is is possible to be an aspie if outgoing as a kid??
I would like you all to say if I have it (ASPERGERS)
When i was little I used to talk alot because I learned how to talk really early. I wouldn't shut up and I was very open and outgoing, but I didn't make eye contact for long periods of time and shifted my eyes away from people very early, and I liked to play alone many times and also i did things such as spinning around myself. I was very clever and learned how to read before 5 perfectly and i always wanted to know everything from an early age. I was also a little hyperactive and wouldn't stop running around or talking. i was also very clumsy, didn't dance rythmically but did odd movements, hated sports because i was very clumsy and had serious difficulties tying knots and dressing myself up on my own.
as the years passed by the other children at school started laughing at me and bullying me. I didn't know how to defend myself and if someone laughed at me I would cry. Also I would cry if a friend told me s/he didn't want to be my friend anymore. my parents had to explain to me what it was to stand up to people and how to act and what to say if someone laughed at me because I didn't know what to do. However I was very clever and had more memory and learning abilities than the other children and my games with them used to be imaginative but it always seemed to be my own story and I used to play my own story for instance that I was magic and the others were the bad ones and i had to run away from them, etc. I also became very obsessed with space and astronomy and sometimes wouldn't talk about anything else.
as i grew older i only read the same types of books (casually famous five and secret seven ones lol) and everything about space and was a little boring because i used to read the same all the time. I would also watch the same movie over and over again and learned disney pocahonta's speeches off by heart when i was eight.
when i was about 12 or 13 i had serious difficulties making friends and children used to laugh at me and call me nerd, and even though i tried to protect myself from them, it was useless. By the age of 14 i had become more isolated than ever and since then till now i became really introverted like i am now. However if people are nice to me i am nice to them but I don't know how to keep friendships and sometimes don't know how to act naturally in crowds, particularly with people i don't know. i liked to play a sort of game in which i faked personalities but somehow i ended up being just myself. I realised i was different from the other kids because i didn't want to go out with them at weekends but preferred being alone and could only talk normally to a few friends in class because with the others i was tense and gave them odd stares when looking at them. I also had difficulties sleeping away from my own bed and whenever i went to camps or to other friend's houses i had to be taken back to my home because i cried because i was homesick.
now i am older and as an adult i realise i don't like to party like other people do, i'm not at ease at romantic situations because i don't know how to act and i even have trouble undressing in front of friends who are girls too!! !! !! i get on better with adults (40-50-even 60 years old) than with kids my age. I have trouble making new friends and whenever i socialize a lot i then need to regenerate alone. i also have a hugee memory for dates which people find incredible and which i always find normal. I sometimes don't seem to understand why other people don't want to be friends with me anymore and i also find myself eating the same food over and over again. i've also been very sensitive to loud noises ever since i was little (even the sound of things frying in a frying pan!! !! !) and to certain touches too. but i have sensitivity to music and love it and i'm great at it and at poetry and maths. my way of walking is also a little rigid and people say it's odd.
could i be an aspie??? i think i am but when i was little i talked a lot and liked to be with other children. one of my friends say that i became isolated through years because i subconsciously realised i couldn't relate with them anymore and even though my personality was outgoing, my aspergers made me grow apart from them all as soon as my personality began comming to life. is this possible??
Of course it is!
You should have seen my son before he entered school....he would go up to anyone and chatter on and on to complete strangers. To him, everyone was as nice and kind as him, and every adult would answer him kindly like mommy (me lol) did. He just had no notion of "mean" and thought the world was fantastic.
School changed this. Bullying changed it, other kids started to notice his interactions were a bit "off", and called him weird, and ganged up against him.
I was a very happy little girl before entering school, too. I started living in books around age 6, but the worst of my social "retirement" came at 8 or 9. I just gave up on making friends after a girl told me that "if she needed a dog following her around, she'd buy one". I thought we were friends, turns out we weren't....
I think rejection plays a good part in our social isolation. We just learn that no matter how nice we are to people, we're not wanted.
TenPencePiece
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Agreed, many people on the spectrum take rejection to heart and become reluctant in pursuing social acceptance and friendships, I don't think it is healthy or productive as it can lead to feeling insecure and defensive when it comes to meeting people who hold a genuine interest or desire in us.
Agreed, many people on the spectrum take rejection to heart and become reluctant in pursuing social acceptance and friendships, I don't think it is healthy or productive as it can lead to feeling insecure and defensive when it comes to meeting people who hold a genuine interest or desire in us.
That's true. Around your age I couldn't ever have had a boyfriend, for example. I always thought every boy who approached me had some hidden agenda (doing it on a dare, doing it to see if I was ret*d enough to believe he was interested in ME (haha funny joke), doing it to be able to laugh about it with his friends, something.)
I was completely paranoid for some time after leaving high school.....
People with Aspergers can either be introverts or extroverts. An extrovert will be more willing (or able) to approach people, but might be socially clumsy and talk too much. An introvert is more likely to only speak to people that they feel comfortable with.
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I was completely paranoid for some time after leaving high school.....
It can definitely leave us traumatized, hurt and unequipped when it comes to building a sense of security and trust in a relationship and opening up to others. I also think that it leaves people on the spectrum to be underdeveloped when it comes to relationships and maintaining them so many withdraw into their special interests rather than pursuing social acceptance and validation from others.
I was very outgoing too when I was a kid. It was just the feeling and assumption of being weird that build up throughout the years that made me isolated. People think we Aspies are not interested in making friends, but most of us are. What happens is that we don't have the natural instinct that engages us in friendship/romantic relationships, thus we end up preferring to be alone, since coping with social interaction drains us.
I was completely paranoid for some time after leaving high school.....
I still feel that way about most people. All the bullying I went through as a child made me think anyone new I meet probably will not like me or do things to harm me in some way.
based on the title the process sounds backwards of what is typical, as far as going from social to less social, where as many people start with non-social tendencies but learn to adjust over years. However reading all the details of your post, it sounds like you have many aspergian traits, and that is the thing about aspergers, is that we are not necessarily totally overt to attempting to communicate, as are classically autistic.
Verdandi
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Here's a description I found on a web page:
http://www.awares.org/static_docs/about ... cSection=3
3.2.1 The aloof group
This is the most common type of social impairment. Behavior may include:
Behaving as if other people do not exist;
Little or no eye contact made;
No response when spoken to;
Faces empty of expression except with extreme joy, anger or distress;
No response to cuddling;
If something is wanted, carers' hands may be pulled towards the object;
May respond to rough and tumble play well, but when this stops return to aloof pattern;
Seem to 'be in a world of their own'.
3.2.2 The passive group
Least common group, features include:
The child accepts social approaches;
May meet the gaze of others;
May become involved as a passive part of a game.
3.2.3 The active but odd group
Children of this group make active approaches to others but make that contact in strange ways, including:
Paying no attention to the other party;
Poor eye contact although sometimes may stare too long;
May hug or shake hands too hard.
3.2.4 The over-formal, stilted group
Seen in later life, this behavior is common in the most able person with autism. The following characteristics tend to be displayed:
Excessively polite and formal;
Have a good level of language;
Try very hard to stick to the rules of social interaction without really understanding them.
Outgoing sounds like active but odd.
CockneyRebel
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I was outgoing as a child and I have AS. The reason that I'm not as outgoing around certain people such as members of my generation and sometimes my parents, is because my parents tried to raise the autism out of me by stopping me from talking about my special interests. When I reached the age of 15, I didn't talk to my family members that much anymore and I was afraid to talk to my peers about anything, because I knew that if I did, I'd start talking about my special interests. My mum said to me that if the kids at high school ever found out what I liked, that they would pick on me about my interests. The first time that I started talking about my special interests again was in the form of typing, when I joined WP in the Mid July of 2004. I talk to my two best friends and a few members at my clubhouse about my interests, but I don't do it continuously.
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I was chatty and strange and precocious. Sometimes I felt like a little rocket shot from a cannon. There was lots to explore and experience. Why didn't others get it? Instead of receiving direction, I got slapped down. Many of us know that getting slapped down so many times is dispiriting.
The sad part is, I never got even half of that spirit back. Society is a spirit killer. (Doesn't that sound dramatic?)
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CockneyRebel
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So am I. Now you know why I post about The Kinks half of the time. People are a product of their upbringings and environments. The words come out where I feel the most free.
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