Do not feel upset if diagnosed with Asperger's

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If you were diagnosed with Asperger's, please don't be upset.
Although a lot of things can be explained by AS, if you want to change you still have chance.
For other people that are "normal", they don't have AS, they communicate with others easily, they have other problems.
They may not as smart as AS, they have to spend a lot of time study math or other courses.
When you AS are frustrated by the social things, they are frustrated by lots of other issues.

And yes, AS may land on a wrong planet that are controlled by "normal" people.
Oo other planet, there may be a planet controlled by AS, and the "normal" people on that planet will feel bad on behavioring differently from most of the people.
That will be interesting.

So just be yourself.
If you want change, just make an effort.
The progress maybe slow, but you have to try and you have to be persistant.

As for me, I don't know if I am with AS or not.
I read the rules for a AS, I found that I match a lot.
For example, I barely had any friend when I was a little girl.
I didn't like to talk with others and I couldn't start a talk when I was with others.
I don't like social things.
I don't like eye contact.
And I don't feel comfortable when touched by others.

But I wasn't be diagnosed with AS or other "diseases".
That all becaused I was grown up in China, not so many people are intereted in that kind of mental disease.
So I was grown like normal people.
And I know I have such problems.
When I don't like what I was, I just tryed to correct it.
Although it seems I have to spend more time on it.
But the important thing is I persist，so I succeed in becoming what I want to be.

So just take it easy.

Be what you want to be.
Do what you want to do.
Don't be upset.
The world is still beautiful, not only to me, to him, but also to you, to everyone.

Last edited by Juan on 25 Nov 2009, 10:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.

would you like to edit your post to spell the word as Asperger's?

alcohol cures EVERYTHING.

but in all seriousness im more indifferent about serious paraniod disorders, and depersonalization disorders

lol. Tequila.

Aspergers is a bad thing. But there is much worse. amd there is always tequila.

AS is an atypical brain function. It does not change, anymore than it can be cured. Whatever challenges and obstacles it presents will be with you all your life. Coping mechanisms can be learned, but the disability is never going to go away.




Thus there can never be an absolute 'norm', therefore there are no 'normal people'. Everybody's got issues. This is not news.



An atypical brain function is organic, it is not a mental disease. It is a mental handicap caused by a physical disability.


Thanks, Juan, for your inspirational and supportive words. While many come here to vent and complain about the particular difficulties that AS causes, to people we know can understand because they deal with the same issues (which is what WP is for - that's why its called a support group), I think most of us realize that we're not the only people in the world with problems.

On the other hand, the biggest obstacles with which we struggle are not the things that we can or can't do - though those are often significant - its the way our inability to read signals and communicate them causes others to treat us that is the most emotionally debilitating over the course of a lifetime, and inspirational speeches will not change that.

"Just keep trying and everything will work out" sounds good on paper. Tell me that when you're fifty and the society you live in has trodden on you, rejected you, used you for their own benefit and then left you behind to fend for yourself. Tell me that when you do everything you're supposed to do by the book and some bully decides to prevent you from accomplishing a goal that will allow you to work for a living just because you stim a bit, or don't always look him in the eye. You can try all you want - you can even DO exactly what the world demands and still be blocked from succeeding because of the way AS causes others to perceive and react to you.

When there's no reason to get up in the morning because there are a strictly limited number of things one can do constructively and none of those options are open to us, then tell us unicorns and rainbows will make everything all right. After we've appealed to our state representatives and congressmen for help and they try to placate us with platitudes and turn their backs, how exactly does "just keep trying" serve us then?

I've been told all my life that I could do whatever anyone else could do if I 'just tried', and you know what? It was B**LS**T then and its B**LS**T now. If 'just trying' would solve my problem, then I wouldn't actually have a handicap, would I?

my goodness, Willard, you have hit the nail precisely! May I use your quote in my sig. line sometime?

Merle

That's a lovely way of describing it Juan. Thank you

Your intent seems pretty correct, but I think the way you're saying it is a little off. AS does change, because people themselves change. Just like a neurotypical child does not have the same brain function as a neurotypical adult, an autistic child does not have the same brain function as an autistic adult. In some cases, that can mean that an adult with autistic brain patterns, who was impaired as a child, might not be impaired as an adult. Given good education (perhaps even good self-education; many of us are good at teaching ourselves) and a decent environment, autistic children will reach their potential, increasing in skill and knowledge as they grow. That's the cause for the "lost diagnosis", in many cases. People with all sorts of brain disorders lose their diagnosis that way. People with mild dyslexia learn to read at an average level; people with low IQs can become self-supporting and completely independent and no longer be diagnosable as mentally ret*d.

This doesn't mean that your brain loses its autistic configuration. But the idea that autistic adults are going to be just like they were as children (and, for that matter, be the same decades later as they are now), is a myth often spread by autism "charities" who like to raise money with fear-and-pity publicity. Autistic people do grow up and change and learn, and they become, as any human being does, gradually more and more capable as they learn to do things. You can't even predict a child's adult functioning, because our development itself is often so atypical that we may be simultaneously behind and ahead of others our age, or start behind and eventually surpass our peers' abilities; or plateau for years before finally "getting it"; or even learn the traditional milestones completely out of order. But we do grow and learn; and I'm really getting quite sick of the supposed charities putting out the myth that we don't.

Iwasn't

My mom's told me I could do anything but I don't believe it. If anyone could do anything, then we (all people and us) all can be scientists or vets or doctors or mathematicians, etc. So I have no idesa what she meant by "anything."

The Invisable Disability. This is the crux of it. People with Asperger's Syndrome are generally not percieved as people with Asperger's Syndrome. They (you) are perceived as NTs who are flouting social norms on purpose just to aggravate people. That's where so much pain and miscommunication comes into it. If yopu have a visible wheelchair, nobody expects you to walk. If you have black glasses and a cane, people will automatically move out of your way because they know you can't see them. If you have Asperger's Syndrome, people will wonder why you are ignoring their clear-as-day facial expressions. Must be because you are obstinate. If you tell people you have Asperger's Syndrome, you will have to explain in exhaustive detail what that entails. And even then, there will be people who will cry "Bulls...t" because they think Asperger's Syndrome is as fake as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (The Yuppie Flu) was believed to be years before and unless they see rocking or other obvious stims they won't believe. Nothing to be done about those people. But the vast majority don't even realize it exists.

I think the biggest problem most other Autistic folks have is approving themselves despite the "disabilities" present due to being Autistic.

Ok, so fine....if I were in a presidential election, and I had the best possible platform, and was up against John McCain, Michael Dukakis, John Kerry, Gerald Ford, Walter Mondale, Adalai Stevenson, Hubert Humphrey, or George McGovern, I'd lose in a landslide due to poor social skills.

Doesn't mean I haven't learned 'em enough to at least get by.

And what I haven't learned in social skills, I can get by regardless due to my real skills, and being the best at what I do...knowing the 48 Laws of Power, and what most people will likely do in such and such situations definitely helps as well.

Was I relieved to find out I was mildly Autistic? Yes, indeed I was! It explained so much; however, I can't speak for everyone else. I'm someone who's willing to accept the truth, as painful as it may sometime be. I'm not someone who likes to live in the dark, and pretend something is what it isn't to make myself feel better for BS reasons.

I'm someone who likes to live in reality, and even with knowledge I gain that I may not enjoy, at least know the truth so I can use it to my advantage as time marches forward. Should that truth affect me in a negative way, I can always work around the problem, think outside the box, and find a better solution.

Oh yeah...I usually do, too

I'm sure that there are people whose lives are decent, and they're not upset about having AS. People who see it as a part of themselves and they like themselves, and they like their own talents.

However, the way I see it, being upset about having AS is better than being upset about being yourself. As I child, I would constantly wish to be other people. I would then spend great amounts of time pondering this concept; if it was me in there body, then eventually I wouldn't actually be them, but just be me, because I'd still act like me and think like me. If I were actually them, I wouldn't be them, they would still be them, because it would still be them in their body, and no me. I suppose my overall wish was just not to have AS. But since I didn't know I had it, I simply wished not to be myself. I find it a bit easier to conceptualize, that while it may be part of me, it's more than that. It's not me inherently being bad or wrong or anything, but having a disorder and disability that, while it is part of me, is also in some ways an entity of it's own.

I'm very unsure that I'm putting this correctly, but I'm not totally sure how I should put it.. I'm pretty tired now, though, so I'm not thinking too well. Long day.

It sounds kind of like escapism to me, not wanting to deal with the reality that you do in fact have AS... focusing on being someone else instead of yourself, instead of trying to make the world work for you the way you are. But you were a kid; you really can't be blamed, especially not with the extremely negative perception the world has of disability.

as I've mentioned before, I didn't even know I was Autistic 'til I was around 19 or 20. Even then, there was barely any information on it, so my knowledge of it wasn't too thorough; I didn't really learn a lot about myself 'til roughly 2 years ago.

And all that time, as a kid, I'd just be called weird. After a while, I'd tell people I took it as a complement....just to shut 'em up. Now, I just laugh at it.

I make fun of myself all the time now, but not in a putting-myself-down way, just a light-hearted "yeah, I know" type of way

I hated being different growing up and wanted to be normal. I couldn't figure out why I was so different so I figured it had to do with other people and them making it so hard for me.
I couldn't understand why things had to be so hard for me so I thought if I just tried harder, I'd be normal.
Then the last thing I needed to hear was "That's called Asperger's." But since I've been diagnosed, I had always been told I had very little and only this much and she show me her finger and thumb and they would only be 1/8 inch apart. But that was still no help because I figured if it was so little, I wouldn't have so many problems with my school work. I did think back then it had to do with troubles with my school work because it's when my mom would usually mention it. I didn't even know what AS was back then. I even had no idea I was literal or knew sarcasm existed. I knew of "Thanks a lot" and Oh great" but didn't know it had a name. But once I started reading about it, I then understood myself more and learned why I had obsessions and why it was always difficult for me to have friends and why I was literal and couldn't tell when someone was teasing. But it tell tell me how mild I have it.
But sometimes my mom would make me sound worse than I really am and then act like it's no big deal and then act like it is.
It took me nearly three years to accept the AS label though.
But once I started to feel normal, I went onto thinking I don't have it. Then I thought I outgrew it. Sometimes I still think I don't have it and sometimes I realize I do have it. I just ignore the label these days and don't care what I have. I think I do fine.