This is my first thread posting on these forums, although I have posted on other forums and gotten varied responses. I was diagnosed with Asperger's when I was 3 years old.
I'm going to bullet point some of the nuances of each day of mine to make it easier to read through it. If you don't want to read this, then you don't have to; I just want to talk about this stuff and if anyone wants to offer their own experiences and things they can relate on then I urge them to.
Here are some of the things that have made me who I am, for better or worse, as traits of mine that seem to occur naturally.
Eye contact does not occur to me naturally. For me to look at someone in the eyes for more than 2 seconds, I am unable to focus on the conversation and often get sidetracked. It creates a mental block where the only thing I can focus on is maintaining contact with one's eyes. Usually I'll just look at other areas of the room or look down or something instead.
Attempting to listen to a professor is very difficult during a class. Due to aforementioned issues with eye contact, if someone else looks at me and I happen to look back at them at the same time, for whatever reason, it will often cause me to have an anxietal attack. Alot of things will cause me to have such an anxietal attack.
I notice the temperature in a room very quickly, and it will affect my mood and my anxiety heavily. Infact, it is one of the major determining factors of if i'm going to have a good class or not. I also notice sounds, no matter how quiet and passive they can be, such as someone breathing near me. The lighting of the room even will decide how I am going to feel. Generally if the room is nice and dark, I will feel better, whereas if the room is bright, or if one part of the room is brighter than the other (especially this), I'll spend the class with alot of anxiety.
An anxiety attack to me, is a bit more than just panicking in my head. My face will often get very red, aswell as my neck, and will remain like this for the rest of the class. I sweat heavily, and usually it is most noticable from my forehead. I don't get an anxiety attack each class; it is usually determinant on the previously discussed sensitivity factors and eye contact, as well as other things.
Because of the sweating symptom of my anxiety, I only wear a certain types of shirts that absorb sweat more easily. The color of my shirt is huge to me; something that is black or a darker color makes me feel alot better. I have a very serious phobia to wearing clothes that I am not comfortable in, and I will spend sometimes 30 minutes to an hour deciding what I should wear for a day. To make this clear, this is not because I care about fashion or what other people think of me, infact quite the opposite. I do not wear anything to impress anyone else. I wear the same tennis shoes that I have had for 2 years now (if I wasn't a runner i'd have them for more like 4 years). One of my comfortable shirts has a couple tears in it that most people would not wear because it looks kind of crappy, but I wear it because it helps me stay calm.
I actually handle presentations and group discussions pretty well. My ability to talk and articulate everything is very sharp, which I am thankful for. I can generally lead a group as long as my anxiety is under control, and I seem to have a much more absorbed interest in course material than most other people i've met in college so far. In a group presentation, I actually have less anxiety when i'm talking myself than when other people in my group are talking and i'm standing there waiting for my turn.
My reaction to change is my weakest quality. Sensitivity changes, seating changes, schedule changes, everything I react to extremely. When I'm driving to school, I need to get parked at a very specific time, as sitting there will give me anxiety and leaving too late will give me even more anxiety. I time my schedule every day to the minute; it is quite absurd how intricate I try to plan my adventures to each class.
I do not handle emotions well. If my professor/ teacher tries to be funny and makes the whole class laugh, I get a ton of anxiety from it. If something really sad occurs, I get alot of anxiety from it. For these reasons, movies/ videos that are not entirely informational (such as a WWII movie) can often make me feel 10x more anxiety around other people than it would make me feel on my own, which is why I prefer to watch all movies/ videos on my own time and will skip classes to avoid this.
So that is it. I could keep talking about this for hours and hours (I was even considering writing a book these types of topics on my own time), but I want to hear what you guys have to say. If you don't care, if you don't like it, please don't post rude things. Just leave the thread alone. Oh and for those curious, I do play League of Legends; if you want to add me, add 'Drift God'.
Thank you all.
-oSovereign
07 Feb 2016, 12:56 am
