Did you realize you were different when you were a child ?

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This question might sound a little strange since I'm pretty sure most of you did realize they were different when they were children but I didn't.

I had "friends" when I was a kid, until I moved to another town. We weren't the best friends of the world and I had difficulties socializing with other people outside the school but I never felt different. Then I moved and was rejected and beaten. I still didn't realized I was different, I didn't understand what was the problem (except that I locked myself in my thoughts to protect myself from the others ).

Nobody ever told me I was strange except for the other kids. My parents think I'm normal except from my hypersensibility to light and sound, they think all I do is just "to play dumb and make them angry" (but that's no true). My teachers never told me anything until I was 16, they liked me because I was smart but they finally told me that I was not normal because I couldn't socialize like the others did and seem to live in my own world.
I once saw a psychologist who told my parents I just needed to grow up. I was 4 and my brother was with me. In my country, many mental problems are not diagnosed properly.

I never realized people found me strange when I was a child until now.

Until I saw everything that my teachers had written and realized I was considered has "socially inadapted", lacking of independence, but smart (and interested in thing most people dislike). I was also considered as extremely clumsy and people still says I may have an attention disorder.

For now, I haven't been diagnosed with anything. I'm afraid I may have no difference which could explain what I've lived and how I feel or any of my inabilities. I'm also afraid of being different.

Mostly because I never realized that my childhood was different. I never felt that way until I was a teenager and I have difficulties dealing with what I've just learnt.

So, does anyone else thought they were normal when anyone thought they weren't ?

I think my environment and age did it to me. When I lived in a small village I sort of fitted in. We moved, and the new place was kind of scary. Some kids were teasing me a lot. Else than that, I didn't really think I was different. Took until I was around 14 to realize I think, I never went through "normal" teen issues. I thought the teens were extremely weird, I couldn't for my life understand their lifestyles. Then I truly realized I was different.

I knew I was different before I was 10.

I'm not sure. I knew from an early age that other people were odd and I didn't understand them. I knew that life was confusing. I knew that people made life difficult for me, and said and did confusing things. But actual self-consciousness - the awareness of self and how oneself compares with others - didn't really come until I was a teenager, I don't think. Before that, I don't think I looked at myself objectively or had the ability to analyse myself comparatively. I was just me. I did think I was bad though, because everyone told me I was a bad girl.

People told me I was weird, lol. That solidified it for me. I did have friends, though. I never really approached the other kids but they approached me sometimes, usually another girl would approach me and we would become close, then I would get incorporated inot her group a little.

Anyway...I learned to incorporate my weirdness into my personality by eighth grade and I got along well socially after that for the most part, although I was a loner for a few years in my teens and have been so in my twenties as well, after about 23. It's hard for me to stay sociable even though I'd like to have friends. People still tell me I'm different but they mean it in a good way, *most* of the time.

See just below ...

I've known since I was about 3 I was different. I didn't take notice until we moved to Washington and that was when I was in daycare up there. Before that, it never occured to me I was different. Same as when I was the only one in diapers and all the other kids were using the potty and my dad's friend's kid who was my age and everyone else could talk and I couldn't and the fact they could all play with each other and interact.

Then I started to notice something was different about me and I couldn't figure it out. I figured it was just people that made me be different and how I am treated and I just had to try harder to be normal. I didn't really care until I was ten and that was when I started to change and fight to be treated like everyone else and I would rebel when I felt discriminated. Whenever I get punished for being like the other kids, I just kept on doing it because it made me want to fight more. It wasn't fair I be the one punished and not them or when they make a big deal out of goofy stuff I do while other kids can do goofy stuff and not have it be made a big deal. I think I instictivly knew something was missing because I used to ask what was wrong with me and with I could trade my brain for a normal brain.

I wrote this Facebook note about it.

When most kids were watching "age-appropriate" television in kindergarten, I was busy watching Wild Discovery. When others were in groups, I was mostly left to my own devices, playing by myself. The other kids knew I was different, and ostracized me for it. "The kid who played with pencils and rulers" I was called. Less charitable names included "ret*d" and "in need of mental help", and were a common theme of my childhood, leaving me quite bitter.

When I went to high school, things got better, though I was haunted by the horror's of my childhood due to my very good memory, my greatest gift and curse. Most people have memories that aren't worth their weight in human excrement, but all I have to do is focus and I can remember things that happened a decade ago as if it had happened last week. It often comes in chains following words I hear, unavoidable and unpredictable. As a result, I have little good memories to speak of, as the bad comes out far too easily.

I felt and still feel as if I'm in this world, but not really part of it, which I feel is probably due to my AS. I found myself generally unable to find much in common with other people outside of the Internet and inside the clubspace. One was with videogames. Sure, many people play videogames, but I can count on one hand the amount of people I know that can talk about any videogame series on a serious level outside a gaming forum. Save for those people, everyone else may play but can't really look at a videogame at more than face value. They can't imagine the world, and breathe deeply in its lore. It's just a pastime to them, not even worth critical analysis like a book or movie.

For example, I can't exactly discuss the deeper themes behind Majora's Mask and other games with most people in the clubspace, non-gamers and casuals (as much as I despise that word) as they are. Most wouldn't understand, and it would take me too long to explain it in ways a non-gamer would understand. Often enough I've felt as if overtures at conversation were merely because of the belief that it was pleasing God, rather than a genuine attempt of getting to know me. My own social ineptitude and dislike of small talk didn't help matters much either.

Then there's the difference in music tastes. I pretty much listen to only music off of videogame soundtracks, which I consider superior to pretty much everything else I've heard. My clubspace friends couldn't understand why I listened to my collection. They talked about it in the same room I was in, and probably when I wasn't around as well. (Unlike a lot of people I know, I pay full attention to my surroundings, even while playing music. You must either be really naive or really stupid to think someone can't hear you say, "I don't understand how he could like this music.", in such a small room. It's insulting to my intelligence, and you're not nearly as secretive as you think you are.) I swear that if I hear another "Why don't you listen to Christian music?", that insinuation that my tastes somehow make me less of a Christian, they'll learn what happens when you earn my enmity.

In the end, however, despite my differences, I wouldn't have it any other way. As far as I'm concerned, people can either accept me, weirdness and all, or get the Master Sword rammed up their rear.

at least at age 5 i knew for sure...

Moving to a new place sort of changed things for me, too.

Before the 3rd Grade, I did know I was a bit more hyperactive (likely ADHD, but never diagnosed) and sensitive, but overall I didn't think I was really different. I had a few problems cooperating with others, but it didn't really show up as a problem. Boys tended to get into arguments and fight a lot, just normal. If I hadn't moved, I might have also kept a few friendships.

It didn't really seem like there was the problem of fitting in.

When I moved, still in the same state but with a different school, things did get problematic. I didn't really get along with anyone except for one person, who is still my friend today (but he's kind of in the druggie group these days, kinda sad). But my own interests probably showed themselves more. Unlike the previous school, Pokemon wasn't as appreciated as much, and of course, the prior summer was when I first started playing it. Nobody else cared about Pokemon or my other interest at the time, Art. Nobody else seemed to want to be friends with me. It was a much different setting. Being a bit more hyperactive like before just made me stick out more, and being sensitive just made me the target of laughs. Any "friends" I made just ended up poking fun at me for everything that was different about me. This was just elementary school - during this time, I just thought I was weird.

Middle school introduced drama into the picture, and everybody just became more cruel - combined with heavier schoolwork and a hard time transitioning into that, it became obvious to me I was different and looking back on how it's affected me (along with a few things in high school, it was kind of traumatic), I can't say I handled it pretty well.

Yes. I thought everyone perceived things like I did. I had no way of knowing that they didn't.

Although I acted differently younger, I started noticing that I was different around age 7 or 8. Even though I had friends, I never really felt like I was apart of them. Even if we were in a group, I'd feel distant from them somehow.

Nope. Now that I look back at my early childhood, I was way different from most of my peers. I had no idea then, though.

Either I would become a robot or a raging tiger
if I were mistreated.

I didn't realize I was different because I hadn't hit on the idea of comparing myself to other kids. I think I realized I was different for the first time when I was maybe fourteen years old, though before that point I had made some weak efforts, starting at age ten, to participate socially because I felt it was expected, like washing one's face or wearing clothing. Now, looking back on it, I realize I was highly unusual even as an infant; I just didn't have the insight to understand it.

It's probably because I was more socially aloof than anything else. I've always been very introverted, almost bordering on schizoid, with so much more to do than think about other people.

I knew I was odd, but I assumed that everyone was secretly odd in their own way, and it was just that others made more of an effort to conform. I didn't think that I actually had a different way of thinking from the majority, but in retrospect it explains a lot.