Mother in denial about my AS

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My mom is in denial that I have AS due to the fact that if I have it, then SHE must have it. Also, she claims to work with AS kids in a regular music class setting, and I am an adult with AS. She is comparing me to their age level, and not taking in to account that I am an adult with AS. Our maturity levels are drastically different obviously. I have had years to cope with my AS anyway, and having not known I've had it, have learned to adjust accordingly; however, I am VERY socially inept, and have been recently diagnosed twice with it. And yet still, my mom is in total denial. And it's my family, I can be myself around them right? Put me in any other situation, I have to TRY and NOT be my Aspie self, just to hide it. Or sometimes, maybe I find myself not being my Aspie self around my family. Maybe I appear too "normal" to them, because subconsciously or unconsciously, I am not being myself.

Does anyone else on this board have family especially moms that refuse to accept the fact that their daughter or son has AS? How do you cope with it when you are trying again and again to remind them you're different?

why must she have it?

I checked your profile- it says you are diagnosed. I don't see how she can argue unless she is the type of expert who diagnoses autism. You have it whether she believes it or not-it isn't like its bigfoot or something like that. Maybe you can give her some educational resources. I cant think of anything else that could help you and her come to terms. Maybe once she knows that it doesn't mean she has it or gave it to you it will be a relief for her. I am undiagnosed, but I gave my mom a lot of information, and she has had no problems. For her it was an "a ha" moment. The family has wondered about me all my life.

Incidentally, my grandfather on my father's side had all the signs of a classic Asperger male, so if genetics are involved it doesn't mean it is from your mom. There is a large gene pool to choose from.

Maybe she is thinking because it can be genetic that the parents always has it too. It's not always true. AS can skip a generation. My auntie is pretty AS, my mum has more ADHD traits and my dad was definitely somewhere on the spectrum. I'm most like him.
She may also see some of the symptoms in herself and is in denial about it herself.
Is it really necessary that she believes you? Yes, the support can be a good thing much too much support and they treat you like a child and constantly ask 'will you be ok?'

you recieve genes from both parrents, and who knows both may had it ressive ly and you got the 1 in four shot for it

It's really hard to get people who think they are "normal" to read about autism unless they feel it is directly involved in their children, it's also to hard to get parents to believe that there is something "wrong" with their kid. Thats how NT's or other aspies who haven't been enlightened think, there's something wrong or they are normal.

Just stand firm and if they ask, "whats wrong with you?" Just say this is how I am, I guess you should act however you have been acting up until now, no need to hide any aspect of who you are.

I had a similar situation when I was 5 and I was diagnosed with Auditory Processing Disorder and my father decided the doctors were quacks and so was my mom and I was perfect because I was his son. My father later found out after living with me when he injured his foot that maybe they all were right and he was in denial and he died an enlightened man.

nothing wrong with being abnormal

I've told several people that I supspect that they have AS, and it never goes down well. Except for with my mum, ironically for this thread, who then took the test, and then took it to her doctor.

No one in my family denies I have it. They all know.

I think my paternal grandmother is in denial about me having AS. She tells her friends all about me - everything except that I have AS - and she regularly tells me that I'm "perfectly normal". When I met some of her friends a few years ago, I struggled to keep up with the questions they were asking me about my home life, school life, etc.

My mother thinks she may be AS. she toe walks, is fairly isolated, fairly socially inept and eccentric and loves facts, reading, current affairs and listening to the weather. She is also very routined and rigid and struggles with dynamic thinking.

She now sees I have AS (formally dx'ed) and also says two of her other children would probably receive formal dx'es if they were to pursue them.

I am one of 8. Of the others, she agrees one is severely ADHD and she also maintains our family is riddled with ASD traits - far moreso than the norm.

My mother reached this conclusion through concentrated and thorough research over a couple of years.


I might add, if one comes from a family where one or both parents are possibly on the spectrum, the whole notion of what fairly "normal development" consists of, is skewed. My mother now realises there is an awful lot she did not understand about her own children because of her own view of what it is to be human. She viewed our development from her own undiagnosed ASD paradigm, in an era when the issues we presented with were blamed on poor parenting, abuse and nothing else.

it has been quite amazing to see previous mysteries about my family and our 'oddities" answered and it is quite a gift to have a mother who has had the intellectual thirst and openness to consider this information and weight it up and absorb its relevance in the life of several in her family. We are, in short, an "autistic" family. that does not mean all are on the spectrum, but it does mean there are several of us who are, and the others present with many traits and would tend towards an NT/AS or NT/ADHD presentation or a combination of these.

My view is - be patient with parents. Offer information that is up to date about ASD's. And DO NOT try to force others to accept a diagnosis that may be unwelcomed in their lives or their personal construction of self-identity. Acceptance of a label or a dx is a personal choice. and this, in my view, always needs to be respected.

I could challenge a few of my siblings about being on the spectrum. I could also challenge some relatives. But why? Each human being has their own journey with regards to how they choose to view themselves and their life history. All I can do is live in accordance with what is right for me and applicable and helpful to me.

It is a difficult point of "surrender and acceptance" to reach. It is not easy. But it is better than ramming a DX down the throat of family members who may not really welcome it.

The first thing my husband said after listening to my monologue about me and AS was "Then am Autistic too. And everybody esle is too. Because nobody likes looking in the eye, everybody sometimes wants to be alone"... He told me I might be oversensitive to sounds but I wasn't Autistics. I talked to him very long and he realised (or just said so) that it is AS. I am 100% sure, my whole family would deny it even if I was diagnosed by a doctor. And even if they accepted the diagnosis they would say, that doctor Asperger made up this all since he wanted to be famous. My husband thinks so...

i am 32 and got diagnosed as an adult. my mother has always complained that i am too distant, selfish, self centred etc.
when i told her that i have AS, she seemed not wanting to believe me as it would mean that she has been wrongly accusing me for many years.