What do you think?

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I hope this isn’t something that happens so much on the forums that you’re completely irritated with it by now. I am 25 and I suspect I may have undiagnosed Asperger’s, but since I don’t have insurance I don’t want to pay for screening unless I’m reasonably certain it will result in a diagnosis. I’m looking for some “lay-expert” opinions before I go in for an expensive, professional one.

I have always had a great deal of problems with social skills. I have been more or less completely unable to hang onto what few friendships I’m able to make. Since I’m not sure how to accurately evaluate my own social skills (especially since I’ve been told I don’t have any, so I don’t have a clue what the norm is to measure them against), my best guesses come from the reactions to me that I’ve seen in and heard from other people. I have always been regarded as something “other.” Beyond just being “weird” or “eccentric,” people tend to think that I am literally fundamentally different than they are, perhaps not even quite human. (Logical? No. But it’s what I’ve observed and what I’ve been told.) It’s difficult to describe. All through my childhood, even though everyone knew that I was smarter than all of them (they talked about it frequently, which is how I know they knew), many of them would use baby-talk when speaking to me, as if I were a young child, or a pet. Although the baby-talk phenomenon ended by the time I entered high school, the “other” treatment never really did. Among people who like me, it has been met with a lot of condescending head-shaking, a sigh, and “Oh, Mmarie…” and people who don’t know me very well frequently posit theories like “You must be some kind of robot/alien/insert some other insulting non-human entity here.” When I ask why they would think something like that, people usually say that something about the way I talk and/or my facial expressions is extremely unusual in a way they usually can’t quite describe.

There are certainly some social norms that I don’t understand at all, although I feel like I’m learning to be more socially adept as I grow older. But I still make mistakes. Oversharing. Undersharing. Comments that, after the fact, I realize are random and out of place. General awkwardness. Extreme clumsiness. I know I use too many big words, and I’m working hard to break myself of that habit, but that doesn’t make sense to me either. If there’s a more specific and applicable word for a given situation, why wouldn’t you use it? I mean, most of the people I interact with are intelligent and well-read, it’s not like they don’t understand the words I use, they just think it sounds weird. And that baffles me.

I’m a very honest person, and when I’m not honest, I’m secretive. Flat-out lying is very difficult for me. Thus, the question “how are you” (to which the only acceptable answers are “good” and “fine”) frustrates me to no end. I don’t know how to really describe the problems with my social skills, because I feel like there are so many of them that I haven’t been able to discover or try to remedy yet. Sometimes I’ll even feel like I’m doing really well in a conversation, and find out that the person still left with the impression that I’m different and strange. And this is after spending 25 years trying to learn to hide it.

Sensory overstimulation and large crowds do upset me, but not to the point where I can’t function. I get shaky and nervous, and sometimes my heart races, but it has never escalated to a full-blown anxiety attack or anything. And I always, without exception, jump out of my skin at loud noises. Even when I know they’re coming.

I have a weird habit of playing with a certain piece of hair. I play with it so much that most of it has broken off. I have long hair, but the patch I play with usually stays between 1 and 4 inches long, and even stays an entirely different texture than the rest of my hair. It’s been this way for a little over 10 years now. I’ve also always had a tendency to eat the same thing every day for months on end, or wear the same thing for over a week (only if I’ll be seen by different people each day so no one knows I’m doing it.) I have small, insignificant rituals that I do not because I’m afraid something bad will happen if I don’t (as in, I don’t think it’s an OCD symptom), but because I like them so I do them over and over. Stopping at a certain rest stop to buy a certain soft drink every time I do a certain drive. Eating a certain meal while watching a certain movie on a certain day of the week. Always eating a certain salad when I watch a certain season of a certain TV show. That kind of thing. I always eat sandwiches or burgers by tearing off little pieces and eating them instead of biting in. I always eat the crust around the bread first, then the white part after. I’m 25, but I still have an attachment to my teddy bear that’s frankly unhealthy and a bit freakish. I am often lost in my own thoughts. It’s difficult for me to pay attention to any one thing for too long, but I have been tested for ADD twice (once as a child and once as an adult), and both times I was told I don’t have it. The lost-in-my-own-thoughts thing also causes a lot of difficulty sleeping. I have a lot of trouble recognizing faces. (I don’t know if that’s a sign that Asperger’s is likely or unlikely, I just know that it gets asked about.) For example, once, when I was sick, I watched a 6 hour marathon of a reality show that had two blonde girls on it, and even after six hours, I couldn’t tell them apart for the life of me. (They were not related.) And if I’ve only met someone in “real life” once or twice, I am unlikely to recognize their face when I see them again, and I certainly can’t “picture” them in my head.

Also, when I commit to something, my commitment is absolute. 100%. I am very stubborn. But I don’t have one singular obsessive interest. I have a Master’s degree in one field, but I’m considering entering another one. Both of these fields differ from the one I was sure I was going to enter up until I was 16 or so. This would seem to suggest that Asperger’s is the wrong diagnosis.

Plus, I have always had a strong sense of empathy, and this has also always been recognized by other people. I had always dismissed the possibility of Asperger’s because I had been under the impression that empathy and Asperger’s were more or less mutually exclusive. (Of course, I’m learning now that that’s a myth.) I have always had an unusually strong knack for understanding other people’s feelings, and for caring. People notice this somehow. In fact, whenever someone in my life (even people I don’t know well, or people I haven’t spoken to in years) is in crisis, I’m the person they call. I’ve done the talking-people-down-from-suicide thing. I’ve done the lending-an-ear thing. I’ve done the de-facto-therapist thing. It is very common for someone who’s in the middle of a major life crisis to choose me as the person they call and talk to for an hour or more every single day. These are the types of things that make me think this can’t possibly be Asperger’s…right?
Oh, and of course…once that person is feeling better, farbeit for them to call me for any other reason, like to invite me to a bar or other social gathering. I am weird and different and no fun. But I guess “weird, different, and no fun” isn’t a diagnosable condition.

Any thoughts?

I don't see anything in there to suggest you're not an Aspie.....as you say, your strong empathy doesn't rule it out......I like to think I have some skills in that department too, yet I was diagnosed positive.

Aspergers is a spectrum disorder and even after diagnosis you won't be 100% certain. They try to make the tests as objective as they can, but it's still a very woolly, subjective thing. Paradoxically, Aspies are often the ones who find "grey" answers diificult, and prefer "black-or-white" answers, which don't always exist in real life. I still have days when I wonder whether it's all been a big mistake.

Have you tried doing the AQ test or the Aspie-quiz? If they both turn out strongly positive, then that would probably justify a formal diagnosis.

You might do well to ponder why you want a diagnosis - if you just want to know for your own peace of mind, well it could make you more certain, but it would be cheaper to just do the free questionnaires. Also, a private diagnosis can usually be kept secret if you want it to be, whereas a State diagnosis (at least in the UK) will go on your medical records and the cat will be out of the bag. That might impact on your employment chances and there are other reasons why you might not want your condition to be on your records.

After I was diagnosed very little happened, apart from getting on disability which helped me get a job. But besides that there was no help in social skills. It's something you get better at with practice and getting help here helps I guess. I've stopped forcing myself to get better socially and just cope with what I can do.

You definitely have Asperger's; I would be willing to bet a pretty large sum of money on it.

I also tend to be the person people ask for advice or just vent to, and I have Asperger's.