Aspergers and overprotective parents

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I recently took psychology classes in college. Here I found aspergers, I was completely ignorant about such disorders at the time, it wasn't until I started analyzing my own past experiences that it all made sence. I now understand why I was always alone and had only a couple of friends in highshool. I always believed my actions/thoughts were normal, and I had a slight feeling that everyone around me was so immature/ignorant. (oh the irony haha). I've brought my "research" to my parents but they say I'm normal and I'm just being lazy. I don't have the resources to get properly diagnosed. But it all seems to fit just right for once. My parents have been supportive, yet I've always felt a lack of true understanding from them. Now that I understand why I can't function in college I want to just get a job and possibly move back in with the parents. They're the type of persons who are extremely ill but will still go to work, I feel so lost. But alas life is a comedy to those who think, and a tragedy to those who feel. Forum you have more experience so tips would be appreciated.

Er, still not formally diagnosed, but my mother is super protective over me. She has gone to my schools before to tell-off teachers and the like; and if I'm having a problem at work (even when I was an adult...). She'll call the boss and tell him I'm being bullied.

It's kind of embarrassing... I have to be careful of what I tell her since I know she has no problems of putting people in line.

My mom was rather over-protective and my dad was at times but not as much. And yes I have some issues from that but that does not explain all my AS symptoms. Also if anything my behavior was constantly criticized by my mom...overprotective does not=everything the child does goes. So though I see you're point I prefer not to be put in the 'you were just a brat who acted out because your parents were too protective catagory' as that sort of has a way of diminishing all the things I struggled with as a child.

Also my mom did not know I had AS let alone any other mental disorders.

It's only recently that society has changed to a point where most people are expected to deal with a constant stream of strangers and new situations. Previously most people lived life with a small group of people around them in a much more tight knit community - many people with Aspergers would have been considered odd, but as everyone around them would have known them all their life, it would have been odd in predictable ways. There would also be minimal interactions with strangers, and life was a lot more routine.

In regards to parenting, I think it is oversimplistic to talk about right or wrong parenting "styles", and often more a reflection of media campaigns than reality. What is "overprotective" for one child may be necessary for another, particularly where social interaction is concerned. In my opinion, most parents adjust their parenting to take account of the needs of their children, and how they parent tends to change over time as they see what seems to work and what doesn't - which means that parenting styles are often as much a reflection of the child as the parent.

It is also impossible to know for any individual whether a different parenting style would have worked better or not - I often wonder how different my life will be if I had parents that were MORE protective & stepped in to stop some of the bullying and insist on better schools etc, but I will never know if it would have really helped, or even made things worse.

My mom was never really over protective of me. Even when she suspected I had something going on, she still didn't over protect me. I used to think she held me back but she didn't. She just knew what my limitations were and didn't want me putting myself there. For one I wanted to work while I was in high school so I have my own money but she and dad just told me I didn't need to be working and I am only a kid once and to enjoy it. She told me all those kids were in a rush to grow up. They wouldn't let me go on the honor roll trip either when I was 14 because they said I wouldn't enjoy it and I will ruin it for the other kids. There be things I wouldn't enjoy and I may get hot on the bus and not be able to have the window open. Mom wouldn't let me leave the school ground for lunch and said there is no reason for me to leave, school lunch is cheaper and healthier than fast food. But the truth was mom just didn't want me getting into trouble and also the fact my anxiety was worse then and there was no way I could handle school and work at the same time. There was no way they could let me on the honor roll trip and spoil it for all the kids. It make them bad parents for it.

In my case this would be totally counter-productive. I've spent the past few years trying to find the best behaviour management techniques to deal with my daughter. She's now on the waiting list for autism assessment (most likely Aspergers), after years of coping with her and thinking she was just highly spirited and strong willed, then finally seeking medical advice. She doesn't do a thing she's told and seldom responds when we speak to her (among many other problems), but she's happy, highly intelligent, very sweet and gentle. If I were to excuse her because she has an ASD, that wouldn't help me in the slightest. The problems exist at home too and I'd love to get up in the morning, knowing that there would be no arguments. We need to get out of the house in the morning, she needs to eat properly, she needs to go to bed at an appropriate time, etc. If I just excused her, she'd never do anything that needed to be done. With social skills, I could talk to her until I was blue in the face and she'd just go off and do the same thing again. I really care about how other people see her. I need and want help in that area as I just don't have a clue how to teach her these skills. I feel people see my daughter doing inappropriate things and blame me, even though they've witnessed me attempting to correct the behaviour. Mums of NT kids just take it for granted that their child will learn these things without much instruction, and they're right, that's the way it is for them. As for strict parenting, absolutely nothing has an effect on my daughter. In fact, the only thing that she responds to positively is praise.

I'm not at all over-protective. A lot of the time, my daughter has had to learn by her mistakes as she just will not listen, although I'd never allow her to put herself into a perilous situation. But, when she told me that a boy was hitting her at school, I went straight in to see the teacher. I was concerned that she was being picked on because she's so different. This wasn't the case as he has other victims. When it comes to bullying, I will do my best to protect her.

My parents were extremely over protective. Whenever I try to tell them, they turn it around and make it like it was my fault. My parents basicaly brainwashed me into thinking I couldn't handle a job beacuase of the noise and they brainwashed me into believing that I couldn't drive either becuase I couldn't handle being with other people in the classroom.

My parents try to dismiss the fact I got ASD

Actually before my mom accepted the diagnosis, she was more ready to excuse my behavior as normal. She tried to become more strict on my after she accepted the diagnosis unfortunetely I was 19 and in college, away from home. There was very little she could do. My social skills are 90% self-taught and thats what works best for me. Its really a crappy method of learning, but scolded me constantly doesnt work. Getting burned constantly does. Scoldings simply are more crippling to me cause i got a social anxiety, pretty bad thing when you got a social anxiety problem. For me, using logic of the "why" things are done a certain way is much much more effective.

I do wish I was diagnosed earlier and could have had earlier intervention back when I was much more cooperative. It would have saved so much pain but oh well. With better diagnosis techniques, I probably would have been diagnosed at 9 instead of 18.

My children do not get away with anything, despite being on the spectrum. Well, my son anyways. Daughter most likely is also, but we havent gotten all the evals done yet. Anyways, they do NOT get treated any different. Each according to their means. They are not allowed to treat others poorly. They must do their work. Daughter can do more than Son can, so her duties are a bit different. They both get punished and positive reinforcement.

Simply because a child has a disability does not mean they get a free flipping pass.

That being said, I am overprotective. I am actually overprotective in a bad way because the reasoning is that I think my kids will behave poorly and offend other kids. I am not all that concerned about other kids picking on them at this point. Odd eh? I am trying to let go.

Well keep in mind it really does cause a lot of pain to be picked on by a bunch of other kids at school, so I would try to keep that in mind.

A lot of people don't seem to realise how badly being picked on as a kid can mess a person up mentaly.

My father's parenting styles have evolved over the years. When I was little through my early teen years, he was a strict military dad (basically b/c he WAS in the military of course the divorce from mom added stress on him which personally i think wasn't necessary when it came to me b/c sometimes he got aggressive and yelled and threw things (or broke things), during my teen years he was still an authoritarian but he wasn't destructive instead he would take things (such as my computer) he still yelled but it was now insults to my or any of my other siblings intelligence (this still has a big effect on me since I am AS and he is NT) After graduation, he started playing this mind game with me and sugarcoating things I saw as evil (Group homes, forced sterilization and whatnot) and he wasn't the only one in on it, his new wife was in on it too. After I repeatedly stated that I didn't want to get sterilized, he showed me a clip of a mother suffering a seizure on the TV show "House" while she was in the bath with her baby.
Now, I knew that was a TV show and what responsible person in their right mind would actually take a bath WITH their baby?
No one listened to my wants and thus, I was sterilized at 19. the year before My stepmom also sugarcoated the Group home subject telling me "You never know, they could all like American Idol." She doesn't know that ppl on the spectrum have different inetrests and btw, I like TOKIO HOTEL now!
Now that I've moved out, my dad has become a helicopter parent. This means I'm safe when it's ME and I make my own rules (And I like it like that) but my dad still hovers every now and then through Facebook, text message, phone call, THE UNANNOUNCED VISITS *insert "dun dun dunnnn" dramatic music* (good thing tho is that he's got my bro to keep him company when my stepmom is trying to rent out our old house)

I didn't have a diagnosis as a kid, but my mother knew I was constantly hurt by the world and she did become overprotective regarding school teachers and our family, she had to fight everyone's opinion that I was a know-it-all ill behaved rude little brat, she knew, because she had known me since birth, that I didn't have a mean bone in my body. And everyone hated me. How do you not become protective??
Same story with me and my son, he didn't get a diagnosis til he turned 9 and I was hyperprotective of him since birth, since the moment I noticed, walking with my 2 months old in the street, that he was startled to tears by a passing motorbike, then at the sandbox, when he used to give away all his toys to strangers in the hopes of making a friend, recieving mockery in return for his kindness, then at school, when he'd have a meltdown and teachers would chastise him for it, against all my family who'd say things like "leave him to me for a week and you'll see if I don't straighten him up", or "he needs a few slaps in the face", to the most kind and innocent kid ever, I mean, yes, mothers tend to protect their children when they are so badly misunderstood, and I hadn't even heard of asperger's at the time.

My parents were overprotective, by modern standards, though nobody knew I had AS until many years later. Unfortunately their overprotectiveness was not of the type where I got very much protection from what I would have seen as threats to my well-being at the time. For example, when my teachers expressed disappointment with my academic progress, my parents always accepted what they said, instead of questioning it and sticking up for me. Most of their protection was in the form of restricting me from doing anything that would worry them, e.g. associating with kids who didn't meet their standards of tidyness and refinement. I think Mum in particular didn't want me to have friends at all. I was also "wrapped in cotton wool," i.e. they took paranoid precautions to ensure my physical safety. They didn't seem to appreciate the need to encourage me to think for myself, so when I finally wrenched my independence from them, I had no idea how to solve the problems of living in the real world.

I don't know what difference it would have made if I'd been diagnosed. I doubt they would have been any less restrictive.

What doctor performed this? Legally, after 18, your consent is what matters and it is criminal for a surgery to be performed based on the wishes of the parent.