The intelligence see-saw -anyone else?

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The intelligence see-saw . Constantly going from " Wow I’m really intelligent " to " **** me how stupid can a person be ?"


I think what causes the see-saw effect for me is to some degree mood and also having a spiky profile where I’m very clever in some ways and have borderline intellectual functioning in other ways.

For example I’ll average about 72 on non- verbal tests online , and yet on 50 and 25 question sample Wonderlic like tests I scored in the 98th and 99th percentile respectively.

I definitely lack a lot of practical sense, and struggle with day to day practical tasks . If I had no family support I could easily end up in a group home because of it.

As it was living in Essex I avoided that but left to my own devices was not doing well at all. It was just that mental health services had only been around once since my wife died to give me my injection so had no idea how things were. My stepdaughter knew but couldn’t do much as we lived far apart. When I moved here she stressed the need for support and how bad things had been in Essex.

Oh, yes. In more ways than one. And it's not just intelligence and real life performance in my case.

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Absolutely! And then there is imposter syndrome... I know I'm smart, but I don't always feel that way and almost never feel that other people would think that of me. Having chronic health issues that affect my memory doesn't help at all. But at the same time, when an answer is needed I'm often the person filling in the gap so...

Yes, all the time! I go from smart to incredibly dumb, depending on the situation.

Appearing to be intelligent can sure be a trap. People figure you don't need much help, and that can be true up to a point, but it makes it hard to get attention when you need it. The response seems to be "Really? You can't figure this out for yourself?"

As a result, I try to downplay my smarts and education except around my intimate circle.

When I was 21 the psychiatrist that diagnosed me with autism gave an IQ test. It was only accurate to the nearest five points. In each subsection

Nobody has a constant intelligence at all times

BeaArthur,

You described my experiences perfectly. I was always a self-motivated person when it came to academics and didn't need a lot of help in that area, but I would have appreciated help in achieving normal adult milestones much earlier than I got it. I didn't get my driver's license until I was 48, although I believe I could have had it much earlier. I don't talk about my education all that much because I don't believe I have applied it at the level I could. I don't know if I will ever be able to do all I need to do to become a fully functional adult, but I work at it every day and I don't give up hope.

My greatest problem now is controlling my anxiety over new situations. If I can do that, learning new things is much easier.

Yes. I can be really smart. Other times I get easily confused. I'm really struggling with executive functioning at the moment. My house is a mess. I'm not good at planning ahead. I'm just so tired these days I'm living very much in the moment.

I have days when I'm great at conversation, other days I'm almost mute.

I've been called smart but I did try to get hand soap from the air freshener twice last weekend.

As far as self-esteem goes, no. I don't have moments of being impressed with myself or disappointment, either. Intelligence just isn't something that I care about. Being educated is, and I sometimes cringe to think about what I haven't learned yet (or take great satisfaction in what I do know), but I consider that a separate thing entirely. As far as intelligence goes, my experiences as a kid were split between high expectations and failures - I was considered ahead of my peers but consistently failed every standardized test I took. I don't think I ever knew what to make of my intelligence as a kid because of that, and I've never considered myself sub-average or intelligent since. I've consistently considered myself average.

I did take cognitive tests during my autism assessment (have yet to receive the results). From what I can tell, my performance on them was very poor. I'm not worried about the results, though, except so far as they will affect my diagnosis. I have more important things to worry about, like independence. If I am sub-normal in some areas (which is possible), then I don't care, as long as I can compensate or find work-arounds in order to function.

My IQ, on each occasion it's been tested, has always been quite considerably above average (between 111 and 146 online, 130 exactly on the WAIS-IV), but I still feel like I'm inadequate in a great many ways. One day I can study for eight hours straight and achieve tremendous progress, the next I find myself labouring for half an hour over the same simple grammatical point in - say - Spanish and failing to grasp it. I think a large part of the problem for me is overwork. Even NTs tell me that they burn out if they try to take on too much intellectual work.