Are autistics agressive?

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After reading about peadratric bipolar disorder almost off of the symptoms fit me as a child. I was super physicaly agressive as a child and I was a girl. I'm watching Temple Grandin's HBO movie right now and when the other kids would call her names or laugh her I knew I would have potentialy killed them. The campus security people would never have gotten away with taking my machine away like that and the dean would have had something coming. My parents say that if you took it personaly I was a very mean baby. I was always getting into fights with other kids and got such a high from it. If I felt a teacher had slighted me, I did not feel any quit about attacking her. I would also instigate fights just for the thrill. After my parents took me out of public school to homeschool me I didn't feel on edge all the time anymore and could let my gaurd down. Still, I won't hesitate to defend myself against an attacker or pervert if I have too. I sometimes actualy wish someone would jump me, just so I have an excuse to attack. Is this kind of extreme agression normal to autistics?

Hmm, I don't know. The 'thrill for aggression' I'm getting from your post sounds like Oppositional Defiant Disorder. I know some people here doubt that ODD is real, but I'm led to believe it is.

I was the quiet inner aggression type of child. I still kind of am.

sometimes i'd want an excuse to kick someones ass. say if they were to try and steal my bike i'd hurt them pretty seriously. (i've had 3 stolen!) I've only been in a few fights as a child. I'm not sure if i started them or wanted them to happen.

I am quite on my guard sometimes but it really sucks because it means i can't walk about in public and feel ok about it. I think that was caused by a separate quite traumatic issue where i was conned out of money.

No, it's not. There are cases, but they are not common and IMO are related more to pharmaceutical concoctions than autism. I think in general, autistics tend to be non-confrontational in the extreme, and left to their own devices wouldn't even interact much with other people, much less attack them without provocation.

That having been said, we do live with a tremendous degree of frustration, due to our difficulties communicating to those around us WHY we can't always do things the same way they do. Those communication problems can, over time, make a person so exasperated and unhappy that they become quite volatile and may lash out physically because they simply can't find any other means to make people get off their backs, leave them alone and let them do things their own way.

So a person who has never experienced autism might interpret that reactionary behavior as aggressive, because they don't know what its like to explain something to someone until your head is ready to explode, only to have them insist that what you're saying simply isn't so. In those moments, slapping someone upside tha head can seem a perfectly reasonable thing to do.

ditto i was pretty bad as a child and i enjoy fighting and if someone hurt something i loved i would take great pleasure in pulverizing it.

its also a way to feel strong and in control something i dont feel very often so thats another reason why i enjoy the rush it gives and i tend to get passionate about what i believe and i dont like being mocked so... >< yea i can get aggresive and told how silly i am after gotta love ur family lol

Yes. I have an aggressive attitude and a passive one. I also got in fights with bullies as a kid and my mom said I used to hurt kids as a toddler to express myself. When we moved to Montana I attacked other kids thinking I was the one being bullied.

I have been bitten by an autistic teenager before and the doctor I was shadowing had her hair nearly pulled out, so yes, autistics can be violent. Not all people on the spectrum are like this though.

You know, you may be right. I'm not sure if you're thinking of me when you refer to people not believing that ODD is real because I know I've mentioned it more or less being a perfect definition of adolescence.. But just because the diagnostic criteria are way too broad and the diagnosis may generally serve more as an excuse for therapy than an actual description of a disorder, that doesn't mean that doesn't exclude the existence of an actual disorder that they're attempting to describe.

I can relate. If someone dissed my special intrest, I would go beserik on them. If someone ever tried to physicaly hurt my bearded dragon or a meerkat, it would be a miracle if I didn't kill them. I've never let a person get away with hurting an animal if I could prevent it and if they kept their heads in their asses and kept giving me BS excuses, I would attack. I've stolen animals I've felt were in danger. I snatched a poor litlte toad from these teens who kept making it hop back and forth to them (I was afraid they would get bored and tortue it) and tried to save a poor little garter snake from these stupid hicks who were joking about ripping it's head off they seemed like the type who would actualy do it. I saved the toad but I wasn't so lucky with the snake. I'm not afraid to get violent if I have to. I am told that when it comes to animals, I have a hero complex. I won't even let people step on insects.

Last edited by PunkyKat on 07 Feb 2010, 8:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I tend to get angry a lot during sporting events. So, I guess, yes, it can happen.

The number of times I've resorted to physical violence is a single digit. So no, it's really not.

Only agressive during meltdowns.

My son is only aggressive if strangers come up and try to give him a hug. The way I see it, any adult who tries to hug a strange kid deserves whatever they get. He's not their personal huggy toy. I just tell people I've taught him about "stranger danger" and they are thoroughly embarrassed for invading his personal space. This may become problematic once he reaches school age, but it works for now.

The only time I get aggressive is when people keep pushing me or I get too bogged down with my problems plus everyone elses problems and feel overloaded, then I have a meltdown and am prone to yelling and crying and I can get physical but that's rare. Sometimes I have suicidal thoughts. I hate these times because I don't even feel like myself and can't believe I act that way.

I talk aggressively but lack the desire to do anything physical, like hitting or kicking. Physically, I am a pacifist, verbally, a green beret.

I'm not aggressive at all. I can be a little passive sometimes, because I'm afraid to hurt people.