Does you anyone feel normal people get more things?

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Like jobs, money, housing, spouses, relationships, kids, traveling, etc.

They are often granted more oportunities to earn them.

I don't see having multiple jobs as being an advantage.

I've done just fine with having just one job in 30 years.

I've traveled enough that I don't plan to do much of that when I retire--I've done well over 100,00 miles in the air traveling on commercial airliners.

Last edited by BTDT on 17 Feb 2016, 3:15 pm, edited 2 times in total.

A charming person ca n get a job even if they are not the most qualified person,
Same goes for getting promotions

You know, in the nicest possible way, I take exception to the underlying attitude on display here...

"normal people?" You mean NTs like me, I suppose. However, stop n think, everyone is here envying someone else over something. That's human nature. NTs or HFAs, we're mostly all capable of envy, would you agree? After all, we are all human right?

There's no such thing as a level playing field for anyone. So what if you have a condition that causes you extra work? You think "normal people" don't have to work for the stuff you've listed? You think it comes easier for them, than for you?

They may lack brains, the right background, skills/abilities in arenas you may excel in. Since time immemorial beauty has been a ticket out for the lowliest to the highest. Envy of looks, skin tones etc also abound. "normal" doesn't mean anything. The individual however, is all.

Anecdotal evidence for you. My other half is AS but he never let it define him. Maybe it helped him that he got a late diagnosis, in a roundabout way, because he forged ahead regardless of perceived differences.
He is bright, not unusual, he has an ability, and he made that into his profession and career.
I on the other hand have all the implied advantages, middle class upbringing, private and boarding schools, and yet I'm a definite failure in life.
Those much vaunted opportunities didn't do squat for me now, did they?

Your condition is not the sum of who you are. You can "choose" to do your best regardless, or you can fall into the pity-party pit.

Your call.

It's either confidence or luck, whether you're NT or not.

... or dogged determination. Do you really want me to submit another post about how I refused to give up, and eventually served in the military, put myself through school, got married and raised a family, earned an MSEE, and just generally been successful without knowing that I was as aspie until recently?

It wasn't luck. It wasn't dwelling on the obstacles and letting them hold me back. It was hard work. It was actively looking for opportunities to take instead of passively waiting for someone else to give them to me. It was deciding early on that no one else was going to determine for me what my future was going to be.

I've done 100k miles of flying for work activities. Being able to do business travel opens up a lot of job opportunities--lots of qualified people turn these jobs down because of all the stress being away several days a week puts on relationships--but this wasn't an issue when I was in my 20s and early 30s. In most cases the most qualified people aren't doing this sort of work. Instead, its the people willing to do the work.

In retrospect, all that business travel was excellent preparation for a romantic relationship.

I wonder what it would be like to start pursuing my goals with dogged determination at my age and in the shameful situation I've let myself fall into so far. Certainly, no worthy rôle model would ever be caught in it.

Feeling like you haven't deserved a chance to live for a very long time already may be an excuse to do nothing, but it is a fact that it makes it really hard to know what to do. There seems to be little practical difference between making your best effort to earn an honest living and surrendering to your fate, not just in the outcome, but in how to carry out either option. And the attempt to use any opportunity I might still have to get some semblance of a proper education at my age makes me feel guilty, too.

I have three of those four things, and I pretty much had to work three or four times harder than almost all the people I know who don't have a mental and/or physical condition just to get as far as I have.



In my experience it generally isn't. I worked a lot of part time jobs when I was younger, I pretty much did the opt-out from the very beginning. At one one point I was working eight part-time (though usually it was around 5-6) jobs a week, and just barely making over a grand. Of course by the time tax kicked in I was only really earning £900 something for my 7 days of back breaking labor, flavored with the odd mentally straining job here and there.

Ironically, one nights pleasure as an Companion/Escort could easily see me walking away with nearly twice what I earned back then, even after tax. Oh yes, even Escorts and the like have to pay income tax, such is the modern world.

Still it's my retainerships as a Freelance Architect that really keeps me afloat, without that I would most likely not be able to afford the kind of lifestyle I'm currently living, especially since I'm extremely poor, but very wealthy.


I've seen some horrifically messed up people who not only had the worst traits of Autism, but had some of the worst childhoods you could imagine. Though most fell into despair and are most likely broken beyond repair, a few did rise up in the face of such adversity to make a decent life for themselves, and some even found the family they never had.

That being said, I've also seen a lot of people who came from decent families, who's Autistic difficulty is something as minor as not being able to look someone in the eye, or feel a little anxious when talking to someone. I see them occasionally complain about their parents wanting them to do house chores, or keep their room clean, generally minor things like that.

When you take that high-mid functioning person that complains about everything, and then compare them to that low functioning person who was abused, molested, raped, humiliated, underfed, not cared for, unloved, poor unfortunate soul, that doesn't stop to complain about any of it and just keeps moving forward, and compare the two, well...

Admittedly, It is kind of hard to feel sympathy for a lot of people in the Autistic Community, and a lot of the time you really do feel like raging out at them for some of the very simple and minor things that they complain about. I have a couple of friends that complain about how dirty their homes are, who despite being unemployed and living off Welfare Benefits, spend their entire day either watching television and/or surfing the web.

A small part of wants to tell them that the "give-a-f**k" reservoir has finally run dry, and that there a simply no more f**ks to give. Thankfully... (Sadly?) It's overruled by the part of me that wants to believe that with enough encouragement and support, that they'll eventually be motivated into action and do something, anything, for themselves. All the "Your Autism isn't as bad as mine is, you don't know how hard I've got it" BS that they come out with really bites into just how hard I'm pushing myself. There are times when I feel like I'm just going to implode from all the pressure, like the great weight of life is just on the verge of crashing down and snapping me like a twig at any moment.

There are many things that keep me going, there would need to be. One of them, that I think most people are sorely lacking, is perspective. I think a lot of people would do better in life if they just took regular doses of perspective, and I mean genuine firsthand perspective, because clearly those starving African children and jobless homeless adverts aren't cutting it. Some people need to do the unthinkable, and actually go out into the world and interact with people, no matter how uncomfortable the prospect might be.

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THIS^

I'd rather hire one partially-qualified person who wants to work than a dozen fully-qualified people who won't do the work.

I think there is a glass wall between autistic people and others.
The world is set up to accommodate the neurotypical. They built it, its their show. Autistic people can succeed in the ways you mention, but it takes work and support.
A lot of autistic people work very hard, but don't achieve these things, myself included. You don't get a lot of credit for the little things.

I agree, with this.

Bingo.





Excellent post. I couldn't agree more. Had to laugh at your reservoir comment, too. I only just got here, don't have the benefit of your experience nor insight yet already find my reservoir running low as well.

Thank you. Seriously.




Fixed that comment for you because otherwise it was reading as tho "autistic people" merit special treatment. Unless you feel your differences = deserving of special treatment?

I meant exactly what I said. I am drawing a distinction between autistics and neurotypicals. Autistic people face challenges that neurotypicals don't. If this warrants special treatment, I don't know.

I'm not, never have been and very unlikely to ever be normal.

I'm fine with not having a normal life.