A proper diagnosis?

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Hey all. Just joined, so let this be an introduction too...Name's Conor, btw.
Im 18, and have had social struggles my whole life. I went through the wringer of the mental health system as doctors and my parents looked for a diagnosis...

First it was depression and anxiety...then it was bipolar, followed by Borderline personality disorder...I think ADHD was thrown around as an idea.

I read "look me in the eye" by John Elder Robison, which is about his life growing up with asperger's...I took a few online tests, all of them saying "extremely likely" for Aspergers...
I've always known I was a bit odd. Now, being who I am, I've googled and wikipedia'd ad nauseum to find out everything about the autism spectrum.

I feel now like I am reprocessing every action I go to make, as far as social interation goes. As if I am second guessing myself, hoping to say the right words so as not to alienate people like I have in my life.

I would go up and just say, "Hey, I have Asperger's," but then again, I have no clinical diagnosis. I also don't want to have people thinking of me as "Conor, the guy with Asperger's." Just Conor... I know that being an Aspie is in no way a form of retardation or a pathological condition, but the rest of society sees it as this.

What do to guys? I'm going to melt the keyboard if i don't stop typing, so reply away!

-C

Hi Conor.

Welcome to WrongPlanet!
Those are hard questions!
Now I wanna know those answers too.

Welcome, Conor, I am 59 and I hope you enjoy WP!

To my family and to some other folks who are likely to just continue being critical of me anyway, I have practiced my usual form of "rumor control" by letting them know I have just learned of my AS ... and as far as I am concerned, they can do whatever they wish with that information. I have told my employer and my cardiologist, but I will likely not begin wearing an "I am an Aspie!" button for the remainder of the world to see.

Being much younger than me, however, I can imagine it being to everyone's advantage for you to learn as much as you can about how to show others the unique elements of friendship and interaction you have to contribute in life and to then let them know a little more about you at the neurological level after they have come to experience and enjoy your participation and company. In other words, try viewing yourself as possibly being wired a bit uniquely for the good of all rather than as oddly to your own demise.

I think it's the kind of thing you should share only as much as you need to, but it's also perfectly possible to mention symptoms without mentioning specific disorder.
Self-deprecating comments are generally considered socially acceptable, so sometimes if you don't want to share that you have a disorder but do want to make note that you have the issue, calling yourself "dense" might work. Something along the lines of "I'm a bit dense, so if I seem to have ignored something you tried to tell me, I might just not have noticed" or "I don't do subtle." That also kinda makes light of the issue, so you can let somebody have an idea about the general nature of the issue without thinking of it as a disorder.
And you don't need an official diagnosis to know for sure that you're dense.

That can also kinda lead up in case you do need to tell somebody.

I went through the same thing with all the bizarre diagnoses that just didn't fit. And even when the symptoms technically seemed like they could fit, the treatments wouldn't make any sense.

Welcome. Whether or not you have AS/ASD you're in good company here. I went through the diagnostic wringer as a teenager and young adult, with AS as the final diagnosis (or HFA, depending whose terminology you prefer).

Who to tell how much about AS is difficult. Oddly, the very nature of AS makes the condition obvious, but at the same time I (and probably other Aspies) lack the skills to figure out what to say or who to say it to and under what circumstances.

I'm 40+ now, and don't worry about these things. People quickly figure out I'm quite different, and often wonder if I have some sort of "savant syndrome", since I'm very good at a few things and very bad at a great many other things.

There are a variety of threads on the topic of disclosure. I hope they help. My experience has been that most people are further ahead in recognizing me for what I am than I imagine, so I don't think much about it.