Would you take this pill?

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MS - This is a public forum; my avatar is distinct. If you do not wish to read what I write, please feel free to move on - but this isn't a pissing match. You don't have territory. And I will not be intimidated by your words or approach to stifle what I think or what I have to say. Do not expect me to avoid getting involved in discussions; however, unless you continue to be insulting, I have no interest in responding to you further here.

Back to the subject at hand - is anyone taking into account that after spending lifetimes learning to adapt, that such a pill would likely cause MORE problems than any it would solve? Personally, I believe that there would be greater trauma by such abandon than there is from the experiences growing up. Something to think about - anyone else?


M.

No, but it's clear that you think you do.

You would do well to accept that others have different opinions from you - rather than questioning their right to express them whenever they disagree with yours.

Would prefer to let this drop, but something here isn't right - I never questioned your right to have your opinions. I've disagreed vehemently, and I have taken exception when you choose to assert statements as universal truth when they are your own truths. That's all. You can tell me the sky is purple, and as long as you don't insist that I see a purple sky as well, there is no problem. When you try to tell me how I - or anyone, for that matter - should feel, how I should be, then we will encounter this problem.


M.

Sorry, but I'm having trouble recalling when I told anyone how they should or shouldn't feel.

I'm also having problems recalling where I asserted that my opinion was a universal truth.

I think you're reading a great deal too much into what I've actually posted.

I post with conviction - but you seem to find that unacceptable.

I wonder why.

This is one of my main objections to any sort of pill to make me behave "normally," as well as to having any plastic surgery or physical work done to make me look like other people. I don't think I'd appreciate people being all chummy with me when if I had been my true self, what I was meant to be, they would've ignored, avoided or outright mistreated me. I'm glad someone brought this up!

But even if this pill made me lose all my memories of rejection and pain and the pieces of my identity that had been formed by those experiences (because yes, the feeling of being an outsider has played a significant role in who I am and what I want to do with my life), I would still not choose to take it. Side effects are one of those concerns - I'm sorry, but insomnia, lack of appetite, passing out at random intervals, sudden bouts of irritability, seizures and the whole rest of the laundry list of effects I got when I was forced on pills are not worth fitting in.

Besides, I'd rather pick and choose the AS traits I'd like to keep and what would be easier off without. If there was something with no side effects that would make me unaware of painful noises or at least unable to perceive them as painful, or something that made me unafraid of strange people touching me and bumping me in crowded situations, or something that would make my eyes a lot less sensitive to light (like, sunglasses would actually make a difference for me if I had this device or treatment), that would be worth it. Or if I had something that translated the world and its logic in such a way that it made sense to me, that would help. But I like my visual mind. I also like having my mindset unclouded by a lot of things that distract other people and allow me to do, say and think things that most wouldn't even dare or want to. I wouldn't want to risk losing these traits for "normalcy." It would be such a waste of a unique perspective that could be helpful, to myself and even others, in the long run.

So no, I wouldn't take such a pill. I'll wait for things that actually improve the quality of my life, rather than take things that will make shallow people around me happy that I'd be like them and risk losing myself.

Two examples, from this thread. You attempt to define the reality and opinions of others by insisting that you are right instead of offering any explanation. I hope that clarifies it for you.


M.

If I took the NT pill, then I might become as bland, insincere, and superficial as any naturally-born NT.

No thank you.

Thanks for responding, BokeKaeru... I think I like some of your ideas. There might be characteristics that I could dispense with, but the interconnected nature is tricky. My experiences with medications have been similar, so much that the thought is pretty revolting on purely a reactive level... and as a musician, I don't think I'd be the same one I had been before if I took such a pill. For me, I've found benefits that make the rough spots worth it; as long as I remember that, I can endure them.


M.

Insisting I'm right ?

Do you understand what 'insisting' actually means ?

It's to assert in the face of forceful challenge.

First off, who challenged my POV that I was afforded the opportunity to 'insist' on anything ?

Secondly, how am I able to 'define' someone else's reality or opinion ?
Reality is what the individual experiences - not what someone else tells them.

It's as I thought, you just aren't particularly bright.
Read : unintellectual.

I wondered why you bugged the feck out of me.

At least I now know.

Don't bother posting anything more in my direction, you're wasting your breath with cr*p like you've just posted.

So, not only are you a sanctimonious know-all - you're actually a thick, sanctimonious know-all.

How fecking annoying !

What a pillock.

Not in a million years.

If I became NT, I would have to re-learn everything.

My brain is Aspie. That means my way of interacting with the world, handling stress, learning, and having fun are also Aspie-colored.

Imagine:
You're upset. You try rocking or covering yourself with a blanket. Suddenly it doesn't work anymore. You try to talk to people in order to feel better, but people aren't always available and usually have their own problems.

You find yourself helplessly mimicking other people's emotions.

You suddenly lose interest in the wonderful things you've loved ever since you can remember.

Your sensory perceptions are all scrambled--you notice hardly anything anymore; and you haven't learned, as lifelong NTs have, what's important to notice. Your mental filters are on full-force, can't be turned off, and don't let the right things through. You might as well have no functional senses.

Overcome that, learn to notice the right things, and you still miss the details you might otherwise have noticed. You lose your ability to focus on small things in exchange for general big-picture thinking, possibly losing what makes you good at some things.

You're now dependent on other people for approval, support, and even identity. You define yourself at least partly by what other people think of you, what groups you belong to, and what your social status is. You can't control any of those things--but now you are dependent on them.

You're less able to speak precisely; you've replaced your pedantic, exact speech with the nuances of nonverbal communication. And while this might help you when laughing about your weird uncle's behavior at the last family reunion, it does nothing when you want to communicate scientific, logical, or any sort of precise data.

You stop picking up facts and start picking up people's personalities. You probably look a lot less 'smart' than you used to.

Your IQ normalizes, with the gaps between verbal and performance closing to the average. This causes your overall IQ, which is based more on the higher than the lower of the two, to drop.

You might have the brain of an NT, but the skills of an NT have yet to be learned. You still don't have good social skills, though you can now learn them; but your neurotypical brain wiring demands socialization. Until you learn it, you'll be an outcast.

Your thinking becomes more conventional. Unless you retained ADHD when you switched off your autism, your thinking is firmly in the box, unable to think of unique solutions because your mental network is defined by what is "the right way to do things".

You become vulnerable to some personality traits you weren't vulnerable to before: You want things because other people want them; you are more tempted to spread gossip; you are more tempted to bully, exclude, and attack others. You notice differences between people more; and you're more tempted to think of those differences as bad. Along the way, you lose the benefits of relationships with diverse people.

My answer, surprisingly, is "Yes, I'd try it."--not because I want to be neurotypical, but because I want to understand NTs. It would probably be a lot like having someone else's memories of however long you spent on the medication.... Because Asperger's affects so deeply who you are and how you think, it wouldn't have been "me" at all.

There's one caveat to that, though: I'd try it only if I could be sure of not being able to obtain any more during the time I was on the medication. The NT-self would probably want to survive as NT, just as I want to survive as Aspie. There are ethical problems involved... stopping the medication might well be equivalent to suicide...

Y'know what? Screw it--I've changed my answer. The complications probably wouldn't be worth it; I'll ask NTs about themselves instead.

I wouldn't. I would not be the same person that my family and friends know

Okay. "NT" part of myself typing here and remember, all you Aspies, you have a lot of "NT" in you and you would be surprised at how much of it shows through in your posts!
First off, the idea that if one is a detailed, introspective, profound, thorough, thinker one cannot socialize.
You can do both! Bouts of socializing mixed with intervals of aloneness and introspection works for me. No one has to choose one or the other.
My problem is getting past the
"How are you"
"I am doing fine, thank you."
part of the conversation with people I don't know.
Is this a problem for many Aspies? It's not the small talk as much as keeping the conversation going. I am not in the habit of thinking of endless things to say but if I worked at it I bet I could get into the habit.
Right now I have a cold and am sliming myself whenever I sneeze.

Penile Shredding? Inbreeding? Male pregnancy?

Seems a little too risky.

Stop being rude and stop attacking me. Thank you.

Your argumentation and interpretation of mine and others' posts do not show a lot of understanding of autism spectrum disorders, in particular of the often accompanying aspects of difficulties with change and the impairment in parts of imagination.



Unrelated to that;




Awesome! That's totally what I think about this, wish I could express it like that.

I also first though - sure, I'd try it, until slowly in the past year the impact of what it means (and what you all explained so well in your post) started to become clear to me.