Before your DX or knowledge of autism....

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Same here... I could never get my face to "work right" If I was happy, it didn't show it, and neither did it register to others when I was sad. I always thought my face just looked "dumb"

I thought I was either an alien of some sort or "going to go crazy any day now".

Ah, that brought a chuckle to me heart. Its a classic "no pun intended" for an aspie. Most of my life Ive been holding on barely, thinking any second would be the last straw, and I would go crazy. Then I realized that I already was, and am finally free of that fear.

Crazy, it's so much more than just a breakfast drink.

Crazy is what happens when you accidentally slip into the parallel universe.

Oh my God I so know what you mean!

wrong planet absoutely was the crossroad for me

ppl always say i look tired,,, i can be in my best mood and ppl will still come up to me "all concerned" and ask me what's wrong and why i look so tired.

i hate that! makes me wanna rip their face right off their head, like how magicians pull table cloths off of table from under all the preparings.

Same here!

I knew I was different and put it down to various things like having a relatively sheltered
upbringing,my parents moving house just as I started high school (so I lost touch with
friends) and the fact I'd become shy and introspective.For a long time I began to think I
was 'special'
It was only after I learned about AS last year at the age of 46 that everything clicked
into place.I still find it a little difficult to come to terms with,but now instead of thinking that I'm different or even special from the rest of the world ,I realise that every person is special in
their own way regardless of whether they are autistic or not. At the same time I feel I can
now relate better to so-called "normal" people

in school or anywhere... i always felt like i was asking the wrong questions and that all the questions i was hearing from other people were "stupid"....

like i always knew the answers to tehir questions but never understood why i would get all these weird faces when i asked my question. i can't think of a good example atm

lol your quote says it all, scrulie

i've also always had a fascination with hedonism...

i guess cause i've always felt that it'd be nice to actually be able to do w/e i would wanna do.... cause it seems there's never an appropriate time for my likings... or that what i like is wrong.

In my life I've had plenty of acquaintances, but very few real friends.

I always wondered why no one ever seemed to want to be my friend. I always thought I was nothing but nice to everyone I met, yet no one ever seemed interested in being around me. I could not figure it out. I was clueless, and clueless that I was clueless! My self-esteem plunged, yet at the same time I wanted to believe that I was a good person.

I made up excuses - other kids made friends because they learned social skills in preschool, and I never went to preschool. But lots of other kids didn't go to preschool. I figured it was because my parents had never taught me to be assertive and stand up for myself. But some kids come from extremely broken homes and can still stand up for themselves. I figured maybe it was because I got glasses when I was 8. But I was made fun of well before that, and other kids had glasses too and they weren't made fun of. maybe I was just ugly. But there were some real ugly people in my school who had plenty of friends. I just didn't get it.

People always told me I was quiet. My response would always be "I don't have anything to talk about". Then they would say, "just talk about anything!". It took a very long time for me to figure out that people didn't talk to me, because I didn't talk to them. I figured I didn't talk to anyone because I was "shy" (as I'd been labeled since kindergarten), and had no self-esteem. I figured if I could grow some confidence, I would magically be able to talk to people.

So shortly after my 23rd birthday, I said to hell with the rest of the world, I AM a good person, I AM intelligent, I AM pretty, so if anyone doesn't like me, it's THEIR problem, not mine. It actually worked - I became much more confident. And I guess confidence inadvertently radiates in body language because people actually started talking to me. During the first six months, I was asked out on 3 dates. The first two never asked me out again, but the third eventually turned into my husband. But this "people talking to me" thing was always incredibly short-lived. I still couldn't maintain a simple conversation with ANYone. (The only reason my boyfriend/now-husband stuck around was because he was also a quiet-natured person, and neither of us felt the need to fill every silence with words). It took a couple of years, but my confidence started slipping again.

At 26 I discovered ADD. I'd always been a daydreamer, and apparently many people with ADD have problems in social situations because they are so distracted that they can miss social cues. At first I totally accepted this - aHA! - I thought - that must be it. But the more I thought about it, the more it didn't seem quite right. I don't think that "looking the other way or daydreaming" while trying to interact with people resulted in this much social retardation.

I started trying to dissect every situation. Yes, I'm still quiet, and I suppose quiet people are boring. So what do other people talk about? Work, their kids, the weather.... okay, I thought. There's only so much you can say about the weather. I hate my job, so not much to talk about there. I don't have any kids, so I can't relate to parents. I'm totally screwed in the "chit-chat" department! But jeesh, not everyone loves their job, has kids, or is fascinated by the fact that it rained that morning. How the hell do they do it??? So now I was aware that I didn't do the chit-chat thing very well. And apparently people like chit-chat. I don't know why on earth they enjoy it so much, but hey, it seems to be somewhat necessary to these people. Then I felt like I was trying to play a new game without knowing the rules. I actually felt myself withdrawing again, just like I had when I was a kid.

Last month I was reading about Sensory Integration Dysfunction on Wikipedia. I'd always been ridiculously hypersensitive to things, and I was relieved to find that I wasn't the only one. It also said that SID was very common in people with Autism and Asperger's. I immediately dismissed Autism (picturing the stereotypical mental retardation), but was intrigued by this Asperger's thing. I followed the link, and was absolutely floored. It took a good two weeks - filled with some pretty obssessive research, I might add - before it finally really sunk in. Now I have no doubt. Then I found WP and here I am.

I thought I had depersonalization disorder or some kind of delusional disorder, possibly severe social phobia.

Hello! I also thought I was weird, not in touch with my feelings, frustrated about not being able to connect to people and not knowing why, was called a freak as well at times, and rather hurt by that , didn't think of myself as shy but others did so things just didn't add up Now luckily they do, for me at least. In the workplace people are also a bit mystified, still saying I'm not a good communicator but at least I'm an effective communicator (so I still don't see what the problem is ) But anyway, the struggle to be accepted continues, it just doesn't drain me so much anymore.

As far back as I can remember I recall feeling different in some weird fundamental way. I'd look at other children playing and interacting and get an eerie shiver because they looked the same as me but they WEREN'T LIKE ME. If anyone's seen Invasion of the Bodysnatchers, that's how I lived my life.

I was always the kid that didn't have a best friend, wasn't invited to parties etc. And I went through five different schools in seven years due to bullying.

On a related note, I used to be fascinated with various movie and cartoon villains, especially if part of their character was that they weren't entirely human, or had lost their humanity somehow, and were struggling to cope with this. Darth Vader (part machine), Robocop (same), TMNT's The Shredder (disfigured/exiled from society), Johnny 5 from Short Circuit (trying to be human via logic and intellect) and later FF7's Sephiroth (part alien) and StH's Metal Sonic were all at one time or another obsessions for me, and I used to play at being them, wandering around the playground all on my own. Pretty obvious why, now I look back. A psychoanalyst would've had a field day with my childhood fantasies.