Are you "okay" with having Asperger's?

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Why would I be okay with having a mental disability? Some things I would prefer not to experience:

1. Sensory overload, which prevents me from fully enjoying my environment.
2. Social dysfunction, I will never know what it is like to feel truly close to others.
3. Irrational or black and white thinking, precludes normal mental processing and leads to inappropriate response.
4. Lack of fine motor skills and co-ordination.
5. Difficulties with verbal expression.

Autism presents these challenges to me and I am not okay with it. It is a constant battle and has made my life not particularly worth the bother.

As for vaccines, do some research.

I accept the diagnosis and agree with the assessment but I am not okay with who I currently am and where I am at in life if that answers the question.

When I read the question, my first thought was: "Am I 'OK' being me?"

Sometimes. Say, when I am totally engrossed in solving a problem that I can focus on for hours at a time. Or, when I have a list of things to do and feel accomplishment when getting them done. It's in those situations (which typically occur when I am by myself) where I am in my "element" and am totally fine being me.

There are other times, where I dislike myself and who/what I am.

Ultimately, I don't know how much of "me" (who/what I am) is the result of having Asperger's versus something else.

Without a doubt, I would say that I am far more OK "being me" now (at age 53) than I was at any time earlier in my life (including my childhood, which was for me, a very difficult time).

Rocket123: A nicely considered response sir. I can identify with all of that, especially with being "more okay" now than at any time in the past. Thank you for your input.

It is what it is. I tried to stop spending so much energy worrying about what I can't change, anyway. Either things would turn out okay or they wouldn't, and that would be the end of it.

I struggled more because the negatives tend to impact things that are important to me, like my family or my writing. That made it so much harder to appreciate any positives, or to get support when I needed it during difficult times growing up.

A constructive and logical way of thinking about it Canary, thank you for your reply.

You do highlight a particularly familiar part of the condition there; being unable to get help when it's at its worst.

Also I have no idea if that second "its" should have an apostrophe. Anyone?

I love having Asperger's. Why? Because it has given me gifts and talents that I probably would not have had if I had been NT. I find my special intense interests (roller coasters, house plans, etc.) as very relaxing and fun. I have invented an entire amusement park that I enjoy most nights after I lie down in bed. I also wander through the various rooms of the house plans I love when I lie down. I am able to play various musical instruments that I become fascinated with, without lessons and in very little time. By the time I was in high school I had memorized (without trying) the statistics of every roller coaster in North America (height, length, ride time, number of passengers per train, designer, builder, year built). So for me, although I lacked all the friends that most people have, I found the gifts of Asperger's to be my close friend.

I wanted my diagnosis, so it would be a little odd for me if I wasn't okay with it. I wanted (but didn't necessarily need) my diagnosis because I wanted answers to my life's mistakes, gaffs, isolations, insults, blame and ridicule. My selective mutism, synesthesia, anxiety, obsessive-compulsions, lack of friends, and all my special interests had sudden confirmation. Many of my characteristics came with benefits, so that was great. I could actually do certain things better than others. I could remember details for use decades later. People still avoid me, but I am okay with myself and my autism.

I don't really have a choice, but if I did, I would get rid of it. Yeah, it makes me who I am, but what if I don't like who I am? I'd rather be a different type of person: one who is happier and can navigate social situations with relative ease. I want to be able to experience the things that NTs take for granted. Yeah, it gives me a few skills, but the negatives outweigh the positives.

I'm okay, but are other people okay? It doesn't look like it most of the time.

NTs are still very ignorant, cruel, superficial, arrogant, and love to hurl insults like "sperg" and "a**" burgers" at anyone who appears the least bit awkward. They need to forget everything they think they know about ASD, which is practically nothing, but since they haven't done that great of a job learning not to be cruel to people for being a different race, gender, sexuality, or other disabilities I don't see it happening quickly enough.

I'm not the one who needs to be fixed, *they* are. I don't need to be cured of Asperger's any more than a person needs to be cured of having a different eye color.

glider18 and AspieUtah: These responses are the closest to my own experiences and opinions. I think the only deviance would be with your's, AspieUtah, in that I think I needed diagnosis at the point I did. I genuinely don't believe I would have lasted more than a few years without it. There were too many unanswered questions about why I had always been so different; too many unresolved failures in certain areas, yet strange successes in others.

Grammar Geek: You don't seem to be alone in feeling that (I think approx 30%-35% of responders in this thread would rather not have it). Thank you very much for your reply, and for your answer to my grammar question. You just changed my written/typed output for good!

I'm okay with being on the spectrum. I wasn't when I was in my teens, but I am now. I guess the reason I'm okay with it is because I've proved a lot of people wrong. I've proved my parents and my ex-mental health workers wrong. I think it was one of my ex-mental health workers who told me that I couldn't work in a bank. I'm also okay with my AS to the point that I like to celebrate my differences in unorthodox ways.

I think I am okay with it now. I've accepted that it is something I can't change and I do like the person I am. If you asked me five or ten years ago, however, I definitely would have said "no".