Aspies and Coordination: My Soccer Class

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I wanted to get everyone's opinion on the notion that Aspies are not very coordinated.

I agree that Aspies are often not very naturally coordinated but to what degree are we uncoordinated? How much practice does it take an Aspie to become coordinated at something? Can all Aspies learn athletic skills that require hand-eye coordination?

I am in college and I am in a soccer class.

I wanted to learn how to play soccer because I had never learned how to play before and it is a common and popular sport.

Anyways, I thought that after I had learned to do better in Basketball and Football in high school I was starting to wonder if I had grown out of my low coordination that I had observed in the earlier days of Basketball.

But after playing soccer, which I had no experience with, I discovered that I was still very much uncoordinated as an Aspie.

When the ball comes close to me or whenever I have to do something quick, I just think too much and often tense up. This also happens in basketball when I shoot. I can make three pointers but I have always been consistently inconsistent because sometimes I tense up before shooting.

I told my Soccer teacher that I have Asperger's and he said that it made sense as far as my coordination goes.

We had a skills test coming up and he said that we might be able to make some accomodations for me if I had a rough time with the skills test.

I left this door open but I did not want to seek accomodations for one because I don't want to have to go through the paper work, and also because I have never needed disability services in college. I didn't want to start now.

Anyways, on the skills test I got 34/52 points after I practiced a little bit the day before.

That was a week ago. Today we were finishing the skills test and I had to bounce the ball off my body ten times before it touched the ground. I have had a lot of trouble with this from the first day. But this weekend I practiced for three hours and I was finally able to bouce the ball off myself ten times in a row! Then today I did it in soccer class and now I am expected to pass the class.

Anyways, although soccer has reminded me of my problems with coordination, it has also reminded me that I can overcome those problems with some practice.

So a question to all of you...can Aspies learn coordination skills if they practice? What then does it mean that Aspies have problems with coordination?

Personally from my experience in sports, I feel like I can learn anything that requires coordination if I practice hard enough, but I am always going to be behind someone else who has had just as much practice.

What do you all think of this?

Well...like so many other things, it kind of depends on the depth and intensity of your obsessive interest. My parents wanted their nerdy son to show some kind of normal little boy skill, so they forced me to join a little league team. I couldn't have given two hoots and a holler about baseball, but they were determined. Took me out in the yard and tossed balls at me for hours and hours - it was torture - I couldn't hit that damn thing to save my life, and they insisted that I do it until I could. Never happened. I still can't hit a ball with a bat, and I still don't give a rat's patoot.

On the other hand, when I started working as a radio disc jockey at 15, in the days when music was still issued on vinyl records, working a live on-air boardshift - and doing it well - was a challenge of physical coordination. Everything had to be timed down to the last quarter-second in order for it all to go out over the airwaves in synch and with never a moment of 'dead air.' To get through an entire 4 or 6 hour shift, writing jokes in between manually cueing up records, answering the request line phone and never making a single technical error - was like a well-choreographed dance. And I got damned good at that. But I loved it, and I was obsessed with doing it to perfection.

Driving a stick-shift car requires coordination and I got that right.... But it took a lot of practice and motivation (being able to drive myself!). The same with labwork in the past (experiments are fun!). But other things, like hitting a ball, are impossible for me (I do not see the point of hitting a ball)

So with enough time and perseverance it is possible to get some coordination done, but most people are better than me. So my opinion is a bit similar as yours.

If you keep practicing, it will only help you get better.

As a kid I was very uncoordinated at some things, but fairly adept at others. I had no problem riding my bike or roller skating. But, I was completely incapable of performing the standing long jump for the Presidential Fitness test in school. Also, my shins were always covered in bumps and bruises from running into things.

Now I am a very active person, and as an adult I have participated in many sports in a capable manner. But, I would still consider myself to be pretty much of a clutz in day to day life.

I think coordination varies from person to person.