I'm writing a book on being a teenager with Asperger's.

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Care to take a look?
I'm sure I don't have to say this, but I will be extremely irritated if anyone were to use this work without permission.

I'm really needing some feedback on the book that I'm writing. I'll post the first chapter, and if you want to read more then comment and tell me.

Aspie

A poem that I wrote about my feelings on being diagnosed with Asperger’s.

I have Asperger's Syndrome.
Even saying it makes me feel relief.
I'm not weird.
I'm not strange.
I'm not different.
Well, I am different.
But I'm different for a reason.
My brain is wired up differently.
My brain is square when everybody else's is round.
My brain has three layers and everybody else’s has eight.
I get worried when I don't know what I'm doing.
I get worried around lots of people.
I get worried if things change.
I'm bad at telling how people feel.
I'm bad at reading people's faces.
I'm bad at a lot of social things.
But I'm good at things too.
I'm good at Maths.
I'm good at Music.
I'm good at knowing right from wrong.
I was unhappy before I knew about my Asperger's.
I'm not happy now. But I am relieved.
I'm an Aspie.
And I'm sure about things that I wasn't sure about before.

I'll read some of it. Do you want feedback?

Yes please!

Next chapter;

Introduction
I introduce the book and say my reasons for writing it. I tell the reader what the book is going to include.

Greetings, everyone! My name is Julia, and I’m sixteen at the time of writing. I’m Scottish. I’m a girl (as you can tell from my name) and I have recently been diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome. When I got diagnosed, I got Googling, and discovered the lamentable lack of books for teenagers with Asperger’s. The only one that I could find was “Freaks, Geeks, and Asperger Syndrome”. While this is an excellent book, and one that I read as soon as I could get my hands on it, (Thanks, Mrs McQuaid!) it is written by a thirteen-year-old boy, and this book is being written from a different point of view, that of a girl in her mid-teens. Girls do seem to have to be more social, (more on that later), and this book focusses partly on that. Boys can get away with being loners more than girls can. A boy who is a loner can often be seen as mysterious and appealing. A girl who is a loner is more often seen as weird. Darn you, double standards!
In this book you will learn about how I have coped without a diagnosis for almost 16 years. Some years have been better than others, much like wine. This past year has been like vinegar, extending that simile. I’m going to take a leaf out of Luke Jackson (the author of Freaks, Geeks, and Asperger Syndrome) ‘s book, almost literally, and make a list of the idioms that I use at the end of the book, and their meanings. This should help the readers who have difficulty with that sort of thing. I used to look up any idioms I didn’t understand in a little idiom dictionary. One of these might be a good idea to invest in, as I won’t be able to list every idiom.
I’m going to talk about the difficulty of and methods for making and keeping friends, trouble with bullies, rituals, other mental conditions that can come alongside Asperger's, worries that can bother a lot of Aspies, whether to tell people that you have Asperger’s or not, the definition of Asperger’s, coping strategies that I have learned, self-soothing, interests known as obsessions, sensory preferences, yoga, how pets can be helpful, and the talents that often come along with Asperger’s.
This book is primarily for teenagers with Asperger’s, but parents, teachers, professionals and people who simply want to know more about the life of your typical teenage Aspie are welcome to read too! Feel free to dip in and out of the book according to what takes your interest or is relevant to you. I will summarise each chapter at its beginning. So, let’s get started!

I like it. I'd like to read more!

I am interested and want to read more. I was diagnosed with aspergers when I was sixteen years old so I can relate to being a teenage aspie.
I think you write pretty well from reading your introduction and you should finish writing your book.

This is just a background chapter, so I'll upload another chapter later.

Fabulous Family And Home

I write about my family, how my dad may also have Asperger’s, and my pets and home.

I thought I’d start us off by giving you a quick introduction to my family. Firstly, there’s my dad, Cliff. He’s in his late forties, and possibly has Asperger’s as well. However, he hasn’t been diagnosed. He’s very funny, but has no filter between his brain and his mouth, a definite Aspie trait. He used to tease me all the time, but has now mostly moved on to my brother. He has dark hair and is clean-shaven. I don’t like it when he doesn’t shave and he’s all stubbly. Then, there’s my mum, Lesley. She’s also in her late forties, and is very sensible. She probably has the most common sense of everyone in the family. She has rheumatoid arthritis, but she is very, very good at crafty stuff like scrapbooking. She also has dark brown hair. It’s very curly. There’s me, Julia. I have dyed dark brown and red hair which is curly (I’ve inherited that from my mum) and short, and pretty brown eyes. I’ve always wanted red hair and green eyes, though. I’m in fifth year of secondary school, and I’m studying English, Physics and Biology. I would have studied Music, but you can’t take Music and Physics in the same year at my school. I have a very good imagination. I love rabbits, Disney, praise, music and art. I aim to work for Disney one day, in advertising. Finally, there’s my brother, Elliot. He’s two-and-a-half years younger than me. Apparently, when he was a baby, my mum put his car seat (with him in it) down in front of the car, and I told her “Just run him over, Mummy.” Thankfully we get along better now! Elliot has a quirky and mature sense of humour. He’s excellent at inventing things in Lego, but spends most of his time on the PS3. He has some Aspie tendencies, but he’s a total social butterfly, (he’s always surrounded by girls - my dad calls them his harem) so that doesn’t really fit. He has brown hair, but he was very blond when he was little.
Pets wise, we have a dog called Turriff. He’s a chocolate-brown Labradoodle, which is a cross between a Labrador and a Poodle. Labradoodles don’t cast, which is good, because I’m allergic to most dogs, and all cats. So are my dad, and my brother. Turriff, or Tufty as we often call him, is my brother’s dog in name, but my mum’s dog in spirit. Turriff can really annoy me sometimes, usually when he’s eating my food or making messes on the carpet. But his ears are very soft. I often tell him, “Your ears are the best part of you!” but he just looks at me with, literally, puppy-dog eyes. You can’t resist those! I’m still not sure about having a dog. It’s a very big change, and I, like many Aspies, am not very good with change. Elliot was desperate for a dog, though, so we got silly old Turriff. My mum really loves him, too. He’s a really daft dog. He chases up and down after a laser pointer dot (It’s not a laser, it’s a little lightbulb that blinks! Sorry, Toy Story reference there). We have a long hall, so he tears down the hall after various toys that my brother throws. Silly dog.
We also have two rabbits. I have written more about them in Perfect Pets. For now, suffice it to say that I adore them.
In my house we have a ridiculous number of computers. My dad loves computers, especially Apple computers. He had his own computer-fixing company when I was young. It was called Fuzzy Stone Incorporated, after a book that both my parents loved. We have four computers, but we used to have more. That’s not counting the various computers out in the garage waiting for my dad to fix them. All but one of the computers in the house are Apple computers. At the moment, I’m writing this on my MacBook, which is my pride and joy. I got it for Christmas a couple of years ago.

We also have a piano in my house. It’s out of tune, scarred and dented, and about eighty years old, but I love it. We got it about fifth-hand from one of my mum’s friends when they moved house. It was in a real state when we got it, but fixing it became my dad’s project. My dad likes to have a project, and he fixed it up quite nicely. Before he fixed it, he called a piano tuner out to tune it. The man had a look at the piano, told us the sounding board was cracked, and charged us forty pounds to do so! My dad saw this as a challenge, and soon fixed the sounding board. It still doesn’t hold a tune very well, but at least it’s playable now.

My house is quite big. It’s the bottom floor of a building that is over one hundred years old. It is made of yellow sandstone, and was commissioned by a man called Charles Reid, who was a photographer. My brother and I used to have to share a room, but then my parents turned the dining room into a room for me. It’s very cosy, and it’s probably the warmest room in the house. A big house is expensive to heat, you see. An old lady lives in the house above us. She used to live with her sister, but then her sister died, which is sad. I didn’t know what to say to her when her sister died. I was quite young at the time, though.

Anyway, that’s my family and my home. Hope you’ve enjoyed the tour!

Announcing Asperger’s

I write about the pros and cons of letting people know that one has Asperger’s.

It can be very difficult to know who you should tell about your Asperger’s. If you have been diagnosed in your teens, like myself, you might find yourself wondering, “Should I tell my sibling/s? Should I tell my teachers? Should I tell my friends?”

The short answer is “probably”. You can get into a lot of bother for doing Aspie things if people don’t know about your Aspieness. For example, if you say something that offends somebody without realising that it will offend them, it’s an awful lot easier to say, “I’m sorry, my Asperger’s meant that that came out wrong. I didn’t mean to offend you,” than to try and backpedal and unoffend them. Or if you get very anxious over something that most people don’t get anxious about, (see Worrying Worries) if people know about your Asperger’s then they can help you to calm down, rather than thinking you’re odd. Chances are, if they know about Asperger Syndrome already, they’re probably aware that you have it, even if you haven’t told them. Aspieness can be hard to hide.

Telling your school means that proper arrangements can be made for you. For example, if you get worried when teachers move seating arrangements around, you can be notified in advance, so you can prepare for it. If you are prone to sensory overload, an area can be provided for you to have some time out.

It can also mean that when you enter the world of work, provisions will be made.

However, you might believe that your diagnosis is personal, private. That’s fine too. You might feel that you will be discriminated against because of a perceived ‘disability’, or that people won’t want to be in a relationship with you. Just remember that, especially if you are getting into a relationship, it’s best to be honest with each other.

I was lucky in that my Asperger’s diagnosis was explained to me immediately after I got it. It was also given to me at the same time as my mum and dad were told. This was good, because it meant that there was no whispering. I hate whispering, especially if I know it’s about me. My mum is always saying I’m not on the ‘need-to-know’ list about things. This drives me mad! Once or twice I’ve actually said to her, “Where is this list? I’m going to rip it up!” But it’s not a real list. It’s in her head. Drat. I can’t rip up something that is imaginary. Or can I... *Imagines reaching into Mum’s head and pulling out the list, then ripping it into teeny tiny pieces.* *Clears throat* Sorry about that. I go off on little flights of fancy sometimes. You might experience more of those throughout the book.

Hi. You have a witty writing style which makes it informal and almost as if you are being familiar to the reader, which I suppose is a good way for writing about AS, especially as the NT world seems to find us funny. You also wrote in an interesting way, so the text wasn't boring.

I think its a good start introducing yourself and the family; again that adds to the familiarity. It seems to work in drawing the reader in. If you continue with that style that will be fine, but I would say to add something written in a more serious tone at some point to put across that AS can be a serious issue for people and surrounded by the informal style it should have an impact. Maybe you have done this already so would look forward to reading more.

Thanks for sharing.