Aspergers in the military. Anyone?

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I served in the Ohio Army National Guard from 1999 up until 2006. Almost the entire time I went undiagnosed and suffered greatly while in just like high school, only worse. Anybody else?

I read from good sources that the National Guard has a suicide rate than the regular military. And military ofcourse having a much higher suicide rate than the general public. War Veteran suicide is insanely astronomical.

I guess having fun murdering people in foreign lands backed by unlimited govt funds at 18, 19 years of age takes it toll on most of us later on in life.
Ofcourse the psychopaths come out of the military theatre unscathed and go on to become successful CEOs and politicians.

I was surprized at the national guard being the highest.
Why do you suppose that is ?

I read from good sources that the National Guard has a higher suicide rate than the regular military. And military ofcourse having a much higher suicide rate than the general public. War Veteran suicide is insanely astronomical.

I guess having fun murdering people in foreign lands backed by unlimited govt funds at 18, 19 years of age takes it toll on most of us later on in life.
Ofcourse the psychopaths come out of the military theatre unscathed and go on to become successful CEOs and politicians.

I was surprized at the national guard being the highest.
Why do you suppose that is ?

OP

There are several other threads about Aspergers and folks in the military, just search it. There has been some to say they've done well, others haven't. Right now, if you have an official diagnosis of Aspergers, that can prevent you from enlisting.

I would hope you have some good memories of your time in the Guard.

Thank you for serving.

I spent 6 years in the military and earned an Honorable Discharge before I had even heard of Asperger's Syndrome! At the time, I found it odd that I adapted to military life so readily while others were getting booted out all around me - my boot camp company went from 100 to 63 people by the end of the seventh week, and then went up to about 70 by the 13th week because people who had joined before me had been held back for disciplinary reasons.

For me, military life was good, except for having to deal with subordinates who thought that they were better than me ... Although I just loved putting them "On Report" for insubordination!

In my late teens I served a short stint in the army reserves as a gunner in the Royal Canadian Artillery.

Compared to the other guys in my unit I was kind of a runt and not able to manhandle the 105mm howitzer like them. So....I ended up getting trained as a recon soldier. <Hey dumbass - run down the road a mile and see if anyone shoots at you>.

I got very, very good at camo'ing up to look like a small shrubbery

...As was pointed out here in the past lines as well as above here the military (U.S. ~ don't know about others , of course) now specifically bans Aspergers' (All 6 branches ? Specifically " Aspergers " not " HFA " , say ? I don't know...) , and I think joining , certainly if there is any kind of reference to you as being so diagnosed absolutely anywhere at all , as anyone through 34 almost certainly AS-DX''d probably has on the Web somewhere , would likely make it impossible (And a Dishonorable Discharge/etc.-baiting action if you somehow got through anyway but got discovered ?)...At my age , now , I sort of look back and wish I had done it by I thought I could never take it , even though I was very fascinated by the idea as well , back then .

psych and medical waivers were done for me to enter the army in the early 80s. I did not belong in the army, it was #1 on my list of things never to do, but it was better than being homeless and life is what happens when you've made other plans.

auntblabby, you got waivers and were able to join, how was it, all bad or occasionally somewhat decent?

Or since it was better than being homeless, do you think you were able to put up with much of the nonsense that they call espirt de corps?

What kind of MOS, job skill were you able to get? Other posters amid this subject of military service feel what you end up doing for your day to day job is the key. Ie Working as a clerk or in supply, vastly different from combat arms- infantry, armor.

"life is what happens when you've made other plans." That's similar to the saying, if you want to make God laugh, tell Him what Your plans are.

...AB , this was the middish 80s ~ what did they call what they gave you psych , and medical , waivers for ???

there wasn't much of an "esprit de corps" when I was in, all around me were variations of "couldn't find a job on the outside so here I am." IOW it was during the "Reagan recession" in the early 80s that swept a bunch of us in. luckily there were no real wars going on at the time. as for my MOS, it was 91D10, "operating room specialist/central material supply." sgt. joe recruiter, due to much competition for the better MOS, gave me a limited list of things he could enter me for based on my ASVAB scores, namely 11B [infantry], tank turret repairman, and 91D [operating room specialist], and back in those days they had visual scenarios of the various MOS on 12" video discs, and I watched the various MOS acted out, and only in 91D were there no bullets flying and mud humping, so naturally I chose that. I worked in a hospital, although I was pressured to join a field unit I resisted - it was stinking internal unit politics, there was this attractive woman phase II student who all the men in the barracks had carnal knowledge of, and they much preferred her company to mine, and wanted to get rid of me so they could keep her (only one could stay). they hated me, the dickheads. anyways, my job was to arrange surgeries and supply all the stuff they needed to be carried out. I washed and sterilized equipment, inventoried equipment, updated logbooks, sterilizer maintenance, distributed equipment to the various wards, "scrubbed-in" during surgeries assisting the surgeons, pulled 24/36 hour in-house call [emergency duty], and all the other military crap such as CQ and barracks surface maintenance. at the time, there was no GI Bill in operation [I was between the old and the new bills], just some worthless thing called VEAP that was of no practical benefit. I will say at least it still got me a hospital civil service job after I got out. that much good it did. but if only I had gotten computer operations MOS like I wanted, I'd likely be in a totally different place in life than I am. water under the bridge, in any case.

medical: 15 degree scoliosis between 8th and 14th vertebrae in thoracic region, with periodic "wry neck"; 20+mm leg length discrepancy.
psychiatric- history of school special ed and psych problems, noted psych record of ADD [as it was then called], "schizoid behaviors" and [later on] "autistic traits" as described by various gov't. [DSHS and school] shrinks.

...Thank you . " CQ " = ?

"CQ" = Charge of Quarters- basically a baby sitter for the barracks, guard duty of a sort.

"POW" = "Petty Officer [of the] Watch" (Navy)

I'm a recent college grad with a degree that lends itself well toward the intelligence part of the military. With my Asperger's diagnosis, the only branch of the (u.s) military that would even consider me was the Army, and I'm inclined to think that the recruiter simply didn't want to explicitly say no. I'm pretty sure that having an ASD in your medical records is something that would permanently disqualify someone wanting to enlist. Which seems kind of silly if you ask me, because I could definitely imagine people with Asperger's enjoying the structure and rule oriented nature of the military. Oh well. Their loss, right?