Are we just spoilt brats??

Post Reply New Topic

No, I don't really think we are, but this is how I felt after speaking with my psychiatrist today, and my ex used to call me this.

It did get me thinking though. Even after countless hours of studying asperger's, there are still bits and pieces and big picture aspects left to click.

She was talking about how I need to learn to be my own parent. In that, I often don't do things because I don't "feel" like doing them. Now, although I believe there are many logical reasons as to why I don't "feel" like doing things (like when I come home I don't want to do the stuff I need to do because I am so mentally exhausted from the real World with all its sensory and executive function and social interaction issues) that I just NEED to do nothing but get in my pyjamas and get absorbed in my special interest for a while. And then, with my executive functioning being so bad, I am shocking at organising myself later.

It made me think about the whole emotional maturity aspect. I know I have read countless times that AS is a developmental disorder, but I finally think I got it. In that, we don't mature as much (or as quick) as others our own age with regard to emotions, social interaction, etc, but that we can still be extremely wise and intelligent well beyond our years (people get confused that I can be so wise and smart and yet so incredibly immature and naive also!)

She told me that if my Son threw a tantrum because he didn't want to do something, that I would tell him that we have to do things in Life that we don't feel like doing. And it's true, I always tell him this!

Yet inside of me it is almost like I have both a VERY stubborn child, and a very stubborn parent, yet the child seems to be that teensy bit stronger. I have very strong - childlike - reactions to many things in Life, in fact I am WORSE than my Son!! Sometimes I can get into a "zone" where the parent aspect is totally in control and the child aspect gets squashed, but it takes a LOT of mental effort to do this, and if I succeed, I get totally stuck in it to a point where it can go too far in that direction also (like anorexia for example).

Anyway, these are still new thoughts for me, so I haven't put heaps of though into it yet, but was wondering if anyone else can relate, or have i just had a temporary moment of (greater) insanity here? lol Does anyone else feel this war between a really strong child and a very logical, rigid parent inside them?

The fact that you think to ask this question, and the fact that you have to try this hard just to force your "parent persona" to come to the surface suggests that you are far from spoiled. If you were, you wouldn't care about the consequences of your behaviour, and would blame them on other people for not raising you/looking after you/teaching you right. Having a developmental disorder that makes us act younger than our years is not the same as deliberately putting off stuff we know we should be doing, we need the downtime in order to function properly and get the important work done effectively, without shutting down halfway through. So, in short, your ex is wrong, we are not "spoiled" (well, at least, having Asperger's does not inherently make one spoiled, but I've no doubt there are aspies who are spoiled, regardless of their condition), we just have different, occasionally less effective, but ultimately mood-sustaining ways of going about our lives.

You certainly don't sound spoiled to me. So, when you get home you need to get comfortable and spend a little time on yourself and your interests, that's great! Think how many "normal" people come home from work and the first thing they do is drink or something similar. That's more mature? I don't think so.
You sound like a good person and a loving, caring parent, it doesn't get any better than that. As far as what your ex says or said, well they're an ex for a reason.
Your psychiatrist is just another person who happened to go through the hoops to get a degree, big deal, psychiatrists can be exes to if they don't serve you well.
I don't know if I'm making sense or not, I get a lot of ideas and thoughts in my head but have a very difficult time organizing and expressing them effectively, even in text. I guess what I'm saying is I think you're doing good from what I've read in your post.

According to the psychs who evaluated me, my parents did a good job bringing me up. I suspect especially my mother is responsible for this, as she's a pedagogue by her profession. Unfortunately, my parents' family life hadn't been a good one, they often had quarrels. I believe I began to lose their (social) support gradually in my teens and also this served as a motivational force that pushed me to finally make friends (primarily by shared interests).

So, for me it's a mixed bag. I'm bratty because I'm inherently a brat, and this was partly compensated by my upbringing that was rather positive in my early life. You know, early years count much more than the following ones. However, the resulting stress that I've got from the less-than-optimal relationship between my parents might have caused my marital/relationship-distress, a kind of PTSD.

I'm sure that emotional immaturity (or whatever) is a characteristic of many autistics, including me. I don't mind that inside I feel I'm still a child, if over-aged a bit...

Thank you for your replies, you were all very kind, I appreciate it.

Is nice to have people who actually understand!

I suppose the "not feeling like it" depends on how big it is. If it is a small "oh, I don't really feel like doing that" issues, then yes, this is something to be addressed. But for me it is generally that (a) I am on the verge of a meltdown and cannot handle doing any extra activities at that time, particularly ones I am not good at, or (b) I am very caught up in a special interest and can't pull myself away from it.
I can handle the small "I don't feel like it"s, because they are easy to motivate myself to do if I am feeling ok.

I hate the whole meltdown thing though. I don't understand why the emotions become so overwhelming compared with others! The only thing I can think of is that we have experience MANY triggers compared with NTs during a normal day - sensory and social issues - and on top of them, there are the other stressors like everyday problems that everyone has. Maybe if NTs got stressed as much as we did each day, they would explode in the same way we do, also ?

(My parents didn't spoil me btw, They looked after me, but we weren't spoilt, no way! They had definite boundaries that we could NOT push past, and we were definitely not spoilt. We weren't hard off either, it was a good "in-between".)

What do you mean by being "on the verge of a meltdown"? Feeling stressed out? Needing some alone time to unwind? I'm feeling close to a meltdown emotionally if I'm stressed by certain interactions during the day, mostly at my workplace, that I somehow consider sinister and/or unfair (besides some possible sensory issues). I noticed that it's often my somewhat paranoid imagination that plays with my fallible and naive, often hard-to-control emotions. Yes, some situations can be really hard to me, but I would find myself shut in a room with no latch inside but soft padding on the walls very soon if I took it to heart every time it happens... I was in a very gloomy mood yesterday (on the verge of a meltdown) due to building stress in the last few days (actually kicked the wall and a door), but during the trip home, sitting on the train I realized I need more contact with people, paradoxically. Yes, there are people who worth a smile, a few words. My psyche just suffers if I shut in, cutting down "little contacts" to an insane low level.

I think I can enjoy my special interests more if I feel OK with people.