What's the point

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I'm only 98% sure I have AS, but when I first came to that conclusion, it seemed like a huge relief. Finally, one reason to explain all my deficiencies and idiosyncracies.

But now I'm thinking than an aspergers diagnosis is less than reassuring - if anything it destroys all the potential I have to make up for my deficiencies "if I only tried". It's like saying, I'm not just shy, I don't just have problems understanding conversation because I'm tired. Maybe there actually is something wrong with me that I can't fix. And maybe this is as good as I'm going to get.

It's discouraging to read articles about other females with AS, because they always emphasize how much danger teenaged aspie girls may face when boys start to be attracted to them. The article in Psychology Today on a girl with AS emphasized how pretty she was and that she had no problem attracting male attention (just didn't know what to do with it). And every aspie woman who's written a book mentions how she was lucky to find a husband who understands her and helps her compensate for her problems. But I'm not attractive. I don't have a nice body and I don't have a nice face. I don't have a nice personality to compensate. I don't have any motivation to want a boyfriend, other than having someone to split the bills (and maybe even cover the rent so I can focus on my freelance writing career rather than working a deadening job to survive).

I've accepted that I am flying solo for life, and aside from the financial benefits of a relationship, I'm content to stay single. But the rest of my life doesn't look all that great either. I hate my job. I convince myself that the only thing I'm capable of doing is writing, but then I look at my writing and it's not that great. I'd like to make a living writing freelance, but then I'm too afraid of people to interview anyone. I'm depressed, I'm exhausted, and I realize that every road that once looked promising is only built for people with the vehicles (social skills, confidence, competence) to drive that direction. I realize a lot of jobs LOOK like fun (I see all these people enjoying themselves and think I'd like to be a doctor, or a cruise ship employee, or a barista) but then I realize they're fun if you have the right disposition. Not me. And unlike true aspies, I don't have the focus to just specialize in one area and be happy. I have a wandering eye. As soon I get deep into one subject, I NEED to change.

I don't think I can ever be happy with my life. My doctor thinks part of my tiredness and depression comes from eating wheat. But eating wheat is, sadly, one of the few joys in my life. People say that you can turn to food for comfort but it doesn't make you happy. Not true for me. Wheat is an opiate. I love wheat. Pizza, sandwiches, cookies, paninis, wraps, pretzels, brownies. I get happy thinking about them, I feel relaxed eating them, and all night long I stay thrilled. I never regret eating an entire pizza. I truly am happy when I can eat food and watch TV. TV makes me happy, too. Not all TV, and not just vegging in front of the TV, but new episodes of about 5 shows make me happier than pretty much anything.. except, perhaps, a new episode of my favourite show + a pizza. I've never had a friend that made me that happy. I have been orgasmically happy being with highly selected friends, eating pizza and watching a new episode of our favourite reality show. But even the most rigorously selected friends make me just as depressed as they make me happy. When they spend time with their other friends, when they have other priorities in life, or when I realize that they are happy in their lives - when they plan to go to Miami for spring break, and want to go to the bar or club, and they throw dinner parties - I realize we're not as alike as I thought and I'm still grossly inferior to them. Yes, I'm the wickedly funny person in the group, but so what? They're the ones with friends, with supportive family, with romantic prospects, with genuine hobbies, that people actually like. And once we finish with whatever purpose brought us together (university, current employment, night class) they'll find a new group of friends and continue to thrive, while I'll spend another 5 years aimlessly searching for their replacement.

So what is there for me? What do I have in my life now, and what do I have to look forward to? I have a job I dislike that pays more than I should be making. I have a nice apartment and can afford to take night courses. But the contract runs out in September and I don't think my boss really wants me to renew - and I don't really want to either. There's one other job there I'm sort of qualified for, and if I could get it, I'd be a little bit less unhappy about my job, and I'd make more money (umm, yeah, enough to actually pay off my credit card and maybe actually start saving). But on the other hand, I'm not qualified for it. And I'm not sure how to apply for it without asking my boss. I don't know how to ask my boss. And I probably won't get it anyway, so it's like going to the trouble of asking him for no reason. So by asking him, I tell him I no longer want to work for him. Which means, if I don't get that job (95% probability) then I can't really renew with him. And if I can't renew with him, ,there's very little chance I can get another job that pays anywhere near what i make. It's a very precise skill set, and one which isn't really much in demand. Plus my organization pays way too much, which means even if I found the exact same job elsewhere, I'd likely make 70% of the salary (but back to the same problem, that I don't even want to do that job any more). I can't afford my rent if my pay is cut more than 5%. And I don't know if I'm ready to move. I really don't know if I want to move home again. Especially now that my uncle is living there indefinitely. There never was anywhere for me to escape at home, and now that he takes over the basement, there's definitely nowhere for me to hide.

I'd like to say I could use this as motivation to launch a freelance career. But even if I pay no rent, no utilities, no phone bill, I still have to pay $600 a month in student loans. If I could find a $10/hr job (which is no small feat in the distant suburbs), that works out to 15 hours a week just to have a net 0 income. I'd be working half-time just to get bus fare, and that doesn't leave a ton of time for procrastinating from work I'm terrified to do, which won't start paying for at least 3 months (assuming I sell articles right away and they run immediately - more like 6 months before I even earned enough for a Walmart shopping spree).

I have too much junk to move again. I live in this beautiful apartment and it's always too messy for me to enjoy. By the time I clean it up, I'll be moving out. I have no friends. My psychologist is leaving in May. I can't start with someone new. She's the first of 12 counsellors who actually tried to understand me. Even still, I don't think we really got all that far. Like every other counsellor, I can convince them I've improved because I come out of my shell the more I know them, and I pretend I'm doing well as a way of wrapping things up. But I'm not better today than I was when I started seeing someone 5 years ago. Probably worse. Definitely more tired. Tired most of the time. And whoop-de-doo. The current one grasped that there's a cycle to my moods. Um, yes, but what that really means is 2.5 weeks of the month I feel depressed, 1 week I feel frustrated and angry, and 0.5 weeks I actually feel tolerable. So what. Some days I feel so tired it's like I just want to give up. Exercise helps. But it's not wheat + no exercise makes me sad. It's: I'm exercising, I'm avoiding wheat; but I'm starting to feel down. So I eat wheat to feel better and I skip the gym to have some time to relax. And it's a slippery slope. I think there's about a 3 month cycle. At the one end, I'm exercising all the time, and I feel pretty good. That lasts for a few weeks, but then I realize there's no time for anything. I'm exhausted from not sleeping enough that week. The dishes are piling up, food is going bad in my fridge, and apartment is messier than usual, because I've basically come home from the gym, grabbed dinner, and climbed up to bed. I'm depressed,THEN I compensate. Not the other way around. And going to school makes it harder. Maybe if there was no school I could handle the gym. But I think school is more necessary than the gym. School is a way to open up new career options - freelance writing, editing work, preparing me for an internship at a magazine or in publishing, developing a portfolio for a creative writing MFA. All the near-future things I'd like to pursue demand I take night courses. So I can't do night courses and the gym. I just don't have the energy. It's tough enough getting myself to class once or twice a week, not to mention doing the actual homework. I need the other nights of the week to relax. So it's easier boosting my mood a bit now but creating no path to a future, or suffering a little more now and opening the door to a career that might actually interest me.

Still, I can't help but think, I'm suffering now. And I don't think I really want that future anyway. What is the point. Just go work at Starbucks and stop worrying about MFAs and workshops and homework. Just write your crappy writing and let it mature on its own. But then, of course, I'd probably be more miserable. I'd be living with my inflammatory parents. I'd have no money, no mobility, and no pride. I'd feel ashamed every time I ran into kids from high school or every time my cousins laughed at me and said how I wasted my time going to university. Even if it was to write, there's no justifying that. And my mom would keep asking if I was sorry Iwent to university or if I was sorry I quit my (mind-numbing) job, when the only thing I am truly sorry about is that I didn't ignore her a decade ago and follow my goal of being a writer in the first place, going to university to study english and actually knowing anything about books and writing rather than just writing terrible crap and being frustrated about it all.

I don't know. There's just nothing anymore. All my life I've gotten by because I had a dream, that after now, there'd be something to look forward to. After high school, I'd escape to a world where people weren't only concerned about parties and people, where they actually cared about intellectual discourse. In university, I'd escape from the tyranny of exams and have a routine, easy to schedule a gym date into my 9-to-5 existence. Well, now what? My only dreams are an existence I'm not sure I want, a poorly paying, terribly intimidating existence as a freelance writer. Maybe that's someone else's dream and I just haven't figured out yet that I'm watching other people having fun and still thinking I can be one of them. I realize journalists care about what's going on in the city, talk to people, and have no problem thinking of subjects and topics for stories. I don't have that. I don't have a natural connection to other people. I'd make a terrible journalist. I just haven't accepted that yet.

So that leaves the only job that actually suits me. My first dream. Writing novels. Which pays nothing. And demands you do press tours and all that nonsense. And then you face critique from heartless reviewers. I can't even stand the well-meaning writesr workshop. I have no self confidence. And I have no material. I have no ideas. And my storeis are derivative. I don't care about artsy prose and unexplored terrain. I just want to tell a story. But I have no stories to tell.

Tell your own story. Sounds like there are no books about aspie women who don't have a nice husband, ect ect. Not that it fixes the money issue - I guess we need to work in this world (trying to figure out how not to though), but it can be something that you fill non-work time with. I'd start with some short stories, send them out; they'll get rejected - that's just the way of it, but you might get some advice which is helpful to selling to that particular magazine. At least you will have some of what you want to do happening.

so, you want to be a writer but you have no ideas and would the book tours and interviews...have you tried writing about something that you like? of course, you have...hmm...you can have a book of memoirs...from other fellow aspies. like a book for the world to read and further understand who we are. i'm quite tired of hearing mother's of aspies' sympathy stories and how hard their life is. just brainstorming here. i don't think i have enough real world experience to say what paying job a freelance writer can do(i'm in high school).

also you can tell your own story. the biography of an aspie...i'm sure psychologists would like to read an aspie's point of view.

That's not the way I see it. We can't change our neurology (and I wouldn't want to even if I could), but we *can* find workarounds for the problems it causes. We have to learn by conscious effort what comes instinctually to NTs, and learn how to play to our strengths. It's an uphill battle, but it's possible, and it's a lot easier when we have a name for what makes us different which allows us to develop a more objective understanding of it.

Also, a lot of what causes us distress comes from the social anxiety, depression, and other psychological problems that are so frequently the result of living with AS, and those are treatable.

You really need some [better] friends, there aren't any support groups around town you could visit? Maybe there you could meet some others like yourself that you could hang out with.

there is a number of different alargys you can have to wheat, and while i totley understand what u mean by the fact it makes you happy, that comment in its self makes me think you may have the problem with gluten that i have. if that is so every time you are eating those your brain is being inundated with a substance that is almost exalty like morphine. sure drugs make u happy when u have that hit but they make it harder to think and function which = depression maby it is somthing to think about. its not ezey or fun but even on the worsd day when all i want is a huge bowl of cheesy pasta i would not go back. my life is not perfic and i still have a lot of problems but i am so much clearer mentally i don't have huge hissy fits caused bu not getting my "fit" and i lost 15 kg in the first 2week.