Are they confusing HFA with ADD here?

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May explain my recent hyperactivity- including throwing pens against my head and jumping up and down.

How very similar!

RANT

It sounds like Tony Attwood knows what he's talking about! Having been diagnosed both, I'm now reminded which parts of me are AS and which parts are ADD. I used to not be able to control what I focus on, and still have trouble when distracted. When combined with school, my AS and ADD can join forces and foil my train of thought. And with certain subjects, I won't pay attention unless the teacher is exaggerative and keeps me interested. I also get distracted/annoyed by blinking flourescent lights. I failed Chemistry because I can't memorize formulas quickly, have a boring teacher, am not as interested as I thought I'd be, and was insanely distracted by an evil flourescent light. Even without the light and boring teacher, I wouldn't have been able to keep up. When you have AS and ADD together, you get the usual challenges of being ADD and the social consequences of having AS. Conversations have an extra twist if you're not completely interested in the topic, you're mind'll wonder and you'll then start thinking (and sometimes talking) to yourself. I can not begin on how different it can be having both ADD and AS. Granted, I've probably got some sort of creativeness from ADD, but not really the focus to use it that often. When bad attention span is added to the AS first impression, I can seem rude. My mom has recently been forcing nicer hellos from me because she thinks I'm rude. No point in fully explaining AS, she's undx'd ADD and'll just write it off as an excuse. The good thing, I'm probably one of the few people here who can keep a one on one conversation going for more than two minutes. When I read of conversational problems, I'm reminded my only problem is being distracted by women's breasts and an occassional uninterest in the conversation topic. For me, if the topic's interesting, one on one is easier. I have more power over the flow of the convresation, and thus can change topic if I'm uniterested. I don't know if I can attribute that to ADD or AS, but changing topics seems to be a problem for people with AS. I really don't know, I just know my ADD isn't a severe as my bother's and my AS isn't as "bad" as everyone's here. So, it'd be safe to say that having both can be seen as an advantage. I'm not as easily distracted as some ADDers, and I'm not as socially inept as some ASers. I'm just enough of each to get diagnosed. Odd...I'm suprised they don't have a special word for having two neurological conditions to an equal degree which is slightly not as severe as average for both conditions. Unfortunately, I'm begininning to feel the onset of Adult ADD and Adult AS. My conditions are changing, ADD for the worse, and AS...well...worse socially, but better educationally (I guess). I just wish I could keep my creativity and still have enough focus to apply. Pills kill creativity but supply me with focus. But I want focus to be used on my creativity. But my focus is not yet controllable enough to be directly applied to such an occassionally boring subject as some of the things I'm good at doing. Add to that the fact that I have multiple creative interests, most of which I can't really afford, and you have a failure waiting to happen. I just wish my family were wealthy, If only my parents hadn't divorced... OH GOD, it sounds like one of my journal rants, that's why I haven't been writing in it...I've been blood-letting here! Oh well, easier to hide my rants if their on the internet, I guess. OK, it's safe to say my mind has been emptied...the end rant headache has just set in and I've become mindless. Can't...think...anymore... Oh no, what if GH discects this?! Nah, I don't care.

Edit: Thank God I have OCD to keep me compulsively correcting Grammar and Spelling when reading post over again after typing.

Yeah, I was diagnosed 11 years ago by a paediatrician who apparently specialised in ADHD (though I'd be more inclined to think that he's one of those 'seemingly nice doctors' who likes to dish out pills. He diagnosed AS with characteristics of ADHD, though ruled out ADHD when I didn't respond to ritalin as he expected.

While that supposedly proves biochemically that I don't have ADHD, though I don't know if it's entirely proven that drugs will help in 100% of cases. Nor is it entirely known how to physically pinpoint these conditions. Though I saw the same doctor again last year who diagnosed me and he drew a Venn diagram showing me that ADHD and AS can overlap. I asked him if it was still a possibility and he said perhaps but he wouldn't want to prescribe me drugs for it. I think that just goes to show that he was a 'seemingly nice doctor' (he sure does have a very smooth personality) though if he can't treat it with drugs, he doesn't want to know about it.

I'm not too concerned about it at the moment anyway. Though I think it goes to say that if an AS person exhibits behaviours characteristic of ADHD then they should be given due consideration.

I agree that neuroleptics are mind-numbing as well. I was put on some last year after they screwed me up with other drugs, thus triggering a bit of a melt down. They made me feel very irky for ages until finally I went against the shrink's advice and went off them. Though straight after going off them I felt increased levels of anxiety, a psychologist friend warned me that can happen as a withdrawal symptom of neuroleptics. I felt much better after that. Not to mention that the shrink shied away after I took an overseas trip on my own.

I have been diagnosed with AS and ADD (not hyperactive, the inattentive kind). So I assume it is possible to have both.

Kinda skipped over this when I posted in this thread before, but kinda feel the same about a few things.

I guess the light could be hypersensitivity, which is an AS thing anyway though not sure if you were inferring that anyway.

I can certainly relate to the feeling of not being able to concentrate though. Maths was particularly my weak point in the end, I just couldn't concentrate on a topic that had no real interesting facts to it or anything. Even if I could do the work. I did better at physics because the teacher kind of kept us focused with a good sense of humour and everything. Some of the topics I even found to be interesting.



That can be an AS thing too I think. I'll certainly do it at times in any case. Same with classes, the teacher might mention something which reminds me of something else then my mind goes off on a completely different tangent.



I don't know if that' necessarily true either. I can be quite good in one on one conversations if the other person is on the same wavelength as me. Though I'm finding it increasingly difficult to find people who have the same interests as me. I find it harder to talk about life and other forms of fluff talk, though that might be attributed to the fact that I don't do enough, so have little to talk about in that area.

I also find group conversations far more difficult. I just can't get a word in and when I do, the conversation has gone off in a completely different direction.



Again this might be making an assumption about the other people here, I don't know. I was always told that my AS was very mild and I don't think I stood out from other people too much. Though considering I had an integration aide all through school since Grade 4 and my lack of friends at times, that certainly doesn't make it sound mild. At times, I also wonder if CAPD is an issue for me since I can have trouble understanding what people are saying. That could almost explain my lack of concentration. Though at other times I'm surprised how well I can follow the conversation with so much background noise.



That's probably the same with me except the educationally bit, since I've yet to get anywhere since finishing high school. I haven't read up on ADD/ADHD for a while but I've felt like I've been increasingly fatigued in life and that sort of thing.

I still often stop in the middle of things and just go for a walk around the house, etc. Mum used to call me creeping moses for that. Just lots of small things like that. Then there are issues when I can't get to sleep at night when my mind is over active or just a feeling of agitation sometimes.

In contrast to this, I can sometimes get quite stuck into things that interest me. Even then my interest can be quite short lived and I just go back to randomly switching between various activities/tasks.

I think it should be more evidence of the possible comorbidity of AS and AD/HD when there are Asperger cases where it is very clear the person is not AD/HD at all, and others where there seems the possibility.

But all these neurological disorders run into each other and overlap anyways, because many similar areas of the brain are affected. I think it's a matter of seeing what the person is having problems with, and if the Aspie is having AD/HD-like symptoms and stimulants or other attention-deficit medications help, then all the better.

I mean, if Aspergers and AD/HD diagnoses are a better summation of what the person is having trouble with, rather than one alone, then I think both diagnoses are warranted.