Something happened in 7th grade

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I don't remember what it was-all that I remember is that there was this counselor that came to our home and later I had to go for "brain wave" tests. I was smart, probably have Asperger's-I was a defiante dork in junior and senior high, in college and in much of my working life. My parents are gone, I was an only cihld. I asked my therapist, she didn't have a clue either. It's been bothering me because I wish I knew what happened. BTW, the school year involved was 1967-68

If they hooked you up to an EEG it was probably to check for seizures, epilepsy, or something similar. I doubt it was for AS or autism.

Steve

I have a seizure disorder and have had several EEGs. Thankfully, due to my medication, they have been normal.

Except I don't have a history of such

I had an EEG when I was 6 (in 1985). It was one of the most frightening experiences of my life. No one told me why they were doing it; they just told me that they had to check my brain to see what was wrong. I was afraid that I was going to get euthanized like a rejected dog if they found out that my brain wasn't normal. They had me sit alone in a dark room for a while and then I had to drink this bitter, urine-yellow drink that made me pass out. The results turned out to be normal, though.

An EEG can't detect Asperger's. In retrospect, I think they were checking me for absense seizures because I was always daydreaming and ignoring reality. I also had auditory processing disorder, but that wasn't a possible diagnosis at the time.

A friend of mine had violent out burst, they did the same test on him, and discovered a non-cancerous tumor. They said thats what caused the anger. Don't know what happened to him though. Lost touch.

And that is if what happened that made them want to run that test is the same thing that made my life so awful for so long. Yeah, I also remember drinking some stuff to make me sleep

Kristen,

Coincidently, I had symptoms that NOW I think would look CLEARLY like AS, and I went to a psychiatrist about the time you had the EEG! Autism and AS weren't considered valid in the US at the time. Anyway, if you had a history of it, there wouldn't be much of a reason to test you. You could have had just about ANYTHING that would make someone think about it. Staring into space and seeming oblivious, daydreaming, sensory problems might qualify as such events.

Gender stuff started in high school and has bothered me since. However in the past couple of years I got comfortable with where I am, accepted it and came out of my shell

I remember having the same kinds of tests - especially the EEG. I didn't get anything to put me to sleep, though. I remember being told to lay "VERY STILL" or else it would mess up the test. I could hear the machine. (I was in third or fourth grade at the time - mid to late 60s) When I moved a finger, it made the most horrible noise....so I tried to lay very still.

I was taken to doctors, shrinks and counselors as long as I could remember....trying to figure out what was "wrong" with me. They never did figure it out...I was just told I was ret*d, stupid and a bad kid. "Why can't you be like your sister? She does her chores, gets good grades, doesn't talk back, etc., etc." I believed them...I didn't know any different.

I was just diagnosed as an Aspie a few weeks ago. In some ways, it is a relief...and in some ways, it just means I am damaged goods and they were right all along. I still don't know how I feel about it all yet.

Last edited by liberty on 05 Oct 2007, 10:43 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Some school districts in America keep records back as far as you're talking about.
I have accessed my elementary records which would have been around the same time (I'm 47).

It might be worth contacting the school district to get a copy of your records.
Even if all they have is records of your report cards, sometimes teacher's made remarks on them.
Back then, there was no such thing as HIPPA and privacy concerns, like there is now.

If you can remember the facility you were tested at you might be able to gain copies of medical records if they happen to still have them. This is less likely though since now, hospitals keep hard copies for 3-5 yrs then destroy them.

How about old friends of you parents? Teachers?

but as far as friends or teachers I don't think so.

Before my husband realized he had Aspergers, we had been in marital counseling and I told our counselor that he stared into space frequently throughout the day and also was frozen into silence in emotional situations. She insisted that he have an eeg done to rule out seizures. We agreed that it probably was not seizures, but there are seizures that are not visible, so she just wanted to know what she was dealing with. This happened just this year.

Your test definitely sounds linke an EEG.

The bitter yellowish drink you were given was most likely chloral hydrate.

I had said test done at the time I was 13. I was given two doses of chloral hydrate and still not the least tired. The technician had to omit the "sleep" phase of the test as a result.

The time frame you mention (late '60s) Asperger was only know by a very small group of experts (ie Herr Doktor Asperger, etc). It wasn't accepted as an official Dx at that time. As a result very few if any therapists would have heard of this Dx at the time.

1) You aren't supposed to remember your seizures (though i remember some of mine and can say without a doubt they are VERY painful, regardless of what the doctors who have never had them say)

2) There are many different types of seizures. IF you aren't trained for looking for them, and aren't expecting to see them, you will often mistake some kinds for something else such as daydreaming, or being momentarily lost in thought. There are also ones that you are fully awake and in control during. Usually they are described as just having a feeling of "de ja vu."

I doubt they discovered anything that unusual. Do you know if it was diagnositic, or basic research?

It could have been basic research - part of a psychology experiment just trying to understand something trivial. I was a guinea pig around that time for a college psych student that had a bunch of blocks of different size and different weight - they were trying to see if little kids got fooled and described the big blocks as heavy or the little blocks as light, even when they put various weights in them so that the big ones were light and the little ones were heavy.

My room-mate in college (1980) was a guinea pig in a study that was looking for a particular type of brain wave in left handed people that wrote with their hands hooked-around. The hypothesis was that there are two kinds of lefties - those that hook their hands when they write, and those that dont, and that the brains are somehow subtly different. I volunteered as a right-handed control and got paid to get my head wired. I went on to volunteer for a lot of other experiments - only cognitive stuff, I never got dosed with any chemicals (maybe if I had a rare form of cancer, I would do that).