Parents: a question for you

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I have been diagnosed with Asperger's for a few months. (I have 21 years of age)
I told my parents that I think I have AS for a few years now after I discovered it in one of my AS subjects of interests about Social Anxiety Disorder.

They are both still very apprehensive and nonchalantly dismissive whenever the subject comes up. Such phrases as "No you don't" come up quite a lot.

I think they already know, but won't give me any support.
Any answers as to why?

I actually am facing the same thing with my parents, and I'm 45. The reality is usually a guilt issue. If you have Asperger's then that means that for your entire childhood you parents probably failed you. They expected you to master social skills that were beyond your ability and most likely berated or punished you when you failed. Therefore, a diagnosis of Asperger's can be a condemnation to them. (Even though they most likely don't realize it consciously.) All I can suggest is maybe getting a printout of Asperger's symptoms and write personal examples under each one. For instance, with the obsessions: "Remember how many times I talked you ear off about Star Wars? Or Legos, or life on other planets, whatever. Well now you know why." Or face blindness; "Now you can tell Aunt Sally I couldn't remember her at the family reunion because I don't register faces well, not because she was forgettable."

I would advise keeping it as light or neutral as possible, but give as many specific instances as possible. I like the idea of doing it as a printout because your parents can read it without your presence and take time to assimilate it. Of course, it may not work and your parents may continue to resist the idea of your diagnosis. If that happens, just realize that they can't accept it, and it's their problem, not yours.

I think there is a lot of misunderstanding about AS, and that creates a lot of resistance. They may envision an unemotional robot when they hear the term, and know that isn't you, so ...

It also means that your weaknesses are not likely to change. That you will have to own them, work around them. That is difficult for parents to swallow, to accept that there is anything about your child that is not perfect and is never going to be, no matter how hard you try.

And, as the last poster mentioned, there could be guilt about not having spotted it and adapted for it.

My question is this: does it matter? What does having them accept the diagnosis do for you now, at this point in your life? If there has always been a wall there, and they've never been able to understand you, then your goal will be helping cross that wall, and I could see why you would pursue it. But what if they have always just accepted you as you are, and not pushed too hard about the things that are difficult for you. Then, does it really matter?

I don't know the history there, so only you can answer. But given that you are now an adult, I think you should ask yourself why you need them to accept the label. It is just that, a label. It doesn't change who you are and who you have always been. For me, trying to raise a child with AS, knowing the label helps me out. But if that child was grown and standing on his own two feet, would it really matter? Would it help our relationship? I don't think it would matter much at that point, for hopefully we would have adapted around it all by then. A label is only as good as what it accomplishes for you.

You have to understand dw, that all ANY aspie really wants, is ACCEPTANCE. Its the one thing we thrive for, the reason we actually even try usually. We want the people who have had the most impact on our lives to UNDERSTAND that when we said we couldnt do something, we were right. That sometimes they were too hard on us. We want them to admit it. We want them to feel that pain they caused us, but not in a vindictive way, but in that one called empathy. We want them to realize we were trying as hard as we could, we just weren't good enough for them.

Every parent might want perfection, but what they should want is happiness. And not just their own, but their child's. See the problem comes from parents who never want to believe the child. And to be able to find out what was wrong with you when they couldn't, is far beyond their reach. They would rather refuse the possibility of you being right than to admit they were wrong. At that point, Who knows what else they were wrong on????

I am not AS, but have gone through similiar issues with my parents. They have always discounted anything I've said that they refuse to believe and/or deny my feelings...........After years of therapy, I've come to the decision that it doesn't matter what my parents think, nor why they think what they think. I have come to accept who I am & how I got to be the person I am today. I am a good person, and I deserve to be treated respectfully.
You are a good person. You deserve for your parents to not only listen to your perspective, but also to really hear what you are saying. Do you still live with them ? Who holds your health insurance ?

Absolutely, a parent should accept a child as they are. During childhood, and once that child grows into adulthood. I don't need a label for my child to do that; I always have and I always will.

For parents who can't do that in the first place, can a label make a difference?

Reading the responses here I would say it is unlikely, although I can certainly see why a child who grew up in such a situation would hope the label might finally cross the barrier. But sometimes the fact that the barrier exists is the beginning and end of the explanation: the parents were never capable of seeing things from a different perspective, and that is a difficult thing to change.

No parent ever wants to admit that there's something wrong with their child.

It's hard enough when it's a broken arm or cancer or something else that you can see or x-ray.

When it comes to aspergers which, on the face of it at least, often gets diagnosed with a quiz and a bit of observation, parents find it pretty easy to deny.

After all, it's like someone doing an "am I a good lover?" quiz in dolly magazine. You can skew the results any way that you like - and it doesn't look all that professional.

Your parents are seizing upon the opportunity to dismiss the aspergers tests as nonsense.

The other thing to consider is that aspergers is genetic. If they admit that you have a problem, then they could be admitting that they do too.

Maybe your parents are in the first stage of grief over the "loss" of their "normal" child...

The stages are:

1. Denial: Example - "You look fine."; "This can't be happening."; or "'Not you!"

2. Anger: Example - "Why you (us)? It's not fair!" "NO! NO! How can you accept this lie!"

3. Bargaining: Example - "Just try to act normal and you'll snap out of it."; "I'll do anything to help, can't you do your part?"

4. Depression: Example - "I'm so sad, why bother with anything?"; "We've failed you somehow ... we were bad parents."

5. Acceptance: Example - "It's going to be OK."; "I can't fight it, I may as well adjust for it."

My mother isn't surprised but my father doesn't believe for one second that I am under the spectrum. The ironic thing is that my mother is "NT" and I am SURE my father has AS. My mother believes he has it too but he would never accept that!

I don't have Autism, but I am 24 and I just tried to convince my mom that I was diagnosed with ADD. She argued with me even when I was giving her examples from my childhood- I would be sent to do something and wander off, completely forgetting the task; I could never pay attention in class so I did well in the subjects I could learn on my own, but not well in others such as math etc. etc. I still don't think she believes me. I think some parents have an idea in their head of who their child is and ignore all conflicting facts (hope I don't become one of those).

My daughter was only diagnosed AS in April. I see her differently to most people to me she's bright intelligent and talented in many areas I wish others could appreiate her more. But when they are around she has very little to say .I know she finds communicating difficult but how can they know her when she disappears upstairs. I guess i'm saying sometimes parents are so close they can't focus .