After learning of AS did you look back on your childhood?
Obviously for those who were diagnosed later in adulthood perhaps you looked back on your childhood and saw traits etc. So I'm curious looking back what did you see. Anything specific besides an answer for social issues? I was looking at an old report card that mention I loved learning and everyone wanted to be "my learning partner" and me being obsessive with learning was becoming contagious by years end LOL! So I've always had an interest in learning which explains my special interest and it kind of makes me sad inside that WOW! I behaved then as I do now for better or worse.
I looked back on my childhood a lot. It's funny, my child hood has always been something I was desperate to forget. Whenever I thought about it, all that really came to mind was all the frustration, self injury, lonliness, and my obsessive drawing and video game playing. I tried to tell myself I wasn't crazy, like I used to be when I was a kid. I did everything I could to "shed" my old childhood "skin". When I discovered ASD and was diagnosed with PDD, I suddenly became desperate to remember EVERYTHING about my childhood. I called my Mom and Dad berrating them with questions about my behavior. I made my mom cry. She said she didn't want to think about what I used to be like, because that was a really hard time for her. (whatever she made it worse IMO) Anyways, now I embrace myself and FINALLY accept the way I was and am as not normal, but not crazy either. I know I can resist self injury now. I know I can make friends. I know I can still work on not obsessing so much but I think I've come a long way. Being diagnosed that I was on the spectrum was extremely healing for me because it forced me to look back and gave me closure on such a confusing and painful chapter of my life....yay. Even writing this paragraph felt really good.
As an adult I was unofficially diagnosed. Everything about my life, including childhood, seemed to fit a different model when I found out about this. I kinda wish learning were contagious, but instead it seemed to be yet another thing separating me from the others. I wasn't willing to dumb things down just to fit in.
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A boy and his dog can go walking
A boy and his dog sometimes talk to each other
A boy and a dog can be happy sitting down in the woods on a log
But a dog knows his boy can go wrong
Oh yes. As did my parents. My mom was like "OMG, that explains your toe-talking and lining things up!! !".
I am not diagnosed (though I keep thinking about it and want to ask the psychatrist on Monday about it) but my childhood was hard to forget. I was very meltdowny and such bad social skills they at one point had a college psychology student go to class with me to try to teach me to interact with the other children.
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Crazy Bird Lady!! !
Also likes Pokemon
Avatar: A Shiny from the new Pokemon Pearl remake, Shiny Chatot... I named him TaterTot...
FINALLY diagnosed with ASD 2/6/2020
I never saw obsessions in my case. Even my parents admit i was never really that obsessed with anything. In fact i have no idea how i was diagnosed as i always failed to meet the 2nd criteria category in the DSM. Nearly every single one of my old report cards say I was incapable of paying attention in class and that i never joined in group activities. When i was younger still people noticed that i always played alone instead of with others but im sure that when i was forced into play with others i did ok. So it sounds like i had extreme social anxiety as a kid, but i have no reason to base it on. Im almost sure it wasnt because of my poor interactions with peers cos my cousins are my age and i got along with them really well. I recently found out about CAPD but i dont know if that holds any answers.
So... looking at my past just confuses me
Oh and the doctors ive talked to tell me that 'lining stuff up' is a myth and that many kids do it, not just autistic ones. I think with Autism lining up toys is all they tend to do with them. Whereas other kids will line them up but they will also play with them regularly at other times.
It sure does explain why I was lying to neighborhood kids, telling them I was "grounded" and couldn't play with them when they knocked on my door at 5 and 6 years old (I'm sure of the age because we moved to a different neighborhood when I was 7). I always wrote it off as being "shy" and an only child as the reasons for doing that.
It also explains about a zillion different other things. I wasn't diagnosed until this year, when I was 38. So I've been having those "ah ha" moments for months now. Oddly I'm still not comforted by the explaination, in a way it just kind of makes me more sad, because I was so alone in this.
L2K
In my report cards, it is said I don't follow the rules, I have difficulty with change, and everything was check marked as "needs improvement or improving while my brothers had X's for success meaning they do it.
It was also said in my IEP when I was nine I had a severe learning disability. I think whoever wrote that was suspecting it. I thought I was mild. Well learning disability can mean all sorts of things like not seeing the overall picture or not being able to follow rules or difficulty with change, short attention span, anger issues, not just with doing school work or learning differently than others. Aspies are known to have learning difficulties.
I remember being three and I wanted everything to be the same in the classroom, the way it was when I was new there. If there was a slight change, I fix it. Then I started to get used to constant changes and I didn't have to fix them anymore. I think once I got used to being in the classroom, change didn't bother me but I hated when our schedule change and I feel uneasy and I see it as a bad day I had in school. I even played with things the same way, I hated people touching my stuff and moving them (doesn't anyone?)
I also had difficulty with my friends, when I be at their home, I just stand there, couldn't relate and lot of the times they didn't want me around. But yet when they come to my house, I could relate because I be playing with them and interacting. I also couldn't see where the lines were drawn and when rules get broken, I thought the rules had changed so I do it and I get in trouble. I couldn't grasp that kids know when to break them and get away with it. I was 12 when I finally grasped it so I stopped copying kids. I also had obsessions and I always thought they were normal, I didn't seem to care about other kids because I couldn't understand why they get upset or like what I was doing. I hated kids touching me, not that it hurt, I just didn't like it. I hated jeans. I always lied to stay out of trouble but I was always caught, I was a horrible liar. I can remember taking phrases literal but don't all kids when they are young?
I was used and didn't even know it and I couldn't understand how they were using me. hey wasn't I using them too because I needed someone to play with? So therefore I was using them to have someone to play with.
I was bossy, I wanted everything my way, I hated when my friends move my doll furniture around, I always wandered off when I was little so my mom had to buy me a bracelet with my name and address and phone number printed in it.
I don't remember lot of my symptoms my mom has told me about like not wanting to be hugged by them or getting upset when people yell thinking they were mad at me, wringing my hands and flipping my lip with my finger, or what other autistic characteristics I had. I don't even remember having to take a certain step in each room or needing my food to be served in a certain way and have it in a certain spot on my plate. When I was diagnosed, it didn't really explain anything because I didn't even know what AS was. I just assumed it was no wonder I was stupid (problems doing my school work). Then when I was nearly 15 I started to read about AS and it explained why I had difficulty with friends and why i couldn't fit in, my obsessions, me being literal, not liking change or surprises (unless I liked them). Hey it also explained why my memory was better than other people and why I be so absorbed in my interests.
PlatedDrake
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Joined: 25 Aug 2009
Age: 44
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,365
Location: Piedmont Region, NC, USA
Yeah, I looked back and was wowed by how much was explained. My inability to understand metaphors, sarcasm, etc . . . obsessive interest in certain games, having certain toys present while watching favorite shows, etc etc etc. I like certain aspects of my childhood though: my brothers and i got along fine, played with the neighbor kids a lot. And yes, i was addicted to learning while in school; i thoroughly loved information and seeing how remembering one fact/logical process can be used to answer some random question later (math and chemistry were my strong suits). Admittedly, history did bore the hell out of me, as did the dreaded social studies <shiver>, but i am grateful for remember some of this stuff (just dont ask me to regurgitate it).
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I'm a man of too many thoughts and not enough words to express them.
This thread presents a great question for me to answer. But first, 1-year ago tomorrow (Nov. 8, 2008) I was officially diagnosed with AS at the age of 44.
I began a fascination with tracing my childhood. Here are some of the things I found:
*report cards from elementary school with comments like: "needs to socialize more", "has been having more trouble settling down to work lately".
*audio cassettes of my speech---analyzed by a qualified speech therapist as "typical AS speech in children."
*audio cassettes of me impersonating celebrities and accents (I loved the British accent).
*8mm home movies: The stim of finger flapping that I thought I started in adolescence I was doing as a little child. I moved at my own speed. I avoided touch contact with relatives. My therapist looked at the films and said I was a very "ritualistic child."
*IQ Test---I went to my old home school and got my childhood IQ score, it was 111. I used to believe I was academically gifted, but I am gifted with AS. (Academically gifted individuals often have traits that are similar to AS).
*old school notebooks---these are filled with scores of drawings and categorizing of things like motels, yachts, tents, roller coasters, houses with building supply lists, golf holes/courses, etc. I really loved to categorize and list things.
There are other things too, but these came to mind tonight.
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"My journey has just begun."
I was diagnosed with an anxiety disorder and OCD as a child. Then back in 1996 it was changed to AS. So I didn't have too many ah-ha moments since I've always carried one label or another. The one funny one is a comment on my second grade report card from the principal. It says something like I am the only kid in the history of the school to make it through kindergarden, 1st grade and second grade without speaking to anyone at all.
Its actually kind of sad. The school was so idiotic and ignorant of these things, that they didn't even see this as a problem. Idiots!
Shadowbound
Supporting Member
Joined: 4 May 2007
Age: 45
Gender: Male
Posts: 405
Location: UK, Staffordshire
I am constantly doing this. On a daily basis, I'm remembering incidents from when I was younger, just thinking how stupid I was. Often times I even say to myself "Why the hell did I do that?". I can trace my aspie-traits all the way back to 4 years of age. It's very frustrating, but at least I'm able to have an explanation for things.
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Reality is a nice place but I wouldn't want to live there
I don't know whether i have it or not. But it explains a lot.
One major one was the reason why i was held back before starting K. I was told i only talked or interacted with my teacher. I would sit in the corner and play alone. They didn't think i was ready for K socially and gave me another year to work on that.
Another was my many years of liking and collecting unicorns.
I was super shy and i definitely was not leader material growing up. I don't think i was easily led, but i was definitely a follower.
Always meltdowns in the store....complete with throwing myself on the ground and screaming (in which my mom would leave me there and go down the next aisle).
The innocent one....always a pleaser, but also a tattle tail because the rules have been broken. (this is so my son as well!) But hated being center of attention.
Was tested twice for the gifted program two years in a row. But did horribly on the tests. Perhaps i needed some accommodations during test taking time?
I also use to keep everything. (still do sorta, but i am trying my hardest to get rid of things! I don't mind giving it to my daughter, i know she will use special paper up in a minutes time or break something else...i won't feel bad about tossing it).
I am sure there's more, but i am tired.
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This could get long...
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