The Aspie Poseur

Post Reply New Topic

Hi, Diamonddavej! Great article!! You are truly a special person to start up an AS support group!! You are going to help a lot of folks feel heard and appreciated. I just started attending a support group, and it's just awesome to sit around and talk about our social goofiness and special interests, and just feel comfortable in a group setting for once in our lives. To others on this thread, here are my thoughts on this subject. Yes, I'm officially diagnosed with Aspergers, but I would personally have a very hard time trying to "diagnose" or disprove other folks on WP without meeting them face-to-face. Anyone can write anything, and probably alot of us can write a heck of a lot better than we can talk! You can't see the physical signs in writing! I've said this on another thread, but for those of you wondering whether or not you really have AS, I would recommend that you try to attend a support group. You will know within a couple of minutes whether or not you truly fit. I get the most surreal vibe whenever I run into someone with AS; I can't really explain it but it's great. And it's not something that really comes through much in writing. I just enjoy WP because you guys are interesting!! I wouldn't want to spend time over-analyzing anybody else's situation.

<waves at Unnamed> welcome . you articulate well.

Thanks, Rhino! Good luck to all of you.

One of my tasks in running the social group is meeting people who are going to the group for the first time. I don’t know what they look like, but I a can always spot them and I introduce myself. Well I made one mistake in 4 years; he was an American Tourist.

I was late for a meeting once and there were several new members arriving that day, they all found each other. We all found it curious and funny that we could spot each other in a busy city.

Also, we have people who come to the group who think they have AS but don’t have a diagnosis. In the 4 years there has been dozens of people who have sought advice on whether they had AS or not, only two were wrong. The first was a 20 year old Uni student...

As soon as I met him I knew he didn’t have AS, because he shook my hand. Aspies don’t shake hands. Also, he didn’t have a hobby. That’s the other thing, he seemed so boring because he had no interests. The other guy had Paranoid Schizophrenia, he smoked allot of dope in his youth. So, I think self-diagnosis is usually very accurate.

ya, its like gay-dar. I guess you'd call it Aspies-dar. lol. (Gay-dar, like raidar.)

It would be very interesting to go through the history of this board (or even all the aspie boards) to see when the "poseur" accusations began. I think this stems from the instinct (which even aspies have, apparently) to exclude people from a group. The search isn't working here so I can't start looking.

I might have schizotypal personality disorder and not AS, but I think I have AS. Especially since my son is (unquestionably) autistic, and I do believe there is a strong genetic component in autism.

On a related note, every time I choose "have asperger's-- undiagnosed" in my profile, within a few days it starts to say "have asperger's-- diagnosed." Is this a glitch? Does anyone else have this happen to their profile?