For the millionth time: Social skills can't be learned

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it is like the higher-functioning ones have a hard time putting themselves into the shoes of the lower-functioning ones, and vice-versa. I am somewhere in the middle so i can't help but notice that.

I'm not sure that has so much to do with how profoundly autistic one is but rather whether one has cognitive impairments as well as autism. Autism does not preclude learning, but cognitive impairments can.

speaking for myself at least, I can't pinpoint where my autism leaves off and my cognitive impairments pick up, or vice-versa.

Isn't that the point of getting tested/evaluated by diagnostic professionals, to find out those things?

I got a shrink [psychiatrist] to dx me, but all he could say to me was [paraphrasing] "I'm sorry sir, but it is my medical judgment that you have a preponderance of traits of AS, there is not that much I can do to help you."

That sucks. He doesn't sound very professional.

to be fair, it was 2003, the state of the art was not what it is now, I did not have depression or anything other than ADHD [inattentive subtype which I was already being treated for] and a hatful of more minor things that in the aggregate probably hamper me but are not really definitively treatable with anything that didn't have side effects worse than the illness.

He seems both professional and honest.

AS can not be cured. The doctor can prescribe drugs to change behavior and perception; but that may only make Auntie Blabs drug-dependent.

You have to remember that a psychiatrist is a medical physician whose treatments of choice usually involve medication. A clinical psychologist is essentially a counselor whose primary tools are observation, identification, and recommendation.

speaking again only for me [YMMV], I can say that Strattera made life easier for me. but it was and is an expensive drug that group death would not pay for, after about a year. so I had to learn to do without.

Human social skills cannot be perfectly learned on a purely intellectual level, no matter what anyone else says. There is a reason NTs learn it instinctively.

Human social interactions are extremely complex and full of nuances. Every social situation is different and requires different actions to be taken. It can be faked, to an extent, but not perfected.

Those Aspies that manage to socialize successfully are not necessarily more intellectually gifted, but instead have less social impairments. Remember, autism is a spectrum, and everyone is going to have different degrees of impairment in the various areas.

It seems that some people are implying that those who aren't successful are either not as intelligent, or aren't trying hard enough. I strongly disagree with this idea. Sure, there probably are some people who aren't trying hard enough, but I don't believe that this applies to most people who are struggling.

And what the heck does a "cognitive impairment" mean? It sure sounds like a euphemism for "intellectual disability" ie mental retardation.

I see a psychiatrist regularly, and medication is only part of the treatment I receive from him (I have comorbids like anxiety and depression that respond to meds). A psychiatrist may not be trained in talk therapy, but they can recommend you to other professionals who are trained in such services. My psychiatrist thinks talk therapy is key to mental wellness for people with struggles like mine and encourages me to seek talk therapy when my anxiety issues and depression are bad. I find it helps a lot to sit down with someone knowledgeable and verbally sort out my problems. Just the act of talking about problems is cathartic, I find. It helps me make sense of things, and it has contributed to my skill set of coping mechanisms. I've learned a lot about self-care from therapy that I didn't learn from my parents or at school.

i learned to be passable at small talk after the age of 50. i agree with the person who said not to give up.

I get a lot of functional therapy from my fellow aspies at my biweekly support group meets

I've done group support therapy before (not specifically for AS) and I found it really helpful, too. Sharing your trouble with other people that have similar struggles can be an amazing experience and produce a sense of camaraderie and community, and you can pick up skills and tips from people who have been dealing with a problem longer than you have, and vice versa.

Yet, he still has you on drugs ... thus supporting my claim.

That's because there is no logic to master. It's completely illogical. If logic were involved, we would be able to figure it out.