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Hi hope you don't mind if I just do an intro here and fire off some questions. I've never been one for 'etiquette' or small talk

I'm Paul I'm 24 from London. My psychologist said she thought I had AS. I have been diagnosed with SA, GAD and 'Executive Frontal Problems' in the past. She has helped a lot with my SA and eye contact. She told me back in January but I've been too stressed to look into it. Having made some progress on my SA I've been trying to find out more about my 'Executive Frontal Problems' or whatever is wrong with my brain and trying see if I can do something about it. She can't help me with that and after over a year we decided I would stop going to see her but I could come back if I needed to. In the last session she mentioned AS and that I should look into it go on forums. She did try to mention it about 6 months before that I think but I was I bit angry at the time. But I was/am a bit distracted with worry. I did try on another forum but I deleted it.

Anyway because of my brain troubles I can't remember far back like my childhood. But as far as I remember, which is misty, I didn't have real friends growing up. I was just around people some of the time, and some people were friendly to me, but the point is I didn't know how to be a friend. But generally I hated school/adolescence and became isolated several times and was bullied for being different. Back then I didn't want or need real friends it was enough just to be around people some of the time. At 20+ I realised I was missing something and I was very isolated. I needed to figure out how to make friends. A year ago I took steps that eventually enabled me to make friends with fellow SA peeps. I have two good friends who I see regularly. It took months to make that feeling go away that they were going to reject me. I’m really amazed I did it.

My friends don't think I have AS. I can understand that I guess. I’ve sort of learn how to be normal they don't know what I was like, though I've told them. Also because we are SA I think we understand each other better.

I recently asked (interrogated) my parents about my childhood for a letter to my doctor. It was so weird hearing this stuff. I didn't engage with the other children and didn't follow instructions of the teacher. I was in my own world and would wander out of class often. I generally liked to wander and would talk to strangers. I was always putting things in my mouth like mud. I caught hepatitis from it. What is also weird is apparently I was seen to by a string of psychologists, I thought my shrink was the first one. It makes me wonder why I wasn't diagnosed with something sooner. I suppose because they were moving to different countries, maybe they didn't know about AS. I don't know how well it was understood in the 80's.

That is it for now. I hope that is not too long I can go on and on.

These are the questions I want to ask:

1. Can you do anything to get rid of the anxiety and random thoughts? I get negative thoughts but also random stuff just lots of different things at once. I can pace at night for hours before I can go to bed. I pace to think but also when this happens.

2. Do you get a strong feeling like you want to be alone sometimes, or general strong feelings that you want something to be a certain way?

3. I noticed reading stuff from AS people that you are all really coherent. Is it a myth that AS are not coherent? I heard about verbal fluency. If it is what I think it is I don't think I have a problem with that. I do get tongue tied because of SA.

4. Do things or people make you nervous / uncomfortable even though it might not be to do with you? I don't like ringing/clicking noises. Neurotic people like my Parents make me nervous. Also I feel uncomfortable when I’m not really sure how so people are feeling and I think they are angry. I can't work in offices, even the psychiatrist said so. This for many reasons but to do with is I can't cope with a lot of cross chat and basically can't work unless I'm completely alone.

5. Do you find it hard to know when to join in a conversation? I find I only interrupt. It is really weird it shouldn't be that hard should it. It is hard to find the moment, some people barely stop. Sometimes I just respond. I do understand that small talk is important but sometimes I just want to be me and talk about real stuff. Weird thing is although I can talk quite a bit I can't actually start until the other person(s) talked a little bit other than greetings. Not many people know this because they just talk but my shrink used to try saying nothing at the start many times.

6. Do you learn best teaching yourself?

7. Is it fair calling our interests limited/narrow? I'm interested in programming and that is really broad. But I'm generally curious about many problems. In fact aren't neurotypicals limited with careers and stuff. I don't get careers. I want it to be like the renaissance so you could be a surgeon and an architect or whatever at the same time. Just do what interests you at the time. I like creative stuff too. Unfortunately my brain troubles are making it more difficult to be creative nowadays.

8. Do any of you have trouble driving? I passed my test third time lucky. But I stopped not long after. I can't do it. I can't really travel far anyway because I get lost. I get things muddled up so I don't feel safe. I just hate it anyway. I haven't driven in ages.

Thank you. I think that is enough though now. I have many, many questions still to come.

Paul:)

To answer your questions:

1. Working on your interests certainly helps.

2. YEP!

3. That has historically been the case. I didn't hear that STUPID myth about AS people not being coherent. Asperger said little kids were speaking like they were professors! That sounds pretty coherent to me. I learned the word articulate before I was 6, because people said I was articulate.

4. YEP!

5. YEP!

6. YEP!

7. NOPE! My first interest was ELECTRONICS! I later specialized into a kind of sub specialty COMPUTERS! We are not alone in having such broad interests.

8. I don't, but many others here do. That may have to do with your executive problems.

So what kind of brain problems do you have?

Steve

Welcome, Paul! I have the same problem judging when the right time to enter a conversation with a group of people is. Like you said, I always feel like I'm interrupting. The only advice I can give is to start by adding to the conversation when you have something to say about the topic they are currently discussing. For instance: If they're talking about movies, you probably wouldn't want to blurt out something about baseball, seemingly, out of the blue.

Congratulations on being able to maintain your two friendships! You must be doing something right.

Welcome. You will find that we are all unique, so you will likely get a bunch of different answers from different people.

I take benzos and am a huge fan of them - had life-crushing negative-thinking insomnia before Klonopin, now I sleep just fine.



Definitely



Yes it is an unfortunate myth. This is a spectrum, and currently it is viewed as autism with less-verbal functioning at one end and AS (which by definition means no verbal or speech delays) at the other end. There are many of us on the spectrum (OTS) with hyperlexia. Check out wikipedia and all its links.




That's a pretty diagnostic paragraph for AS, IMO. In other words, YES to all.



Yep.



You betcha.



No it's not fair or true. Everybody is different in this respect also. You'll find much more information about this if you read more of the posts on the board. I happen to be like you in this respect - good at a lot of things because my interests change very rapidly so I know a little about a lot, whereas others may be opposite.



Yes.

BTW, I believe your "brain troubles" might also be known more commonly as executive function disorder. That one's also on wikipedia. Have fun reading!

1. If you keep thinking of whats making you anxious it wont go away, unless you deal with whats bothering you. Usually when im thinking of what could go bad or wrong, it never ends up being as bad as i think, plus being calm usually makes everything easier. Its easier said than done but it helps me.
2. YES, like in the middle of socializing, or around people, happens me all the time. As much as I try to help this from happening, it happens every once in a while. But most of the people Im around dont seem bothered or weirded out, they just let me be for a while, partly because i think even NT's can feel this way at times.

3. YES, although when stuff overwhelms me(damn my executive function[damn it sounds weird saying that]) I can say stuff that hasn't much thought into it, or words that mean very little without context in a reply/statement. This happens to NTs as ive seen, but usually not as often.

4. YES, they can, but usually I end up thinking of things that can/would make anyone nervous. The less i think about whats bothering me and try to get on with the situation, the easier it is for the nervousness goes away. Although even I cant stop this feeling completely all the time.

5. Often. But ive noticed that happens in many conversation, if the topic is generally more interesting and not that rudely interrupted, people will stop talking and listen to it. But its sometimes difficult to appeal to the general conversation and not be noticed negatively for 'interupting'.

6. Unless the teacher is very good at explaining things, but generally yes.

7. Our obsessions can be, but I find many things interesting.

8. Not at all, I drive manual too.


I think learning to concentrate better can help with the executive functioning. Learning to focus on music, reading, guitar, etc can help when your trying to remember something, pay attention to some instructions/conversation, explaining something.

And I know what you mean about friends not really believing you, its happened to me but it bothers me less now that i know it doesn't matter anyway.

Thank you everyone.

Yeh I sort of know this from my SA but I'm dealing with something different, it is not all bad thought just really random stuff with no relevance, my head full up I can't get rid of it.



It doesn't seem that simple to me. This is more than that I believe. They said it usually happens when somebody is hit on the head. Believe me I've tried to help my concentration. But I get extreme brain haze/overload. It is not just a question of being distracted. I'm still looking into it. I realize now that aspie might have some deficiency there but for the time being I treating it as something different because it is such a problem to me. Basically I'm slow for my intelligence if that makes sense. Also the guy said that my dyslexia is probably less if not non-existent but they might have confused part of this problem with that because the test for that is not as extensive and doesn’t last at long. Still it doesn’t mean that the current diagnosis is right either.



Yep my curiosity moves quickly. I often just go to the part that interests me and work backward. I also like cooking, Art martial arts. What I don’t get is people think that if your automatically into computers you’re into computer games, etc.


Yeh because my sister told me to read Silent Incident of a Dog in the Nighttime I didn't really like it. The boy in it came across incoherent. That what makes me think people think of us as incoherent.


I don't know about baseball Sometimes I think I'm being relevant. I guess I'm more abstract. I have a habit of saying something then realizing they don't get it because I haven't explained how I got there. Though the relevance thing really annoys me, like when I was in doing English lit in high school they never valued what I wrote.


I did some embedded systems in University. It was interesting but there weren't enough emulators and people fought over them so I hated being there. I quit soon after I'd had enough. I'm interested still in Programmable ICs and Programmable Logic.


Basically I have long and short term memory problem. I can't remember my childhood at all. It isn't a fixed point but before around 10 I can barely remember anything at all. But like I said there is stuff last week that I've completely forgotten. If you think of a memory leak it is like that. My brain basically crashes, gets overwhelmed easily. My concentration is terrible. But it is not the type of concentration where you are being distracted. I get that but this is where your brain can't cope. Sometime I go in what I call a 'null' state. Basically nothing matters I’m not really there, unresponsive, sounds around me are meaningless. The test I did was 3 years ago. I thought all my problems were one thing at the time. I didn't mention something because I didn't realize they were different from other people. I didn't realize the people 'see' things in their head. If you ask me to visualize a tree I can't. I can only see things in dreams. It is hard to explain how I think. But there isn't images popping up. I think this is the key, I think images are really important part of thinking I just need to access them somehow. With all these amazing abilities you hear about Aspie it make me feel kind of dumb.

I just broke my computer table

1. Can you do anything to get rid of the anxiety and random thoughts?
My GP gave Prozac for anxiety. I don't know how to deal with random throughts though.

2. Do you get a strong feeling like you want to be alone sometimes, or general strong feelings that you want something to be a certain way?
Yes, usually when everything is bothering me (background noise when I'm trying to concentrate or relax etc.) or if I'm feeling sad. I like being alone though.

3. I noticed reading stuff from AS people that you are all really coherent. Is it a myth that AS are not coherent? I heard about verbal fluency. If it is what I think it is I don't think I have a problem with that. I do get tongue tied because of SA.
I have problems with fluency when I'm speaking (because I'm nervous) but my tutors have said my written work is very fluent / coherant. With me it depends on the style of writing as well, I can write fluently and coherently when I'm writing essays, but online I'm not as coherant I don't think.

4. Do things or people make you nervous / uncomfortable even though it might not be to do with you? I don't like ringing/clicking noises.
There are a lot of noises like that that I don't like as well.
People make me nervous all the time, I seem to be in a constant state of confusion when I go out and I'm around people.

5. Do you find it hard to know when to join in a conversation?
I've improved a lot through practice but I'm still not very good with conversations. I can only really talk properly with just one person. When there are two or more other people in the conversation I always end up just stood there because I never know when to speak.

6. Do you learn best teaching yourself?
With most things, yes

7. Is it fair calling our interests limited/narrow?
I'm interested in history and animals which are very broad. Although I usually focus one one area at a time (I used to be obsessed with the Fire of London 1666 for example, which is narrower.)

8. Do any of you have trouble driving?
I've never tried. Probably because I'd be too nervous though. I get hypersensitive to everything when I'm in the car.

I had a similar problem. I worked around that time to try to recover it. But it was like I was a different person. I DID find that a NUMBER of autistics have the SAME problem, generally around 8-9.

Have you tried to remember elements of your past, etc? Heck, I managed to remember every school, every toy, every pasttime, accomplishment, etc.... Not ALL, but a LOT! That took me like 3 days(maybe 6-12 hours)

HECK, I even remember some things from when I was like 2 months old. YET, I STILL have to ask when I did things like first talked.(It is now down to 9-10 months, and I was walking by then also(Luckily, a picture was taken, and made my mother remember)), or first read(now down to 4 or, probably, earlier. Luckily I remembered an event where I was reading, and my mother remembered that the event happened when I was 4 years 3 months old).



HEY, my mind USED to be like a giant computer! NOW, it is like a little CHEAP computer hooked up to a network with stupid low speed media. That network, however, is that SAME giant computer I used to have, and it seems to still have EVERYTHING on it! So it is harder to get to, and takes longer, but I can get to it.



Actually, I stopped REALLY concentrating around 9 or so. After that, I got headaches. ALSO, it turns out that science says stress KILLS short term memory!



It turns out that NT people sometimes have ganzfield meditation. A lot of that happens to autistic people and others see it as a person with a blank stare. Frankly, with me, I WANT to be unresponsive, and have sounds meaningless. I generally avoid this at work, and may do it at traffic lights! But HEY, its nice. It only APPEARS that you aren't thinking, etc...



Actually, I am similar. I have described it as a feeling. I could mentally fly over a city, see the streets, enter stores, navigate around the store, and plan out where I should go from my bedroom(or while I'm driving!), and do my chores all at once with the shortest route, yet it isn't really like I am seeing. If I get really distracted, like reading a good book, it is like I am watching a movie. YET, I wouldn't really call it photographic.



HEY, JOIN THE CLUB! Then again, there are a LOT here that aren't that good.



I can even relate to that.

This is just not possible I have no recollection of then. I remember some very fleeting things they have no time. I can sometimes place them to about 2-3 year spans using deduction. But some of my 'memories' are not memories at all they are things I've been told. I would say there is absolutely nothing before seven that is basically it.


I guess it is a definition or feeling. There is absolutely no visual thing at all. I don't get fly over’s, etc. Not even a crappy drawing nothing. Somehow I sort of know how things are but it is not precise at all. What I don't get if somebody had these visual while driving wouldn't they crash the car? Like where is the image? Dreams I do get about 1-2 times a month. Last night I had a dream about this bird but is sort of looked similar to a macaw but was a dirty brown grey colour (like a pigeon) it’s beak was as big but slightly more elongated and pointy. It taw this other bird (white with a long neck) to shreds in mid air. It was very vicious and bloody. I have been reading up on birds of prey like eagle owls recently.


I used to take sertraline hydrochloride (Lustral/Zoloft). I wasn't really myself it was really difficult with my shrink because she wasn't talking to me. It pushed my anxiety beneath so I was just as anxious on the inside if not more because of the stupid things it made me do.

I thought prozac is for depression. Anyway I think I'm really sensitive to medication. I'm really worried that if I take something my brain will be even more messed up if I do. Though I will try anything I there a good get rid of my cognitive problems.

So did I but apparently you can take it for anxiety as well. I didn't want medication at first for the same reasons but they said it would be good and nothing else seems to work. I only started it last week so I don't know whether it's right yet, it's been giving me really bad headaches

As I said, it is like a feeling. I guess you would have a problem with that, because you spoke of having so much trouble with driving, etc... It is more a feeling than an actual visual. It is hard to explain. So I don't have to worry about confusing it with my own present. There isn't an image per se, hence my reference to feeling, and hesitance to call it photographic.

As for precision? Well, there IS a limit to MY precision also. Like yesterday when I saw a woman without glasses and almost commented, but wasn't one HUNDRED percent sure I was right she usually had glasses. It turned out she usually does. I also couldn't have described her, yet I could imagine her in a room, and recognized her when I saw her, and even knew every detail I ever heard about or regarding her. When I remember a store plan, I can tell you relative differences, but not absolute measurements.

Anyway, I can traverse the internal map while driving without anyone even knowing. It is almost like chewing gum while walking, talking while driving, or using your tounge to move food in your mouth when you chew. I'm not sure how the executive deficits affect people, but I DO know I had some trouble with some things and worked at improving them.

Every now and then, I will almost unconsciously toss bottles back and forth between my hands. That is a throw back to an attempt to develop some dexterity and speed in my hands. When I watched a show with Leonard nimoy, I took his statements as a CHALLENGE! I can do the normal and inverse aronic benediction(AKA vulcan salute) with bothe hands. (OK, I STILL have trouble with the inverse on my left. ) Even with getting into a car, a lot of it is SUBCONSCIOUS! While I get my key with my right, and put it in the ignition, my left is finding the buckle, and trying to put it in the latch! SOMETIMES, the whole thing is accomplished in parallel with 100% success! That wasn't something that just happened.

So MAYBE you can practice. The brain IS pretty resilient. It APPEARS that one Autistic problem is that we have less ROM, BUT MORE RAM! That means you may start out worse off in some ways, and may have to learn more, and may be slower, but can learn MORE, and possibly faster! I don't know about YOU, but even todays COMPUTERS are moving more towards RAM, and RAM like ROM! You would be hard pressed to find ANY computers or similar devices today with REAL ROM! Even ipods and cell phones today often have more RAM and FLASH ROM(which works a bit like RAM). I guess we shouldn't feel inferior if we are kind of like that. You might be SHOCKED at what you can do.

Steve

Is it your GP who prescribed you? Only my gp misdiagnosed me with depression before I when to a psychiatrist. I would see a psychiatrist for a second opion if you can. Some GP know a bit about mental health but I've heard some really shocking stuff. Basically it can be a bit hit and miss don't assume a GP has any mental health experience at all. Though I wouldn't blame you if you found it hard. I find it really it really hard to talk to my GP especially in the time. I wrote him a letter to see what I can do. But after them losing it once I'm still waiting I recon he is staling for time. But I find it so hard to follow up and keep pushing.

I can't learn faster steve that's why I said I'm slow. Basically I have a brick wall that I hit it really goes against my curiosity to figure things out. I just can't traverse virtual maps. I wish I could. Oh well.

I like flash rom. I the pics i blew were flash. The guy that invented flash should get a prize sure beats EEPROM or UV-EEPROM.

It was my GP who prescribed it but a psychiatrist / psychologist (the person who diagnosed me with Aspergers) who recommended it. I'm going back to see him on Thursday so I'll see what he says then. The GP I have is good as well, apparantly - my step-dad's a doctor and my mum's a midwife so she knows about doctors and makes sure I see him each time for some reason. I find it difficult talking to doctors as well, if my mum didn't make appointments for me and take me there I'd probably never get it done
As you can see, I'm not very good at doing things for myself, I need to work on that

Flash basically IS EEPROM!(Electrically Erasable Programmable Read Only Memory). It also has the same problems.

As for learning faster? I learn faster now than I did even a year ago. I have been running sub par for years primarily because of some amino deficiencies. ALSO, there ARE different ways to learn. Ironically, I could always learn EVENTs FAST! As for maps? It takes some thought. Right now, I am struggling to make my short term memory larger and more precise. I'm certainly not happy with MY performance EITHER! I am over 40! Last year I mentally felt like I was 60. TODAY, I feel like I am 15! By next year, I want to feel like I am FIVE!

HECK, I speak 3 languages pretty well, 2 languages somewhat well, and 1 a little. I learned more about the last 3 in the past few months than I did the others in the first year. I am hoping to finish them as early as may, and maybe studying another 2 languages. BTW my goal is to learn at least nearly 2000 words in each language. With the first 2 I know a LOT of english words that I wouldn't dare to estimate, and perhaps as many as 10,000 German words, and I think perhaps 5000 Danish Words. I probably already know over 1200 words in each of the next 3.(Of course I only really know the 1000 basic words of english,german, and danish. My goal is to be able to make that claim about every language I want to speak. With luck, I'll be able to talk with like 1/3 or more of the planet in their native language by the end of next year or maybe this year!)

One more thing. I used to have trouble even picking out words in foreign languages. Today, some of them almost sound like english. It took me long enough, but it isn't like I study them ALL THE TIME. So don't give up.

BTW I am also not that great with mental math, not musical, and not an artist. I also can't draw fancy pictures from memory.

Steve

Yep but they have different backgrounds like eeprom had much smaller chunks and can't usually have as many write cycles. It is getting a bit ambiguous now isn't it? The point is when flash came out eeprom was behind. You can tell I'm full of bs lol. You’re the expert wasn't it originally UV-EP? Like the ones with the window to shine the UV on. Now you can't say that is better than flash. (I must win this )

I have to say I can't learn languages except programming languages. Actually they had this system in the uk where 'special needs' would go to 'special class' instead of doing a language. Great system huh They scrapped in now. But even when I've tried to learn a language i just can't. Weird think is my parents said I spoke Portuguese when we lived in brazil. I can't even imagine that. I couldn't speak it when we lived in Angola. I would have been about six in brazil and around eleven in Angola. I can't remember being six and eleven is not clear at all. I don't know if at eleven I remembered being six. I really don't care about that everything before a year ago was crap. I just don't want to forget now it is really important to me.

Thing is I'm constantly forgetting things even my programming. Just really obvious things not the principles. Fortunately nearly everything is open source so I can look it up quite fast. But it does get on my tits. Basically if it was anything else I'd bomb out as I have done. Like I would totally freak out at waiting tables compared to programming even if I didn't have SA. I would get everything muddled up.

Anyway what I’m trying to say, whatever you say (I must win this too ), is although you're being kind I don’t think this is AS. I’m just having a moan I know I guess I have the behaviour AS but am also slow. I don’t really have the perceptive side of AS because of this. Anyway this is my main confusion.

My parents said I fell backwards onto a rock when I was a kid. I don't know if that has something to do with it. According to a neurophysiologist they might be able to find minute legions in the brain. Though I hope it is something I can change. I don't want to live like this anymore it sucks I'd rather be stupid. I know that sounds dumb but that's how I feel.