Does your autism define you?

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Are you a person who happens to be autistic, or are are you 100% an autistic individual? How much of you life is an autistic/AS identity? Do people know you as "suchandsuch, the Aspie girl"? Do your aspie characteristics dominate your personalty and/or your life? Or are they more subtle, and come out only occasionally? Are you a person first, and an aspie second - or is the reverse true for you?

I just...exist. Does that answer your question?

Basically, I am what I am. I don't think about it. I DO, however, think about the fact that I'm aspie when social situations arise and I ask myself why I can't just blend in.....but in a way it does define me...I guess. *shrugs* I'm not known as the "aspie guy" per se, but more or less the "really quite guy that always looks pissed off".

i am autistic and i have autism, i feel both ways, there are times it seems im just autism, then there are times i have autistic traits. A lot of the time ppl just see the autism, thats all, like i have no personality, no mind, no real thoughts, just autism, which sucks. There are times people see me more then the autism, those are the times during i'm signing mostly. does that make sense? idk haha

Hard to say. Kind of both, i guess? My autistic characteristics definitely affect pretty much every area of my life to some degree, so in a way it sort of does dominate my life. There are certainly other elements to who i am... i'm still an individual, not JUST an aspie... but these other elements are still probably affected to some degree by AS. For example... I don't talk about autism all the time, so i'm not going to be known as "the aspie girl" by people. But i might be known as "the snake girl" by some people, and that's because of a special interest, which is directly related to the fact that i have AS. Heh. See, being interested in reptiles isn't just an autistic thing, most reptile-fanatics i know are NTs.. So, being into reptiles is another element to my life. But, it's because of my AS that i have the kind of obsessive focus on them that i do. If it weren't for me being on the spectrum, i might still be interested in reptiles... But i probably wouldn't have thrown adult tanrums when my parents didn't want me to buy more snakes, i probably wouldn't bring up the same topic constantly even to people who hate snakes, and i'd probably have other interests that are just as important to me all balanced out. So it's just all connected in a way that's difficult to explain.

I really don't know what people see when they look at me. Most of the acquaintances that I have discussed the AS-stuff with continue to not understand..and I guess I am just this unnecessarily cross-distant-detached person to them...as I am to the people who don't know that about me...Um...howyousay...I struggle every day with issues that are related to my particular set of issues..Repetitiveness...communication difficulties..scattered energy...etc....

I try not to let it define me, but sometimes, I can't help it.

I don't think anyone knows me as "the aspie girl"...as most people I come in contact with don't know what that means....
I have been known more as the sock monkey girl and/or the ukulele girl...and probably the unnecessarily cranky SHFL bartender....I agree with the above poster that I am more defined by my interests than anything else. I don't interact with people closely enough to get a take on how they might regard my eccentricities.

I'm just a person with a Asperger's label. I don't know how often I have it. I don't really care or even think about it.

There is hardly a facet of my existence that is not coloured in some substantial way by autism or its many concurrent manifestations. The result is a differentness that, while often subtle, people still cannot help but notice. Most times, in brief encounters, one thing or another is sufficiently noteworthy to a passerby such as to elicit comment, usually in a friendly manner - the most common is "Aren't you cold?". While I can usually hide most of the more obvious charactertics for the duration of, say, a business meeting, any recurring contact inevitably - and usually quickly - results in people noticing the I am obviously and substantially different from anyone else they have met. It is not all bad - people also notice my unusual abilities as well as the difficulties. Those rare people that stick around to really get to know me treat me far differently from how they treat others, in an accepting and accommodating way. These exceptional people have an unbelievable effect on the quality of my life, which would almost certainly be an much more unfulfilling existence otherwise, if not a former existence.

Yet while people immediately sense my "differentness", they do not (at least to my knowledge) recognise it as autism. As I in general do not tell people unless it is important that they know (such as business partners or serious dating partners, if ever that were to occur), I am defined to most people as being different, not as being autistic.

To myself, however, it completely defines me, day after sleepless night, forming the framework for understanding the series of assorted struggles big and small that is daily life. I would be fooling myself to think that I am just a person who incidentally has autism. All of my experiences, past and present, for decades embarrassing, hurtful and unexplained, are now viewed with the understanding of why I was as I was and did as I did. I now own these once-painful memories, and they can no longer hurt me.

It affects every part of my life. People notice I am unusual. Without a label, they assign character flaws; with a label, they assign inferiority.

it's not something i'd share publicly , if I has AS (diagnosed, that is )

I think as the concept of AS becomes more part of the public awareness, others will define you as AS on your behalf (and not necessarily with your best interests in mind). eventually it will gain euphemistic usage, as a taunt or insult. so adopting a term like aspie may be counterproductive in the long run.

Being Aspie is part of my identity, but is not my only identity. I have three close NT friends and I can mix with them OK most of the time. So I try to not make being Aspie an issue unless I need help or something.

I don't have big problem with my Asperger, probably because it's mainly "mental" and only limited "phisical" (yes I rock but I can control it, yes I hate chaos and social things but I can go to a supermarket without crying.. but I need some time to recover, I don't have a lot of empathy but it doesn't bother me). I don't know if Autism is in my personality or is something "I have" I only know that the 2 things go well together and it's all that matter.

The good things enhance my brain and the bad things don't bother me because they are fine with my personality (I don't like hung around with people, I don't like small talk, I don't like contact so, what's the problem if I have problem with that?)

^What she said. ^

I don't think those around me define me by my autism. Frankly, I often wish they did - I'd feel they understood me a lot better, but that would require learning what autism really is and it doesn't affect them personally enough to bother with all that.

As for the AS individual - whether we want to admit it or not, we have an atypical brain function - our perception of the world we live in is markedly different than what the average person is experiencing. How could that NOT affect every minute aspect of your life to some degree or another? You're walking around in the same space as everyone else, but what you're seeing and feeling is NOT QUITE THE SAME as what they're seeing and feeling. I'd say that pretty much defines you, no matter how much you'd like to just smile and say "I'm fine - everything's good, no problem".

Who do you think you're kidding? Not them - they can tell you're not like them. But they expect you to learn to be. Can you "learn away" the way your brain is made?

When I was young, yes. Granted Asperger's was virtually undiagnosed in the 1950s, I was just considered odd. But today very few people, even professionals, would be able to identify me as such. Close observation of people, including myself, and presenting the required/desired responses takes effort and experience, but it can be done.

Until very recently, I have often been a chameleon:

"a person given to often expedient or facile change in ideas or character : one that is subject to quick or frequent change especially in appearance" (Merriam-Webster Online).

And, I think AS or HFA has made that necessary in order for me to survive. It was like I had to be one person at home as a child, then somebody else at school ... and all of that just got worse as I grew older and found myself living in an ever-expanding world I did not understand. So, maybe it could be said autism circumstantially defined me, but now I say it helps in finding direction.

Being on the spectrum is merely one of dozens and dozens of facets to what makes me "me". It doesn't "define" me so much as it is simply a small part of me.

I want to say it doesn't define me but I do think about it ALL the time. I think since I found out about it, about 5 or 6 months ago, it's become a big part of my life. Before I thought everyone had the same anxiety and sensory issues that I did and I was just more whiny about, or I dealt with it differently. Now I notice how I'm different much more often, because I'm looking for it. I'm very aware of myself and my ASD but when I try to explain it to someone else ,they just say stop making excuses. Sometimes they say snap out of it which is just ridiculous. So the answer is, it doesn't define me from other people's perspective, yet internally I'm constantly aware of it, so I guess it would define me. It's a good question and a hard one to answer.