Are you a happy person?

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I'm not very happy. My life is very confined and I don't have the things I would like to have, not objects but better interactions. It has nothing to do with being on the spectrum, other than the fact that being on the spectrum has ruined some of the social relationships I once had.

I'm a person who is sometimes happy.

i live in dc with a bunch of nasty a**holes and i think it is starting to have an effect on me. i am paranoid as hell and autism makes me isolated. i am going to go with the excuse that the culture of the place that i live is bad however.

I'm unsure of what happiness actually feels like.

I feel blank/blah 50% of the time and the other 50% is spent being grumpy/irritable. I'm quite a decent person but it's not reflected in the way I come across or the way I feel. I feel more at peace with myself when I do positive things but I wouldn't call it happiness.

I'm just me, I guess. I checked "happy" because I'm certainly not depressed. I experience worry a lot, but that's to be expected.
I think that a lot of the things that make my life enjoyable are due to my deep imagination and creativity, mixed with low standards.

Complacent describes me, better. It might benefit me to be a bit more agitated so the impetus is there to do more. Complacency takes my motivation to activate.

I answered "I am not happy because I'm autistic." I'm not sure that's entirely accurate because I don't understand this idea of "happiness" as an all-important life goal. My parents always tell me "We just want you to be happy" but that seems so strange to me. I mean, WTF does that even mean? Sure, I laugh and smile and love my wife and kids and have lots of moments of ephemeral bliss but I'm also miserable on a fairly regular basis. So no, I wouldn't say "I'm happy." I'm not sure that I even want to be happy ... it's a strange objective as a life goal.

I've been depressed and miserable with myself long before I was diagnosed. The fact that the diagnosis didn't change anything about my life just makes me even more depressed.

No, not generally. Would lack of ASD stuff make a difference? I'm not sure how to figure that out. Maybe it's characterological and if not my current discontentments, there would just be another arbitrary set of things to feel bad about. Or, maybe it's due to a messed "life learning," (such as to never to trust people, and so forth), that is messing things up. It's probably some of the both, but since I can't imagine what being another person would be like, internally, I can't know for sure which is the more important factor.

I'm an unhappy person because of my own personal life experiences but that includes my own form of autism. Autistic people can be happy but this one isn't and it's because of his autism.

My understanding is that eighty-five percent of people with Aspergers have a form of Alexithymia. For some of those people that aren't good in understanding their emotions; it is a hard question to answer.

I guess one person could consider themselves content, yet not happy. And another person who is content might consider themselves unhappy because they don't experience a wide range of emotion or understand it well. And there are likely some who have not experienced what others consider as happiness.

And finally, since it is not proven that Autism causes Alexithymia; it's hard to say what causes what.

Personally I've experienced great joy for extended periods in my life and horrible depression at other times. I don't feel happiness now, but it's hard for me to blame Autism, because I experienced so much happiness earlier in my life.

Five years ago I would have given the same exact answer as Charles did. It evident to me that Autism doesn't necessarily cause depression; it is associated with it. You don't hear answers like that in the general public, very often.

I have been diagnosed with Alexithymia, so objectively I know that is the underlying reason, at this point in my life.

However, the limited research available on people that have Aspergers, indicates that it is more prevalent among people with Aspergers than the general population; judging from the overall response from this website, I don't see that as unusual.

And interestingly those same studies don't as strongly associate depression with Kanner's type Autism.

I am not happy. I am depressed and anxious. I was bullied a lot, and the scars run deep.

I answered "No, I am not. It is because I am autistic.", but I would have preferred an in-between answer like "No, I am not, and it has a lot to do with my autism, but I don't think it's entirely due to my autism." Answering "No, I am not. It is not because i am autistic" would have felt more like a lie than the other answer.

I'm probably alexithymic as well. Lots of people with AS are, also, apparently. Is that coincidence? Does one "cause" the other? Is there an underlying cause of both? Whatever. There I am.

There is some research that suggests a correlation in problems in communication of within the brain that are a source of alexithymic issues for some who have Autism. Still, no direct relationship is proven. Eighty Five percent is pretty high, if I were a betting person I would guess there are some structural differences behind it that are shared with Autism.

The first thing my psychiatrist said when he diagnosed me with it, he said that it was rare, something they see in Aspergers and is related to the structure of the brain. It scared me, because I wasn't fully aware I even had a problem with it.

But as you say "there I am", that kind of knowledge doesn't improve the condition of Alexithymia.

I picked no, because I am autistic. I think that needs further explanation though. I do not loathe the autism itself. I don't know how to be any other way. What I do know, though, is that ever since around the age of 8 years old, I have not been happy. Ever. That was when everyone at school began to point out my differences to me. I still did not understand this, but that did not prevent them from tormenting me. I was miserable because of the way I was treated. Today I remain unhappy because, since I am severe HFA, I am unable to function at a normal level (or seemingly normal) level. I cannot hold a full time job, I cannot have friends or relationships, I cannot move into an apartment of my own. If I can ever learn some of those skills, I think I would be happier. And the reason I have been unable to up until now is because I am autistic.

i am less than happy, but more than unhappy. that didn't come out right somehow



some of my autism makes me happier, some of it makes me unhappier. if autism were the only [pure] thing wrong with me, life would be happier for me. but [also] having schizoid disorder, OCD, tourettes, avoidant disorder, auditory processing disorder, etc. are signifigant challenges and obstacles to my happiness.

BTW, the gradations in your poll rendered it too coarse for me to honestly check a selection.

I am very happy because I am married and have a beautiful baby and my own apartment. It is not because I am on the spectrum. If I wasn't on it, I wouldn't even be in this apartment nor be with the guy I am with or have this baby because I would have taken different pathways in my life and met someone else and live elsewhere. Maybe yes then, I don't know.