Does my cousin have Aspergers?

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My cousin is just a year younger than me, and all through his childhood he was showing a lot of AS traits what his mum and my mum had been discussing (since my mum knew all about it because I'm obviously on the spectrum). When he was 9 his mum had a nurse ladie visit his house to have a talk and discuss his behaviour, and they wanted to get a diagnosis. He never did get a diagnosis (I don't know why), and he's 19 now and doesn't seem very Aspie-fied to me anymore. I'm feeling lonely and miserable again because I thought I had another Aspie in my family - but apparently I was wrong, and his mum or my mum haven;t really said anything about it for a few years now (they don't see eachother as much anyway, but I still see my cousin). But lately he's been seeing friends from college, and going out to nightclubs, and having a confident-looking girlfriend (well, he was boasting about having her) and doing other things what I don't have a hope in hell of doing.

But when he was a child he showed so many traits that it was obvious, even to the special needs teachers at school, who knew all about AS and Autism. Here's the traits he showed in his childhood:-
-had big obsession with electronics
-was in his own world a lot
-had meltdowns over little things, eg, if the printer wasn't working or something (his meltdowns included kicking objects and screaming then marching out of the house to somewhere quiet like a field, where no-one could be near him)
-hated loud noises
-walked around with his head down and not speaking to anyone or making eye-contact
-had trouble mixing and fitting in, very shy and low self-esteem
-got bullied at school
-got very anxious when a social event was coming up and would cry and panic and hide away in his room
-very difficult to get on with, even for me (used to pull me about and annoy me and giggle and try to drag me into his obsessions) He also behaved differently to all my other cousins (they're NTs)
-got angry when unpredictable events happened
-was clever, but needed special help with coping skills and working in a group with other children
-apparently used to stack things when he was a toddler, and seemed more interested in the TV than any toy

I can't think of anything else, but I discovered that he showed more AS symptoms than I ever did. But now he doesn't seem to show many traits at all, and I seem to show more than him now. Maybe he's learnt to act NT in front of people but might behave differently at home, I don't know. It can't just be childhood AS because he showed too many traits, like me.

I can't make him out. Makes me angry because I'm struggling with it for the rest of my life, and he finishes it and lives happily ever after - or so it seems.

Having AS doesn't prevent you from doing any of those things.

He could be a geek who discovered girls.

who knows. Maybe you should call him and maybe hang out and ask him to help you out besides maybe she asked him out. If I were you I would ask him to help you. He obviously did something to overcome these things and maybe he can help you. Or maybe he got help as a child.

Definitely don't assume he has a perfect life!

I haven't been diagnosed, but am pretty sure I'm an Aspie, and over time (especially since graduating high school), I've done fairly well for myself and developed a lot of NT social habits, at least on the outside. I have a long-term, serious boyfriend and a decent social circle. HOWEVER, it is an extreme struggle for me to get through some days when it comes to trying to deal with my boyfriend and family, people at work, looking for a better job or even just getting the motivation to get things done and stop obsessing about crap that doesn't matter.

So just because your cousin appears NT on the outside doesn't mean it isn't hard or that he feels that way. Maybe reach out to him.

Your cousin could be an example that poor parenting/environment does not cause Asperger's--he might have been the way he was as a child, because he was outcast by bullies and nobody did anything to fix the situation. He might have grown up in front of the computer/television and not learned proper social interaction as a child. But, once he got away from the bad situation by going to college he was able to quickly learn the social skills he needed. This is pretty much the opposite of what I saw of the HBO Temple Grandin documentary--she had a great parent and lots of excellent schooling--but still couldn't learn basic social interaction.

But he has an older sister (2 years older than him) who is very confident, and she was also brought up in front of the TV or computer. She's nowhere near like him. And it was nothing to do with his upbringing - they were just an ordinary family.

I could just sense that he had a form of AS, because he was a typical Aspie. Maybe he's got better friends now because it may be easier for Aspies boys to make friends than it is for Aspie girls, simply because when girls lack social skills it notices more, since women like talk. Men and boys just talk about their special interests to eachother anyway, so what does it matter if a boy has AS or not. They can just muck in with other shyer NT boys.

But even now, every time I see him he never smiles, even when I see him with his friends. He never looks confident, and neither does his friends. Maybe he's got a slight touch of AS, and can get away with mingling in with lads who are shy. Maybe they just all grouped together and decided to go out on a Saturday night to try to meet more people, I don't know.

Another thing what has made me think is his mum got a really confident boyfriend, and she was saying that he ''brought him out of his shell'' a bit. Before she got this boyfriend she used to worry a lot about her son because even just a year ago he used to be stuck up in his room on the playstation 3.

So maybe I might become more confident because my mum and dad aren't very confident, so I've never had anyone pushing me really. (I'm not saying it's their fault though because I love my mum and dad and they are still trying hard to give me support). But my mum and dad have split up a few years ago and neither of them have found anyone else - (I would love more than anything else for one of them to meet someone). So sometimes it's good for young adult Aspies (whose parents have split up) to meet other partners what might help take the Aspie under their wing and give them a push into adult life. I'm not saying it's always necessarily so, but sometimes it can be better.

Thanks for the advice by the way.

I can't say whether he has it or not from this (I'm pretty sure most toddlers like to stack things and will stare at a TV if it is there), but it seems more likely that he does, and he has learned to fake normal, like most of us have had to do to some extent. I think for different people there's is both a range in how "severe" the Asperger's traits are (that is, different from the expected NT behavior) and also how adaptable the person is to learning the rules and acting like an NT. It's also possible that since he was aware of this talk and that you had Asperger's, he looked at your outward behavior as an example of "what not to do", and modified accordingly, which is probably not evident to a lot of us growing up with Asperger's. There were a lot of things I did that it took me a long time to grasp were bizarre in other people's eyes, either because nobody pointed it out, or they pointed it out and I brushed it off (I'd never heard of Asperger's growing up).

It may simply be that he has had an easier time adapting, or has more understanding/helpful friends, to help him fit in on the outside. If I were you, I would try asking him about it... not "do you have Asperger's" per se, but about how he thinks about things and processes them. It could not only show you if he does have it, but might give you some tips on coping with it that have worked for him. I think Asperger's tends to be more noticeable in children not because it "goes away" but because we learn strategies to deal with it to one extent or another, as we become more aware of it.

That is a very good answer. Admittedly, I have learnt to adapt and I've also learnt what's right and what's wrong. And Aspergers can vary from person to person, so his traits may come out in a different way from mine. It might be because I've had a diagnosis, and I also suffer from Dyspraxia and high anxieties. My cousin doesn't have Dyspraxia, nor does he get too anxious like I do, so those might be other reasons as to why he may have found learning the social cues slightly easier than me. Like I said before, I have learnt to figure out what hehaviour is wrong and what is right, and in the last 6 or 7 years I've been able to find it easier to hide my AS when it comes to socializing, even though I may still find it harder to make friends than him. Perhaps I'm naturally shy anyway, and he might have that much more confidence in him. It is very true that some Aspies can make friends easier than others. Like NTs, we all have different amounts of confidence in us. Just because you're on the spectrum, doesn't mean you've got to be really shy and quiet.

Aspergers Syndrome can be a very complicated condition at times. One child might have it and show all the symptoms and the doctors still can't give him a diagnosis, and another child might be very mild and can get a diagnosis fairly easy, like I did. I consider myself as mild, and so have the doctors, but I still got an easy diagnosis for being on the spectrum, and I've got Dyspraxia quite severe, and I was only 8, so perhaps they overlap eachother and makes me seem worse than what it really is. It can all depend, because there are so many different conditions on the autism spectrum, not just Aspergers, so it all depends.

Thanks for good advice