Did you think your family members or anyone else had autism?
I think that she means (a)if you were diagnosed with autism at an early an age (so autism became a "thing" that you were aware of from an early age), and (b)And when you were a kid and you talked to others (in or out of your family) about autism related things that you were struggling with, and if these people "yes I struggle with that too" did you then wrongly jumped to conclusion that these other people were therefore full blown autistics like yourself, only to disappointed to learn later that that ...no...said folks were never diagnosed as autistic, and were just regular old NTs?
Most NTs probably do have some isolated autistic like traits and might well have some mental roadblocks in common with an autistic (like remembering which name goes with which face among aquaintences). And since autism seems to be linked to genes an autistic's own relatives would be expected to often have autistic traits even if they don't have enough and in the right combination to be classified as autistics. So an autistic child might find common ground with relatives about certain issues even if those relatives are not actually autistic.
Ohhh. Okay. Well, if that's what she meant then no. I've always been "different" and it was always seen in a negative light. My Mother is very similar but she had a lot of issues with self approval, confidence, and esteem. She didn't like herself, who or how she was, for a very long time. So by default she didn't like me either. I also wasn't diagnosed as a child.
_________________
"So much of what she'd thought was truth before was merely tricks. No more than clever ways of speaking to the world. They were a bargaining. A plea. A call. A cry."
I am a Bookwyrm.
Get it now?
Hmm. I'm not sure if you're aware how condescending and rude that can sound. But paired with your previous replies, it's certainly coming off that way to me. Good luck with your post and getting answers. I don't think I'll be responding to any more of your posts in future. Hope you get what you're looking for. Bye.
_________________
"So much of what she'd thought was truth before was merely tricks. No more than clever ways of speaking to the world. They were a bargaining. A plea. A call. A cry."
I am a Bookwyrm.
Get it now?
Hmm. I'm not sure if you're aware how condescending and rude that can sound. But paired with your previous replies, it's certainly coming off that way to me. Good luck with your post and getting answers. I don't think I'll be responding to any more of your posts in future. Hope you get what you're looking for. Bye.
I was asking if everyone in this thread got it now. As for my previous replies, I was trying to rephrase my questions so you would understand them better, I wasn't doing it to talk down to you or anything. When people can't understand what I am saying, I try and think of another way of saying it and I give up if I can't think of any other way and I take it as I don't know how to express it yet and maybe someday I will figure it out. People ask me all the time if I understand or if I get it now after explaining things to me.
You weren't the only one who couldn't understand what I was trying to ask so I was trying to ask it in other ways hoping the same people will see them and answer.
_________________
Son: Diagnosed w/anxiety and ADHD. Also academic delayed and ASD lv 1.
Daughter: NT, no diagnoses. Possibly OCD. Is very private about herself.
Yeah, I guess I got your question.
I see a lot of autistic traits in my friends but I live in the nerd subculture so chances are, many of them do have something.
I also see autistic traits in some of my family members. But I'm too doubtful in my approach to see it the way you described. So there are many people with "I don't know if they are autistic of not" label in my mind.
I just question myself too much to get that far.
_________________
Let's not confuse being normal with being mentally healthy.
<not moderating PPR stuff concerning East Europe>
I see a lot of autistic traits in my friends but I live in the nerd subculture so chances are, many of them do have something.
I also see autistic traits in some of my family members. But I'm too doubtful in my approach to see it the way you described. So there are many people with "I don't know if they are autistic of not" label in my mind.
I just question myself too much to get that far.
This is what I am constantly doing and I am not sure if it's my OCD like mind like what if I am really just normal and this is everyone? What if I am just weird like kids have always claimed when I was a kid? Can one be different and still be NT and not have anything wrong with them despite not being like everyone else? No mental illness or disorder.
Then reading The Difficult Child and I am thinking "what if I am just difficult and I was just a difficult child?" and my husband said that's my anxiety doing that and I talked about it here a lot and that got a member here upset with me.
But maybe I should perhaps stay away from those books and discussions.
_________________
Son: Diagnosed w/anxiety and ADHD. Also academic delayed and ASD lv 1.
Daughter: NT, no diagnoses. Possibly OCD. Is very private about herself.
Well, I put it in order in my mind by deciding:
Okay, I'm weird. Asperger's Syndrome is a sophisticated name for my kind of weirdness. It's part of the autism spectrum. The less pronounced part.
I have had some mental illnesses. Anxiety, depression, social phobia, something dissotiation-like. These were mental illnesses. They made me unable to function. With them cured I function well, althought often weird ways.
ASD is not a mental illness. It's a weirdness hard-coded into one's mind. Life with it is tough and you are likely to get some real mental illnesses on a top of this.
This is how I settled it in my own mind.
_________________
Let's not confuse being normal with being mentally healthy.
<not moderating PPR stuff concerning East Europe>
I believe the vast majority of people have violent thoughts, and have a "filter" to prevent them from acting on them.
The reason why my therapist wasn't concerned because I wasn't going to act on them. He thought it was better I talk about it in his office and make up stories than putting them online or putting it out there for people to hear. People take those things seriously. Even I cringe when I hear something like "Someday I am going to hack into the whole system and make the whole world blow up." My ex actually said this and my mom told me me feeling uncomfortable hearing that is justified because it was unacceptable what he said and just showed me how deranged he is.
Looking back I find it disturbing how my only reason why I wasn't out killing people was because I didn't want to go to jail and be locked up for the rest of my life. That was implying I am a horrible person and a sociopath but what holds me back and makes me "normal" is the laws we have. I thought everyone would be killing each other if we didn't have laws against murder but I find out that isn't true. Some religious people even believe if everyone didn't believe in religion, we would all be killing each other. But I know that isn't true.
_________________
Son: Diagnosed w/anxiety and ADHD. Also academic delayed and ASD lv 1.
Daughter: NT, no diagnoses. Possibly OCD. Is very private about herself.
I see autism in my brother (one of them) and my mom. I don't think they are aware of it though, though I definitely see myself as ASD 2. On new years my brother said that he too has problems with knowing the right things to say and conversation bla bla. And sometimes he chews on his thumb.
_________________
Change: sometimes it's painful, sometimes it's beautiful, but most of the times its both.
"Someday you might see who I really am, and it will change the way you feel about me." "Nothing could ever do that."
Made different to make a difference
whether as victor or vanquished, isn't it better than sullen resignation?
It’s hard to say if there’s anything to distinguish your autism traits from your family’s “normal people quirks”. I think whether or not it’s autism depends on how many of those traits you have and how much it impairs you.
So if someone says “it happens to everybody”, it probably DOES happen to a lot of people. They just don’t result in impairment, and/or they don’t have many other autism traits.
_________________
Life ... that's what leaves the mess. Mad people everywhere.
I have started to note some traits in close family members.
I have noticed my mum does not make much eye contact with me when we are together. I also note my father's great focus on Music which was his great interest, to the point he was able to make a career in it. I can see hints of some of the traits in my maternal grandmother, while my paternal grandfather's intense interest i his garden and great ability (he won prizes, and sometimes passed other people specimens and these won the recipients prizes in competition) so I wonder if there has been a lot of DNA wandering around in a bit of a "Sweet Spot" of the spectrum.
With reference to the first post in the thread, I have only actively looked for traits and pondered since being assessed. On the other hand, before the summer of 2014 (age 51) I had essentially no knowledge of autism / aspergers and would have found the thought of anyone in the family being autistic very very unlikely, and in fact I would probably have taken offense at the notion.
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