Do I sound like I have Aspergers?

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Hello. I am a 31 year old male from the UK that has suffered with a variety of mental disorders since childhood. Like many people in my position I know something is not right with my mindset, but I'm not really sure what. I've done a lot of reading about a variety of mental disorders and I seem to be able to identify with many of them. I'm trying not to fall into the trap of wanting to be diagnosed with something because I think that will be a cure for all my issues, but it would be nice to have some validation I guess around what is going on inside my head and that I'm not just imagining it.

My mother tells me that when i was a toddler I developed extremely quickly. I could ride a bike without stabilisers by eighteen months old and was talking fluently by age three. When I was about seven I had an IQ of around 130 (from doing tests online it would suggest that it is now 140-150 but I am not sure how reliable these tests are).

However despite this high development rate and intelligence I was no better than average at school. I found learning on other people's terms extremely boring and uninteresting. However I maintained a parallel, almost involuntary ability to remember facts, dates and figures about things. I also had an extremely good eye for detail and general all round memory. As an adult this has developed into what friend's describe as an unusually high level of social perception and reasoning. I can often read other people better than they can read themselves, can put myself in other people's shoes and have a good grasp on the cause and effect of events in the outside world when I am not directly involved with it.

However I often struggle to understand my own life and my own interactions with people. I find social interaction extremely difficult but have become adept at putting on a mask of superficial charm with age. However I become stressed easily by social interaction and quickly become paranoid that everybody is out to get me.

In situations like this such as work or family, when I am under stress I often hear the words of people I have been interacting me running around inside my head and taunting me, saying hurtful things to me. This makes me more stressed out, which in turn makes this thought process escalate. A vicious circle you might say.

I have also suffered with chronic depression and anxiety since childhood. I would say that this began to develop around seven or eight years of age. I would say of the two emotions paranoia is the most pronounced. I live in a state of constant fear and anxiety, always thinking the worst about every possible situation. A psychologist recently told me that I have slightly disassociative symptoms when suffering depression and anxiety.

When I was Venlafaxine (an anti depressant) in my early 20's in induced mania in me. I also have a history of substance abuse that was ruining my life from 17-21. I was compulsively taking drugs as much as having any kind of physical addiction to them.

However around the age of 21 this compulsion ended as suddenly as it started and now I have no interest in drugs at all.

Also since around the age of 21 my ability to focus and concentrate on things I don't want to do or to execute an idea to fruition have come to the fore a lot more. It is from this point that I have really begun to notice some Aspergers like symptoms in myself.

From 0-17 years old and 21 onwards I have had few friendships. Between that, when I was taking a lot of drugs I had many and valued friendship much more than at any point in my life. These days, the few proper friends that I have I do value a lot, however I have come to regard casual friendships as pointless and a distraction from my main aims in life which is absorbing myself in my interests.

I am an obsessive reader of Wikipedia, which I hold in the same level of regard as I do my loathing of fiction. I also have a lot detail heavy. technology interests. In my day job I am a SAS developer working in the financial sector and in my leisure time I am a musician who is heavily into music technology.

These interests, amongst others have developed to the point where they define who I am as a person. If I am not delivering something productive I feel severely depressed. The only other thing that can relieve the depression is endurance training (I often go on extremely long bike rides through the hills near where I live for hours at a time).

Lastly I have been described as having something of a Jeykll and Hyde personality and someone who thinks in extremes or extremely black and white terms. I generally have trouble maintaining balance in my life and I have no set circadium rhythm. I generally tend towards nocturnal activity but even this is somewhat free floating. I am envious of the rigid, daytime body clocks of other people and do not understand how they maintain them.

I hope all of this makes sense and I haven't ranted on for too long. If you have any input or advice then it would be greatly received.

Thanks

I got about maybe a quarter of the way thru your post. When I read that you can "read" people well, that struck me as saying it all.

Asperger's is a form of autism.

Autistics have a PROBLEM reading social indicators like facial expression, body language, and so forth. Autism IS a 'social interaction and communication disorder'.

There is the fact autism is a spectrum. How an autistic person varies from the average person (the "Neuro-Typical") will vary, each having their own strengths and weaknesses, but the problem with social interaction seems to be always present to a greater or lesser degree.

But then you go on to say you have a problem in that area, despite being able to "read" people...

I'd suggest you read some more about autism and the sub-catagory of "Asperger's Syndrome", and give it some thought again.

From the sounds of things, you must have medical people in your life. If after some more research you still think you could be dealing with an Autism Spectrum Disorder, speak with one of your doctors and present your case.

See what they think.

It sounds more like something along the lines of ADD or ADHD from what I've read. I guess we need more information of Autism/Asperger symptoms you think you have, but from the information you supplied, I don't know if I can say it's something to look into.

Some people can speak fairly well at a very young age. I have 1 or 2 cousins that were quite well spoken around 3-4. I mean I was walking at 8 months, or so my mum tells me. I don't know if that's average.

At 3 it is fairly common to have a good vocabulary, whether the child can yet read and write yet or not.

Hello,

Welcome to Wrong Planet.

I relate to your journey.

The fact that you've reached a point of realisation regarding your set of confusing traits and behaviours is progress.

Have you looked at any of the Asperger tests online? Once I did these, it wasn't very long after that I decided I wanted to pursue a formal diagnosis. I'd already spent many years researching other possible conditions (I was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder in the early 90's - but that never sat right)

I personally needed to know why life had been so very awkward for me. My research to understand Aspergers Syndrome began about 5 years ago. In time, I phoned the National Autistic Society in the UK and spoke about my concerns. They sent me info to take to my GP; eg how to approach the subject and explain my concerns/realisations. This got the ball rolling. In my case, my GP was very understanding. I was referred for assessment - this appointment took 2 years to come through. I was diagnosed May/June 2013. Whilst the diagnosis of Aspergers Syndrome gave me answers and closure to all my big questions about me, the challenge remains, as to how I navigate the rest of my life. I feel Im no longer searching blindly for answers about me, but I'm not really happier deep down (but yes, more content in the knowledge of 'knowing')

I would suggest you get a note pad and start writing down your own realisations, quirks, concerns etc. This will be very useful if you continue to discover more about AS and approach your own GP.

I hope your own journey gives you some sort of closure and contentment along the way

Thanks for the replies everyone. Yes I know that having good ability to read people and situations other than my own is not typical of this condition, but when I took one of the online tests the average score was given as 16.4 and the score diagnosed people with the condition got was on average 32. I scored 29.

To clarify what I meant about reading people, I am good at reading other people's moods and thoughts and if someone comes to me with a social problem and explains another person's behaviour I can often give them a good explanation of why the other person is behaving in this way. However if the person is interacting with me directly I have to work really hard to stay with why they are doing and saying what they they are.

I hope that makes sense...

You will have to dig deeper and find out if these trait were present in your childhood. For autism im not 100% sure but for ADD diagnosis you need to have an history of ADD behavior as a child.

To be honest mate unless you have difficulties from across the board your case sounds more like ADD. Do you have sensory issues? Do you have OCD type sympttoms? Do you have difficulty with motor control eye contct. I spent months obsessing over whether I was autistic or not and it turns out that I probably am - I still doubt it though and always will. This ironically is an autistic trait. Just goes to show how complex it all is.

You have what should prove an interesting journey mapped out ahead of you. May fate be kind whatever hand it deals

im extremely OCD (locks, clocks, germs, doubting whether i have turned things on or off etc) and i never used to make eye contact when talking to someone as it put me off talking. these days i do make eye contact but only when i force myself to, otherwise i lapse back into not doing it.

I dont have any motor control problems other than im extremely inconsistent at things like football. sometimes im really good, but other times im like a different player. im like that with drawing as well. sometimes im actually pretty good but most of the time i am terrible. its infuriating and a big reason why i never pursued art. my sister is fantastic at it. music is the only thing im really consistent at.

Im pretty good at 'reading' people too (moods etc). There are, however, areas, when its more about me engaging, one on one, where I can struggle with 'small talk' or trying to work out what Im supposed to say next (that's more in regards to general conversation) The older Ive got in life, the more Ive observed a general expectation on how things are supposed to go in chatting, but it can still be a struggle, like a block.

The spectrum is huge.

Based on the given information, you don't sound like you have ASD. There are not enough core autistic traits in the description. The ability to read people and be socially perceptive about social situations goes against ASD.

the description sounds closer to hyperlexia- heres a starting place for that- http://www.specialeducationalneeds.co.u ... lexia.html

I don't know, I wouldn't like to say to be honest.

I hope you're ok though.

Some traits could be explained by giftedness (130+ IQ).

I'd guess that you either have a more-social-leaning aspergers, have Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD), or both.

SAD isn't a very well-understood disability, and its symptoms often get mixed into those of autism due to many individuals with autism also developing SAD alongside their already diverse neurology, stemming from their inability to access others socially, and their often unfavorable social interactions in the outside world. If anything bad happens to us often (and, most important, randomly) enough, we tend to fear it, and never know when it could pop out of the woodwork to hurt us. Social interactions are absolutely no exception to this.

Have you been bullied or abused as a child? Did you have many friends, a few close friends, or no friends when you were younger? How about now?

I was sexually abused once as a child, by an older female child. I think I was around seven and she was probably about 12. Certainly old enough to know what she was doing was wrong and I wouldn't at all be surprised if that wasn't the only time she had done that to someone.

I was bullied a lot at school because I had chronic eczema, asthma, hayfever and allergic conjunctivitis to go along with my being brighter than average. As I got older but was still in school I got three quite bad beatings of gangs of lads near where I lived. This did cause terrible aggrophobia for a while, which I largely self medicated with alcohol.

I also have a mother who when she was younger was pretty mentally unstable and extremely difficult to live with. She had a hair trigger temper and favoured my sisters more than me because she liked girls more than boys and because they gave her less trouble.

I realise that these are perhaps causes of social anxiety disorder, but before any of that had happened I was already displaying a lot of the traits I have mentioned.

If you think you have an ASD, get professionally assessed.
We aren't qualified to state whether you are or not.
We are not professionals.