Doubting your own Aspieness

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I apologize for in case the text is hard to understand, I'm still in an unbalanced state of mind, plus English is not my native language.

Today we went visiting my grandparents. Especially the way back was horrible. I was breaking under coping with the smoke from my parents' cigarettes, the disgusting smell of the washing fluid, the humming of the car and basically everything. I was fiddling with everything, reaching for the ventilator at all times when the washing fluid wasn't being used and in general doing my all to keep sane. However, in the middle of all this I couldn't help thinking; "This is exactly how I would act as an Aspie. I have read about it, alot, so what if I'm just faking and picking it all up? What if I'm really not an Aspie?" I have this kind of moments very often. Sometimes I just shake my head and push the whole idea away - no way I could be an autist. Later, I still always end up in a situation which should supposedly prove myself this everything. Like I just caught myself rocking around at a high speed to calm myself down after the journey without even realizing.

Still, dang it, how could I - or anyone - assure myself that I'm not faking? Or prove it that I indeed am and don't have AS?

Whatever the label, I know I'm different to the majority of people. I just have to lift my head up when I'm out amongst people and...feel the unreality of my existence amongst them; feel the unreality of their existence to me, and this detachment from humanity burns my mind as I'm blinded to theirs (see: "meltdown").

That's how I know I am different.

I sometimes doubt it when I'm in my happy, calm environment, i.e. home. But I get reminded of the fact I DO have it when I step out of my bubble and into the hell that is the world of frantic shoppers, drunkards, bullies, and eye-contact wielders.

Same here. When I'm around people I've known long enough that I can deal with them almost without thinking it seems like maybe interaction does come naturally. Then this past weekend I noticed all it takes is a new person joining the group and changing the dynamic somewhat and suddenly my gears have to start turning again.

I doubt it because of course, all aspies have SOME NT traits too and its easy to think we are getting it right until we go into major NT territory and then of course, we are confronted again with our differences and our inabilities in their eyes

being undiagnosed the doubt always hovers.

When I'm alone and everything is quiet, I show very few signs of AS, when I'm around others it does come out.

I know exactly what you mean, I often notice I am fine when i am alone, but not in company. And its comments from other people that let you know, just when you think you might be like everyone else, that you just aren't.
But its not a bad thing.

An interesting topic, no doubt!

I never question my Difference, and my Internal Role Model (IRM) is an Aspie too, and we remind each other, and so there you go.

But, on the other hand (not in the extreme sense), we all have doubts about this and that. What I do is analyze(my internal stimming) and I feel assured.

yeah, i think this too. except i have NOT read about it a lot, because of this very thing, i don't want to research it too much because then i might "pick up" more traits. i am not officially diagnosed, but since finding this site, i think--- have i REALLY always done this? or am i just imagining my whole life, and i'm just faking all my weirdness? sometimes i feel like i don't know. and sometimes i feel sure. it's odd to be conscious of things now-- things that in the past i just took for granted.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm basically an NT raised by aspie parents. Maybe I act and think like an aspie because I come from a family of aspies. But I don't think that would account for the sensory issues. And in many ways, I am more aspie-like than my parents. So I do not spend much time questioning it.

I chose "other." I don't so much doubt my "aspieness," in that I certainly have a number of traits associated with Asperger's. But what I do doubt is the whole notion of a disorder that is based just on personality traits and behaviors. It seems unscientific somehow. Nor do I understand the relationship between "classical" autism and so-called "high functioning" forms of autism. So my doubt is not so much personal as theoretical.

I only doubt it because I'm self-diagnosed and because I was conditioned to think that my symptoms were out of being evil or out of having been abused as a child.

I'm officially diagnosed and I doubt it quite a bit. I think it's probably because there are some ways which I didn't/don't fit the AS "mold" and even though I'm terribly shy, I seem to be less socially clueless than most aspies. Diagnosis just seems so subjective to me, and I wish there were some definitive way of finding out whether I'm on the spectrum. When I tell this to my boyfriend he says he can guarantee that I'm on the spectrum, but I still sometimes have this self-doubt. When I told the psychologist who diagnosed me (who specializes in AS) she said that my need to have a definite category to put myself in was itself a sign of rigid, black and white thinking. When I tell my mom she says I am very high-functioning for someone with AS, but that doesn't mean I don't have it. Even though I have all this confirmation of people who know me and think I'm on the spectrum (psychologist, parents, boyfriend, even my boyfriend's parents), it's still hard for me to completely accept sometimes. But I desperately want to because if I'm not on the spectrum, then I have no idea what the heck is wrong with me. I worry that I'm just crazy in some weird way. I really hope that's not true, and that I am (mildly) autistic.

srriv345 I feel much the same (though I am not diagnosed) about wishing there were some definitive way to identify what I am, and what Asperger's is, even though I keep telling myself it shouldn't matter. The whole idea of high functioning autism is like a puzzle I have stuck in my head and I can't figure it out.

If I could afford it, I would have brain imaging done. I recently watched something on CNN about how autistic brains are on average larger than NT brains. This might even explain why female autistics seem less impaired than males, since female brains tend to be smaller than male brains. Even in a situation of hyper-growth, maybe the autistic female brains remain smaller than the autistic male brains, though still larger than a "regular" brain. They showed one young child who at age 3 had a brain the size of a normal 7 year old.

the only reason i doubted it is because on that aspie quiz i only scored 80/200 which was lower than everyone elses scores. i know quizs dont always reflect it but i answered honestly and i dont know why i scored much lower than the other people.
However i do know i have As. i know i am not faking. Its as simple as that.
xx

I've been questioning so much lately, that included.