What Autistic Girls Are Made Of

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Sorry, I didn't mean to be offensive. I just wanted to say that I can't relate to females with Asperger's. Maybe I said it in a wrong way.



Sorry again.
About pleasing people, I'm telling you my experience with girls with Asperger's I've met. I'm not saying every female with Asperger's is like that. Sorry if it looked like a generalization, I didn't mean that.

And however, I've never said that depression is a choise. My mother is depressed, I know she didn't choose that, and every day I see what depression can do to someone, even if I don't have it myself. Sorry if it looked like I was being offensive.

Thanks for the article. I've found it hard to find reliable information on girls and women with Asperger's.

I didn't relate to the article, but that's okay. I had some friends when I was younger, was able to use social media, was good at math, etc. That's okay though. I've just been wanting to find out more about what makes Autistic girls and women unique.

That's a difficult question, if you are looking for scientific evidence there is little data on women, and the researchers do not seem interested in redressing the balance. Many books on AS will have a chapter somewhere mentioning some of the differences they encountered between men and women with AS during their research, often followed by a disclaimer that they cannot draw any conclusions based on the small sample they had of women and girls. I'm not sure if there is a lack of scientific interest and/or funding.

To find out more about what makes Autistic girls and women unique you could read some of their biographies, there are those small chapters is the more academic books, and there is always the internet with an array of forums like this, blogs, sites, articles.

I'm split.

Sometimes I completely relate to the article. I am f**ked-up, left-out, left-behind, broken, unlovable, waiting for my husband to throw me out of the family I never should have had without a backward glance.

Sometimes, I relate a lot more to chlov's statement. Look-- I'm me. I am good at what I'm good at, I am not good at what I am not good at, guess what, that's everybody. I like me, f**k you if you can't take a joke.

For the record, I don't see her saying that depression and low self-esteem are choices. They are just things she's managed to avoid-- like Daddy mostly managed to avoid them with the attitude I quoted from him above, like I've managed to get whole weeks, even months, free of them and to see the glimmer of a life without them with the same attitude.

Depression might be chemical-- although I still think it has a huge basis in experience and self-reference, and that brain chemistry most of the time is only part of the problem. Self-esteem really IS a choice you make-- or anyway that's the way it seems to me. I am going to think well of myself, I am going to think poorly of myself, I am going to believe my detractors, I am not. I won't say it's all choice-- being bombarded with negative messages makes liking yourself hard, really hard-- but there is a huge component of free will involved.

I think it LOOKS like women have it easier because the whole goal of treatment since 1995 has been to make autistics appear neurotypical; the more NT you seem, the better you are believed to be doing. Girls tend to internalize rejection, to blame themselves, to try harder and harder and harder to please and then to hate themselves and continue to blame themselves even after they give up. It gets worse as we get older, and a lot of us never get over it. I have an NT girlfriend who is only just now finally learning to accept herself as she is and work on being her own best version of herself instead of what her mother/brother/society/man du jour/magazines in the bathroom tell her she should be. She's almost 36.

Inside?? In terms of life and society and emotions and stuff?? In terms of the life everyone wants for themselves, the life they would want to help (or even simply allow) us to achieve if they would start looking at us as people with a difference instead of a disease that needs curing so we can find the normal person underneath?? Not so much.

An autistic woman who achieves that life can look forward to being bombarded with the message that she shouldn't be. Gotta love it.

*climbs down off soapbox*

That's interesting. I have never slept well.

Self-Esteem and Depression, for me, are not correlated.

Or at least, I don't think so.

I have always been prone to depression. I am in my 40's and am struggling with it now. I have been off work with it since mid January.

As a child and teenager, up to my late twenties, I was extremely shy, hated the way I looked, and tbh didn't make the best of what I *did* have. I was left on my own from the age of 14 (Father was never present i my life) and my Mother left to go and live in NY, where she had to work, and I stayed in Portugal, in my Nan's house, but fending for myself (Mum sent money for expenses). As you can imagine, a teenager with tons of social problems, a ton more of sensory ones (this is very acute in me) was a sure recipe for disaster.

To cope, I would drink alcohol. I drank to go to class, I drank to go out at night (as everyone else was going out) and I drank if I had to go anywhere and deal with anything. The only time I didn't drink was when I danced. One of my passions. I always did a lot of sports, not because I wanted to keep fit as such, but because I enjoyed it.

I was told by others I was very "feral" in my looks, I never wore make-up, hardly wore skirts or dresses, my hair was unkept and my personality "odd".

I became a wild child. I had a boyfriend when I was 16, but the above behaviour didn't really help.

It wasn't until my late twenties, when I did my performing arts degree, that a shift happened. I became a different person in terms of confidence. I stopped "having" to drink to feel good (although the social problems and sensory ones obviously didn't disappear, I'm referring to feeling good inside) and my appearance went from "wild" to "mild". I began copying the dress sense of people I admired as actresses and realised I had my own dress sense too. It was quirky, but nonetheless variable and I always had compliments. I sorted my hair out, and for the first time ever wore mascara and lip gloss (still the only 2 I use).

My confidence was sky high, and it still is to this day. Unfortunately, I am despite this, still prone to long/short, frequent periods of depression. I am currently trying to get help for a formal ASD diagnosis, and counselling. I don't have a social life at all, and I attribute this to my high levels of anxiety and my sensory issues. Whilst my acting skills have helped me tremendously in life, it is still an "act" and very tiring one at that.

I am most content not having to interact with people, and prefer to have one good friend and if possible a partner.

Sorry to blab so much.

In relationships I have been extremely lucky that he first man I dated also has Aspie traits, he won't admit and is perfectly content considering himself NT, he is very successful and professionally respected in his chosen career as a programmer but cannot maintain friendships as even other the programmers he knows are not as interested in code as he is.

Friendships have never happened for me, I had a best friend in primary school but she didn't play with me much. I could not understand when she didn't want to be friends with me in high school. Most of my time I was alone and unable to break into this world of friendships. I met a friend who I thought wanted to spend allot of time with me when I was 15 but she told me that when we left school she would really miss me. This confused me as I did not realised our friendship was dependent on school until that moment so I told her I would miss her too. Now I think I made the wrong assumption.

Work has been difficult, there is so much to remember, I will observe how another female, also my age and in my level of work, will handle a handshake in a wide variety of scenarios, everything just seems to have so many parameters to remember. So many cause and effect issues happen too, even with simple things like making drinks. If I make a drink for one person in a office of 12 am I expected to make a drink for everyone else too, how frequently, what should be expected in return, how do I know what it's my turn again, what about when people have days off. Most people like to give me verbal instructions which I just can't do. I have been fired before and told I there was no issue with my work but I wasn't making enough effort with the my co-workers which was really confusing as they were always getting told off for standing around chatting and I would be used as the example of a hard worker.

My family tend to think I don't care about them and that I am unable to follow their conversations which is untrue. I don't always remember to smile when they/ I have good news so I am accused of depression.

I can relate. I'm such a failure compared to the rest of my high school friends, where 99% of them are male. :v

Videogames
Bad nicknames
a world to blame
minus the shame

Wow.... it's nice to know that another aspie girl was obsessed with the Babysitters Club and Little Sisters books.... that was my obsession for a few years in elementary school.

I'm on the high-functioning end of the spectrum. I'm 22.

Education: Bachelor's of Science from a top university. Accepted to medical school and will attend in late summer. Was the top of my class in high school but then imploded in university due to the big jump in difficulty between HS and uni and my inability to quickly adapt to the new environment. I also hadn't developed study skills because I have a very high IQ and school was always a joke up until then. In university, my grades went down a bit but I still managed to get accepted to medical school! I had 3 interviews that were direct rejections (and given the low proportion of interviewed applicants who get rejected, it was likely because my apparent AS was a red flag to these health professionals). Somehow I got into the 4th school I interviewed at, my favorite of all 4 (yay!) AS is really stigmatized in the professional world, so I'm quite scared about how I'll fare there, but I feel really lucky that I managed to get this far. As my psych told me, I really beat the odds. In fact, he is so interested in my case that he wants to skype me over the years because he's curious how an aspie would fare in med school because he's "never seen it happen."

Social:
I was badly bullied in high school, started making friends with other "outcasts" starting in 9th grade. Was obsessed with being popular in middle school which of course made me very unpopular. I was obsessed with reading "girly books" as it allowed me to get lost in a world where I wasn't the social outcast nobody could stand. Was put on Paxil at age 14 which made me suicidal. The therapy I received as a result resulted in my AS diagnosis and subsequent acceptance of my condition (which allowed me to make more friends). The further I was in my education, the more friends I had, the more "normal" my life felt. However, I still have times where I feel like an outcast, especially when faced with people who are the type who were probably popular in high school (people I call "uberneurotypical", those who are super-good at subtlety, very fake and intolerant, "party girls", people who seem to move through life seamlessly and have an endless stream of friends and lovers - think sorority girl). Since I have managed to mask most of my aspie traits to the point where I appear neurotypical most of the time (if not slightly "off" or awkward), I have an interesting mix of friends, and float around several cliques with a couple of core close friends. My cliques range from aspie/ASD/PDD clique from high school, to my college friends with whom I shared a special interest (medicine) who were neurotypical but prized my knowledge and enjoyed studying with me and the fact that I was helpful. My "core group" (around 4 people) are NT but each member is either mentally ill in some way or just highly unconventional. With my best friends I can be myself. While there is the odd situation that reminds me of how different I am and makes me feel pathetic (for example, when I inadvertently insult someone, go overboard on a particular topic, fail at transitioning properly into another conversation, interrupt, etc.) in general I am pretty satisfied with my social life.

Romance:
I've been really lucky in that department, although I was a late bloomer. Guys in high school always made fun of me, and I was always the butt of jokes, the girl who they'd never date in a million years. I blossomed in university (it also helps that I'm quite attractive, even without makeup), and at age 19 I met the man who would become my fiancé. He and I are extremely similar, and I'm pretty sure he is aspie (although he "doesn't believe in diagnoses"). He took the AQ test and scored higher on it than I did, if that's not an indication enough. (I scored a 27, he scored a 29, although we both admit that when we were younger we'd have probably scored higher since much of our condition was "outgrown"). He is one of the few people I have successfully connected with, to the extent that I could read his thoughts and finish his sentences. I will be attending medical school in his hometown and we will probably marry next summer. Our parents like each other and feel we are perfect for each other. We are a bit scared of having children because we fear the heredity of Asperger's and don't want to subject a child to the horrors we went through growing up. However, we do feel we will be more loving, accepting, and understanding than our own parents were about our issues, and see Asperger's as more of a personality difference than a serious disability.

Family:
My family is very affluent, which is honestly the best and worst type of family to be born into as an aspie. It's great because I get unlimited access to quality therapists, but not so great because high SES people are so much more obsessed with decorum. My mother's hounding of me 24/7 has gotten demoralizing to the point where I really can't take it anymore. She wasn't even loving about it - just hardcore critical, nonstop, nitpicking at every little thing to the extent that (according to my boyfriend), I struggle to distinguish the big social issues with the minor/unimportant quirks, as my parents freak out equally over everything. Her attitude towards me makes me feel like a failure, and she was anything but accepting of me, constantly trying to change me and turn me into the perfect upper class socialite (which I could never be - so many unsaid social rules I can't seem to wrap my brain around!) As a result, I opted to apply to attend medical school in my fiancé's hometown, since his parents are way more accepting. My siblings, both NT, are pretty accepting.

Employment:
Okay. Let me tell you this was FAR from perfect. I was able to hold a summer job successfully the summer I turned 16. I was a camp counselor who taught theatre. Not only was I very successful, I was invited back and given an excellent evaluation. I decided to come back 3 years later (after doing academic programs for the two years in between), had a different boss this time - she was the "socialite barbie type" who I really didn't like. She had a lot less patience for my quirks (even though the kids LOVED me) and didn't give me a very good eval. While she recommended I not be invited back, her boss (who worked there my first summer) invited me back anyway. i declined because I honestly had better things to do during the summer - things that would actually prep me for med school! Things like volunteering. I've been successfully volunteering at the same hospital for 4.5 years, and everyone there loves me (except the volunteer coordinator at first, but she eventually learned to love me as I addressed her criticism and modified my behaviour accordingly). I volunteered in a third world country two summers ago for an NGO. I felt like a bit of an outcast but my boyfriend was there and felt like even more of an outcast so it was okay because I had him. I held a couple of freelance journalism jobs that turned out great. I'm very good at networking and, as my psych says, very likeable (even the people who can't stand me really like and respect me). As a result I haven't had trouble getting jobs, although I've had bosses be frustrated with certain quirks (which they put up with because I do a good job anyway and am open to criticism and improvement). I have not told a single one of them about my AS and frankly I think it's better that way because there is so much stigma associated with it, as I said. My fiancé has a lot of trouble getting jobs - he hadn't succeeded at landing an internship last summer, nor has he landed a job post-graduation despite looking since October and applying to over 40 jobs. He has worked a couple jobs with no issues as far as I know. He has the advantage of being very quiet and extremely hardworking.

All in all: I'm really happy with my life. I know being very high-functioning may have something to do with it, but I am very determined to mask my quirks and come up with good coping mechanisms while still embracing who I am. While I definitely don't blend in that well and am pretty awkward at times, and am horrible at novel social situations, I do use my likeability to my advantage and have succeeded a lot because of it.

TL;DR: Accepted to med school, have a fiancé who is also aspie, estranged from my family, have a good number of friends I really adore who love me for who I am, and have been pretty good at getting and keeping jobs. My advice is to not be in denial - don't pretend you're neurotypical and "above" other aspies like I did in middle school. Be as open-minded as possible, and pick the right people - they're out there somewhere! If any of you want advice or have advice for me regarding surviving med school as an aspie, feel free to PM me. I'd love to network with other female aspies and feel less alone (all the aspies I know are male).

Well,I don`t think they are so many differences between AS men and woman.AS woman have different special interests,such as reading or animals,and men tend to like technology.AS woman are more sensitive to rejection than AS men.Everyone is trying to change AS woman,while they leave AS men to do whatever they want.Also,society tolerates eccentricity in men better than in woman.Most AS woman end up as lonely old cat ladies.Most AS men end up as shy geeks.But you can`t say that someone has problems because he/she is a man or woman.Asperger expresses slightly different in woman than in men,but the basic problems are there.I personally,don`t have low self-esteem,but I have some depressive moments(and who hasn`t?)when I think I will end up alone forever.I live in dreams most of the day.I dream to become famous,to have a happy life.I am excellent student at school,but I have zero friends.I never had a boyfriend and I am scared I never will.But I will become a psychologist one day.This is my special interest and this is a way to help people who have worse problems than is mine.Hope never leaves me.

I am considering going to a center for the official diagnosis, since from the online tests, condition descriptions on many websites and reading this very thread I can relate more then I would ever have thought.

My life experience has been revolving around facing relational issues... People my age would find my vocabulary (in Italian of course) inappropriate and obsolete. Still, from the beginning, as a child I used to have interests my schoolmates wouldn't relate with, I was eager to access knowledge to an extent that became obsessive, I read the whole encyclopaedia my parents had bought for me, then I read the whole medical encyclopaedia, then I went to the library at the age of 10 and read all the books about myths both in the children and adult sections. I did have "friends", mostly same age school mates that now and then would take the time to spend a couple of hours with me, they used to call me weird and I simply wouldn't fit in, as much effort I put in social relationships it never worked. In high school I had already accepted my condition as a weirdo and I would do whatever I felt was right for me without paying attention to everybody else, eccept that I had to try to fit in at some point, and the result was being bullied by a bunch of "unfriendly" teenagers (which is why I'm still kinda scared when I see bunches of teenagers gathering somewhere and I usually avoid to pass near them). Having studied conference interpreting and consequencially linguistics and some neurolinguistic programming, I have found my way out of interpersonal relationships. I never became able to apply the rules, I learned them mechanically when I had to, and as far as I still have memory of many of them I find them unnatural and mostly obscurely illogic. I never finished conference interpreting, health issues mostly based on the terror of facing people prevented me from finishing the university. Still now I'm having big truble with social relationships, which are restricted to a good friend who accepts me for who I am and keeps encouraging me to be myself cause he finds me cute this way, and my boyfriend whom I've met 7 months ago. He said he finds the way I am beautiful and that'd be the reason why he chose me in the first place. He actually is the one encouraging me to go to a center, he would want me to stop obsessing about my inability to have a normal social life.
My workplace is a nightmare... I've experienced heavy bullying in that place... they even tried to fire me with illegal excuses, I need to work, hence I fought until they decided to leave me alone... meanwhile, my life was totally destroied, depression is an undestatement, during that time I went through heavy panic attacks, I spent every night crying like crazy, I couldn't sleep more then 30 minutes a day, my habits and routine were being attacked from family who wanted to push me to socialize, neighbours hearing my screams would try to give a hand, people I had never met before that scared me to death ringing the bell of my door without notice... It was the most overwhelming time of my life and it was also the time when I totally shutdown grasping on logic, IQ tests, geek tests, logic exercises, maths, science, philosophy, antropology, psychology and neurology were my life jacket during that awful year. I shutdown to the point of refusing to talk at all.
Things are going far better now, my boyfriend is providing a nurturing environment where my habits and routine are fully respected as much as my floating obsessions and my need to spend time in my head. He was the first person in the world that didn't panic when I started rocking with my hands on my ears under extreme stress.
The last meltdown experience I had a few days ago when my mother opened my wardrobe (I live on my own) and started reordering it... A nice lady at work who usually treats me well spent a lot of time with me telling me her experience with intrusive attitudes trying to make me feel better. As much as I appreciated the effort, it worsened the overwhelming feeling to the point that I had to close myself up in the toilet and spend 5 minutes rocking on the floor. Rocking calms me down, and doing it with my hands on my ears produces a sort of white noise that makes my brain reset and restart functioning.

It's the first time i spit it out this way all at a time, I would be extremely grateful about any feedback

Ps. I'm usually a very cheerful girl, with a grotesque sense of humor, still... cheerful... but here, i'm seeking support, which is not a very cheerful thing at the beginning...

DNA! Estrogen, and progesterone! *not sugar spice and everything nice*

You sound pretty typical for an aspie. Welcome to wrongplanet.

I think you may be right about getting the official diagnosis, it can provide some solid support, in your case - especially for work. The bullying and such will be taken for seriously if you have a diagnosis and you will also be able to get accommodations if you need them to make your work life easier.

Apart from that, the extreme stress you mentioned in your second last paragraph, you need to be careful of that. We only have a limited amount of time and energy for activities which tire us, if you try to do too many at once, or are operating under too much stress long term, you may have a burnout.

This scares me a little, not the diagnosis per say, that would actually sound more like a starting point and a "solution" in a way... rather the implications a diagnosis may have with my job, I wouldn't want to end up being fired with the excuse of Aspergers, and someone in a very high position in the company had already hinted something this way, he asked if I'm foreigner given my too grammatically correct prosodie and a "weird" accent I said I'm Italian (and being in Italy it means being native speaker) and the answer I received was a weirded "oh, I see"... I need to check but I was told we have a law over here that gives companies faculty to fire you if they can prove you're psychologically not adapt to the job.



When you say burnout, do you mean like needing anxiety medicine and weaks home for uncontrollable and unstoppable shaking and total inability to focus even on simple tasks? If so, I went through that a few times already

PS. if I'm being off topic please let me know and I will hopen a new topic in the correct (possibly indicated) board