Family reaction to adult AS

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I think telling my family about my suspected AS could only hurt at this point. There is too much at stake for the future for me to risk bringing it up. I have decided to just keep it to myself and work on my difficulties and work on eliminating my weaknesses. I think a diagnosis could well work against my goal of accomplishing more in my life, not because I don't want to, but because the evaluator in charge may say it is not practical.

I'll probably tell the folks fairly soon (the pieces only fell into place on Friday). Why? As an exercise in expectation management. I hope that mum understands that I am probably not going to live up to her expectations of me (which are rather on the high side in some aspects - rise to the Senior Executive Service in the public service for example, and mundane on the other - find a nice girl and have kids).

Fortunately both of my parents are economists and have brains instinctively wired for rational argument. I suspect it will confirm their suspicions though.

The only one in my family I've tried to tell is my mom, and she basically wouldn't hear it. I haven't bothered to try with any of my the family.

I did tell a long time close friend that I had AS, and she was open to it originally. Then a few weeks ago, she did a 180 on me after gossiping (more or less) with some of her friends who don't know me about whether I really had AS. Unbeknowst to me, this trusted friend put my dx up to a community vote, among people who 1) don't really know me and 2) don't really understand autism or AS. Then she just announced to me one day she didn't believe I had AS. I felt very betrayed by this. It's essentially ruined my friendship with her.

At the moment, outside of AS forums and other dx'd Aspies, I doubt I'llbe telling anyone else about my AS any time soon.

i told my father and brothers that i might have mild AS, my father read up a little more about it online, and he was really happy to see that everything clicked, especially my childhood behaviour.

he noted that my lack of awareness to other people's reactions disturbed him the most as i was growing up, he felt a little relieved that i wasn't deliberately ignoring him, i think in all probability, it took some pressure off him as a parent. perhaps there'd been some guilt that he might have failed as a parent, and i was glad that the knowledge of AS absolved him of some of it.

also, he seemed rather pleased to note that he had quite a few AS traits himself, that i probably inherited it from him. heh.

i tried asking my mother if she knew what autism is, she brushed me off by saying that 'back then, there was no such thing'. end of conversation.

my brothers (aged 27 and 18, i'm 31, i told them a year back) simply nodded their heads and the older one said something to the effect of "as long as you're happy, you deserve happiness after what you've been through". they both don't seem very 'AS-like' to me. neither one thinks they have AS either.

my friends (ok, 2 friends, 1 is a cousin does that count?) took it in their stride, they said they already knew i was 'different' so a diagnosis wouldn't make a difference in our friendship. my cousin had always been the one to chide me for my lack of social skills, she pretty much taught me why and how people interact the way they do. i have since distanced myself from my 'best' friend due to a rather convoluted situation (friends should never become colleagues!) and it saddens me that it had to turn out the way it did.

my online acquaintances/friends shrugged it off, they said my eccentricities and quirks were what made me interesting.

my bf said it made no difference, i'm still me, but if knowing that i might have AS gives me peace of mind, he wouldn't care if i went for a formal DX or not. he has refused to read up more on it, because he says i am unique, and what he has learnt can't be taught by books. and this far he's doing a fine job i'd say.

I did it by email - how else?

I wouldn't recommend it.

http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt15708.html

I did too, but there was no real harm.
Everyone knew I was screwed up, so
putting a name to it didn't matter.

i sort of told my mom. i know she listened because the next day she sent me a link to some yahoo group about AS.

she was perfectly nice about it. she said, "well, we always knew that you were probably going to be the only one able to figure out was it was."

but... i don't know that she really GETS how huge of a deal it is to KNOW what the REASON is for all of my life, you know? or if she GETS that my 12 year old brother is the same. and i am sure she would be mad if i tell him about AS, so i have not. but... i am just going to try to talk to him more in general, so when his world crashes in, i will be the one he comes to...

This is a little off topic...

But have you ever made up a fake sickness, such as just a name and then told someone that you have it?
I have, it is really quite amusing when they start to fuss over you haha...but I soon put a stop to that as I don't really like it.
I do this always to test peoples reactions.

I told my brother, who I thought would understand, as he has bipolar, so I thought maybe it would be a connection between us, neither of us being quite 'normal' - I hate that word but can't think of a more appropriate one right now. Anyway, he just wasn't interested. That sums up the attitude of my family really. We aren't close. It no longer bothers me, I no longer feel the need to be understood by them. I say that a little sadly, but that's how it is. The older I get the more emotional distance from them I feel. We get along on a superficial level and I don't expect anything more than that.

Nicely said. When I read about AS it is not much of a great effort to relate to it, but explaining what it is and why I strongly believe I have it to others is not an easy task. I started discussing it with both my parents 3 days ago (they are divorced but live near one another). I printed the best AS articles I could find on the internet and gave them to my mother and explained my thoughts about myself having AS. She first was very reluctant about it, and basically said I did not have it even before she read the articles I've printed or before I totally explained what AS was. Rather than letting me fully illustrate the big picture of AS and then conclude if I may have it or not, she rejected every argument I pointed out as I was trying to represent point by point what asperger is about. This discussion ended in an argument, as you can imagine.

In the last few days, she read the articles I printed and seemed a bit more open to the idea I might actually have AS. She's a good mother, affectionate and understanding, but she can also be quite impulsive and she's not too fond at thinking I might have a psychological disorder. My father is not too fond at accepting my-self diagnosis either, but he also acknowledges I never was a "normal" child. I also spoke of my thoughts to one of my friend, and he seemed kinda annoyed by them, as if I was trying to find myself a disorder in order to gain others attention.

I just hope my relatives will be as understanding as possible and open-minded in regard to my AS theories. I might come back with it in few days (or weeks). Wish me the best of luck.

Last edited by Bigbang on 18 Oct 2007, 3:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I tried telling my mother once and she said basically that I should be bringing this to the attention of a doctor because she didn't have time.

I wonder if that was denial on her part or if she really didn't care ? Who knows.

It seems like most peoples' families either don't care or think we're lying.
I generally feel that AS is genetic, but this discussion makes me wonder.
Maybe having uncaring, unsupportive parents plays a role.

I only found out definitively 6 months ago and have so far only told my husband, you guys, and a friend who's son is an aspie. (That's how I found out about it).

My husband was at first bewildered - I got diagnosed without telling him (cause I wasn't sure what I was going to get) - and couldn't see how I had any "syndrome". He's since been wading through "the complete guide to Asperger syndrome " and going - "O yeah -you do that!" -and asking questions and finding out just how much I have to compensate.

I did try (before I was diagnosed) easing the subject into conversation around a family gathering by talking about my friend and her son. The general comments were " Arseburgers! He has Arseburgers!" So, yeah, that went really well. My family of origin is fairly dysfunctional. My sibs are intelligent, but they are often really, really shallow.
I suspect my dad was Aspie. I don't know what my mum is - possibly narcissistic, but she is really shallow and hypocritical. One of her insults for me as a child was "bloody autistic" so maybe she knew, or maybe that was just a general insult to go with the rest. Consequently, she's probably the last person I'd tell.

Well, I told my folks about it a couple of weeks ago, and they went off and read a fair bit about it.

Their reaction: that explains a lot and makes sense, and were pleased for me that many parts of my life that were once inexplicable suddenly seemed clear. Naturally, mum has started re-planning my career for me to try and work out how I can better use my talents. But that's okay - I love her concern for me.

In addition, I've told my boss (who as explained in my haven posting now has even more knives out for me and is treating me like a five year old who can't behave around grown ups) and a former colleague, who seemed somewhat indifferent.

My brother and (selected) work colleagues can wait until I've got an official diagnosis.

Well, it seems I'm not alone.

I told my boyfriend first and he was incredibly sceptical. After taking numerous on-line tests, showing him the symptoms etc, he sort of agrees that I have it, but he seems to have a hard time accepting any official name for anything I get (sinusitus for example). Oddly, he shares the majority of my symptoms, but he refuses to believe that he does.

So then I tried dropping massive hints to my Mum and she didn't pick up on them.

One crazy night I told my sister about my depression and my AS. She was very shocked about the depression but explained away my AS as me being a bit weird. I'm 99% sure that the rest of my family would do the same, or worse, treat me like s**t for a while, which they tend to do now and again if they don't like what I'm saying.

I also told a friend once, and he stopped talking to me.

I occasionally really want an official diagnosis just so I can prove it to them, but even then I think they'd deny it.

I've always wondered that myself. I have parents who 'care', but if I were to die I don't think it would phase them in the least.

I also told my wife recently that I have AS and she just refuses to believe it. Oh well.