Ideal job not quite ideal...

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How often does this happen? The following situation certainly has all my family totally lost.

I am an aspie, my family are [u]all[/u] aspies.
My resume constantly invites people to ask about my checkered work history and what appears to be constant job hopping. What can I say - I get fired or leave because people dont seem to care about quality of work? Most of my experience is in admin, very little background in jewellery and what is there is exaggerated.

So imagine my surprise and delight when I am offered the ideal perfect job - Gemstone administrator. Among my long standing obsessions are making beaded and fine jewellery, minerals and lapidary. The job involves spending all day playing with diamonds and looking at jewellery. I sort and grade diamonds into matched sets depending on what piece they will be attached to (I mean mm or smaller in size, and minute variations in cut colour and clarity). How darn cool is that!? Lots of extreme detail and fine hand skills, just the way I like it.

Now imagine my consternation and frustration when after two weeks I am still only showing basic ability when I should have progressed much further by now. Me, a person who thrives on exactly this sort of task, is having trouble keeping up with a pair of NT's who seem to show a natural apptitude and aspie like abilities.
While speed is a current problem as well, I am assured that that will come with confidence.

What is burning my noodle is the concept of not being practically good at something that in theory I should be good at. When I announced that I had accepted the job, everyone made comments that it is right up my alley and I will do really well.

The company is an international company and despite its size appears to genuinely care about its people. The benefits and facilities are almost better than what I have at home, and the experience and knowledge gained will almost set me for life. The staff discount is also quite substantial for both finished jewellery and loose stones, but it does not happen until after a three month probation period.
I really do not want to loose this job, but am getting a bit worried that I may not survive even the probation period. And if that happens, I dont know if I will be psychologically capable to get more work. Thats not making allowance for the ongoing bills and debts that I have racked up due to inconsistant and irregular employment. This is all adding more stress to a mind that is already tired. I am starting to get thought associations and mild emotional flashbacks relating to a particularly traumatic job that has almost left me with ptsd. Yet nothing has actually gone wrong yet. No one has given me any warnings or told me to 'lift my game'. But I spend my time wondering how long until it does happen and who will do it.

I really dont have any idea or expectations about what will come of me submitting this post, but I really need to rant a bit. My mum and my job case officer have not been able to soothe or reassure me, and there is not really anone else who really understands the situation.

Have you got someone at work you can talk to and trust? Do they know you have AS?
This really sounds like a dream job for you. Don't give up.

If you're anything like me, you put a lot more effort into trying to be perfect than most NTs do.

Perhaps you are concentrating too hard, and taking in too much detail. Remember, if an NT can be good at it in such a short time, there must be a bit of a margin for error.

I was laid off a job after 11 years. It was through no fault of mine, in fact I was one of the last to go as the company went out of business. However, I ended up with an admittedly unreasonable fear of failure. I have spent the last 6 years afraid that I'd be fired at any minute. It hasn't happened, and probably won't, but that doesn't keep me from being concerned - all the time.

Those fears make me spend a LOT of energy in watching every single detail in all things. This adds huge amounts of stress to a job that shouldn't really be that hard. And, sometimes, it causes me to be significantly slower than my NT coworkers.

Also, it's important to remember that you are different. While you do have some abilities that will make your job something you can eventually excel at, there are other parts of it that you may not have as strongly as an NT. This always happens to me too. But I always LEARN the abilities that didn't come naturally to me. It does take me longer, but I am SO much better at even those "un-natural" abilities that I had to learn the hard way.

I suspect that you will be a lot better off by the end of the probation than you think. Tone down the sensory input a bit. Make sure you understand the real expectations of the company. Study related material at home. Talk to the NTs and see if they can put their personal experiences into words. Sometimes those words trigger an "ah ha" experience in our minds.

If you let yourself spend too much energy on self-doubt and feelings of impending doom, you stand directly in your own way. If you keep slogging forward, and think as if you are really close to winning, then you'll surprise yourself in the end.

Good luck. Keep us posted.

Here's the thing: You have higher expectations of yourself than you would for an 'ordinary' NT. So you're harder on yourself, and it's really ticking you off that the 'ordinary' people are doing better than you.

I have the same problem. Call it ego, call it being overconfident; there are times you have to grit your teeth and admit that the skill you're trying to learn will be a slow and gradual process, rather than something you think you can just jump right into and outshine everybody else. (Personally, I hate having to admit it, because then I feel like a failure, and I lose interest in the project.)

The turning point comes when you realize that training programs are set up for NTs. Essentially, it gives you some breathing space, a little more time than you expected. The standards are not as rigorous as you expected. Whew! You can relax a little, and thank goodness that your mistakes are expected and tolerated, much more than you would tolerate someone else's mistakes.

Remember, as an aspie you are learning this skill more deeply, more thoroughly than most NTs, so it will actually take you LONGER to learn it. But you will remember it much better.

The lesson: Ease up a little, and be glad you aren't your boss. Also, try to show a lot of enthusiasm/happiness to your supervisers, to demonstrate how very much you want to learn. Many people will go to extra lengths to give more help to someone who smiles a lot and comments on "how important this job is to me". Say, "It's a Godsend," or something along those lines, to impress on your supervisers just how badly you want to stay there.

To all the many people out there (family and friends included) who said "you have only been there a few weeks, give it time" - Never doubt my instincts, I know when something is not right.
Got fired from my 'ideal job' today. Or more accurately, my probation was terminated.
They said that while I am a good person and a good employee, my overall performance in this specific job was not what they wanted. They said I should have progressed much further than I had (didnt I say this myself in my previous post?!). The said that it is a very difficult job and this is in no way to be taken personally, it is apparantly very difficult to find someone to do this job well.
I will be paid for this week and next week, but after that I am on my own (again).
At this stage, any serious thoughts about what I am going to do are to stressful and difficult, but I think I will take a week for myself before making a few phone calls.
The worst bit is that they are the ones who put me in the diamond job when I originally applied for that of a trainee gem setter. I suspect that they already had someone else lined up for it and I got the consolation prize. I always seem to get the consolation prize, and usually it turns out to be a rubber chicken.

I repeat my original statement/question: How is it possible for an NT to be better at an aspie style job than an aspie?!