Anyone who didn't identify AS in themselves?

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I was taken from specialist to specialist since I was 7...bcs my mom was trying to figure out what was wrong with me. My mom was referred to a specialist in anxiety disorders by the school when I was 13, but that specialist though that my anxiety was different from the other children she saw and asked my mom if she thought my problems could be developmental. He referred her to an AS specialist. So that specialist diagnosed me at age 13 but I wasn't happy about it and didn't identify with the diagnosis until many years later when I started reading about it.

In my last year of undergrad, I wondered if I had Asperger's, but I ended up dismissing the possibility. About 5 years later, I discovered that several friends thought I had Asperger's, completely independently of each other and without me ever having mentioned it to them, which made me actually consider it a realistic possibility, and ultimately come to think that I am somewhere on the autism spectrum.

I don't know how you'd want to count that.

In the beginning I didn't: I always thought I could socialize, it's just that I didn't want to (I didn't want to after all). As for the interest, well, everyone has those.... It's probably impossible to tell if you lacked nonverbal cues (understanding and showing), without having others tell you.

It took me a while to come around and start to think I didn't just have OCD. It was mainly from reading clinical papers, like Wing's original one, and the translation of Hans', which explained the symptoms far more accurately than most basic descriptions you see.

Did the doctor say which label (stereotype) would describe you better, AS or HFA?

For most of my life I was completely unaware of the possibility I might be on the spectrum. I didn't know there was such a thing as high functioning autism either. I first learned about autism when the movie Rainman was out, and I thought I don't have one since I can function a lot better than him and I don't have any savant ability, so I dismissed the idea completely until a year ago when I accidentally came across AS as I was looking for mental disorders for my ex. How ironic...

I had heard of autism and asperger's (I studied disability for a year and a half) but I never identified myself with it. My mum was the one who recognised the signs and took me to a psychiatrist to be diagnosed.

The first time I heard about Asperger's was in secondary school, because a boy in our class had it pretty severely. I never thought I had it, because I didn't know what it was at that point. All I knew was that the "weird, smelly kid" had Asperger's and that's what made him weird and smelly. (I was naive and oblivious to the fact that I was ALSO a weird, smelly kid and that's why I had no friends). In hindsight, I wonder why they never properly explained it to the rest of the class. It probably would have saved that poor kid 10 years worth of bullying. Because I was the only kid who didn't make his life a living hell, he latched on to me. Teachers made me sit next to him because I didn't actively torment him. I resented this, because it isolated me futher from the rest of the class and i felt like the teachers were taking advantage of my meek nature by forcing me to work with him when in reality I didn't want to.
I remember one time, in an IT lesson, he tapped me on the shoulder and said, "Look". I looked at his computer monitor and he had typed a small paragraph about how he wished he was normal, and how sad he felt. I can't remember the exact words he used, but the text on the screen was so different to the words that normally came out of his mouth, I could barely believe he had typed it. It was incredibly profound and for the first time I understood that there was a kind, intelligent boy in there somewhere. Before I had a chance to say this to him, however, he was already across the classroom and fighting with another kid.

Anyway ... back to the original point. My occupational therapist was the first person to ask if I had been tested for ASD. She set the ball rolling and now I'm waiting to hear the date of my appointment.

My parents knew when i was a child, but i didn't hear about it until i was officially diagnosed at 15. At first it felt like a death sentence, it would have been really nice to do the research on my own before. I didn't fully understand what it was, i only knew that it was a form of autism and that craig nicholls has it.

Yeah, see, this is why you can't just tell someone, "you're autistic" without telling them exactly what that means. Your "death sentence" reaction makes me wanna smack all those people who try to "raise awareness" for autism by making people with autism look like pitiful rejects, instead of giving a realistic picture of what people with autism are actually like.

I correctly self-diagnosed myself with OCD, but I dismissed AS as a potential problem due to only ever doing research enough to read general stereotypes. The only thing I identified with before my diagnosis was obsessive fixations on topics of interest. It wasn't until I already had received my initial AS diagnosis and started delving into in-depth research online and in books that I realized AS was/is my life.

That's more or less what happened to me, got diagnosed NVLD, and just ignored it. But, as time went on, my friends kept pointing out all my social cues I was screwing up on tremendously, and then partially due to that, and partially due to outside factors, I was starting to "shut down" and it mirrored how my friend diagnosed NVLD is sometimes, so then I did reading, and yeah.

Honestly, because of how much attention AS has received in the last few years, I think a lot of people might think the same about me, and I don't think I have it.

I've also known other NTs who reminded of Aspies and still do, I really doubt they'd be diagnosed.

Nobody has ever said anything about Asperger's to me, but people have always made cryptic comments about "the way my mind works" or that I'm "creative" or "artistic" both of which aren't really true, they were just saying that I'm weird and other people who were less gracious or simply didn't like me have called me such without the flowery language.

It is very interesting how close one can get to being autistic without it actually being the case, but very tiny differences in wiring account for this, and the only reason autism is "autism" is because doctors have decided how intense the traits need to be to receive a diagnosis.

So the traits definitely do exist pretty frequently among NTs, it's really just a toss of those ol' neurological dice in some cases O_o

I could not identify it in myself. I had suspicions because some of the traits are there. The person who diagnosed me was surprised that I had ever been in employment. As I interact with people more I realise and understand more of what the problem is. Especially when I am a dumb-ass. I apologise for offending people, especially you Ganondox. I apologise for what I do, but for what I am I can only say sorry.

I'm 34 and I haven't got an official diagnosis yet, but last September I was referred to an occupational therapist by work. She was the first person who asked the "right" questions and after 1 1/2 hours she said she strongly suspected I had an ASD. I had no idea what she was on about but as soon as I got home I started researching and everything suddenly made so much sense. I've discussed it with my GP and he agrees and is willing to refer me for assessment but my PCT won't pay. I've spoken to my mother about it too and she's told me things about my development as a child that I didn't know about and it all fits. For me AS is my best guess and is what I now identify as, and I feel much more comfortable in my skin because of it. Still, I'm eager to get an assessment done just to finally put my mind at rest regarding 33 years of confusion, anxiety and depression.

D.

I have no idea if I have it or not, I don't have health insurance so I can't get it checked out. And even then I really don't care. I'm not in any life threatening danger. I only went to the doctor when I felt I had something life threatening.

You have done nothing to offend me except seem to have an odd fixation on me, I'm sure I've done a lot more to offend other people.