Mild ASD/Female: Do you have trouble being/staying employed?

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Hi All,

Because I'm female and also because I tread that foggy area between Aspergers and neurotypicality, I've decided to start a blog purely as a place where I can begin to compile some of the very sparse/sporadic research on the vaguer aspects of the ASD spectrum. (Not to mention that I have a pathological need to compile and categorise all my interests and am currently fixated on Aspergers )

I've included a poll question above which I hope will flesh out what is understood about mild and/or female experiences and I'd like to post the results on my blog assuming no one on Wrong Planet has any objection to that.

I'd also love to be able to include any good comments people make about their experiences if I may. If you do post a response, please let me know if you'd rather it wasn't used elsewhere, otherwise I'll assume I can do so in good faith.

If anyone here has an issue with me doing this, please let me know. By no means is my intention to break any rules or to cause discomfort or offense. This is purely my non-commercial desire to put concepts into neatly labelled boxes and to create an exciting and dynamic new tag cloud for future reference.

More on the poll question:(N.B. I should have added that for this purpose 'mild ASD' should include 'suspected ASD'.)
This is taken from one of the Female Asperger Syndrome Traits described by Rudy Simone: "Will often have trouble holding onto a job and may find employment daunting".

I've chosen it because I do work full time and although I find several aspects of employment daunting, my experience is positive for the most part. I enjoy my career and I have rarely been unemployed for long as an adult. I do however have a habit of becoming really demoralised and unhappy if I feel personally undermined at work or if I feel that the organisation is behaving unjustly/stupidly in some way (I work in not-for-profit so integrity is important to me).

When I get like that I lose all motivation and fantasise about running away or getting revenge. I've resigned from two jobs purely on principle and I have to fight a cyclic urge to escape each place I work, usually when low self esteem tells me that my employer would happily get rid of me if they could only find a good excuse. This tends to start perhaps a year after starting if I'm happy in my job. Much sooner and more unbearably if I'm not. What are your experiences?

Last edited by Filipendula on 29 Jul 2012, 12:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I do struggle to stay employed, and for many of my jobs I have stayed only 6 months. I generally get exhausted by the job and the complex interactions with other people and end up leaving. I have also ended up leaving jobs for various odd reasons often related to the fact that I I am unable to navigate interactions with colleagues.

Job 1: Left after 1.5 years because of change of contracts, I did not want a 0 hour contract. Also I dislike my manager.
Job 2: Left after 1.5 years due to having got into a complex relationship with another member of staff that I struggled to extricate myself from.
Job 3: Left after 6 months due to threat of redundancy.
Job 4: Left after 6 months due to exhaustion and awkward situation with colleague stalking me.
Job 5: Left after 6 months so I could look after someone who was dying, who I'd met off the internet.
Job 6: Left after 6 months due to exhaustion and inability to cope with bitchy attitude of colleagues.

NB. I do not have an official diagnosis.

I have not yet been able to keep a job for more than two months. Sometimes I'm fired, sometimes I quit, but in both cases it usually has to do with co-workers who decide that I'm a good person to scapegoat or otherwise persecute. For that reason I might just start considering myself "moderate" although I'm otherwise probably mild.

That's a good way of doing it SilkySifaka, for my part:

Job 1: Left after 2 years to move to a sandwich placement post (this was a weekend job). Loved this job, but was glad to leave because I felt my manager disapproved of me and that I wasn't good enough. They were really nice to me on my last day though.
Job 2: Left after 2 months due to redundancy, but stayed on as volunteer for a bit longer to try and finish my student placement and because I enjoyed it.
Job 3: Left after 2 months due to end of short-term contract. Informal work with someone else who was also made redundant from previous post.
Job 4: Left after 1.5 months due to hating every minute and developing a migrane every Friday in anticipation of 1-day's work each Saturday. Felt attitudes of staff were unjust and ridiculous, managed 6 days in total over 6 weeks. Left without notice, asked partner to return uniform on my behalf.
Job 5: Left after 4.5 years due to sticking head above parapet re. corruption/nepotism, thus alienating my boss who then made my life as miserable as possible. Everything went wrong though I loved it for many years. Boss later forced to resign (:roll: ).
Job 6: Current, 3 years so far. Love the organisation. Get on well with others and many have Aspie traits due to nature of work. However, have had regular run-ins with new boss who has treated me very unjustly and so I feel angry and depressed a lot of the time with no one at work to support me. Often searching for new posts within the same organisation but recession has hit us hard so no luck so far.

This has happened to me so many times now and I no longer consider myself "mild", I'm obviously mod-severe.

As for jobs, I've held more than 30 in my adult life of 17 years. Most often I quit because I get to a point where my anxiety is so intense I can't return to work. I think the constant confusion, over-stimulation and anxiety prevent me from holding a job more than my gender, though I see how it has an impact in my industry.

I think women are at more of a disadvantage because of our societal gender roles; a strong, confident woman is almost as bad as a weak, submissive woman and for Aspergians where do we moderate our affect along that continuum?

I also have this stupid penchant for not fighting until I absolutely have to, then it's over-reacting and usually fueled from every slight ever made where people think I'm nuts.

In conclusion I think it's harder for women because of society and even harder on Aspie women because of our traits.

I only ever had one job I was able to stay in for 3 1/2 years - it was inbound customer service and there was literally no pressure at all.

But I've learned to work in other ways, running my own things. Teach a skill other people want to learn, run their social media, have an idea and get it funded, knit something and sell it, etc. That's also difficult because it puts pressure on interpersonal relationships (I've had a few disasters), but it's possible and the rewards are much greater than a job that only just pays for the basics.

I voted no because I have never been fired. I have never had a job that lasted me no more than two years. That is because things would change so it was time to quit that job and move on, not because I was getting burned out or couldn't stand people or couldn't do it anymore. The one I have now will probably be the longest I will have. I can keep a job. But finding one is hard so I refuse to quit any job unless I get laid off or something or find a new job and then quit the other.

I once had a job for 2.5 years. That was the longest I've ever stayed at a job. That one was nice because it was almost entirely inbound telephone work, so I didn't have to look anyone in the eye or approach people.

It's easy for me to get jobs. I'm an attractive woman of childbearing age, I got good grades in school, I'm hyperlexic so I know how to look good on paper, and I speak well in formal circumstances. Those things come together to make it super easy for me to get my foot in the door.

But jobs are like dating for me; after a little while, my employer (or boyfriend) realizes they were dazzled at first and I'm actually pretty annoying and I have serious deficits. So people start acting colder towards me and I realize there's not going to be any advancement there. That, combined with the fact that going to work every day and swimming in a sea of sensory and social demands is overwhelming to the point of causing serious gastrointestinal distress, usually leads me to quit and start fresh.

No, I have the opposite problem. I've only had 2 jobs in my entire life. I stayed at the 1st one for 10 years- despite it being below my academic level, anxiety-inducing, and overall a poor experience.

My 2nd job I've now been at for almost 7 yrs. It is also not a high-level job, monotonous, and without any upward mobility. But I enjoy the routine and stability of having the same job, I am scared to death of change.

I have been at the same job seven years in November. The only reasons I am still there is my health insurance and repetition. I don't think I would last long in another job.

No. But I have found a profession that is analytical in nature, deals with a lot of data, is populated by geeks and loners AND eccentricity is tolerated. So I have been wroking here for 7 years. I sense that had I chosen another path, I might be telling a different story.

Yeah, I've had four real jobs (busking doesn't count, right?), and been fired from three of them for meltdowns on the clock. Of those three, the longest lasting one was two months. My first job was my best, I worked there for almost five years and was practically a manager coming out of high school, had lots of responsibilities and "saying power" (my suggestions and criticisms were taken seriously). It was retail, of all things. Turns out my awkwardness is compensated by my incredible honesty and drive to please ("No, this product sucks, but this one works great and costs less."). I had lots of repeat customers who would ask for me, people who would buy way more than they intended to after I was done with them, and I got tipped sometimes $20-$100 for giftwrapping or taking things out to customer's cars for them (which I refused to accept, but it's the gesture that counts). Ohhhh if only it wasn't a local mom and pop business that I had to leave behind when I moved.

Interesting poll. The longest job I had was for about 3 years, however within that job I never got promoted despite having the skills and they sent me on an assertiveness course expecting me to come out as over-assertive (which I think was due to me blurting out the wrong thing on occasion and being blunt) but I came out as passive. I spent a long time temping through an agency, which suited me fine as most assignments weren't for very long, so I only had to suffer any work place problems I had for a short time. I much preferred this.

Yes. I'm 22 and haven't even had a paid job yet, and after being on unemployment money for over 4 years, I've kind of got to a point where I can't ever see myself in a paid job.
I've got a really good CV but employers won't employ me. I've done courses, work experiences in various places, and I'm currently doing voluntary work at week-ends, to keep me busy and it also shows that I want to work. I try not to do much in the week, so I can be free for job hunting and if any job interviews come up. I am getting help from an employment company for people with disabilities, and I've had 7 interviews in the space of 2 or 3 months, but I have been turned down for each of them. I've had plenty of interview experience so I would have thought I'd be good at it now, and I am, but employers still won't employ me because I've got AS. Sadly, from an employers point of view, Aspies are useless, can't interact, are slow, are stupid and aren't worth even giving a chance of a first job. That's from an employer's point of view, and personally I find it quite discouraging. I can't not tell them about my condition because, although I am good at hiding it, I think at interviews employers know there is something wrong with me and so I might aswell tell them. It makes me feel awkward when they ask at the interview questions like, ''do you have any mental or physical disabilities that may affect your work?'' I feel I have to tell them, if I just say no then get offered the job and they find I am having difficulties in my work what seem strange, and I suddenly say ''oh by the way I was diagnosed with AS'', I will feel ridiculous because they might say, ''we did ask you if you had any disabilities that may affect your work and you said no.'' Makes me feel like saying, ''well if I had said yes you probably wouldn't have took me on.''

Makes me really wish I was an NT without any difficulties, then I can just say ''nope, I am normal and I can do your work effectively'', and then I wouldn't have to deal with all this hassle.