Boredom: AS vs ADD

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I know the DSM criteria state that aspies stick to their interest and strongly prefer them to any other task. But all that says IMO is that we prefer to do our own stuff. The criteria says nothing about reactions to boredom, as opposed to ADD where boredom/concentrating on boring tasks is part of the criteria.

I'd like to know how other aspies react to boredom so I have something to compare with.

An example: One of the dullest things in my life were maths lessons. I had no motivation whatsoever, and I have always been unable to focus for more than a couple of minutes at the very most. Usually it wouldn't even take me that long before I started spacing out.
I don't just mean when I was a kid; the last time I tried to get through maths I was 27.

I can't even find words to describe how bad those lessons were. It was literally mind numbing, like a brain freeze, I couldn't focus, I felt like I wanted to escape my own skin (bad image, but the best I could find) just to get away.
When other pupils said they hated maths and that the homework s***ed, their words would be followed by them sitting down to do the math without hesitation once the complaining was done, while I usually found myself unable to even start, not to mention being anywhere near finishing it. So their version of boredom was far from mine.
I pretty much counted the seconds to the lesson was over. When class started after the recess, I always made sure to be 5 minutes late, so I was among the last to sit down. Then the teacher would often have announcements to make during which I brainstormed myself for questions to ask to put off the maths a little more. When we were done with the messages, I would waste as much time as possible in getting the books and the pencils from my rucksack to the desk, leaving me with about 30 minutes that felt like 30 years.

Dyscalculia didn't help but it's not just an issue about it being hard for me. I was told I was skilled in some other subjects like norwegian and english, but since the topics there were boring I was as mindnumb in classes there as I was in maths. I did well in spelling forinstance but when the tasks were lame I wasn't able to write well at all, and got way lower grades.

So I'm wondering: If you feel certain that you only have AS, how does boredom feel for you? Are you able to concentrate despite being thoroughly bored with a topic?
Or are you like me?

If you have ADD or suspect you do, is it like it is for me?

And if you're NT, what is boredom like for you?



There is a book called "All dogs have ADHD". I read a review of it by a person with ADD only who wrote that alot of the things listed there were true for ADD as well as ADHD. These hold true for me:

Can't really help you much but would want to jump onto this because I also want to know more.

I'm DX AS and was just screened for ADHD (result unknown).

I used to claim I don't get bored. But then I think of my life now. I can decide what to do and when. But when I was a kid it was different. If I wasn't interested in schoolwork (and usually I wasn't, either it was the topic or the presentation, I much preferred to read books not aiming to teach, because the style and because being oppositional LOL), I just couldn't read. When I tried I found I had no idea what I had just read, and then I stopped. I couldn't make myself read and understand. If it was a non school book and an interest that I had, I could get absorbed. This I understand might be an ADD trait.

I still have a hard time doing "boring" things. They can almost make me feel physically ill.

I remember always scribbling in class. I think it kept me less bored. I've taken classes as an adult too and it even helps me with actually focusing on what is being said, then I think it was more focusing away from the boring stuff.

So... left to myself with just pen and paper you could probably lock me into a cell for a year and I'll be fine. Give me a book I don't want to read and have me read it I would feel so bored I would feel sick.

Yes, that sounds very much like it is for me too, frag.

I hope you'll post the ADHD result.