Unaware of your AS?

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Has anyone here ever thought they overcame a AS symptom but didn't realize you still have it until someone pointed it out to you?

Or what about unaware of a AS symptom you have until it got pointed out to you and you're like "I didn't know I do that?"

I'm constantly hearing things on here about NT social games that I never knew existed.
So many things I never even knew that I was missing.

I live in a sort of bubble where I don't have to really interact with the "real world" on too many levels. I can tend to start feeling pretty normal...and then get reminded sometimes of how akward I really am.

I still get tripped up a lot by the missus; but I had her take the AS, and we have a bare splinter in common...

Doesn't stop me from trying.

I thought I did well with change but I guess not. My bf told me I still have troubles with it. I "flipped out" last year when my parents and us went out and we didn't do what was planned.

When my boyfriend and I went downtown because I need to to do something and then we go to Goodwell, we'll we were heading to the bus stop and he said he wanted to stop at Gamestop and I say "No way, I didn't plan it. You can go and I will meet you at home."
I was being flexible there I say because I said he could stop there but he said that wasn't the same. I think I still do well at work with flexibility. No one is there to tell me if I am inflexible or not or have troubles with change there.


Is wild mood swings an AS trait? I read that in another thread when someone mentioned that was a big characteristic of it because his doctor said he didn't have it since he didn't have that trait. My bf said I have it. I can be cheerful and the next thing, I am screaming just because my bf did something that set me off. And I also go from being unhappy to happy all of a sudden.

Yup. Since I've been here I've read quite a bit about meltdowns, which I was oblivious of. I asked my wife just today and she pointed out one instance where something somewhat trivial caused me to fly off the handle and become so flustered it caused me severe difficulty to think or speak. She also pointed out that I tend to withdraw and seclude myself during such times.

I have those "wild" mood swings.

I don't like it when I get angry over something that seems minor so I try to make it stop as quickly as possible.

When it comes to feeling sad, that one is more difficult but way better to divert than when I was a child.

When I get nervous and upset though, I go from calm to crying to calm again.

I never thought of it as wild mood swings.

Before I knew about AS, I found myself stimming or practicing some OCD-esque behavior and another person would tell me to stop and ask if there was something wrong with me.

I also used to trip, bump into things, and fall down often, and then I suddenly stopped and assumed that it was because a growth spurt changed my center of balance. I watched a video of myself walking over a year ago and I was surprised at the large steps I was taking (effectively stumbling around), as opposed to the tiny but quick steps I take now.

It seems like my body/mind took its own measures to correct that inadequacy.

I used to have meltdowns and stim when I didn't know what it was. People also commented at my staring off into space.

Before coming to WP I was very unaware of my AS traits. I used to be on a parenting ASD board before finding this forum, and I'd actually get into arguments with the other parents about what was "normal" behavior, and what was considered characteristic of ASD. I thought that many of the behaviors, and such that they were complaining about their children having was completely normal behavior, because I thought, or behaved that way. The first time I came here, my jaw dropped. I didn't know that everybody didn't think the way that I did. I thought everyone had problems with crowds, routines being changed, and sensory issues. I just figured that they were good at hiding it like I was. At my age, I thought that it was just another part of life to just push on, suck it up, and deal with discomfort. The only real noticable difference that was glaringly obvious to me was that other women seemed to effortlessly socialize, and build supportive social networks. I couldn't manage to do that, no matter how I tried. I didn't, and still don't have any friends.

So you never read about autism I take it?


What made you decide to come here? I assume you have a child on the spectrum.

Here's one. I work at a so called call center trouble shooting computer hardware and software. Over the holidays the cleaners got time off but I didn't. So I just kept throwing rubbish in my basket until it stacked up. The next week one of the ladies in the office informed how shocked she was at how my rubbish had piled up (! !) I wanted to ask her who in blazes she thinks she is, but made a joke about it instead.

I have no clue how I appear to NTs...................

Actually, I did read about autism when my youngest child was diagnosed, then my middle child was diagnosed shortly after. It seems strange, but I didn't see myself in the medicalized criteria. I guess I was taking it too literally. One of the first threads that I read here was the RDOS quiz. I took it for fun, and it said that I was an aspie. So, being me, I took the link back to the parenting board to get a broad sample of 'NTs" to see what their scores were. I figured that if they all got high scores, too then the test wasn't very accurate. Almost none of them did.

I came here. because autism had quickly become my special interest, and I was searching for information. I wasn't getting that on the parenting board. I was getting ignored, and bullied.

I think my traits are obvious to those that know about AS. It just took me awhile to put the pieces together. I made a joke to my sons' teacher one time after I had taken something way too literally that she had said about not having to look to far to see where my boys get it, and she replied that she figured it out a long time ago.

Yes, I am a teacher and didn't realize that when I speak to the class, I don't look at their faces. I actually look over their heads, or look up. A student pointed it out to me, and after that, everyone was aware of it and would watch me and giggle when I did it, including me. I had to work to overcome that. I still catch myself doing it, though.

Lack of eye contact. I only became aware of this in the last couple of years, and it is quite annoying to say the least, because now that I am aware of it, I feel even more awkward.

There is more is more than just that, but I just don't feel up to doing my usual posts.. A bit tired I guess! A resulting sentence however would probably be this: learning what I did not know, such as lack of eye contact mentioned above has lead to awkwardness. I was more comfortable not knowing some things that I now know. Oh well!

I think I first noticed my lack of eye contact when I was 14. I didn't know why I didn't look at people when I spoke to them. But I was never sure if I had always done that but I always had. It was in my medical records. I didn't know anything about eye contact until I read about it in AS. But then I would look at the other kids in my class and see not all of them were looking at the teacher. They all had their eyes averted or looking down at their desk or table so I thought it was a load of crap that not looking at people was an aspie thing.


I didn't even think rocking was an autistic thing because I did it too even though I saw Simon doing it in Mercury Rising but I thought that was his personality, not the autism.