Receiving disability benefits for aspergers unusual or not?

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I agree. And society changes too. Back in my parents' day (to coin the phrase), few people left home until they got married.

Is that an american thing? Because living in your parents' home past 18 isn't being "coddled", whether you have aspergers or not. If your family life is good, you're not forming a family of your own and you aren't moving from your city, there's no reason you must be obligated to leave your house. The norm is that you get a job and become financially independent, sure, but that just means you become a contributing adult in your family, not that you must leave it just because you hit a certain age, be it 18, 30, 45, etc...

It's those who would refer to their fellow citizens with disabilities who need financial help, as a drain on society that are truly the drain on society. Since a healthy society would want to ensure the wellbeing of its citizens even the disabled ones, but just a personal opinion, I suppose one gets sick of being referred to as a drain on society due to being part of the population who cannot work due to a disability and all. So I am sure I am not the only one who finds that terminology more harmful than helpful.

Agreed. Dirtdigger is lucky to get a set of traits and a set of circumstances that allowed for employment, but not all of us got that.

But I don't think that means that employment is truly hopeless for those of us who, in our present circumstances, could not hold a job. I can't give up on it for myself. Often times there are just so many barriers that make working impossible--lack of training, lack of social skills or connections, lack of transportation, or just not having access to the sort of job you can do. Sometimes, removing those barriers can make you employable.

But this is not a perfect world. Most places accommodate the disabled only to the extent that the law stipulates they should. It's frustrating. I think most autistic people fit into this category of people who can theoretically work, but only in a specialized environment which is not being provided. Some can work only part-time, but part-time work is discouraged while you're on disability. (This is why so many disabled people will do volunteer work. We want something useful to do, but if we're paid, it "counts against us".)

If a person can only work in a narrow set of environments, a maximum of ten hours per week... that person's not going to be able to work. Most likely, as I did, he'll try to find a mainstream job without accommodations, work as hard as possible, and eventually burn out or melt down, and quit or be fired when his performance is so bad that even a nice boss can't keep him on. And this happens repeatedly. Not just once, "Oh, I tried it; now I'm giving up." No, many of these autistic people have records of a dozen or more failures at employment, because they keep trying, because their disability is invisible and people keep telling them that they "should be able to work", that they're "too smart to be disabled".

We should keep fighting for our right to employment in a job we can do, with reasonable accommodations that allow us to work effectively without burning out. And for those of us who can't work even with help in a supported environment, we should fight for their right not to be considered welfare bums or lazy leeches or useless eaters or whatever else they call people who can't work.

Not to mention some people with AS havn't even been able to get anything past an entry level job only to be shortly fired afterwards...because they can hardly make it past the damn job interview or social questionnaire they have for a lot of online applications, are you a friendly, fast paced, energetic person who thrives on intense stress? if not you can forget it unless you want to lie and then attempt to fake it.

But then even there you get crap for not having failed at enough jobs to warrant needing disability, well I'd be glad to fail at some more jobs if I could even get hired. I suppose I find it frustrating that I barely made it through public school and it took pretty much everything I had, couldn't handle college, haven't been able to handle the very little small amount of work I've ever had all due to the mental conditions I have...yet people want to point to my lack of having jobs as 'well see you just didn't try hard enough otherwise you would have a list of jobs you've failed at.' That is why I am worried about the job history section of a form I have to fill out for the SSI because I don't have much of one maybe it would help if I explain my difficulties of even getting a job let alone having the opportunity to be fired from it.

I couldn't even manage to finish school and had a terrible time when I went. I quit at 16.

I only had 2 jobs ever. I had a paper route that lasted 2 weeks and a cleaning job that lasted 5 weeks. I couldn't stand them any more and quit. Those were over a decade ago.

i havent tried, but i think it's probably rather difficult getting disabilities for something as mild as asperger syndrome. the reason is someone from the outside won't understand sensory issues and social phobias, etc. i've heard about cases when they refuse to give people with retardation a helper because they were able to tie their own shoes. when you go for disability, that's what i've heard, they keep trying to prove you can work so they dont have to give it to you. it's hard to prove you cant work because of asperger syndrome. i know it can happen, and some people cant work because of it, but proving it is very hard. from what i heard, there are many people who need disability desperately and dont get it.
i know a man who's been in an car accident, and is in constant pain, but told me he was refused disability, although it hurts a lot and it hurts all the time. people in charge of whether or not to give disability arent always reasonable.
why dont you try a job without interaction with people, like typing. why dont you learn seo and work on that, this way it won't involve talking to people or working as a team. this is why many aspies cant find a job, because we go to the wrong jobs!
i would never get hired as a sales person, so i dont even try. i couldnt last a day on that kind of job anyway. learn something like web design. there are many jobs out there that dont require social skills.
when you go for a job that demands social skills, the person responsible for hiring realizes right away that you dont have what the job requires, but it's so different in the computer world. they just care about your achievements and skills.

I have been on SSD for a little over 12 years now i think it is. There have been times i tried to work, mainly retail.
Yet i don't end up working for long. I worked for a vet for a year then quit it was way too much for me i had a meltdown. I think i lasted as long as i did as they boarded animals in the back i could help care for.

I have worked at Gamestop stores 3 different times in 2 different states. All of the different times i work there for at least 6 months then i had to go medical leave and or quit for a spell.
I was familiar with Gamestop and would actually consider trying again there, however it is far from where i live and i doubt i'll last past 6 months.

People in the past such as exes have said that i am smart and give me the lecture about how i should be doing something with my life using my brain or something, yet i'm not really that type... The person that told me that also thinks i should be capable of working just fine.
I truly think some people just don't understand it since they are not in our shoes.

I got fired from a temporary job involving little human interaction...obviously you cannot ignore the employer or you wont even last the first 5 minutes. But yeah I ended up coming off as mental and rude...and couldn't get the work done fast enough. So having a job with little interaction is not always a solution, also though there can be the issue of availibility. There might not be a job the autistic individual can do available, or they might have no way to get to the job.

If one only struggles with the social aspects of a job then good for them, its good they have the option to find something with less interaction and that it allows for them to function on the job...unfortunately there are other parts of autism like sensory issues, trouble processing as much outside imput ect that can interfere even with jobs that lack social interaction.

Where are these jobs with without interacting with others? I had one of those jobs. It was boring and still had the sensory issues related to Autism.

My 2 jobs were mostly not interacting with others yet I still had problems.

With the paper route I didn't have to collect payments and in theory didn't have to see any people. However that job still had problems. Since I don't drive and can't ride a bike I had to do it walking and those papers were heavy, especially the Sunday papers. I had to do it every day of the week with no day off ever, not even holidays. I had to do it no matter what the weather was, even rain, snow, or freezing temperatures. It was winter when I did it. I was a 19 year old girl walking around alone in the dark late at night and a couple of times I had guys in cars bother me and a loose dog follow me barking.

The cleaning job wasn't so bad at first. I was alone on the second floor and my friend was alone on the first floor and there was a guy that did the halls and gym with a machine and didn't bother us. That changed when there was a school holiday and we had to go to other schools and other people came to our school and my whole routine was disrupted and I couldn't handle it. I would have held out longer if not for that but even though it was part time I was exhausted every day and felt like I did little but work and sleep. A week after I quit my friend quit. I would have had to quit then anyways because she drove me there and it wasn't on the bus line.

The problem with having aspergers is that no one knows where to put us. The medical profession don't know, the benefits system doesn't know, and employers don't know either. So we are in a no man's land and have little option but to hide our traits and try to make it like everyone else. No wonder so many of us go round in circles.

i'm on disability...though i am not quite sure what for? ><
i dont get a lot of money...but it is something.

I wrote down, depression, anxiety, and autism spectrum..

Haven't been able to get a job for 3 years despite trying a lot.

Was surprised to get any disability but when i ask them how they made the decision i get no answers.

Needless to say it takes a year...by the time a decision is made you will have forgotten about it or at least tried to because it's an unforgettable gantlet of BS hoops you have to jump through

I did not have a lawyer present, just was truthful to the best of my knowledge and went through their psych test.

My insurance wouldn't send them records and when i asked them to they still wouldn't and said there were no records? (though i have records from this insurance company for 10+ years)

Some how i am on disability...it helps me get to school and pay for gas...beginning is a lot because they pay you for the past year but after that it drys up really quick...

Strange to be disabled and not even have the slightest idea how they made their decision -.-

But i'm glad i didn't have to hire a lawyer though i don't think i would have.

Considering your constant attempt at projecting an air of superiority (don't even try to deny it), that was an ill-considered statement. If that is a true reflection of your views on the topic at hand then I would suggest you aren't half as clever as you appear to think you are.



This pretty much sums up how ridiculous the statement was. "Back in the day" many autistic people were left to rot in asylums. A little further "back in the day" and people who couldn't hold a job - whatever the reason - were sent to the workhouse. Back in the day was pretty s**t.

I have for the past year, but that's also for tourettes & OCD. I don't like it at all and am going to be studying in February so that I can get off of it and eventually get into a good job.

While I still have my disabilities, I feel like I can still earn my own money and contribute to society, it's just a matter of finding work of which I could do well.

I think if people need it, then fair enough. It's just not for me.

I think we have to remember that autism is a slideing scale when it comes to sevarity and social issues are just one small part of the overall issue. Todays economy dosen't lend itself to AS people either, 50-100 folks are competing for the same min wage job so whats the chance for an aspie to get a chance when theres dozens of good template NT's to chose from, 10 years ago people were in demand to the point were interviews were almost waved in some jobs. Good jobs that used to go for the disabled now go to grossly over qualifed NTs cought out by the economy and even that takes a friend in HR. The old style jobs that most would have gotten are moving to china by the 1000's, Thats reality.

If only every company that donates to autism charitys actually hired and accomidated the people with it we all would be in good shape, for that reason I don't feel bad about people on assistance, at the end of the day thats were they are wanted.

Just saying were not all the same and I can understand why meny can't work or find work.