Jobs For Aspergers/At A Crossroads

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Hi Everyone,

I just want to start by saying that I have never posted on here before, but I’ve been lurking on this forum for a few months now. I’ve been trying for years to find other people like me, either through support groups, online, or otherwise. I randomly found this forum a while back, and it’s the first place I’ve ever found where I can read/hear the stories of people I can relate to, going through the same things I do on a day-to-day basis.

So why am I posting? Some background on me: I’m 22-almost 23 years old, almost a year out of college, and I’m at a bit of a crossroads in my life, career wise. I’m going to provide some background on my situation. I’m not trying to come off as someone who hates his life; I just want to explain my situation to others like myself. If you want to read it, great, if not, I completely understand.

Now, I love my parents, but I can’t help but think that they really missed the boat when raising me, which has led to strain on our relationship. I was diagnosed pretty early in life, and my parents more or less have lived in constant denial of my diagnosis. They essentially told me that they decided to ignore all the literature and raise me as “completely normal.” They refused to even tell me about my diagnosis until I was 12, even though I repeatedly asked to go to a doctor as early as 7, because I knew something was wrong with the way I was acting. I got no accommodation in school, due to them claiming it would drive up their health insurance premium. They put a lot more emphasis growing up on trying to make friends and cultivate social relationships than playing to what my strengths were. Everyone I’ve met with Asperger’s whose been allowed to play to their fascination/obsession has ended up finding a way to become really good at something, even potentially making it profitable. Every time I latched onto something, whether it be a marketable skill (math, statistics, computers) or not (baseball, pro wrestling, southern hip hop), my parents would always tell me to “take a break” and do something else. Last time I checked, the only way to get better at something is practice. This is why I’m probably in the situation I am now.

Some background on my work experience: I turned 16 in December 2008, right when the economy tanked. My parents insisted that I find a job of some kind, even though I wasn’t ready, and companies were laying people off by the thousands. I grew up during a time of economic fervor, and to suddenly the country slip into a depression when you’re that young is jarring for anyone. My parents kept forcing me to fill out applications, to no avail, without any real support or explanation of how the whole employment process works. They didn’t really understand what I was going through, because my mom has worked at the same company since 1996, my dad since 1987. It’s to a point where it causes me mental strain to fill out an application or create a resume.

After an exhaustive 20-month search, in September 2010, I got a job at the local library shelving books. I worked there off and on for two years, and to this day, it’s still the best job I’ve ever had. I started by just shelving books, but eventually I was given more responsibility, and if I would have stayed if I didn’t have other plans at the time. I think I liked the job because, not necessarily do I love libraries, but I wasn’t thrust into anything major on day one. They brought me up slowly so that I was comfortable with everything as I continued to move along. Also, when I was shelving books, I could put in my headphones and escape for a few hours. I would get a question from a patron once in a while, but nothing I couldn’t handle. Even on the rare occasion I had to help out at the desk, they did a good enough job training me where I could speak intelligently and get through a shift with no problem.

I left because I went away to college a few hours away. I didn’t have another “job” for a while, but I took a few internships, none of which I was very good at. The main one was at an ESPN radio affiliate in New York during Spring of 2013, which was overwhelming due to having my boss bark orders to me while running a control board, and also being assigned to interview athletes, which was nerve-racking in itself.

After two years at this school, I was emotionally spent, and decided to transfer so I could live at home again for a while. In November 2013, I took a job at a movie theater, which was comparatively the worst job I ever had. The only thing I liked about the job was my co-workers. The biggest thing I took from this job is that I’ve never had issues with co-workers. It’s always customers and clients. At this job, they stuck me in the concession stand, and all I would do would be talk to people for eight hours at a time. No big deal at first, but eventually it was emotionally draining, and after just shy of a year, I had to quit because I almost had a nervous breakdown. I also had a harder and harder time hiding how inept I was at the job overall, mostly due to how overwhelmed I was socially.

Just after my time at the movie theater was over, I took an internship working in digital marketing, which eventually turned into a job. I enjoyed the internship and got a lot out of it, but I never felt completely in the loop, just because I didn’t go to school for marketing, nor thought of it as a potential career path. When the internship was finished, I took a full time job a few weeks later (beginning of 2015), and I was thrust into a situation I was never prepared for. Quite frankly, I took the job because one of my biggest struggles is sitting through a job interview.

I will say, there are parts of my job that I like. I like running the numbers, compiling reports, and the people I work with are generally nice. Outside of that, though, I really need to get out of this situation. As I’m finding, while working in advertising-related industries, making connections and relationships is integral, almost to the detriment of performance and potential. And again, I have no problem communicating with co-workers, my problem is with clients/customers. I get so nervous in meetings that people don’t think I know what I’m talking about. I do understand to some degree, I just have a hard time communicating it.

I work for a small company, and for that reason, with next to no experience, I’ve had to wear a bunch of different hats and move through things a lot quicker than I would like to. Quite frankly, this job just isn’t for me, and I want the opportunity to leave before I get fired.

So what I’m wondering is, for those of you also in the workforce in any capacity: are there any jobs out there where your social interaction with others is limited? Where it’s possible to still perform but keep to yourself? Better yet, what are good jobs/opportunities out there for people in our situation? I’m not looking to work in upper management or run a company, I just want to find something I can do without having to succumb to the social stress. Don’t hold back suggestions: I am willing to try anything at this point.

Sorry I didn't respond sooner.

I've been working as a data-entry operator for 35 years. Social interaction, generally, is not required for this job. It's not really well-paying.

I sense that your job is relatively high-paying, and relatively productive.

I do hope you keep this job until you find another one. Don't quit this one before you get another job.

In the meantime, you haven't gotten fired, or perhaps even gotten warnings. Maybe you're doing better than you think you are. Maybe you are stressed--but you are succeeding despite the stress.

In this instance, I would just forget the job when I leave the job, and pursue your special interests outside of your job, so you could keep your job in the background until you come in the next day.

If you want a job opportunity tailor made for people in our situation, try looking up Specialisterne. They helped me get a well paid job with accommodations for aspergers. They come from Denmark but they have several locations in America and other parts of the world. Look them up to see if they're near you.

They usually get participants jobs working with computers. I get about 55K (more like 40K in USD) but if your advertising job pays more than that, you may want to stick with it.

It's interesting to me that you have some Broadcasting experience. I used to work in a FOX television station in a role called Master Control. This would be away from the main action in the studio. My job was to just play our syndicated TV shows and make sure all commercials played correctly. I also recorded our shows off of Satellite feeds to be played later.

I was mostly alone and had a lot of autonomy as long as I got things done. I will say that eventually I got burned out on the job and wound up getting let go just about when the Recession was coming on, but I did manage to do this for almost 10 years. If you're close to New York, you might be closer to better opportunities in broadcast engineering than I was.

Anyway, just do some research on the job of Master Control in television and see what you think.

For myself these days, I'm back in college studying computer programming.