For the most part I consider myself to be a fairly controlled and collected individual. For the most part I can maintain a working relationship with people I'm not trying to impress or to endear myself to. Coworkers, for example, are people I only have to see in the confines of work and never again. So as long as I'm doing my job, I will always have a reason to talk to them.
When I try to talk to those same people in a social fashion is where I start to waiver.
Today I had one of those moments. A shop keeper who was rather friendly to me was in her store today. Against all of my instincts (the ones that say stop going into those places when you have no money to shop with) I went in. And as before we had a great conversation. Where did I mess up?
I started yammering away like an idiot about how I wanted to be a tarot reader, blah, blah, blah. Then when I was sure she didn't want to hear it all, I started apologizing about fifty times and repeating myself and...if you've ever had a kid with Asperger's or if you have the diagnosis, you might recognize the behavior.
This is the one aspect of my personality that I cannot deny. It is the one real aspect of Asperger's Syndrome that I can't tell someone I have complete control over. Because you see, it's not my ability to read social cues that's the issue. It's not talking a mile a minute about my favorite subjects and it isn't stimming or tics. I mean, I don't even think it's an issue I would ever ask for help with either but it's something that's there.
There's no doubt that socially I am a bit off. It happens more or less when I'm actively trying to fit in with a group, or trying to *shudder* make a friend, heaven forbid.
Sometimes it costs me when I eff up as badly as I did today...in a shop owned by a Salem psychic no less. Other times the day is at least partially salvagable, like the time I tried to make my very own episode of The Hunted, with the help of Ned Donavon, Mark Bedell and their respective teams. After four or five minutes alone Mark and the others (while Ned went to get drinks) I was a bit of a bumbling idiot that didn't exactly inspire the feeling of "Lets give this guy a sword".
This entry isn't meant to be a pity the kid rant. It's more or less a statement that yes, I do acknowledge that I have some difficulties. Yes, Asperger's seems like the best word to describe them. I try to overcome them the only way I know how, by getting in with people who have the same goals as I have. Sometimes I succeed and sometimes I fall flat on my behind.
Sometimes, like is often the case with my own family, I upset people whether I intend to or not. Sometimes I could care less if I do other times, it burns me in the long run and I stand there wondering what the hell just happened?
That's just a part of who I am. It's a part of the everyday challenge that is being me.
28 Apr 2011, 11:38 am
