I created a username here when I was 17, four years ago, because I thought I had AS. I took two online tests and scored very high on both of them. I've always had social problems and was the kid who was picked on from elementary school through high school. I read a few articles on girls with Aspergers, and I felt like I was reviewing my entire life. The reason I came back was because my brother called me and told me that he had been seeing a psychologist who says he probably has AS or Non-verbal Learning Disorder. My brother has more classic symptoms than I (the crazy obsessions especially), but the "classic symptoms" usually only describes male's symptoms, and female symptoms fit me perfectly. I hated birthday parties, whether they were my own or someone elses, and I always seemed to have had that "motherly friend" who helped me though social situations as a kid and teenager, not to mention my brother and my favorite games as kids involved setting up eloborate scenes, like Sea World, and I would "present" the stuffed animals and my brother would talk about each one in detail. I also played with other kids like they were toys, not like a playmates, and would always get upset if they messed something up or didn't do what I told them to.
Anyway, I left WP because I went to a psychologist and I described my symptoms, and she said "...Hmmm you seem to have traits of..." and I just blurted out, "Aspie?" and she said, "no, no, I don't think you have Asperger's," then flipped open her DSM-IV and read the description of Depersonalization Disorder: " a dissociative disorder in which the sufferer is affected by persistent or recurrent feelings of depersonalization and/or derealization. The symptoms include a sense of automation, going through the motions of life but not experiencing it, feeling as though one is in a movie, feeling as though one is in a dream, feeling a disconnection from one's body; out-of-body experience, a detachment from one's body, environment and difficulty relating oneself to reality." (more at Wikipedia), which I DO have, and was diagnosed on the spot. So I thought, that must be the problem. But still some things remain unexplained. I've always felt like I've had to script my life according to the needs and wants of other people, and I still fit the profile for an aspie. I've been on anti-anxiety drugs which did nothing, anti-psychotics, wich made me sick, and I've tried Homeopathy, but I still can't seem to get over the hatred of someone walking behind me, or the dread of having to call my landlords back, even when it's something as simple as an inspecition sheet. The sound of a TV on mute makes my head want to explode and I've always prefered the company of animals to humans.
Not to mention I say horribly innappropriate things without realizing it! (Like one time when I compared someon'e baby to my dog, because I couldn't see the difference. I mean, I still can't, except my dog is smarter and more attractive, I've just learned that's not something socially acceptable to say.)
So anyway, I'm back, and still unsure if I have it or not. I feel like I either do, or I'm just socially ret*d and wanting to have AS to make excuses for my bad behavior. But my brother's shrink thinks he has it, and we seem to be the only two people who "get" each other.
21 Aug 2009, 12:25 pm
