Hi im new and lost

Post Reply New Topic

My name is Edgar and im slightly autistic. Im 18 and finally found out I was autistic like six months ago. I new I was wierder then most kids since i was little but didnt know there was a name for it. I just thought i was kinda stupid and slow since i had RSP and special ed classes and usually got pulled out of regular classes to go meet a person from the program. So ive been looking for tips for a good while on google and youtube on how to have a regular conversation and other stuff like how to get communication skills and was reading through the comments people posted and saw the word autistic a few times so I looked up the word and wondered if i was autistic so i asked my mother and she said yea and that shes been telling me this since but i guess i never really understood or paid attention up till now. Plus she also told me my younger and older cousins are autistic too but on different levels. So now im going to a community college and of course im getting priorities and benefits for my disability, syndrome or whatever but i mean schools not as fun if your not making any friends. In school before knowing i was autistic i wasnt all that good at making many friends quick and all but i mean i still had a few from my different classes and schools that liked me. Now im not really hanging out with a budd or anything on campus just during class ill sometimes talk when theres a group assignment. Ive tried speaking to a psychologist from my college to see if they could give me any ways to help me improve my autism or something but she wasnt really helpful except she did print me out the article Navigating Love and Autism which led me to this website. Still lost and inneed for some guidance

hiya omar
welcome to our fun little club
you are among friends now.

Good news is there are heaps of books and resources out there for:
- learning about autism
- learning about how conversations work (although sometimes will have to look for ones aimed at adolesecents because not everyone has worked out autistic children grow up to become autistic adults yet)
- learning about body language (these ones especially may not specifically be geared at ASDs)

It takes years of practise to improve but the good news is you can improve significantly a lot of the things we have to learn systematically most other people know intuitively, but with enough practise you'll hardly have to think about it. 2 years after I found out I had got to the point where I had my first proper friends that invite me to things etc.

I found this one particularly helpful at the start: http://www-users.cs.york.ac.uk/~alistair/survival/

Hello Edgar. Welcome to WrongPlanet!
There are lots of kind and knowledgeable people here. I hope you enjoy it here on WP.

Hi Edgar, and welcome to WP!
I suggest you do a WP search for posts by kfisherx. She is a quite autistic, very bright woman who has posted a lot here, including her experience with taking social skills training sessions. You might even consider sending her a PM to find out about more resources.

Having autism does not mean you (we) can not learn new skills. I went through most of my life not knowing I am high functioning autistic and managed to learn a lot without even knowing I had a social learning problem. You can definitely learn social skills. Best wishes to you and have fun here!

Welcome to WP!

Thanks people for the warm welcome and the tips

Welcome to Wrong Planet!

Welkome to WP

Mick

Hello, Edgar.