Diagnosed With HIGH FUNCTIONING AUTISM: Someone Help me!

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I am 21, have been diagnosed with HFA in Switzerland, Bern 2 months ago and, i am currently studying teaching profession even though the doctor who diagnosed advised me to study something related to my strengths since teaching profession requires a lot of social interaction etcetera.

1. This is my second week in the uni and i have issues remembering faces, but even more difficulties remembering their names. If my class mixes up with another group of students i get totally irritated. Most of them are like clones to me. It takes me a very long time to actually recognize them as different individuals.

2. The uni consists of 1000 rooms and 3 buildings. Sometimes i miss classes or even come to late because my orientation is really bad. The extent of my lack of orientation even goes as far as entering the wrong classroom twice or not noticing a certain door.
I seem to have this lack of quick perception.

3. When reading a text book i somehow forget 1 sentence after another, even though i understood it. Exceptionally long sentences are very difficult for me to understand since i tend to forget the first half while reading them.

4. I somehow have extreme difficulties remembering my phone number, numbers in general.

5. I have issues performing multiply tasks, a sequence of tasks, usually remembering just the last or first one of a sequence.

6. It irritates me and annoys me being together in a group. I try to prevent that. However when im forced working in a group or if a try to be sociable i either get treated as evil, as a social outcast, as completely weird, or people pretend i dont exist.

7. I feel no empathy towards others, and i do not understand when people laugh or sometimes even cry unless it is depicted in a extreme manner. Death and pain does not affect me emotionally.

8. Math weakness due to my extreme short term memory.

9. In speech i have difficulties expressing myself but, in a high valency when required in written forms.

There are a lot more things i would like to mention but, those are my main issues. I have no idea what to do. It greatly affects me socially and in school etcetera.

My strength according to a talent & interest test and autism diagnosis lies within the area of Music, specifically Sound Engineering (mixing and mastering) and multimedia composition (digital music composition). I started learning piano last week and, in a matter of 2-3 days i was able to read all the notes, play most chords. I knew where all the notes on the piano were. I had no problems playing at all except for hand-eye coordination which seems to be my greatest weakness, fine motor movements such as fingering.

What should i do? Should i do something in the area of my interest and talent? or should i continue with teaching profession?
Is there a cure to my autism?

Last edited by Beelzerius on 25 Sep 2011, 10:28 am, edited 1 time in total.

Autism is not a disease. It is a condition, like color blindness, tone deafness or dwarfism. Except that autism exists as an extremely finely gradated spectrum so that a person can be at any range along several continuums of functionality/ability. Most behaviour is suseptable to learning. So the places where you are weak, you can improve with practice. But you are who you are and nothing will change that. I have had to reevaluate my own ambitions since discovering my autism at age 53. I am not the person I thought I was. I do not have the innate capacity to accomplish the goals I had that involve social connectivity. I have chosen to look at those areas where I do well - working alone, mechanical/practical proclivities, sensitivity to animals, and an enjoyment in sharing information - and conceive a life for myself that is built around those strengths. I have given up on all but very structured social involvement, group project ideas, and getting more than a little done on any given day. It is not failure to accept that you (I, we, anyone) have been wrong about something or to change ones course when new information comes to light. In fact, the ability to let go when something is not working or right, is a profound accomplishment.

Thanks for your reply. I studied medicine before that, but failed twice due to my interest in composing music being so great that it distracted me and now teaching profession driving me literally crazy due to those social situations and normal human stuff.

I think you are answering your own question. You have a natural talent and enjoyment of music. Just go for it! Maybe you got messages from family or society that you "should" be in a profession like medicine or teaching. No one can know our interior experience as we ourselves do. Let things get quiet and still inside yourself and trust your own feelings and understanding. Good luck to you!

You could be a music teacher or teach pian lessons. It is most likely too old for you to ever be a world-class performer but you could still be a teacher.

I don't do well in loosely structured situations like group school projects. But I did well working face-to-face with clients at H&R Block because it is a more structured situation and because clients want someone who's serious and who knows his stuff, with maybe one or two minutes of being open to light conversation at the end (even this is optional). In fact, and I'm proud of this part, I even experimented with different ways of informing clients of third-party bank cross-collection, which I felt I had to do (and which sounds like the thing you might need to inform clients of!).

I've also done well as a manager of a photocopy center.

And I've done well as a furniture salesman.

I still don't do well at "parties," nor am I all that interested in them.

I think that's the rule of thumb, that world-class performers tend to start young. But we as people on the spectrum do kind of a have a tendency to break the rules! And I mean in a thoroughly positive way.

Still, anything in the arts, and I do screenwriting and a tad of songwriting myself, the baseline is that it's probably a long shot. Just strictly on the numbers of how many people do it and how many people make a living from it.

Maybe the idea of medicine or teacher as a fallback? And you think about it, well, not such a bad fallback at all.

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And by the way, Welcome to Wrong Planet! Please look around and see how you like it. It sounds like you have a lot to contribute to us here, and from time to time, you might learn some things, too.

i think aspies could be good teachers....all they have to do is obsess about their favorite topic (that's what they should teach) in front of a class.

Welcome to the club! It's a very large club, and many of our members are doing quite well, thank you. So don't freak out!

I have this problem. It's called "developmental prosopagnosia" and it is very common on the spectrum. Thankfully, many NTs are pretty bad at remembering names themselves; so they are usually okay with understanding that you are also bad at remembering faces. To get someone's name, you won't offend anybody if you simply say, "I'm sorry; I'm so bad with names. What's your name again?"

Planning, planning, planning! While I don't need to do this myself because I've been at my current school for three years, I would recommend you take your schedule on an off day before you are starting classes and find all the classrooms. If you get lost often, you can memorize the route in words and landmarks rather than trying to remember where everything is. It's probably easier to remember room numbers than what a door looks like; probably easier to remember building names than what a building looks like.

Short-term memory issues, or dyslexia? Either way, it might help to get your textbook into a different format somehow. Would you be better able to remember if you had it read to you? I use panopreter (you can google it) to turn textbooks into audiobooks sometimes. It's a free text-to-speech program.

Write it down.

Write it down! Seriously, it can be such a relief to realize you don't have to memorize everything, and can just put down all the steps in a list, and move down the list. If you forget where you are, you could use a bookmark or scrap of paper or check marks or whatever to keep your place.

Don't know if you can keep away from that. Learning how to work cooperatively is an important skill, and will get better with practice; but I have learned that when your grade matters, the best approach is to request to work on my own. A good "excuse" for this is that I have lots of evening classes and always have trouble arranging meeting times between me and group members. But when it doesn't matter, when your grade isn't on the line, get some experience working in groups.

Okay, so you see someone cry and you don't copy their emotions. That does happen on the Spectrum. Remember though that this doesn't mean that you don't care about other people. If informed that a family member has been hurt, you would likely go and help them, even if you didn't feel distress. I have somewhat the same issue, though I don't have a lack of feeling, just a lack of copying others' emotions, and I've found that it's actually a benefit in crisis situations because I am not overwhelmed by emotions coming from others. Emergency service workers like firemen and paramedics have to stay detached like that so they can do their jobs. I would recommend that you learn how they expect you to show sympathy and learn to do those actions. Once you know that someone is in distress--which yeah, can take a while to figure out--you don't have to feel anything to help them. Helping can mean anything from solving the problem to just sitting there and letting them vent. It's a skill you can learn, like any other.

I'm guessing you aren't actually weak in math directly (except through lack of practice), am I right? Okay. In that case, you need to compensate for the memory weakness primarily. Don't be afraid to write down every single step in minute detail. Let the paper do your memory work for you. I have this same tendency myself; I'll turn in five sheets of paper for a homework assignment that everyone else has used three-quarters of a sheet of paper to do. It goes a long way toward helping you remember where you were and what you were doing next. You can also write down the list of steps to solve a problem and refer to it when you solve similar problems.

The more you can use writing, the better. Many profs are willing to communicate by e-mail. In terms of conversations, if you can have them in quiet places and with people who don't mind your thinking before you reply to them, that's good. I have a trick of "writing" my response in my head before I say it--it helps me; maybe it would be useful to you.

Heh, same thing here. I learned the piano quickly myself--though not as quickly as you did--and love music, too. As far as fingering goes, your best bet is probably to just practice a LOT until the movements become automatic. Your piano instructor says two hours? Practice for four. Probably isn't a hardship for somebody who likes music. Make sure you have the fingering right from the start so you don't automatize the wrong movements. It's easier if you start out playing very, very slowly and speed up as your fingers start to learn where they are supposed to go.

You could combine it if you wanted. Have you considered music education? But really--I think you should go with your dream. If you can get a job in your area of special interest, that'll be the ideal situation.

No; it's wired in, and it's part of who you are. With autism, "cure" is pretty nonsensical--but autistic people, like any people, learn as time goes on; and gathering useful skills is the most sensible approach. I know that the popular image of "autism" is of someone who doesn't learn, but that's just plain stupid. Autistic people of all sorts DO learn, and in many cases faster than NTs, like you and the piano. You can't cure autism. But you can become a happy, competent autistic adult.

Not only is there no cure, there will never be a cure. Even if one did exist, it would completely change you as a person, because then the "cure" would alter your brain. You don't have a disease, you have a disability. Use it to your advantage.

All those answers were great also, a especially thanks to callista for his sincere, concise and, detailed answers.

All those answers contributed so much also, I noticed more and more that autistics need to develope their own methods. What works for neurotypicals might not work for me.

Exactly. The question is; What does work for you?

As an (unlikely) teacher of many years experience who can't cope with group situations at all I can confirm that it can be ok as a profession for those who have problems with groups, simply because you are not a MEMBER of a group when teaching, you're standing up in front of a group which doesn't include you at all, playing a role. I have great difficulties if I have to mix with students or colleagues outside the work situation, so I don't do that. Teaching can be a good profession for individualists and loners, because its's basically a solitary activity, strange as that may sound. It depends what other issues one has. It could be a nightmare to some and if one comes across as completely wierd that is probably a big disadvantage.

Yes. I can confirm that, as well; I have done public speaking without trouble. I have more trouble having a conversation with someone I don't know than with giving a speech to a group of people I don't know; conversations force you to think so quickly, and for public speaking, you can prepare.

If you haven't got a problem with giving prepared speeches and answering questions relating to them, then you can teach. The younger the students, the more you also have to know about keeping kids' attention on you and handling the everyday chaos of a classroom.

This happens to me too. I made maps of my campus that showed the route to all of my classes, and carried them around in my notebooks.



You might also be able to get audio-versions of your textbooks-- lots of textbooks are published as audio-tapes for students with visual impairments or reading disabilities. Someone at the uni library, bookstore or Student Services office should be able to tell you if you can get your books on tape.

This may seem like a strange idea, but do you think it might help if you could read the words as if they were the lyrics to piece of music? (Sing the words so that your brain remembers them as part of the music?)



I think the person best qualified to answer that question is you.

Having autism doesn't automatically mean you can't be a teacher. (Just like being "normal" autism doesn't automatically mean you can be a teacher.)

As Halligeninseln mentioned, the social skills required for professional interactions are quite different from the social skills required for other types of social interaction. I'm a competent social worker, but I don't know how to make friends.

Teachers are employed in a variety of different settings and can specialize in any number of subjects. Just like a person without autism, you would have to find out what kind of teaching suited your particular abilities and interests. (Some people can't teach large groups of people, but they excel at tutoring individuals. Some people can't teach math, but they're very good at teaching art or music.)

My only advice is this: Pursue a career that you think you'll enjoy. Try to be realistic about your strengths and weaknesses, but don't be afraid to challenge yourself.

MakaylaTheAspie: i thought about using a compass for my disorientation and using a text to speech method for learning text books. Hope that will work. I got a few ideas im going to test out.

Callista: What you are saying makes sense. Yes, in a matter of fact, i do make great speeches, i really go into details, yet concise. Im really absorbed into a topic, kind of in a trance of speech when i do public speeches but after, when dealing with normal situations im completely lost. Just as your are saying but i dont know when to stop speaking or sometimes i speak to loud.

Halligeninseln: , true what you are saying but there is a little issue: as far as i understood from my professors, social interaction in school, students and especially teachers is essential for becoming a teacher. I often come across as completely weird. In just 1-2 days im already known in the entire university as the disorientated, or simply the lost guy. No matter how hard i try to fight it off, it seems to be automated. When i was small (2 years) it all started when i ate ants. With 4-7 years i ate and destroyed paper. Until the age of 13 i didnt know how to properly tie my shoes or read the clock. I still cant even deal with money as good as others, no matter how hard they teach me math. Every person that talks to me once eventually, never talks to me again. Im glad i dont do those weird things anymore but, one of the core problems is still there: lack of social elements.