Executive dysfunction and its relation to AS

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I don't want to interrupt the flow here, but that is an accurate/interesting description of this phenomenon-- (I altered this a little)--> "a natural lack in the sense of time." This is central/ fundamental to my experience of this. One has to, (at least in my experience), to force things to happen ( the acquisition of goals) by 'somehow' watching what other people naturally do. You then now have the model in your head, and btw. this is a disturbing/ ("weird") experience, as you intellectualize the motions of life in this way, by forcing things to happen. It's as if the natural motive force is absent and you mechanically insert " to drive forward command" by this M.O. It's always been sink or swim with this due to a lack in "a natural sense." It's like like you're watching as an observer and you don't know or "feel" the alien motivations and supply this by other means.

On this one side of the coin it's a profoundly dehumanizing experience. If you think a lot and compare yourself to others, you sense something is fundamentally missing here about yourself. This has been my experience since the beginning of "time."


But, I wonder if ADHD is the core for the OP, though, Verdandi. What struck me hard was the near non existent working memory, "out of site out of mind" in the opening salvo here. That has the earmarks of ASD.... ?

Last edited by Mdyar on 17 Jul 2011, 9:51 am, edited 1 time in total.

I certainly have that issue to some extent, which does not help the depression....but even so people still like to tell me how I need to put more effort into every aspect of my life, without understanding that its much easier said then done for me a lot of the time.

I don't quite understand the distinction you're making by putting the word "natural" in there.



I have had this problem with time sense all along but I had no idea that I sensed time differently from other people. I wasn't aware enough of others to discern that they had something in that regard that I was lacking.



An impaired working memory is one of the known deficits in ADHD.

The "understanding of time" or 'the feel of time' has a strong unconscious componet with people. I was contrasting or illustrating my experience with this in the example.

That is a scary thought with ADHD being down this low on a spectrum executive d. I've never heard it as being this low.

Okay, thanks.



How do you mean?

This page discusses the deficits in ADHD: http://www.chrisdendy.com/executive.htm

I don''t know. Maybe my bias is such that finding someone as impaired or disabled as an adult as in the author of this thread, would be ASD stuff.

I can see it in younger folk as they are delayed, but catch up later, and sometime much later from my understanding of this.... but I don't know..... as you seem to be good researcher on this site.

I've improved in some areas myself with age, but I think I've suffered greater impairments from SCT. It slows you down in processing speed and this is bad enough without this. I've read somewhere that if ADHD is a 'storm then an ASD is a *hurricane*. It was an online query of "what's the difference beween the two."

Maybe, but only as a comparison with autism; I'd venture to say that mild aspergers and a moderate to bad case of PI/SCT might be on equal footing. I've read of cases of having post traumatic stress disorders as a result of ADHD.... (I believe it).

ADHD can be extremely impairing all on its own. What gives it better outcomes is availability of effective treatment.

I do know that when I was investigating ADHD last year that I ultimately felt that my impairments exceeded what would be expected of ADHD, at least the level of symptoms I have - but I was able to compare my symptoms to a couple of people who have severe ADHD (and I do not), and my overall impairment exceeds theirs even though my symptoms didn't approach theirs in severity.

Since I had already considered that I might be autistic a few years ago, I looked into it again, and it looked like that was the case (and I've had it confirmed).

But I think that there's a tendency to minimize what ADHD can do, and people tend to view it as not being as severe as it really is, and it's actually pretty severe. Probably 90% of the adults who were undiagnosed as children remain undiagnosed, and the 10% who are diagnosed are likely mostly those who are less severe and thus have more opportunities to access medical care.

Anyway, I'm not trying to say the OP has ADHD or ASD or doesn't have either or both. Just putting information out there.

One of Dr. Barkley's videos seems to describe my situation almost perfectly:

ADHD motivation

I imagine then that I probably do have ADHD. It's interesting that I never even considered the possibility before. I've know since I was perhaps 13 that I likely had AS after seeing a documentary about it on TV. It was the first time in my life that I had ever heard of something that might explain the way I was. As I grew older and the impact of many of the problems grew worse, I just assumed that it must be the AS doing its work on me. My assumption was that ADHD was a minor condition by comparison. I'm thinking that this may be because many people in our culture tend to minimize the effects, or even dismiss the existence of ADHD. But what I'm hearing in the videos does sound just like me.

I suppose the severity of my disability could be a result of having both conditions. Each condition brings with it a constellation of life impairments; the combination of the two results in an even more comprehensive disability. That makes sense to me. I have reviewed the diagnostic criteria again for both conditions and I'm absolutely convinced that I would have been diagnosed with both conditions as a child if I had been seen by a competent clinician. Fast forward 15 years, and I have learned to cope with at least some of the problems, to a degree that might put me in a diagnostic hazy zone. In any case, I'm quite disabled where it counts: I can't get and sustain a job with the demands that are placed on me in the modern economy, so if there isn't any remedy for my cognitive deficits, then I'm quite certain that I'll need some kind of ongoing support to survive. I'm not yet ready to give up on the possibility that I could learn to cope somehow, but I'm not aware of any "cure" for these problems, either.

If anyone is aware of any sort of treatment that might result in an improvement in my condition, I'd be certainly be interested in hearing about it.