabilities can relate:

Chronic insomnia. I mean, can't sleep without medication and even then a good night can be two and a half hours in bed before falling asleep, many days operating on only 3 hours of sleep, and in extreme circumstances, not being able to sleep for days at a time. In my case, the longest I've been awake was 5 days.

First off, Welcome to Wrong Planet!

No one on this site is qualified to give you a diagnosis.

80% of the adults with AS/HFA scored 32+ on the Autism Spectrum Quotient (AQ) tests, versus 2% of controls (neurotypicals).
Source: The autism-spectrum quotient (AQ): evidence from Asperger syndrome/high-functioning autism, males and females, scientists and mathematicians

Since you scored in the 38 to 40 range, that is a strong indication that you may be an Aspie or on the autistic spectrum.

SOCIAL INTERACTIONS: What you appear to be describing is called Masking, mirroring the actions of others.

READING/WRITING VS PROBLEM SOLVING: I tend to think there are three types of Aspies. There are visual thinkers. They think in terms of photo-realistic pictures. Often times they excel in painting and drawing. Pattern thinkers. They are sometimes described as Music/Math thinkers. And Word-Fact Thinkers. They are sometimes referred to as verbal/logic thinkers.

INTROVERT/EXTROVERT: The easiest way to describe this is where do you draw your energy from. An introvert will seek to be alone to recharge their batteries. A hard day at work or school; seclude yourself in your room and play video games. An extrovert will recharge their batteries by being with people. They love parties. They bounce off from one person and then the next in conversations each time recharging their batteries.

A few years ago, I put together a list of Aspie traits. In general, an Aspie will not exhibit all these traits but many of them.

* shy and introvert
* feel isolated through most of their childhood and into adulthood.
* avoidance of social contact or events, and may experience heightened anxiety in social situations
* seek out time alone when overloaded by other people (need to decompress after stress)
* despite a desire for friends, difficulty in initiating or maintaining close relationships
* perceived to be cold-hearted and self-centered, unfriendly
* socially awkward (inability to socialize) (severe impairment in reciprocal social interaction)
* difficulty with nonverbal communication (hand gestures, facial expression, body language, eye-to-eye gaze)
* does not understand conventional social rules (have problems with following social conventions such as respecting another person's physical space, speaking loudly in quiet places)
* does not understand the use of gestures or sarcasm (may not understand the subtleties of language, such as irony and humor)
* shows a lack of empathy (difficulty understanding others’ feelings, difficulty communicating feelings)
* unaware of others’ thoughts, feelings, desires, intentions or perceptions resulting in inadvertently appearing rude or inconsiderate
* may not understand the give-and-take nature of a conversation (they do not engage family members in true two-way conversation. Instead, there is limited or awkward turn-taking, and the natural "give and take" in the conversation is missing.)
* dislikes group conversations but effective in communicating in simple one-on-one conversations
* struggles to make eye contact
* seems unengaged in a conversation (seeming aloof, arrogant and uninterested)
* being “in their own world”
* formal style of speaking; often called “little professor,” verbose
* tendency to discuss self rather than others (one-sided conversations)
* average to superior intelligence, brilliant
* may be exceptionally skilled in math, computer science, and music.
* proficient in knowledge categories of information (highly-focused interests)
* a remarkable ability for intense focus is a common trait, becoming an expert in a single object or topic to the exclusion of all others
* the capacity to persevere in specific interests without being swayed by others' opinions
* activities usually involve collecting, numbering, or listing (often likes to collect categories of things)
* obsessed with order (an innate need to make order out of apparent chaos)
* frequently a target for bullying and teasing
* extremely hard-headed
* tenacity
* impulsive
* the ability to work independently
* strong self discipline
* the recognition of patterns that may be missed by others,
* an original way of thinking. (outside the box) [or even better yet – What Box!]
* have rigid routines, may prefer sameness and have difficulties with transitions or changes
* repetitive behavior, such as repetitive eating habits, listening to the same song over and over again.
* likes to wear the same clothes for days/weeks
* inability to deceive or to understand deception
* righteousness, deeply compassionate and easily outraged by injustices (renowned for being honest, having a strong sense of social justice and keeping to the rules. They strongly believe in moral and ethical principles)
* trustworthy (my word is my bond)
* open book (when comfortable completely open and honest), blunt and direct
* fearless and risk taker - "seem to have no sense of guilt or of danger"
* face blind (prosopagnosia)
* prefers hands-on learning experiences
* double check to make sure the door is locked and the lights are turned off.
* child-like imagination
* limitless curiosity
* inattentive to grooming and personal hygiene, awkward appearance
* strong dislike of being interrupted when talking (It short-circuits the train of thought)
* remembers very early childhood events.
* perfectionist
* difficulty accepting mistakes
* difficulty making friends
* difficulty taking advice
* difficulty managing anger
* pattern of black and white thinking
* as a young child - bossy; a little older - tattletale
* calm in a crisis
* dislikes multitasking
* when young, exhibited self-stimulatory behavior: stimming (thumb-sucking)

In the USA the primary diagnostic tools are to look for the "triad of impairments". 1. Social struggles, 2, problems with communication, 3 rigid thinking, fixed routines, inflexible behavior patterns. These are explained in depth in many websites online and in papers and discussions, probably elsewhere on this site too. As well as those struggles, autistic folk may have issues with sensory systems, sensitivity or insensitivity of any of the senses at any time, always or randomly in the same individual. This includes interoception and proprioception problems. Welcome, sending best wishes. Its a lot to sort out.

Welcome

Thank you for that comprehensive list, Jimmy, I appreciate you sharing it with me. There's definitely a huge number of those things that I strongly relate to, but as you say, can't get a diagnosis here! For now I'll remain an uncertain goblin rather than an ASD goblin.

One aspect I come across a lot but wish I knew more about is "perfectionism." How far does this trait go? My experience is that I feel unhappy to the point of not being able to complete or even begin projects at times in my life if I don't think they're going to be up to par. I've gotten better at this with age, I am able to force a decision to stop when the amount of time I put into something becomes too much, but each project that wasn't "perfect" kind of eats at me. I'm also able to make myself start even when I don't envision perfection... but this took many years to get to this point. I've ruined many projects trying to perfect them. I used to not be able to write or submit school essays when I was younger because they never turned out as good as I had wanted them to and failed some college courses because of this. Is this what is meant, more or less, or does it go further than this?

As I'm writing these things out, I'm recalling other experiences that may be traits, and I wonder if these two are some others can relate to:

- As a child and teenager (this happened to me until age 18, once in class at age 25) bursting into tears when people talk or look at you, particularly if something emotionally distressing occurs. For example, being called upon to talk in a classroom. I'm really grateful I finally have this one under control.

- Laughing, unable to stop, when someone expresses emotional distress, or when seeing disturbing images. Sometimes in an argument or a topic of something a bit unsettling, if the person I am talking to looks like they're going to cry, I laugh uncontrollably, and have to leave the room. I burst out laughing once in school when a disturbing image related to the Second World War was shown and had to run out of the classroom.

Thanks again for the warm welcomes and for your time, and input!

I never thought of myself as being a "perfectionist'. I just wanted things to be "right". (I may have wanted that more than the people around me.)

Though I have been heard to say things along the lines of:

     "I want us to get it perfect--and then we can work our way up from that."

     "I will probably find flaws in Heaven."