Thread: A Sudden Discovery

When I was a child I was a follower, never a leader. I liked to play by myself, because if I joined a group of other kids I seemed to always get in trouble. I started avoiding groups and would only play with one or two children at a time.
I didn't make friends easily, I thought it was because we moved so often. I went to six different grade schools and there wasn't time to make friends, so I stopped trying.
I could never quite get what other kids wanted from me in a conversation; I was embarassed several times and then I avoided talking whenever I could.
I was a child; too young to think things through or even wonder why I was the way I was.

In high school I was a loner. People didn't understand my humor or my remarks in talking with me. Fine I thought, I'll avoid them. Who needs them?
The girls I hung out with were the nerds and the geeks, the ones called the losers. They didn't mind if I said something strange. They accepted me as I was.
I didn't think I was a loser, but how do you tell? I was smart, I got good grades, I probably was a nerd. I loved school and learning, if a subject caught my interest I'd read everything I could find on it, until I knew the thing inside and out. Nerd was one thing, but loser seemed rather harsh.

As an adult I was still a loner, a married loner with kids. Luckily both of my marriages were to loners, it's a wonder we found each other.
I decided when I was in my twenties that I just didn't have any social skills; I couldn't tell how I was supposed to respond to other womens conversation and two minutes in I was bored. At the few social gatherings I was forced to go to, I gravitated toward the groups of men. They talked about facts and ideas, not feelings, I could understand the context and respond correctly, but I was a woman and made them uncomfortable.

I realized, sometime suring my second marriage, that my emotions weren't the same as other people. Most of the time Ijust didn't get it, I didn't care about things they cared about. I had no emotional highs or lows.
Now I am older and for the past two years I've tried to find out why I'm so different from other women. I went online and looked up Sociopathic behavior, the lack of emotions fit, but nothing else did. I cruised through psychological sites, reading and moving on. I thought I'd found the answer when I came across Social Anxiety, some of the symptoms fit, but not all of them. I used it as an explaination anyway, so people would understand I had a real problem.

Then on a Saturday in September, I was invited to a barbeque at my grandson's, it was a family get together, an engagement thing. I go to family things with my daughter and her husband, she knows my problem and looks out for me. She couldn't go, her husband had a family thing of his going on then. I told my grandson I wouldn't be there. I would only know four people and they are in their twenties, they would be doing their own thing...I'd be alone. I couldn't talk myself into going. Two grandsons called their mom, then she was in trouble for not bringing me. She called me, told me to meet them there. I went and waited outside in my car for them. I couldn't even go knock on the door.

I did say things I shouldn't have and I didn't respond correctly the way I should have. I felt awkward and sat next to my daughter, a lot. She works with special needs children in the school system and was dicussing a child she wanted to get tested for Asperger Syndrome. She looked at me and said.

"Mom, you have Asperger too, you know. I bet you would test above normal."

Well, knock me over with a feather! Could that be the problem with me? I went online on Sunday and read up on Asperger, found the test and took it. Normal comes in at 18 on the test anything above 32 is positive for the syndrome...I scored 37.

After a lifetime of wondering what was wrong with me, I have an answer. It's a relief to know why, to know I'm not the only one and to know I'm not defective, just wired a bit differently. It's not somethime that can be fixed, after 71 years I don't want fixed. The thing I can do is explain to those I have to deal with, that I'm not rude or insensitive on purpose. I'm still a loner, I still don't function socially and I have few emotional ups and downs. I have Asperger Syndrome, as Popeye would say... I am what I am.

Well said. This needed to be made public by someone who has lived it.

A person I know and love, a young person in his thirties, has Asperger's, so I understood this perfectly. When he came to us as a teen, neither he nor his parents had any idea of why he was so odd. He'd been a normal kid, the class clown even, till about age 12 or so, when he started to withdraw and show all the same symptoms you describe. I finally figured out what the problem was by searching online. Now that he and his parents know, he doesn't act any differently, but we all are more understanding and forgiving of his odd behaviors. I am the only person in the world to whom he talks about personal things, including fears and feelings that he has but doesn't completely understand. He's a "success" in the world, with a good paying job, since he found the perfect career in computers.

One question nags at me about your essay: Why did your daughter never tell you, as soon as she realized it, that you probably had Asperger's? Did she really just assume that you knew? What a way to find out! But at least you finally did, so you can stop blaming yourself, if you ever did. You seem to have dealt with it quite well. It took a lot of strength to "talk about it" here, or anywhere, since you probably prefer not to discuss such personal issues. I wish you all the best in life, enjoying it as you do, in your own ways. After all, we all find fulfillment and purpose in ways that suit us best. There is no right or wrong way to have a good life.

I asked my daughter why she didn't tell me and she said she hadn't learned the indications until last year. She hung her head and said "My bad." She admitted she should have told me, but didn't know that I would care to hear it. I'm just happy to know why I'm different and especially to know I'm not alone in my differentness (?). Suddenly my whole world has changed, just knowing.

I’m an Aspie too. I found out at age 69. Professor Tony Attwood once said there are so many of us that Asperger’s might come to be seen as the new normal, that we are the ultimate realists. Here's a link you may find interesting: Wrong Planet Forums

When I was a kid I was labeled as a ?astard but I knew I was always in the right and being singled out and scape goated, now kids far worse than me are labeled ADHD sufferers. I think they will always be making names up for behavioural types, its the human way to categorise everything into a certain compartment, now they are doing it with behaviour types.

Theres nothing wrong with not being like the crowd if that is our choice, but nowadays science is realising the chemical intake most of us over dose on is affecting behaviour of people far more than we first realised. E number additives, artificial colourings, pills for everything, caffeine, fluoride (pesticide), treated sewage water as tap water, monosodiumglutamate (drugs to make food addictive), aluminium drinks containers (linked with senile dementia), fluoride in the air we breath, all these chemicals being digested have been proven by science to affect peoples behaviour and in some cases to cause autism, but industry rules supreme so we dont get advised on what we should and shouldn't eat or drink.

I was never really concerned about the diffrences between me and others, typical of AS, I didn't really care what others thought anyway. I wondered why though, more on the defective line of thought. Like I said in the piece I don't want to get fixed, just wanted to know why. NOW I really don't care what people think of me...not much change. lol The more I look around now the more people I would classify as AS to some extent, like Attwood said. I'd say Aspies unite, but I'm not a joiner ha ha...Penny
Thanks for the link Ox, I'll check it out.

Egpenny

As I read your article there was something about it which I could not put my finger on. Then from how you had written your article I wondered, long before you declared your daughter’s revelation, that you might have a mild form of Aspergers. The description you gave of being a loner rang a bell in my own head and led to a discussion with my wife who used to be by profession a speech and language therapist. For the first time ever she confirmed that in her opinion I too showed AS tendencies but that she had learned over 47 years of marriage to live with my little eccentricities.

In discussing Aspergers and your article she made a point that, before you indelibly label yourself with a syndrome, that you met with a psychologist to acquire a professional opinion.

I found your article interesting to read. The style of writing did not conform to the accepted rules of grammar but it helped to portray what was going on in your head as you approached certain social interactions. Your writing expressed clearly what you had been thinking at the time.

That the syndrome affects more folks than is commonly perceived does not surprise me. All those conformists out there expecting everyone to adopt a standardised way of thinking and behaving are in for a disappointment. As I get older I delight in hiding behind my grey hairs and bent body so that I have an excuse to express more openly my thoughts. I can pretend that it is my age which brings about my eccentric behaviour whereas the truth is that we humans do not all think in the same way. Nowadays they excuse me because I am old, that I was never compliant does not seem to occur to them.

Penny, keep writing please.

Dv

Divus: Thank you for your comments. I do plan on talking with my primary care phys. about it whenever I see her next to get the AS confirmed. My score from that test would have been much higher if I had taken it earlier in my life. I've lived long enough to learn a few things that have tempered my response to people. I learned how to pretend too. Me too! On the age thing, if I have to get older I might as well have the perks of being a crusty old lady and saying what I think...within reason.