Question for the Aspies - Imagination vs. Reality

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Affection has to be learned, at least with my son, it was a straightforward lesson. He learned to accept, give and ask for hugs from the Teletubbies. Part of the problem, as I understand it, with physical affection is the need to control what's going on. We started with "Big hug!" and just repeating that kind of talking and action. It's a good thing too because my son requires a lot of deep pressure stimulation and is able to accept it from us and professionals.

Again, another expression that is different from NTs and they simply believe autistics don't like affection, period.

As far as echolalia goes, it's an NT function too. It's just that NTs go through that milestone quicker and combine phrases and utterances so that they sound spontaneous. People who aren't around my son a lot think he talking "spontaneously", but I can quote every movie, game, book and person he is quoting!

Aspie1, actually your post is a good example of what I mean, when I say video games can help and apply to life. It seems that the organization of society found in video games, helped you organize the outside world into a way that was easier for you to interpret.

A.S. Imagination vs Reality.

I think imagination is a part of reality because as I am typing this there are composers notating unheard concertos, writers imagining places and people and events which are not fully described yet, artists following initial themes and ideas which have not yet found form in their defining pieces.

What many of these people have though (I suppose) is more of a 'social imagination' because they are able to involve others in their imaginative worlds and others appreciate this and even pay them for it.

I am an adult with AS and ADD and I tend to see myself as evidence of what happens when a person is marooned from the social world. My imagination lacks the social component (and quite often gets along fine feeding back into itself). In spite of this the creative things I might do are no less genuine than non-spectrum creative people, it's just that at the end because at the end it doesn't flow into the social; there isn't a handshake at the end because at the end there is often still nobody around.

It's also interesting that 'reality' is often described in terms of routines and systems; things happening at a given time and in a given order. Academic success for instance is about knowing one's way around an education system and abiding by routines. Modern career success is about mastering the system and routines of an organisation. These also have a social domain (which I have not got) and yet I could never be described as someone who isn't systematic or doesn't follow routines.

All this leads to the notion that I'm doing what everyone else is doing but without a map and a script. It's a 'middle ground' which is missing (the social bit).

Personally, I recommend fine art because that is where the 'social' is looked back at from a great distance. Writing is also good, because it involves small groups of fellow writers.
If you have many special interests try to join them together somehow.

Sorry about the length - and the morose seriousness.

I was like that until age ten; I imagined the characters from Dragonball Z interacting with me in reality, such as a character sitting on a couch next to me and talking to me; I was also completely in that fantasy world until age ten, when my mom tried to manage my potato chip overeating problem, when I was sort of "pulled" out of it by realizing the problems with my health and at age fourteen when I discovered I had Asperger's; as for "controlling" it, I personally think that trying to "pull" him out of it in the example I gave you is a bad idea; I don't really have any advice for you about a solution. I still imagine it but I'm aware of reality as well.

Funny how time and experience can solve issues that at one point in time seemed so serious. It's not an issue for us in our house anymore. At the time I posted my question, it was because I was letting the opinions of outside sources invade my thoughts. When I parent according to my gut instinct, I make good choices. When I parent according to what so and so tells me, I don't.

My son is settled and happy and has a good dose of imagination and reality. He cognitively knows the difference and I'm just letting him be himself.

Reality blows. I far prefer my imagination.

Wow! Before my dx., I felt i couldn't be AS, in spite of signs to the contrary, because I'm a writer, and I thought you couldn't have an imagination! I have a fertile imagination. When a child, I made up a bogus world where my dolls took on weird names and had a sort of backwards reality and I acted it out with my brother, who i believe is a gay Aspie (he's actually classic Aspie). My NT sister thought we were nuts Maybe we were.

I still love to write and don't even try to turn off my busy mind. Beats reality TV

When I was a kid, I allways fantasized I knew these guys from other planets, and they where superheroes, and affcorse I was the strongest of the lot. I didn't had much friends, if any, but those fantasies helped me trough my early years.

As a child, I had heaps of imaginary friends (to make up for the lack of real friends) and plenty of imagination, despite a marked dislike for pretend games. Part of the reason it was so difficult to get a diagnosis of Aspergers was I was a child who like affection and was (and am) creative. Plus, I was able to put on a good facade of coping.

When that facade broke down really badly a few years ago, that is when I finally was able to get a diagnosis.

I don't know where people are getting the idea that autistics/aspies can't have imaginations. I think that's a huge part of being autistic in the first place. It's why we're creative. It's why we're organized. It's why we're so good at thinking outside the box. It's also why we don't feel the need (or don't have the ability) to be as social as NTs.

Give me an autistic or an aspie, and I'll nearly guarantee you there's more going on in his or her head that you'll ever know.

Our reality is how we imagine the world to be.

Adding on to this discussion: I am concerned about my son's tendency to act out violent fantasies, such as those that in video games and other violent media. We do restrict the content of media he's exposed to for this reason (it was recommended by his social worker) but it's impossible to keep this stuff out entirely, so this doesn't stop the behavior.

An extreme example from a long time ago: we saw the Incredibles in the movie theater when it came out, DS was four or five. A few days later, my son tried to attack me in the way Mr. Incredible did in the movies. As we have for some time had a hands-off parenting rule, I disengaged myself as quickly as I could and tried to get away - I wound up shutting myself in the bathroom. Eventually he tired himself out and was able to put him down for a nap.

Obviously, he has matured a great deal since this time, and we haven't had an incident that extreme for quite some time - but it worries me a great deal that when my son has a violent meltdown, it is accompanied by behavior that coincides with whatever fantasy-character special interest he has at the time: batman, ninjas, right now it's Recon Marines. He has accidentally hit kids while making martial-arts-style poses as he ramps up.

I am worried about him stepping into these roles in particular. Does anyone have experience with this?

@momsparky, I'm just guessing here, but maybe he could be taught martial arts. Maybe that could teach him "all these moves are martial arts (as opposed to a disparate collection of behaviors) and there are rules for what you do with them."

As for what the OP said, I was like that. Then I kept the fantasies but learned to hide them. That's how I got to be a writer.