Did You Name It Before You Knew?

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Falls into the "what-the-hells-wrong-with-me" type responses.

Just thought that life was composed of high highs and low lows. That's just how life is, isn't it? After a few decades seemed like something was always just a little off-frequency. Thought it might be an only child thing. Thought it might be a hypo-glycemic thing. Thought it might be an intelligence/education thing. All these, however, lacked persuasive power--couldn't answer all the questions. I also thought that bad luck was, or should be, an expected component of life. After all, I'd had plenty of good stuff too. Tried always to consciously resist the idea of blame. Whenever I looked closely enough, rarely was there anyone specific to blame. Sometimes. Not often.

I just came to the conclusion that life was sorta like Voltaire's Candide; just violent, confusing, fleeting, and made no sense whatever. Whatever happened, picked myself up soldiered on.

"feel like I need to take a screwdriver and fix all the loose pieces in my head"....
is what I used to say in my teenage years.

at age 20, I was diagnosed by a psych with "Generalized Anxiety Disorder" and "Social Phobia". Here, have some Paxil. Gulp. That didn't last long.

Not that I necessarily doubt the diagnosis, but I've come to understand there was a great deal more to it than that.

I am trying shed more light on Asperger's and what role it may play with me. Everything I understand about it tells me that I've got it for sure. It explains too much and in too great a detail not to have some credible influence. But I want to get some professional opinions and learn more about it.

First, I should share i've never been actually diagnosed. But, it's very probable. My nephew has been diagnosed. He names it, even though he knows the name for it, but he calls himself Dark Nore (maybe Dark North, but it sounds like Nore).

I, as a child, just thought nobody liked me. I didn't care why. I just thought it was wrong. My best friend was actually my stuffed dog, Fluffy. I still sleep with her at night or I get nightmares. I did have a best friend human growing up, but she didn't understand me. Nobody did but Fluffy.

When I got older, I decided I had to have been adopted. But, all the papers explaining my birth seemed legitimate, and I have so many physical qualities of my father that they had to be my parents. So my mom being abducted by aliens theory was squashed.

I spent many years not thinking anything was wrong with me, but the world around me. My mom kept swearing something was wrong with me because of the temper tantrums being so hard core, but I kept swearing something was wrong with my sister for causing me all that anger. In the end, we were both right.

Then I spent years saying I was strange or weird, not because I thought so, but because that's what people would tell me out of love. I always thought it was related to my high IQ. I figure I was book smart, so I was lacking on the common sense and social skills like many geniuses had in the past.

When my nephew showed some strange signs that my friend thought was autism, I still didn't know about Aspergers or PDD-NS. I knew whatever he had was also what I had because we were too similar. That's when I decided I must have something wrong with me. I never gave it a name, but I just referred to it as whatever it is my nephew and I have.

When he was diagnosed Aspergers, I still thought it was wrong. I researched and researched to find out I was, for once in my life, wrong. Actually, not so much because we'd be PDD-NS because we both had a speech delay. So hah!

Actually, I came to this forum to learn more about my nephew, and it's therapeutic to see other people have the same or similar experiences as myself.

From Fairy Tales, do you (others here) consider yourself a Changeling? I do even still.

I guess same as those who have written, in essence, 'From another place...?' Yes?

Same here, but the more I read about schizophrenia the more it became obvious that I'm not schizophrenic.

I'm still not diagnosed, though, and maybe I never will be, maybe because I'm not AS at all, but sometimes I also have referred to myself as the "Catman" . No, really. I saw and still see a lot of cat-like traits in me. I guess it comes from the fact that from 6 to 20 I've lived with a cat (RIP my dear) and it was like we shared a common universe, "a nation of two" in which no one else fitted. You know, like here we are, we can see the others, but who are they and what do they want? Whatever, let's hide under the blanket where they can't see us.

I see a lot of cat like traits in me too. I always did feel like a cat stuck in a human's body. Even my husband agrees that I'm a real catwoman, except I'm just the fat lazy housecat version of her (even though I'm really skinny). I do often also perceive NT's as dogs. Very dog like in personality. Being social is a primary personality of a dog, and gaining acceptence is the primary dog motivation. Cats on the other hand, their primary personality is being themselves, and their major motivation is food. Also, people domesticated dogs, but cats domesticated themselves. I will say when a psychic that a friend bought me a reading for told me I was a tiger in a past life, I could almost believe her.

I've seen a book on zero out there, and I've been meaning to read it. Sounds like something you'd also be interested in as well. But I first have to learn more about infinity and pi before I can delve into zero. I have some math questions, and I won't fully be able to figure out the answer to them until I learn those things. Either way, just thought I'd mention it.

In a fit of despair and self-disgust in early adulthood, I named it "sicko freak", drew a comic strip, and wrote a descriptive paragraph of the phenomenon.

I still have this stuff (due to hoarding tendencies.)

Essence of my life topic

I called it "Lonerism", and I thought it was by choice. But I did not know any other way. Sort of an extended phase. Sometimes I would be happy with it, and sometimes not. Now that I know, it is a great relief, and I will be working towards acceptance, slowly and surely, as it is all right to be this way. Might take the rest of my life.

People actually headbang?!? Well.... I did for a while... I wouldn't do it hard enough to inflict any pain, and would use my knee to make a thud sound. Unfortunatly, noone ever got the message of "I just want to be left alone." They still don't get the message for the most part, but at least now I can somewhat tolerate it.

I think I just called it being strange, or abnormal. Nothing special.

But when I got older (12 or something), I found out that lots of other people, incl. kids of my age thought they were strange, so it wasn't that unusual. But even then I thought: I am even more strange than all others who think they are strange.
And asked myself the question: What if you could be so strange that it couldn't be described in words, or so strange that there was no word for it?
(And in one sense it was kind of true, because it was before Asperger's Syndrome became an official diagnosis.)

I put it down to introversion and immaturity.

That's interesting to me, because I have always felt like I'm in a bubble (to varying degrees). I remember walking down the hall in high school, and kids were everywhere, sat on their lockers (which lined one side of the hall like benches) or just standing around talking with each other. As I walked the length of hallway, I was aware of this barrier between them and myself. It was like I was in a different dimension, like a ghost or something, and I was aware of the people, but couldn't reach them, and they couldn't see me. That was the first time I consciously felt like I was in a bubble.

Is that similar to what you have felt? Or is your experience of "a bubble" something different?

I labeled myself as being "ecentric"...everyone else just said I was crazy.

'Psycho'. That was when I was having a melt-down, or what my mum would describe as "screaming ab-dabs".

People stopped calling me crazy a long time ago. They now call me psychotic.