From Aspie Granny

Post Reply New Topic

As a child [long time ago being I'm slightly younger than god, only slightly older than dirt] I was administered 2 different IQ tests. The results? One found me high in IQ, the second as moderately mentally ret*d. At home I could speak[when spoken to. those were the rules] but I was mute at school until I was 14 years old.

School [also homelife] was beyond a nightmare. I had NO friends, couldn't even fit into the misfits group at the bottom of the social heap. I was not an autie who preferred total solitude and I spent many nights wondering if I was going to die of loneliness.

Now, the other kids did notice me. They took particular delight in torturing me [both physically and emotionally] and unofficially named me as both "weirdest" in my school and "the girl noone would touch with a ten foot pole.

Well, I did eventually find happiness.Now, so many years later, I am married to an awesome man. 3 out of my 5 kids are on the spectrum[one with an overflowing bucket of co-morbidities] as are 3 of my grandchildren.

They ALL have had difficulties living in an NT world. They are all awesome people. Because of my own personal experiences I was able to help 2 of them to learn a few skills that helped them to be often perceived as "differrent, but in a really cool way."

I would like to give honest answers to any questions you might have on relating to the opposite [or same] sex for romantic [or other] purposes. I will post a few ideas that worked with my kids and grandkids as soon as I return from lunch.

Aspie Granny

Well, I guess if you found happiness, maybe there's hope for me yet.

wow, tks fr sharing.

my wife landed at my feet as if by the Hand of God in 1977, been given a fortnight to get out of lodgings and eleven months previous being kicked out of my home as my dad had died half a year prev... I was utterly friendless as had been increasingly so from say 13-14 yrs old. I still to this day feel it very lonely to be among people.

yes, i know all about the crud that inhabit schools and make life miserable, my obviously inadaquete parents were clueless ... all of the time with needless house and school moves so by the third school at 6-3/4 yrs old i had given up speaking or playing in the school environment ... and not one ret*d teacher helped me.

self diag aspi abt 15 yrs ago.

Of course there is hope. I noticed your age, 51. Research has shown that you are at the age most people[ autistic and NT alike] are at the LEAST happy portion of their lives[though i am fairly confident they were not including the hell years of elementary, middle, and high school that most on the spectrum go through]and might very well enter a stage where happiness might be less elusive.

Do you know WHY you aren't happy? Maybe some of us here can help.

Granny Aspie [that's really what the grandkids call me. AND I am their favorite grandparent.

My middle child, Casey, is 35 years old now [they range in age from 18 to 37. 4 boys and a girl] Like the rest of my kids he was scapegoated at school and pretty lonesome. He couldn't play team sports, couldn't seem to put his appearance together in a way acceptable to his peers and had the lack of social skills. He also wanted to be called by the name of bunny[?] and felt misunderstood by me because I refused to call him that, especially in public. He cried about it every night.

My kids were each assigned 45 minutes of chores a day, which were on a weekly rotating schedule. So,I waited until the day he was to start his most dreaded chores[the dishes and kitchen] and presented him with 3 juggling balls, a book on juggling, and an option. The option was to do his chores or TRY to juggle for 45 minutes. He thought he would never learn but since he HATED washing dishes practiced the juggling.

Within a short period of time [I honestly do not remember how long. At the time my first husband, his dad, was slowly dying from a form of leukemia and with all that was going on my perception of time was even more skewed than ussual] he was juggling 3 apples while eating them at the same time. He also practiced a few coin tricks until he was expert at them. These were quirky skills that his peers seemed to love and they asked my son how to do them.

During this same period of time I asked the mother of one of the children I did day-care for if she would help me with my sons' appearance. She sat and talked to my son and between the 2 of them they developed a "look" for him. it was basically a Steve Jobs type of look of jeans, boots, black turtleneck. [BTW, she told me the 2 worst things ever was to allow jeans or slacks to be too short, that being too long was vastly preferable to too short and to take it light on any male fragrance] It also involved soap, lots of soap and deoderant.

That was the start, only the start, but a big one. These silly little types of things should not be what's important, definitely nothing compared to character, but this is an NT world, and to fit in at all a modicum of facade must be established[sad but true. I am by no means saying that you should try to "pass" as NT or even want to. I'm just telling you that certain things work better than others in being accepted by others enough that they will ABLE to appreciate your awesome Autistic qualities]

Granny Aspie

My middle child, Casey, is 35 years old now [they range in age from 18 to 37. 4 boys and a girl] Like the rest of my kids he was scapegoated at school and pretty lonesome. He couldn't play team sports, couldn't seem to put his appearance together in a way acceptable to his peers and had the lack of social skills. He also wanted to be called by the name of bunny[?] and felt misunderstood by me because I refused to call him that, especially in public. He cried about it every night.

My kids were each assigned 45 minutes of chores a day, which were on a weekly rotating schedule. So,I waited until the day he was to start his most dreaded chores[the dishes and kitchen] and presented him with 3 juggling balls, a book on juggling, and an option. The option was to do his chores or TRY to juggle for 45 minutes. He thought he would never learn but since he HATED washing dishes practiced the juggling.

Within a short period of time [I honestly do not remember how long. At the time my first husband, his dad, was slowly dying from a form of leukemia and with all that was going on my perception of time was even more skewed than ussual] he was juggling 3 apples while eating them at the same time. He also practiced a few coin tricks until he was expert at them. These were quirky skills that his peers seemed to love and they asked my son how to do them.

During this same period of time I asked the mother of one of the children I did day-care for if she would help me with my sons' appearance. She sat and talked to my son and between the 2 of them they developed a "look" for him. it was basically a Steve Jobs type of look of jeans, boots, black turtleneck. [BTW, she told me the 2 worst things ever was to allow jeans or slacks to be too short, that being too long was vastly preferable to too short and to take it light on any male fragrance] It also involved soap, lots of soap and deoderant.

That was the start, only the start, but a big one. These silly little types of things should not be what's important, definitely nothing compared to character, but this is an NT world, and to fit in at all a modicum of facade must be established[sad but true. I am by no means saying that you should try to "pass" as NT or even want to. I'm just telling you that certain things work better than others in being accepted by others enough that they will ABLE to appreciate your awesome Autistic qualities]

Granny Aspie

There is no hope fo the typical aspie male..sure most can lead an ok life with a cute dog, maybe get their advanced education degrees, maybe hold a job, but girls? we dont deserve girls!! ! at-least that's what girls will tell yah lol.