I'm a bit new to all of this, but I have to say I'm relieved to know I'm not just "weird" and that there are others just like me.
I'm 24 and married. I work as a systems administrator at a small oil company. My interests vary from month to month but they're almost always technically related to some form of science or device. (solar power, windmills, cars, computers, electronics, kayaking, astronomy, etc). I have to admit that I dropped out of college. I've never been able to keep to a rigorous study scheme, so I generally have trouble keeping up with assignments, though I generally learn material very quickly. I think that's where a whole lot of trouble with AS started for me. I never was, and still haven't been officially diagnosed. I'm perfectly aware that there are those out there who will say I'm a hypochondriac or something but at this point, to those who know me it's undeniable. I've shown many of the classic symptoms, intense focus, verbosity (it's likely this post will display some of that), social ineptitude. I walked on my tiptoes regularly well into high school and still do on occasion. And there's certainly more where that came from.
In hindsight, I remember how 'put off' my body language was. I remember someone asking why I always walked with my head down and that was quite a revelation to me. From nearly that point on it was kind of a coming out for me. I managed to coordinate my body language and social skills enough to make friends. A BIG part of that turning point was the addition of a Computer Repair class in my high school. I basically ruled the roost, so to say and it helped me make a bunch of friends and broke me of many social problems.
Before that I was part of a program called "gifted and talented" you may or may not be familiar with. I tested into it in the third grade and it floated me through until high school. At least in GT, I was on a familiar par with most of my peers. I could relate to them in that they at least understood my interests. They may not have shared them with the same zeal, but we could talk about them.
In High School GT was merged with Honors English exclusively. There were no science related outlets, so I dropped out and became a C/D student overnight. Every year was the same I'd start out above the crowd, lose interest, and stop doing work and get really... really far behind. I remember calculus as especially interesting. I started out with the highest average in the class the first six weeks. I was very far ahead because I was grasping the concepts from the lecture easily and didn't need notes. As the semester went on I started falling asleep in class and I couldn't focus for the life of me. I eventually stopped turning in work all together and switched classes mid-semester because by that time I had gotten so far behind there wasn't a hope of catching up before semester's end. So begins the saga that I'm sure many of you are familiar with. College was just about as boring. Unfortunately, by the end of it I'd regressed so much that I'd completely missed or forgotten entire sets of basic math skills and terminology. It made pursuing many of my favorite interests in college nearly impossible because I was so far behind in one of my strongest subjects. Now I fear if I go back I'll just fail again, so I haven't tried. Just like many of you I found something I'm considered exceptional at, and my experience has made a living for me so far. I want to go back to school but I'm deathly afraid that I won't be able to maintain focus long enough to finish a full semester.
At about age 20 my mother was so fed up with my academic squandering she took me to a psychologist. Unfortunately, it was one of those people who should have never been allowed to practice medicine. He went into a yelling rampage about how horrible my mother was and was overtly rude to her right there in front of me. I think I understand what he was aiming at, and had his on-the-fly diagnosis been correct it would have been the right thing to do. But, I don't have ADHD. I was tested for it many times and it was always a shaky negative. The jerk never listened to my history, nor did he ask any of the right questions. It was a horrible experience and probably the single most significant factor in hindering my eventual diagnosis. My mother hates the prospect of seeing psychologists now. Looking back, if there's anything that I'd have changed regarding AS, it would have been to see another doctor.
After college failed, I moved to Tulsa OK. My mother and I were at ends with each other that I couldn't even live in the same state (Texas). I had trouble getting started. I worked at an IHOP, went for broke, and became homeless for a time. In the midst of all this I met my wife on the Internet. Long story short, she helped a whole lot. I decided she was the one, and made huge efforts better myself. Through her and her parents I found a bit of a social haven for awhile. I felt included again and as soon as I found a tech job I started to flourish.
Fast forward a bit to last year. Learning about AS started with my wife's Mother. She suggested I look into autism as she though I showed a lot of the symptoms. I wasn't immediately impressed with it but I honestly wanted to prove her wrong so I researched. I found out her assumptions were more correct than even she imagined. So many things fit it was uncanny. I felt like I had found it but when I expressed this, unfortunately, it fell on more or less ignorant/deaf ears. The word "autism", as is all to often, told my wife and my mother, friends and family members, that I would have had to of been a mute savant or something out of Rain Man. So, I let it settle and didn't really push it. Then, just a few days ago my wife, a med school student, was learning about autism in class and rediscovered AS. That's when the dominoes fell. She brought home lots of medical research that basically supported my all of my suspicions. Now that I have her on my side I am thinking about seeking official diagnosis.
If you've gotten this far. I hope you can help me answer two very important questions. At least they're important to me.
1.) Is there any benefit to getting officially diagnosed? How should I go about it? What does it cost (ballpark)? And are there any long term therapy benefits?
2.) I tend to think that if indeed to have AS it only detrimentally effects me in two ways. The worst and most important is academically. I'm so lost and confused when it comes to making myself stay focused there. I've pretty much given up at being able to do it for myself. I need help, even if I don't have AS. The second, and far less severe, is personal relationships. My wife and I have an excellent marriage, but I want to keep it that way. I get so focused and tuned into projects sometimes that I have trouble breaking that to address other issues and it has caused arguments at times. I don't want that to become a serious problem so I want to keep an eye on it. We want to start a family soon so that has a bit to do with it as well.
Finally, I'd like to point out some rays of hope for others out there who may be suffering from AS but have problems with symptoms I do well with.
I've found that I'm not an empathy void. I was for the majority of my life, but having close friends and family more or less "healed" me of that particular detriment. The plus side is now I'm easily able to detach myself from emotionally heated situations. I tend to be easy to calm down in arguments and I am more apt to deduce a solution from logic and not emotion. This has come in handy as a "mediator" in many cases because it's easy for me to stay on the fence and travel from shoe to shoe so to say without getting emotionally attached to one side or the other. On the other hand it can cause arguments because I'm not always able to understand why someone is so emotional about something that would be insignificant to me.
I consider focus one of my strongest suites. It's allowed me to brute force my way though all kinds of problems and situations. My only trouble with it has been controlling it and being able to get motivated enough about a particular activity to maintain focus even though I might not be immediately interested in it's outcome. If you have tricks to keep yourself 'on track' please let me know. I'd be willing to give anything a try again.
If you've made it this far, thank you for your kind consideration in reading this familiarly verbose "I'm an aspie comming out" post. I appreciate your attention and I'm looking forward to meeting other aspies and learning how they overcome some of the obstacles it creates and learn how they wield some of the powers it gives.
30 Sep 2008, 10:10 am
but no support for adults in NZ yet! b
