Survey on Parental care

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Iam also diagnosed with Reative Attackment Disorder due to childhood neglect and abuse, in this field some consider parts of an unloved childs brain do not develop correctly.
So Iam wondering if its a similar part of the brain that may be effected by Aspergers, hence similar syptoms through inherited Aspergers to childhood neglect.

Forgot to ask if a parent had died when you where young, please put in "Seperated" box
Thanks

I think being AS saved me. I didn't want the people attachment, I attached to things. I'm pretty sure I'd be a disaster if I were an NT. My mother was distant, my father was absent (always working - I would have been too to avoid my mother) and I grew up very much alone physically and emotionally. They were as un-involved as was possible in every aspect of my life.

Grew up in a very religious home. No drinking, no swearing, no gambling (not even a pack of cards in the house) and church virtually all day on Sunday. If we were watching a programme on TV and there was any swearing, nudity or blaspheming then the TV would be turned off for the rest of the evening. Imagine the sort of upbringing that Carrie had but with two parents instead of one.

Three days after I was committed to a mental ward my parents turned up, saw the conditions I was in, then turned round and walked out of the hospital. They never visited me again and when one of the doctors asked about this my father replied that 'I was suffering god's wrath for my sins'.

Glad they're dead and buried.

Ed Almos

There isn't an option for 'my parents are separetd' AND 'my parents were good to me'.

Sorry to nit pick, but my single mum is absolutely brilliant and incredibly supportive.

My father was aspie and while inherently nice did some pretty ridiculous things that had the opposite of the intended effect. When I was supposed to learn how to take a shower, he pushed me directly under the spray (we were dressed no worries) and basically put shampoo in my eyes. Of course, it stung and I wanted to get out so he took it to mean I was afraid of the shower and was a difficult child. My god, my father was an aspie moron. So well meaning but so weird sometimes.

Then when my six years my junior Fragile X brother was old enough to bathe himself, my father did the exact same thing to him. My brother was already a traumatized baby so I took him in our bathing suits one day and stood him next to but not under the spray and I had plenty of washcloths on hand so shampoo NEVER got in his eyes and by the time my parents came home, my brother was casual about taking showers and knew to demand privacy and no touching of his body. "It's my body." stumped and impressed my parents for once. Ai yi yi.

Yeah, there should be an option for those w/ single parents
My mom is very good to me.
I haven't seen my dad in years. I don't think he even knows about Aspergers. I don't really care.

I think most of the problems I had with my parents were because they couldn't cope with my aspie behavior and they were determined to make me be or at least appear "normal." They wanted me to be more like my petty dictator NT sister, someone I've never gotten along well with. They wanted us to get along and have a wonderful relationship, which was impossible because she has always treated me like a lower class citizen and would never consider treating me as an equal. The fact my parents made this easy for her by enforcing rules that in effect gave her alot of control over me, allowed her to mistreat me with no consequences, and punished me if I fought back, didn't exactly give her incentive to treat me as anything more than dirt under her feet.

I also had a physically abusive much older(10 years) brother who also treated me just as badly, except he used to twist my arms. My parents were a bit apalled by the fact that when he went out of state for school(I was 7), I said I was happy he was gone because if he was far away, he couldn't twist my arms and hurt me anymore. He never did twist my arms again, but 4 years later, when I was 11, he worked on my parents to start a chain of events that, between the ages of 11-14, really made my life miserable, and I still feel the damage years later.

If my parents had just left me alone and let me mind my own business, I'd have been fine.

Hi Guys, though not the option you requested, I did have a further option but I think you are only allowed a certain number as it didnt appear.

Regarding your single parents being wonderfull, I wonder if the lack of a second parent or role model of a particular sex could have a negative effect on a childs psycology?

This is precisely what I mean Siuan, so you attach to objects rather than people as a result of AS.

Now I have allways attached to objects rather than people, (I call my motorbikes my family), yet this is also considered a symptom of Reactive Attachment Disorder which I have, objects filling the hole the inability to have human relationships create.

So, two differant disorders with the same symptoms.

I wonder how effectively differant specialties in psycology communicate with each other?
You could possibly go to a RAD specialist and he will say you have RAD, or you could go to an Aspie speciallist and he would say you are an Aspie.

Maybe they are the same thing, but caused by differant things effecting the brain?, ie, genetic, or enviouroment.

At the moment the poll seems to read more people had poorer childhoods, be nice if all the viewers voted for a fuller picture.

My parents were actually pretty good, but they had their issues as well. There were times when it seemed like they favored my younger brother who is NT, as he was able to get away with more than I did. I also feel that one of the reasons I struggle with weight as an adult was that they put me on my first diet when I was 10, and going through puberty and probably didn't need to lose weight.

I couldn't pick one. I waffle on whether my parents "abused" me. They certainly were antagonistic and tried to shame me into being normal. I also don't know where my autistic traits start and the effects of being adopted (and thus a different person from my family) end. I never knew anything about autism and assumed that I was different because of the adoption and generation gap.
One thing I have realized is that they are nuts. My "perfect" brother could do no wrong. But now he's the "bad guy" to them because he is so anti-social. They just need to have constant reaffirmation to feel okay. They also love to put other people down-no matter the reason. Everything is weird to them.
It's almost like the anti-autism, William's Syndrome.

my parents are good people, but my family was pretty dysfunctional when I was growing up....so it was hard to pick one.

My mother told me yesterday she'd like me to be like Doda. As far as I know nobody on this forum (with an exception of Likho who participates in discussions very rarely) is Polish but a person from my country having heard the word "Doda" knows instantly who it is. I'd call her a Polish counerpart of Paris Hilton (not so rich, obviously) - she's equally vulgar, shallow-minded and simply stupid (even though she lies to people she's in Mensa what according to the statement delivered by this organization is veeery far from truth ). She's incredibly vulgar and always talk out of the top of her head during interviews. It's just as if an American parent expressed hope that her daughter should behave and talk like Paris Hilton.

Wow, Im glad they are dead too! *grumbles stuff I would be banned for*

I was fortunate to grow up in an upper-middleclass family, where my father worked and my mother took care of me and my sister.

I was fortunate to have everything I wanted for the most part, however money and materials dont always buy happyness. Because my sister was NT and I had HFA my parents treated me (IMO) differently then her, I was punished for being weird sometimes. It sucked because we lived in a development where everyone was snooty and thought they were better then everybody else, and sometimes when I did something weird, it looked bad upon them (again IMO).

Nobody is perfect, my father is definatly an aspie and so it was harder to connect with him, I connected with mommy more often. Our relationship (me and my parents) were strained when growing up, i was difficult, always in trouble.

Now, we have never had a better relationship, i live 20 mins away from them and see them 1 time a week. I feel I am very fortunate to have had the childhood I did, HFA or not, even so I had many experiences (both good and bad) and many people dont get the opertunities in childhood I got, many people cant say their childhood was good, unfortunatly, and im glad to have had a good experience and would like to relive it if I could.

When I first read about PDD-NOS I thought it was the 'denial' version of RAD ...

Symptoms of PDD's and RAD do overlap, it seems plausible to me that a failure to communicate and a lack of understanding between child and caregiver would have the same outcome as (emotional) neglect. The RAD like symptoms in ASD's could well be the result of attachment problems.

Did anyone here ever take online attachment-tests?

I'd certainly look into the RAD issues, Nambo, there's so much overlap and I doubt you'd get reliable information about your early years from your parents to help support a proper ASD diagnosis.

About my parents, I don't really blame them, except for staying together. Oh, well, lets just say that I am glad my childhood is a long time in the past.