*Pounce*

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Probably should have came here first as it seems I've already introduced myself in bite-size chunks across a few forums. Not to worry.

I was first diagnosed in first school around age 6-7, and as was and still appears quite typical I was wrongly labeled as having ADHD. Towards the end of middle school I started seeing another child psychologist who met me at school and the next week at home. After reading here I now realise the importance of the home visit, it had just never occurred to me before that it was deliberate to study me in my 'territory'. She put me through the IQ test twice, once at school once at home and after a couple more short sessions and a few weeks wait I was re-diagnosed as having mild Aspergers and given a whole new set of pills to try.... oh goody!

Nothing had previously really worked prior to that. I cant remember everything I was prescribed over the years but remember being given liquid amitriptyline before bed at quite a young age along with half a pill in the morning and wasn't till I started in year 5 that I began taking Ritalin (yeah that was a good idea, thanks dick... errrr doc). It started me with a series of quite severe tic's but they just kept shoveling it down my throat even though it was having little effect on anything but my nerves. My middle school was less than useless at dealing with me and I was often simply punished rather than any effort being spent trying to improve it. I was bullied constantly from first school till GCSE's and for years I rose to the bait and bit back which only made my problems worse.

After my re-diagnosis I was changed over to dexedrine which didn't make much sense putting a very hyper me on amphetamines, but my focus did improve slightly when I eventually sat down. In high school all the pupils from the 3 middle schools in town culminated together and my reputation had already preceded me, over a thousand kids and I could count on one hand the people who actually liked me. It wasn't long till I admitted defeat and just took everything in without batting an eyelid, it was a miserable 3 years keeping myself to myself but I found a bit of an odd friend in my learning support assistant and would sit inside playing scrabble or cribbage instead of suffering the constant tirade outside with the other pupils. I noticed with my new tactic of 'water off a ducks back' that the extra bump of energy from the dexedrine wasn't really helping me shrug it off and during my 2nd year of high school chose to stop taking any medication as I was now old enough to make that choice myself and thought I could manage better without it. I still lacked any motivation to do work outside of school hours and towards the end of school all the teachers were hounding me for coursework months overdue but showed some level of support albeit in a strange way by giving me detention until I'd finished it all. Sounds kinda harsh but it was better than the other kids who hadn't bothered got and thanks to the teachers I came away with far better than I had ever dreamed of. My motivation to revise was also entirely none-existent but I had obviously taken in what I needed to in lessons an came away with 1B, 7A's and 1A*.

Since leaving school we moved 200 miles South as a family where I attended college and did an NVQ and BTEC in Motorsport and picked up some qualifications in AutoCAD. I still noticed my trouble with social skills around the other students but was getting a better hold of myself and was able to stop myself from operating my mouth before engaging my brain, still a few slips but a lot better than i had been before. Unfortunately I wasn't able to secure a career with the course I had done as it was mostly academic which as we've established is nooooot one of my strong points and I would have had to continue the course further at University to go anywhere. That I realised would have to remain as a future wish as I could not commit to all the debt it would incur for 3 years more of me failing to focus on any real work until the night before hand-in.

It wasn't till after my 18th that I finally started connecting with people and making friends and strangely I owe that to smoking pot. It coerced me to come out of my shell and begin to trust and see the good in people again. I found I was better able to hold down a general conversation where previously had always been quite technical. I looked over my life up til then and decided what I needed to change to keep myself content. I took a great interest in drawing cartoons starting off originally with Disney's Stitch and slowly prying other characters from my imagination. Some of this was seen by a furry on DeviantArt and he asked me if I was one of them and if I would like to draw his charcter for him on commission. I hadn't even heard of the fandom before that point and it didn't really start to play on me for a couple of months had passed with more and more furries wanting me to draw them. I started chatting in the IRC every night seeing what it was all about and different people's ideas on what the fandom was to them. A few nights in I got talking to some littlefurs who had a house in Sheffield about 30 miles north of me. I had never met anyone from the internet before and I was nervous and apprehensive to say the least but once again that little green plant helped me take a plunge that truly changed my life overnight. It gave me goals to focus on, primarily getting a job and moving out from under my parents.

I had a hard time finding a job for 7 months following the course until my dad got me a fantastic opportunity working on a very large gas pipeline project in Devon. I hadn't really wanted to follow his career path though I hadn't ruled out working in gas, I just never thought I'd get the chance as it's very much a 'who you know not what' business. Working directly alongside my dad would have probably been hellish as he was a senior engineer and my mum was working the document control so I was relieved when I was working under a different agency in a different area of the project. I was working with the inspection department initially doing technical clerical work until I took the plunge to study some more and sit some inspection tickets so I could be out on the line watching other people do all the hard work. The first years project quickly past and I was now finally headed somewhere different to my parents through my own hard work and merit. I found my perfect job and although stability is a bit of a problem with it being contract work I get to relocate my entire life every year to a different part of the country for a nice refreshing change of scenery.

Well I've taken it from several snippets across multiple forums and filled in the rest of the story here. Sorry about the wall of text and I understand that's probably going to be a case of TL:DR for a few users So I'll leave you with this cute picture of the rest of my avatar to even it up a little. I look forward to seeing you all around the fora!



Wofl the Blue Wolf

You have a very good artistic eye! Did you ever think about being a tattoo artist?

Nice to meet you, Wofl - and welcome to the Wrong Planet neighborhood.

Paint shop or photoshop?

Welcome to WP!! Nice image btw. You have real talent there.

Thank you ever so much

Welcome to WP!

Welcome to WrongPlanet, and welcome to my time warp.

I'm Shelby, and I'm a Kinks Fan, who likes the 60s.

Hello Wofl, welcome,

Nice drawing!

Enjoy your stay on the Wrong Planet!

Hey! Welcome to WP!

Its a wonderful drawing, is graphically complicated and layered while still being flat and simple. I like it. Go layers! And weed! Go weed!

Wofl,welcome and hello,beutiful Furry rendering! I notice He has One Blue Eye One Brown. I had heard this happens to twins once and a while.

Hellos *waves at everyone else*

Treehugger: My husky has bi-eyes like my Wofl character so got the inspiration from him, they look ever so cute, and slightly freaky (in a good way)

You're right about that Wofl, although Idid not consider having 'bi-coloured' eyes as 'Freakish', only another example of Diversity,and a pretty one at that. I think its neat that You Actually used Your Husky as a 'Model' for the 'Blue Wolf'.

welcome wofl, nice picture did you draw that yourself?