Not sure that I belong here, diagnosed by sister.

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My sister is a teacher specialising in special needs. During one of her courses they went quite in depth into autism spectrum disorders and after the course she called me up and asked that I meet her for a beer. We met and she told me about the course and the fact that she had immediately recognised traits of Asperger syndrome in her brother... me.

A little about me.

I have always been the 'wayward son'. I dropped out of high school due to bullying and boredom and went on to become very successful in the IT industry. I now specialise in business intelligence where I help companies shape their strategy by recognising and tracking patterns in their and their customers behaviour.

I have always been fascinated with complex systems and the way things fit together. The house we grew up in was littered with 'projects' that I was busy with. From intercom systems built out of copper wire a old telephones to homebrew radio receivers and transmitters and several other electronic bits and pieces.

Then I got a PC.

I broke the software the first day that I got it after spending the whole night messing with it. Then I took it apart and rebuilt it from scratch... I don't think I could have slept more than say four hours that whole week! It was like the heavens had opened up and out had fallen this... thing, within which SO MANY things could exist and all of it under my precise control.

I was lost to the world for several years after that but I re-emerged a successful businessman, with a wife and daughter a close circle of friends and generally quite a happy life.

My sisters diagnosis.

I have always been 'different'. From my school days right through to today I have always been considered 'gifted' but a bit of a 'wildcard'. My mentor used to introduce me with a little by-line: "This is Mark. He does all the weird stuff."
I have a tight but very small group of friends who have also acknowledged something different or odd about me... my best friend often rolls his eyes at things I do or say before dropping his favourite line: "Too weird to live, too rare to die."

...so my sisters diagnosis at first did not seem unfounded. Maybe there is a reason for my strangeness? Maybe it isn't just mysterious oddness but a diagnosable condition?

Other things began to fall into place though as she explained it to me and this has led me to the point of being fairly certain that she is onto something. She is convinced and since sharing it with my dad the two of them are pretty much certain that I have Asperger syndrome.

I do take things literally or sometimes become confused by syntactical ambiguities of how people phrase things and the ramifications thereof.
Maps make me very restless, I cannot look at one for too long because it feels like 'noise'. Like a TV tuned to no channel, I have a very bad reaction to them.
I cannot read recipes.
One ambiguous direction or even one word that could be misinterpreted will throw me entirely, same with directions (I love my GPS!!)
It is as if I perceive all of the possible meanings at once and cannot determine the context which I imagine is what would aid in focusing on one set of meanings... This tripped me up a lot is school so I stopped listening to teachers and instead focused on using my intuition to find answers - amazingly: I achieved exceptionally good results, winning several prizes for English and art which meant that despite struggling - I was never seen to be in need of help. In fact: I was considered a gifted student.

I have never felt like part of a specific subset. As a teenager I didn't identify with any of the scenes the other kids seemed to slot so neatly into, I always kind of felt that I was my own scene and I was happy like that. I still am to be honest.
I have learned to integrate into society over the years but it is a very calculated and unnatural exercise... I am aware of how hard I try and I use that awareness to help mask it. People close to me have complained that I drift off at times or simply walk away when I am finished with a conversation even if they are not.

In closing.

So apart from sharing my story, I'm interested to see any comments around the difficulties I have described. Socially in part but specifically around taking things literally, hearing maps and being unable to follow simple step by step directions... does anyone recognise these things as traits of someone who might have Aspergers?

Thank you.

We cannot tell you whether your sister is right or not but you are welcome here and you do belong here as long as you want to know more about Autism or need to know more about yourself.

There are many self-diagnosed people here, just as there are people who are waiting for a diagnosis or "don't know". "NTs" are also welcomed here as long as there is no bashing (no one should bash NTs either by the way).

I am, myself, a undiagnosed nonNT since I am dyspraxic and people suspect I have Asperger or ADHD. I know NT is a term used to describe everyone who does not have Autism but many other disorders influence people's life and development enough for them not to be "NT".

I believe you will find answers to your questions, many topics have been discussed here and it is a great place. It really does not matter whether you truly have AS, another disorder or are just a different kind of NT (borderline austitic, nerdy, etc).

You're still welcome here, and I look forward to reading, more of your posts. Welcome to WrongPlanet.

Definitely, though I don't think you need any additional affirmation of your suspicions. It seems like you want a definitive answer, and you will only get that by seeking diagnosis. As to whether you 'belong' here, that is a decision that is entirely up to yourself. You have posted on these boards therefore you are 'here'. I think you will find the WP forumites are a good source of information. Perhaps you could read through some of the existing threads and see if there is anything there that you can relate to.

I have no difinitive answer whether you're aspie, or aspie-like or what. But it sounds very likely to me.
It's good to hear someone "different" is having success of some kind. I would be interested in hearing more about your work - computers generally baffle me because they make no logical sense.

You definetly have some AS traits, but be very cautious of self diagnosis. Neither you nor your sister are trained professionals in the psychiatric field. I find that a lot of people on this site are self diagnosed and say things in ways where they may express empathy for others or tell jokes in very normal ways. Remember, alot of people have some autistic traits. That does not make you AS. The disorder is stated as very rare, with only about 1 in 5,000 to 10,000 individuals showing all traits. There are about 80 or so distinct traits which you need to have to be clinically AS. Obviously this requires extensive observations by a team of mental professionals.

Thank you for all of your responses and notes of welcome.

I think the title may have created the wrong impression as I meant only to convey my own feelings of confusion/uncertainty as opposed to any feelings toward this website or forum.

I think that I need to pay attention to those who have indicated that no definitive answer will be forthcoming and weigh up the value of seeking a proper diagnosis.

You have some of the stereotypical traits for sure.

What about eye contact? Aspies have problems looking people in the eye when talking to them.

What about smiling? Do you mostly smile or not smile when talking to other people? Aspies tend more to not smile.

You should also take the aspie-quiz. It was developed by the same guy that developed the RDOS operating system. It is probably the most accurate aspie quiz out there. Google "rdos aspie quiz" and it should take you right to it.

For empathy and Autism, it seems that autistic people tend to feel too much empathy for people or to lack empathy. By the way, I guess it's easier for everyone to show something that is close to empathy on this forum since we went through the same kind of things.

As for language and jokes, I've talked recently to an aspie (officially diagnosed) who never took anything literraly and have no trouble using humour the way most people do, he also understands non verbal language but he took so many tests to be diagnosed with autism that I'm pretty sure he is just an aspie with different characterestics. A lot of people who are diagnosed with AS do not display all traits.

In my country, AS is still not considered as an existing disorder by many specialists and people find it hard to have a diagnosis of Autism (even for low-functionning autists), but there are still 0.5-1% of autistic people. According to some stats, there are approximately 0.3-05% of people who have been diagnosed with AS and some specialists think the real percentage should be closer to 1%, thus it would not be so rare.

But I do agree with you, self-diagnosis can be deceiving. You'll see many people who had self-diagnosed themselves before having a real diagnosis and almost never a "you are NT diagnosis" but that's because most of us cannot be diagnosed yet or are afraid of the answer.

Yep. Even if you're not autistic per se (you may very well be--if you're having issues, go get yourself to a professional, and take your sister along because she knew you as a kid), you still do belong here, because we have a lot of people here who are Spectrum cousins with sub-clinical traits--that is, without impairment due to autism, but with the same brain-wiring we've all got, and thus with a lot in common with us.

Your sister was very nice to tell you of her suspicions. My mom didn't tell me for a decade after she knew for sure, and I suffered a lot because of it.