The Pro-Cure Thread

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Ephemerella, while naturella may think... "the conversational style often includes monologues about topics that bore the listener, fails to provide context for comments, or fails to suppress internal thoughts. Individuals with AS may fail to monitor whether the listener is interested or engaged in the conversation. The speaker's conclusion or point may never be made"

Basically, I just wanted to mention I loved reading your monologue, and I was very interested in it, and I'm glad you may have failed to suppress internal thoughts. No conclusion needed to be made, although I think you made it very clear what your conclusion was, but it didn't need to be made. I swear you are another me.

I too was in the military, and my job there was drafting and surveying in civil engineering. I don't have a degree yet, but I have tons of majors in my college experience. I truly commend you on finding a focus and sticking to it. That is something i wish I could do. But to hear you've had same probs as me, although my probs was sexism in the military, was just awesome (bad that you had them, but aweseome that I'm not alone). It's so therapeutic to know other people have the same probs as you and you aren't going crazy like it's created in your mind. The military is good about scaring off by hazing and demeaning the pretty girls at E4 and below to the point where they either get kicked out for something stupid (like they got raped while their rapist is still earning rank) or they just don't re-enlist (or do what I did, and volunteer under force shaping conditions). I was doing sh!t hot as the term is when I was in, but I don't think my efforts were well liked by the shirt and my nco. I think my experience in AS made me believe they were picking on me when really it wasn't about me but the fact that they were harder on me because i was female, and good. After I volunteered for separation was when I discovered how my my officers and commander did like me, and how much power my shirt really didn't have and that I could mess with his mind just as much as he messed with mine.

Either way, I know what you mean by being better than NT's. Before I knew what AS was, I thought of my self as better because I was. Like you, everything I set out to do academically or in the workplace was at least, if not more, one standard deviation above the norm. My IQ isn't quite genius, but as close as you can get to it without the label, which far exceeds the norm. Same with all those tests I took in school (back then was CTBS tests, but now they are called Westest)...as well as ACT and SAT...top 90th percentile always thanks to my math skills. I was probably top 80th percentile in English skills. I got a 95 on the ASVAB, which is well above the norm. (See, I'm giving examples to prove my thinking just in case). I have other examples, but those are easiest measured. I think what naturella is trying to do is take our ego down a notch. It's one thing to factually be better, but it's another to sit on our high horse about it. I'm so guilty of that frequently, even when I don't intend to. At least that's how some people portray me. What gets on my nerves...specific example. I told my friend that my one year old is too early to tell if she's AS..you can't diagnose it that early. She was like, who are you to say that? Are you a psychologist? You always think you are right on things, etc. I'm like uh, I think I'm right because I am. It's so nervewracking to have every thing I say argued.

Anyway, also on the housekeeping. I'm like you too. Not Donna Reed clean, but not crippling. Since I've had kids, that gets knocked a lot. My friend and mom will act like CPS will come take my children away because I have a big stack of dirty clothes. Sad thing is my house is 10 times cleaner than my mom kept it with me growing up and 90 times cleaner than my friend kept her house when her kids were 1 and 2. I do remember my mom asking me what my problem was. "Why can't you keep a clean house? I do." I said, "why can't you paint me a picture of a lighthouse or draw a tree? I can. Also, why can't you perform mathematical functions in binary code? I can. " Then of course i threw in how she doesn't have kids at her house and that it wouldn't be as clean as it was if her husband didn't clean it all the time. I didn't mention how I would need to clean her bathtub before I'd shower in it. My idea of clean is germ control. Her definition is clutter control. I guess my resentment toward NT's is that they judge me more because I do things different. I know I'm better than them in many ways and worse in others, but I don't expect them to be better just because I am. With them, it's like if you don't do things their way and see things their way, then they think you are wrong and treat you worse for it. They want you to be as good as them in cleaning the house, but not better. I don't think they mean to be that way, I think they just don't pay attention to themselves and have absolutely no control over their emotion based decisions (especially when ego is a factor) in the same way I have no control over my communication and thoughts peeping out in my monologues (especially when my interest is a factor). I think an NT and an AS just have two seriously conflicting personalities, and the NT way to deal with that is aggressive criticism. AS first reaction isn't aggression. After years of being aggresively criticized for no real reason or purpose, some of us learn to get aggressive back at them in a way anybody will eventually deal with their bullies in a very bully type manner. Our knocking NT's is really self defense. Is it the best approach? No. It's just a natural one.

I also think for those same reasons we resent NT's, that is why many of us refuse to be one. But, I do remember a time when I did wish I could be NT, because at that time, I didn't resent them, I envied them. I think a lot of that was the 80's movies. It just made you want a boyfriend and best friend so bad while wearing those ridiculous outfits. LOL.

Yeah, on the cavemen, you got to be careful in this day and age. Look at what Geico went through!

I don't get it?

I will remind you that Aspie is a spectrum, and not everybody has the exact same traits. Some people have the speech delay (PDD NOS I guess) while others do not. Some socialize better than others. What she goes through is her experience as an aspie, and she seems to have a great clue on what is Aspie and what is not. Like someone else already said, I think she was referring to "HER" situation rather than a general Aspie one. But if it were a blanket statement that should affect Aspies, I'll tell you what Aspie traits I think make us better than NTs.

Most psychologically specified traits are bad traits. Nobody would want those. So if you are referring only to, "naïve, inappropriate, one-sided social interactions, limited ability to establish relationships, poor non-verbal communication, a lack of emotional empathy, pedantic, repetitive speech, intense absorption in certain subjects, clumsy, un-coordinated movements, odd postures," then I can totally see how anyone would not appreciate their AS traits. What I don't see in psychology as much as I see in AS people in general as well as myself, I really think we all have founded some theories of some good traits that are highly probable AS traits. While it may seem so unscientific, the world of psychology was founded on self exploration no different than what many Aspies, including myself, do here. Just because we can't prove our ideas true doesn't mean they are false, but it doesn't mean they are true either. This is only referring to a concept of a blanket statement. Mind you, someone like myself thinks I'm better than most NT's in most cases, and if my reasons are stupid reasons, I'm still entitled to those reasons. God knows I've tolerated enough other people's stupidity to earn my right to have some stupidity myself. Either way, behind that blanket statement of AS being better than NT, as in a majority, as in the stats prove it, they don't. It's a generalization and possibly a false one, but it holds more weight than saying blanket statements on race because no study has tried to prove or disprove it, and it has much more logic behind it. Either way, here's a list of traits I believe are probably Aspie traits, and if they are Aspie traits, then I do think they would make AS better than NT in the cost benefit ratio.

Sincerity
Genuine nature
Good reading skills and math skills
Better focus and passion for interests which in turn benefits the greater cause of the interest
Ability to think outside the box (since we live there, of course, we don't know what the inside of the box looks like)
which in turn also leads to intense creativity
Creative problem solving
Ability to objectively look at things more so than subjectively

That's to just name a few I noticed from the top of my head. I truly believe nothing in this world is either good nor bad, or only strength or weakness. It's all a scale. Reason being, objects can't be good or evil. It's the person using the object that makes the object that way. So, just like objects, certain personality traits can be a strength or a weakness. The trait itself isn't strong or weak. It just depends on how the person uses it. Otherwise, you woulnd't find phrases like, "find opportunity in adversity" in fortune cookies or hear the cliche"when life dishes out lemons, make lemonade." The more people that make AS sound like a disability without offering a cure only holds people back unless they are able to look beyond that and see their strengths, AS or not. I don't think it's a healthy perspective to think of any part of yourself as a disabling feature, but I smoke cigarettes which isn't healthy either. Of course, there is the whole range of opinion between the two. You're entitled to feel however you want on the subject, but just understand people that are happy with themselves, AS and all, are providing themselves a healthier outlook and trying to grow past neurotypical perspectives. Yes, that does make us better than neurotypicals because we won't let the haters stop us from getting ours. I mean this no different than the kid that finds a way to surpass his bullies and be able to eat lunch is better than the bully that tried to stand in his way.

Have you not seen the Geico commercials, "It's so easy a caveman can do it!" followed by an ad of two cavemen sitting like yuppies at a fine restaurant complaining about the discriminatory comment about their intelligence. There was even a more recent one of two cavemen talking at a party and one was upset that nobody liked him because he had Geico for car insurance or did the commercials or something like that.

Under ephemerella's standards, could as well mean "I am doing better" or "I feel better this way" - But don't worry, take the worst possible interpretation so that you could bash it.

Perhaps the ones that were mentioned in the post...


I don't see the relation. Acknowledging you are better doesn't make you worse.

I didn't intend to offend anyone or insult any group. I apologize if someone felt I was doing so.

I don't know how to respond to all of this. This is too complicated for me.

This is all I can say.

Don't feel bad, I don't think you offended anybody. I think one person in the bunch put their own personal spin on your words and added ill intent where there was none. It happens, not your fault. =]

Note the bold, underlined, and italicized text above; I read that as according to personal standards, that when measured by their own yardstick, they are far higher than many others. To know what makes you happy and pursuing it is something I admire and encourage; I did not read that post as suggesting that they, as a person, were superior on any basis than in their own personal perspective of what makes life good and worth living. By the values that she holds most high, she feels that her strengths suit her desires for happiness, and losing those strength would lessen her opinion of herself, her ability to live a good life - nothing more in my reading of it. There is It also makes sense - I think people are most unhappy when they attempt to value their own lives on what makes another person feel powerful or successful... to me, that is an empty achievement. The insults at the end of your post are unnecessary; to lob a definition of what affects many of us on this support site in a negative fashion is rather deplorable in my personal opinion.


M.

Never seen em.

AS is s**t, if you think that AS is a benefit you are severely deluded GIVE ME THE PILL

*is a little late*

I've been trying to get that from the doctor- not such luck. It seems the trend these days not to give medication- at least in my area, and all I wanted was short term for the Christmas period. Calms tablets really worked for a few weeks but then they suddenly stopped working.

The only 'bad' thing about Calms was that if I were to go into an area with significantly more sound than the last, seeing as 'meltdown' or anxiety wasn't an option I'd end up spacing out and withdrawing. It was quite strange.

Natracalm works even better- but I can't seem to find it where I live. But I reccomend it, because even though it might not stop the noises it improves your reaction to them.

Cure-wise, my hyper sensitive hearing (I think they call it hyperacusis or something) among other sensory issues is disabling. No question about it. I'm stuck indoors for most of christmas because of the noise of all those shoppers. I'd love a cure for that. As for social skills, I couldn't care less but I'm sure it's a huge issue for other individuals. I'd like to able to stop needing a routine because I break down if the slightest thing goes wrong. I couldn't care less about my stims- they're harmless.

I don't get when people push for a cure for every little thing- even if it's merely a difference or a cultural problem. I suppose either extreme of pro and anti-cure seem illogical, selfish and strange to me.

The commercials are funny. The storyline is that Geico has "it's so easy a caveman can do it" ad campaign, and the cavemen who work at the company get very upset because the ad campaign is discriminatory and they feel marginalized. The anger and discontent over the Geico commercials then spreads through the Caveman community. One guy gets bad therapy from a condescending therapist who tries to encourage him to realize he is indeed inferior. The Cavemen don't buy into all the attempts to portray them as inferior and belittle them, tho. They are pretty grounded, with a strong sense of Self. The story unfolds over a series of several commercials.

What is so interesting re: this thread (Tantybi is really astute) is that these Geico caveman commercials portray people (Neanderthals) who are fundamentally different than normal (modern Cro-Magnon) humans but not less than them. The Cavemen ARE indeed different: they have no imagination for insinuations, pretense, role-playing or the hypocrisy of modern humans. They also have a short fuse and are very emotional. But the Cavemen accept themselves as okay and have their own lives. The commercials have these Cavemen as being a community (living in groups, hanging out with each other) normally and healthy, not as if their traits are pathological problems to be doped up, fixed and surgically or therapeutically compensated for.

The Cavemen story is a great metaphor for AS because they are such concrete thinkers and can't role-play and get frustrated with the insinuations and hypocrisy of modern humans. They are very pragmatic and literal. But even though they lack the ability to appreciate pretentiousness, insinuations and resent hypocrisy (Geico hypocritically keeps airing the "even a caveman can do it" ads even though the company tries to apologize to the cavemen, claiming it's a mistake), they are still intelligent, creative, sensitive (play piano, etc.). They are not ret*d and defective -- or ashamed of themselves. They hang out with each other, validate each other, and don't get why the modern humans think they're so superior. They do resent how the modern humans keep portraying them as less intelligent, when they are not. They certainly wouldn't buy into attempts to "cure" them.

These commercials could have been written by an AS who doesn't feel inferior to NTs and is sick of the soft bigotry of condescension and fallacious assumptions of AS inferiority due to not having a social mind. The funny set ups and great acting bring it all to life.

Here's a few of them all together in one YouTube video:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=179Q_sAMUWM&feature=related[/youtube]

You are more than welcome to feel that way about yourself, but the majority of us (I think) are happy to be the way we are. To call us deluded is rude and ignorant. We are having a civil discussion here about something that is completely hypothetical. Why? Because it is fun to discuss such things and I for one enjoy hearing other peoples thoughts on the matter. But can we please refrain from childish name calling?

Seconded.


M.

I don't think Geico sells its product in Canada. Insurance is legistlated state by state and Canada is near, but definately not, the States.

Merle