How hard has your life been?

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Honestly, not too bad. Ive just been a kid. Most of us been have kids. Its just that my age peers have reached adulthood and im still waiting, im still a boy, y know what im saying?

Im such a boring loser, I WISH i had a colorful life.

I think the main thing about my life is desiring friendships and fitting in, but struggling to do so at the same time, which does make life hard.

Well, speaking pragmatically, my life is a walk in the park. If you compare my lifestyle to most people on the planet, I have it pretty easy (seeing as I come from a first world country and have access to things like food, clean water, medicine, an education, government services, etc). The economy in my country is obviously lacking (recession, duh) but it's better than many other countries right now. I don't live in a war zone; I've never been trafficked; I've never been neglected, etc.

However, in the context of my culture, it's different. I'm from a working class background, so financially I'm not that well off. My father was an alcoholic and a victim of child abuse and that affected my family a lot. My mother suffered from renal failure and she needed my grandparents to help her raise us. When my father (finally) left my mum, he left his job (probably due to his illnesses) and my mother had to support us with a job that made much less money than my dad made. On top of the apsergers, I also suffered from severe panic attacks throughout puberty, which also messed with my ability to function (I avoided school a lot because of it). I also developed depression and ended up self harming when I was in my late teens. I'm in my early twenties and still struggle with mental health problems and my aspergers still affects me (even if it's not nearly as bad as it used to be).

Still, I was very lucky growing up because I got early intervention for my autism and even if I went through many hardships, they aren't the worst thing that can happen to a person.

Some people hear the stuff I've gone through and think that I had a legitimately hard life, but I don't think so. I struggle, but my life is not hard. I don't have a hard life - I'm just not hard enough, haha.

Not as hard as other people's in the world, but considering what I've been through because of other people, I'm surprised I'm not a bigger a**hole than I already am.

Childhood (up to age 13): Bullied at school, blamed for stuff I didn't do at home, the only respite I found was at a relative's house on weekends, had a few deaths in the family.

Teenager (up to age 18 ): Bullying continued even after moving cities, accepted that I was an outcast, contemplated suicide however I found a new sense of spirituality (that I won't discuss with anyone, least of all here) that convinced me not to go through with it. More deaths in the family, roughly one a year (including the relatives that I could talk to from childhood).

Adulthood (up to current day): Most family members gone (that I had contact with), people have taken a liking to taking advantage of me because of my kindness and condition (AS), people generally betray my trust so I can't talk to anyone, I struggle with depression at times, and if it weren't for the few people that accept me I'd give up on life as there'd be no point.

I think that about covers the big stuff.

My life is sunshine and unicorn farts.

No complaints here.

My life has been horrible.

I was bullied until I was in college, when I finally decided to stick to myself because I knew that every time I tried to socialize, the group I socialized with eventually turned me into their pet.

When I became an electrical engineer, I realized I had made a mistake, since EEs have to work with other engineers, and that was a no-no for me. I didn't want to find myself working the night shift because everyone else was bullying me, for example. Or to get blamed for everything bad that happened in a lab, another example.

I am from Panama, but I was living in Orlando, Florida. To make things worse, I was born in a very catholic family that did not believe in doctors, so I couldn't go to a shrink to get help for my chronic anxiety because prayer would heal me. I was an international student in Florida, so I couldn't work and get money of my own and take care of my needs. I was totally in shackles when I was in the US.

Eventually my work permit expired, but my family wanted to stay in Florida, even though I was officially an illegal alien. My mom thought that prayer alone would help us all. Eventually, my grandfather, our cash cow, died, and we had to leave the US.

I found myself in Panama, with no friends, no money, and a family of catholic fanatics who wouldn't help me get a job because, if you believe in prayer, problems will be solved. Period. So I found myself looking for work alone, and eventually I realized that there were few, if any, jobs for EEs in Panama. No one would give me money to get a new major because, hey, if you believe in prayer, god will solve your problems, so I had to ask my aunt to give me money for computer courses. And that's how I began working as a website designer, using Elance.com, freelancer.com, etc. The fact that Panama has no paypal made it tough for me to get paid, but eventually I began to get paid for my work.

These days, I am constantly thinking of new fiction stories, and new websites, and someday, new mobile applications. I cannot stop working because, without internet, and a computer, I have nothing but a family of religious nutcases.

So my troubles have been four:
(1) Inability to get along with people
(2) Crippling anxiety
(3) Good with electronics, with computers, but in a third world country, the question is: so what?
(4) A family that is probably on the spectrum, and in their case, they cover their spectrum with a weird religious fanatism in which jobs and doctors are no-no's.

Hard to say. There have been terrible times, and there have been very good times. Of course I had a lot of problems due to my AS. I had serious depressions a few times as a child and teenager which were really horrible, especially as I felt like I couldn't tell anyone and didn't even know what it was.

I had a lot of fun and good conversations with older, mature people that were fascinated by the calm, intelligent seven-year-old talking to them about philosophy. I was isolated in school for years, only having 2 real friends in my life.

There are people who have it so, so much worse than me. Of course there are NTs who have it easier. But I don't really want to complain. My parents were (mostly) loving and tried to support me, I wasn't terribly bullied, I never really wanted to kill myself. I never had to hunger or suffer like children in other countries.

My life, for the most part, was easy. Then again, that's because I was a wimp who shied away from almost anything that would be challenging. The only hard time I had was middle school, when I had just moved from a new town and was thrown into some semi-special-ed program. Growing up with my father always being overseas probably didn't help either.

I wish I was a braver kid, though. Sure, my life would probably be harder, but at least it would be more rewarding, and I wouldn't end up lonely and in a rut like I am now.

It's so hard to be positive when you read about what people go through with this condition..i think that most people would agree that trying to have some quality of life with AS can be very difficult..no one really understands what we all go through just trying to cope from one day to the other..you do hear some happy endings..but they are few and far between,at least web site's like this can help...at least you realise you are not some kind of nut job that can't interact with people or form relationships, or even hold down a job.....we are just people trying to cope with this condition the best way we can!

My life hasn't been ideal. Never knew I was an aspie throughout my childhood, my parents divorced when I was seven and my mother remarried before it was finalised. Moved to a school with a teacher who hated me and effectively managed to throw my self-esteem and subsequently all academic achievement throughout the remainder of elementary school down the toilet. I never made a single elementary school friend, my only friend at the time was a kid two years younger than me who lived near my dad so I saw him maybe once every two weeks. High school came and we moved again my sophomore year to an overcrowded impersonal school which I hated and sank my grades again, mother got divorced a second time and my stepfather abandoned me, mother remarried and now I'm trying to get through college. Two years at a pathetic high-school-level community college and I'm already $15,000 in debt, haven't even gotten my associates yet. So yeah, Asperger's or no, my life has not what you would call picturesque. I guess I should be lucky I was never homeless.

I have done so much in my life for being so young but it's still been a living hell for me. I love my family a lot but everyone is very dysfunctional (including me) and suffer from severe anger issues. Living in such a household really messed my head up at a young age.

School life has been terrible, been bullied since kindergarten and even quite a bit now in college. I am quiet, shy and a bit oblivious so a lot of people took advantage me and found ways to mess with me even more. The teachers hated me because I was a "problem student". I had potential but I acted out way too much so I kind of wasted my high school years. I am struggling with college right now due to financial issues and being isolated every single day.

My anxiety overwhelms me every waking moment. Every time im in a part of a conversation I feel like Im going to die. Due to this I have a hard time making and keeping friends. I feel like I was way more adult than kids my age but I was also filled with anger and acted out a lot so people I thought I'd would get along with shyed away from me due to my attitude. I have a couple close friends but they seem to be leaving my life. I was in anger managment and therapy for 3/4 of my life and I've been suicidal everyday since middle school.

I think the main reason why my life has been rough is due more to an internal struggle and my social anxiety and paranoia. I really hope i grow out of this..

Very hard life. From society's (including all family) massive rejection, scapegoating and taking advantage of my naivete.

It's usually as hard as I make it. Life is pretty good.

Harder than some, easier than most.

I would say its been quite difficult as in my childhood i was bullied plenty of racist comments towards me found it difficult to develop friendships and in adulthood had a job however found it difficult to keep it as i found it stressful and staff members would pick on me as i was different from them.

My life has been moderately hard. Some mental illness, abuse, social ostracism, prejudice; on the other hand, I was born in a first-world country and almost never had to deal with absolute poverty, generally had access to a library and to education of some sort (often badly mismatched, but still education); I've never been a refugee or been shot at, and while my access to medical care has always been iffy, it's never been absent. Being female has only resulted in a few drawbacks, because women are mostly equals here. Even when I was homeless I never slept on the street, because a friend let me sleep on her couch. I'm naturally resilient, and can recover from trauma and my repeated bouts of depression, and am not very impulsive, so that I am at low risk of suicide compared to others with the same problem.

Many people around me perceive it as having been very hard, though. I get some of them calling me an "inspiration", which I find very uncomfortable. Some people seem to instinctively want to help me, which is one of the things that probably has gotten me through the really tough parts of my life. It doesn't help that autism has such a scary connotation to many people. I try to tell them that it really hasn't been that hard, that I never despair for long, that the problems I have to deal with aren't earth-shattering on the grand scale of things, but I fear that they may simply view it as yet another part of my "inspirational" nature.

I'll be very glad when disability is no longer considered to be a horrible, horrible curse. Maybe then they will see me as a fellow human being instead of some kind of autistic Tiny Tim.