Are you very high-functioning?

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Some people can have a high IQ and not be high functioning. Think about it. I can't relate to all these mildly affected people.

I'm realizing that no, I'm not. Although, trying to get an accurate understanding of that is difficult, and has been an ongoing thing for me for a while now. I just didn't know about the asd aspects of it before.
In some ways I am, I suppose. I've managed to survive a long time on my own. But never managed to do much more than survive. No friends, really. Barely any connections, even with my family. Never married. One relationship that lasted more than a year (and was kind of a disaster). A few that made it about six months.
Never held a job for more than three months. Never rented a place in my own name. Honestly I've never lived on my own, I've always had housemates, and often been the guy on the couch.
I don't even think I've managed to blend in on anything other than the most superficial level. I regularly go long periods of time during which my only social interaction consists of paying for groceries.
There are some good things. In the areas that I excel, I'm usually so far above and beyond that it's just ridiculous. But even then, there's always a central aspect in which I really don't function. I'm a talented musician, but I've only actually played with one other person, for example. I don't even know any other musicians at this point. I don't even know where to find them.
And it's kind of like that with everything else.
Most of the time I'm ok with that. And I can make do, and even be satisfied with it.
And that's all an effort to spare the details.
It's weird. It's sort of like how I'm pretty intelligent, but I can't do math. It's like I've got a loaded deck in some ways, but the ways my deck is loaded are almost completely irrelevant when it comes to functioning in society.
I've been described as dickensian by more than one person. It's a long story. It's hard to tell whether it's a comedy or a tragedy. Too early to tell, I suppose.

I imagine this post is kind of scattered.
It's been on my mind quite a bit lately and I felt like writing something.

Well, I don't like functioning labels. But I suppose I would be considered such, in that I have high intelligence, am verbal, and can do well in school. On the other hand, when I was in school, I experienced a lot of stress and meltdowns, and now I don't really do any social activities. I don't know yet how I'll do with living independently, either.

When I was in high school, functioned fine. Academically good. No friends. But that didn't matter that much at that time

Now, no job no friends

Bathroom blow dryers get on my nerves

Attention span out the window

Physically weak

Academically stupid

Socially awkward

Emotionally fragile

I tell myself that I am, to a certain extent. If I believe that I'm not, I'll fall into a state of conditioned helplessness and won't do anything productive. If I believe that I'm really capable, I tend not to work as hard. My crippling fear of not being good enough for society drives me to put in substantial effort to improve as a person. The goal is to become superior to the average human. So I guess I'm functional enough to manipulate my own thoughts and beliefs, which I guess is pretty good. I can also think without an emotional bias because emotions mean nothing to me.

I'm probably a reasonably high functioning Aspie.

I have 4 sons, one from a previous marriage and 3 with my current partner.
I've been with my current partner for 13 years. We get on well because, even though she's an NT, she's quite like me, and we have similar interests.
I struggle with work, and only ever last about 6 months till I quit, so we swapped work roles about 4 years ago. So now she works full time and I look after the house & kids. It works quite well.

I can manage social situations quite well if they're short. Maybe a couple of hours. I struggle if it's longer than that, or if it's more than a couple of times a week. I don't meltdown or anything, but I just become grumpy and antisocial.

I don't have what I would call close friends, just a few friendly acquaintances.

The thing that bothers me is, as I get older, I'm finding the social stuff more difficult. I feel guilty that the kids are missing out on things because I don't want to do stuff. The missis is good at dragging me out on the weekends, which is great, otherwise I'd never do anything. But I can't help feeling bad when I'm scolding them for running around and being too loud, when "normal" families are loud and crazy!

I try to let them get on with it these days, while I hide in the kitchen, so I don't get too stressed lol

I'm 33, married and have a good job. For about 17 years it was my primary life's focus to learn to be "cool", make and keep friends, finding sexual partners, and maintain a social life. I was varying levels of depressed over every one of those years, I used to think that I was depressed because of my social failures and struggles but in hindsight a lot of it was because I never let myself be myself. But I graduated college, held a job, had a few girlfriends, and now I'm married to a wonderful NT woman.

So does that make me "high functioning"? Or does it just mean that I learned how to convince NTs that I'm cool and competant? Almost all the social skills I learned during my years of "acting" were just that - acting. Learning how to playing with people's perceptions, play the majority culture. It's manipulation, in a real way, because a lot of these tricks involve presenting oneself as particularly "authentic" and "natural" when acting in ways literally learned from books and the internet, carefully planned out, all in order to achieve some goal, whether it be getting a job or just making someone want to be friends with me. "High functioning" sounds like a positive trait, but is it a positive to be a con artist?

I agree with an earlier post that the vast majority of NTs trying to teach "social skills" to those in the spectrum are actually teaching how to craft a good "mask". I'll also state that assigning the label "high functioning" from an NT perspective is usually a judgement of how well one's mask works, because a good mask puts NTs at ease and it helps us succeed (outwardly) by accessing the resources of an NT-dominant world. It's a positive sounding term for something ugly yet useful... Pretending to be the majority culture in order to avoid discrimination. And where does it leave those who are less able to fake it? That shouldn't be a prerequisite for success.

I'm lucky, I guess, that I can pass off as NT. And I'm happy, I guess, that I struggled blindly so long and learned how to function so well in NT land. But I also regret that I spent my late childhood, teen years, college, and most of my 20s depressed and trying to "fake it till I make it", and didn't get to be myself or have genuine relationships. And if I want to continue my career and what's left of my social life (which I often question if I do) then I have to keep faking it... forever? I know that I've had success and stability in areas where many on WP have struggled, and you can call that high functioning if you want, but to me there's something twisted and messed up about the whole term.

I don't know if I would consider myself high-functioning... :/ I mean...I wouldn't say what I go through is anywhere compared to some that are dealing with very severe situations... But, it still keeps me somewhat "bedridden" when it comes to existing and trying to manage and cope in the society today. And I still suffer from some self harm.

I've had a job for a sliver of time but trying to move out to live on my own is still an issue since my social anxiety and other such things are posing a problem. It makes me ball up inside, but I really do want to move out. For the love of god I'm tired of living with my mother... -_- I guess the fact that I'm still doing college and trying to get my Bachelor's in art to work as a graphic designer is something that will help me twoards my goal... but I seriously need to get doing some therapy soon and hopeful get recommended some kind of prescription medicine to help tame my flurry of emotions. Because my years of trying to cope with these moods hasn't been working and I feel that they are getting worse... :c

Hello, I just joined a short time ago. Yes I am very high-functioning in some areas but struggle with the social aspects of life. My marriage ended some time ago and the children are living their own lives. My life has been my work, and soon I face retirement but am mostly alone and very scared of what I will do. Have not developed any close friendships in my life. Mostly cared for my children and developed my work life, which is meaningful to me. I have my special interests but I doubt whether anyone else has those. In social situations, hard as I try, I usually end up saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. I don't want to be all alone; I would like a limited amount of socialization to add to my enjoyment of my solitude. Right now, I am looking for a friend to talk over navigating the social world which never comes natural to me, even after all these years of trying. NTs just do not understand and can't relate. I am sure my AS contributed to my marriage ending.
RS

Hi all,
I believe i am quite high functioning. My job is very social, customer service and i attend university part time, working in groups and always around a lot of people. I also have a partner of 6 years and things are going great.
By all means, no-one outside of those very few i tell would know that i am autistic.

Social encounters are very draining for me. Almost like a battery bar slowly dwindling on your phone or laptop.

I don't really feel the need to tell people that i am on the spectrum, i think that would cause more problems than it would fix. I tend to use my alone time to recharge my social battery and keep on keeping on.

Wow' could've written that myself! I've had successful career and ran my own business. I'm not single after an awful marriage followed by an abusive relationship. I'm happier now though being on my own. Tbh I just prefer to NOT see people.
I've been really successful in a lot of areas of my life - mainly in helping others. But can't help myself to overcome the fear of spending time socialising. Even 1-1 I don't always feel great. Had a family meal last night and I was so glad to get out of there and go home! Too much noise and too many people to try and figure out! Exhausting!

I'm not sure I know how to define HF. It seems to relate entirely to an NT perspective on what is or isn't successful, and I don't think I like the thought of having my functional existence defined by how successfully I can pretend to be what I'm not regardless of the price I pay to construct and maintain that pretense.

I'm intelligent, at least if that's being measured by standardized tests or IQ tests. The academic side of education is a breeze for me as long as I'm insulated from and able to ignore or bypass the social aspects. As soon as I'm required to really interact with other students, that sh*t falls apart quickly.

As a child and a young woman, one of my special interests was etiquette. I'm sure this has helped me enormously in the area of masking, as people will comment that my "formal mannerisms" are sometimes intimidating. My father taught college-level courses in nonverbal communication at the FBI Academy to law enforcement officers for the purpose of giving them an edge in interrogations and negotiations - I studied those materials with great interest as well. Sometimes it seems as if my brain is, perhaps, using cognitive systems as a neural detour around the structures that don't work well, like recognition of facial expressions. That idea makes a lot of sense to me, because I feel far more intelligent when I'm left alone than I do when I'm having to cope with people in uncontrolled situations.

All in all, it seems that NTs would call me high functioning, but they have no idea of the amount of energy and focus that so-called high function costs me. If I spend too much time thinking about that I get angry, and then I wind up in the corner spinning in circles and slapping my temples, and there goes the "high function" label right down the tubes.