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willa
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17 Oct 2008, 10:50 pm

Ok, since I was diagnosed I've never really seen a therapist, I dont talk about it to really anyone and this board is probably the most social i've been regarding AS so I wanna ask a few questions regarding things I do that seem like I'm the only one who does them or has difficulty with them. Are they traits of AS or just bad memory.


Memory. I can not remember a phone number and never have been able to. If I dont write it down while being told its gone. I also took this ball aptitude test once (kinda a general test of skills that tells you what you'd be good at) and I got a 0 on the memory part where it consisted of a list of letters and numbers, then on the next page half were missing and you had 15 seconds to look at complete list and then fill out incomplete. After the 15 seconds I couldnt recall a single one. My counselor said 'hmm, musta been an error in the scoring machine' after seeing my fat zero. I just nodded and said 'ya, hm' knowing I actually couldnt remember even one 2 character sequence.
I can tell you the name and number classification of every galaxy considered to be in our local cluster (and a good amount more beyond that), i can tell you the working title and season/episode number of all 72 Futurama episodes. Recite to me a short sequence of numbers and I wont be able to tell you it 10 seconds later.

Recognition. I never recognize people's faces I havnt seen within the last few months. This includes family members. I seem to remember hair styles more than faces. For example I have two aunts that when I think of them I think of the silhouette their hair makes around their head. After moving out of home state and coming back a year later for holidays my two aunts had changed their hair style and I could not remember who was who. And infact, this is pretty similar with my whole family now that i'm thinking more about it. The men I seem to remember by their bodies, like my one cousin has a pear shapped body, fat stomach, small head, another uncle who sans a neck.
Basically I am constantly coming across people who know me and I do not know who they are and am fighting to recognize their voice or hair or something to a former job/classmate and I find out more and more they are people I worked with like just 10 months prior.

The passing of time. Ok, today I had lunch with a friend who every other month or so we get together for lunch and catch up. Right now, it feels like yesterday, the last time we hooked up for lunch also feels like yesterday (and infact I can not tell you how long ago it was), I can tell you we've had lunch 14 times, and each restaurant, but I can not tell you any order what so ever, when the first time was, any day of the week, any amount of time between them etc. And this goes for just about everything. I remember what I did the last time I spent the day with my nephews, but I can not tell you how long ago it was. It also makes paying bills on time a very unlikely thing. Thank god for online bill pay, but my credit card and student loan I check probably 4 or 5 times a week out of habit to make sure i'm not past the due date.


So after typing this out I realize my memory seems f****d.



orngjce223
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17 Oct 2008, 10:59 pm

willa wrote:


Memory. I can not remember a phone number and never have been able to. If I dont write it down while being told its gone. I also took this ball aptitude test once (kinda a general test of skills that tells you what you'd be good at) and I got a 0 on the memory part where it consisted of a list of letters and numbers, then on the next page half were missing and you had 15 seconds to look at complete list and then fill out incomplete. After the 15 seconds I couldnt recall a single one. My counselor said 'hmm, musta been an error in the scoring machine' after seeing my fat zero. I just nodded and said 'ya, hm' knowing I actually couldnt remember even one 2 character sequence.
I can tell you the name and number classification of every galaxy considered to be in our local cluster (and a good amount more beyond that), i can tell you the working title and season/episode number of all 72 Futurama episodes. Recite to me a short sequence of numbers and I wont be able to tell you it 10 seconds later.



That's unusual, but it's certainly not unheard of.

Quote:

Recognition. I never recognize people's faces I havnt seen within the last few months. This includes family members. I seem to remember hair styles more than faces. For example I have two aunts that when I think of them I think of the silhouette their hair makes around their head. After moving out of home state and coming back a year later for holidays my two aunts had changed their hair style and I could not remember who was who. And infact, this is pretty similar with my whole family now that i'm thinking more about it. The men I seem to remember by their bodies, like my one cousin has a pear shapped body, fat stomach, small head, another uncle who sans a neck.
Basically I am constantly coming across people who know me and I do not know who they are and am fighting to recognize their voice or hair or something to a former job/classmate and I find out more and more they are people I worked with like just 10 months prior.



"Prospagnosia": "face blindness".


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zeldapsychology
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17 Oct 2008, 11:10 pm

I have to write phone numbers down to remember them and your time issue sounds like me LOL! I can do stuff etc. but mom will be like do you remember me telling you X me:No. (It was yesterday etc.) I say it was last week a couple weeks ago. I lose time LOL!



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17 Oct 2008, 11:14 pm

thankfully, we have mobile phones with non volatile data storage to remember our phone numbers for us ^.^

ok.....gimme the episode where fry battles the brains and ends up in moby dick ^.^ x



willa
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17 Oct 2008, 11:16 pm

Wiki'd Prospagnosia and it's kinda scary. Seems pretty spot on but says it seems to stem from neurological damage of some sort. Maybe my mom did drop me on my head as a kid lol.

But now that I'm thinking things through I can tell you the hair color of ever women in my family but not a single guy (my father has passed away but I'm guessing he had the same color hair as me. this is kind of depressing right now =/). I cant tell you the eye color of a single one but everyone who does wear glasses. In fact, if you were to line up the glasses of everyone i've worked with for probably the last 5 years and my family i'll be able to tell you the owner of each. Maybe I've passively dealt with this without much consistency and subconsciously applied certain physical features as recognizable in each sex.



willa
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17 Oct 2008, 11:25 pm

Xanderbeanz wrote:
thankfully, we have mobile phones with non volatile data storage to remember our phone numbers for us ^.^

ok.....gimme the episode where fry battles the brains and ends up in moby dick ^.^ x


hehe, 3acv07 if i'm not mistaken, the day the earth stood stupid. Thats an easy one cause the day the earth stood still is one of my favorite movies and cant wait for the new one coming out soon! Also not to be mistaken with 4acv10, the why of fry (though that one is also considered S05E08 cause it was done during the production of season 4 but aired during season 5. )



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17 Oct 2008, 11:28 pm

yeah, why of fry is the second time we meet the giant brains right....although in an earlier season we had the "brain balls" which were kinda similar....ah fry's breath smelled as fresh as a summer ham :) x



willa
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17 Oct 2008, 11:33 pm

"oh man, and this ham flavored gum is mostly bone" lol. 2acv17 War is the H Word. I think the name of the 3 like smart talking ones at the end were named The Brain Balls.



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17 Oct 2008, 11:41 pm

they've got alot of brains......and they've got alot of......kutzpah...XD



Emmett
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18 Oct 2008, 8:23 pm

I have the "no concept of time" thing. I have no Idea if it's apergers, or not. I tend to think it isn't since autistic traits tend toward hyper memory of exactly when things occurred. I have several dyslexic disabilities and I always attributed it to them.



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18 Oct 2008, 8:29 pm

nah, prosopagnosia used to be thought to be due to brain injury; but lately there has been a huge amount of work done on developmental prosopagnosia, which is the type you're born with. No dropping on the head needed for that.

As to the OP's question: None of those, other than having memorized galaxy names and Futurama episodes, are specifically Aspie traits. Prosopagnosia is more common on the spectrum than off it, but the other two are generally "neurodiverse" traits, not specifically autistic. The bad short-term, good long-term memory thing is interesting; I have a similar, not so extreme version, with a digit span of seven (average) despite being about three standard deviations above the norm when it comes to general knowledge.

So... yes, you have an unusual brain. Aspie? We'd need to know more to guess at that.


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