What do you wish people knew about Asperger's?

Post Reply New Topic

Explaining Asperger's has always been a challenge. It is a challenging state of being to describe to someone, more so than any other I've encountered. I've been trying to compose an "elevator speech" about it to describe it, as well as responses to situations I often find myself in where I may confuse others.

Personally, I describe Asperger's as "a cognitive difference that effectively feels like being in a foreign culture whenever you're around people who do not have that same difference." That's overly simplistic, but I find most people need things to be short and simple to understand them.

Finding a way to explain myself in the moment is often hard as I require a few seconds of processing time to compose a difficult answer.

What I'd like to ask is if anyone at Wrong Planet spends a lot of time thinking about their condition and how they'd like to educate others about it. That is, if you could find a way to explain something to the rest of the world and have them listen, what would it be?

Personally, I would like to be taken as having a cognitive difference rather than a social disability, as a local autism advocacy agency has described it, and I'd like that to be understood and taken seriously.

Great way of explaining it and agreed on cognitive difference rather than social disability.

In addition I wish people knew it's no more "being difficult" than they being their natural selves is "being difficult."

I wish I could load up a small hypo injector with a short-term autism replicating drug, so I could just stick somebody in the neck like it was a taser, and they'd have to experience what it was like to actually have autism for the next 48 hours.

"Now tell me its not a real disability, @$$hole."



Seriously, I think neurotypical types cannot fathom what its like to have the sensory processing logjams that make it feel as though somebody turned the volume of LIFE up to 11 and broke off the knob; how impossible it is to think when there's just so much stuff flooding in through your eyes and ears that you can't think.

or what its like to have eye contact, or the sound of a doorbell feel like an electric shock.

or what its like to be asked a question and then asked another question while you're formulating a coherent answer to the first one and then accused of being rude because the questioner walked away before you could speak.

I've composed these sorts of 'elevator speeches' a thousand times, even written short essays on the subject, but its kind of a moot point when you can't verbalize any of it when the time comes. I could summarize it on a card, like deaf mute people do sometimes, but NTs wouldn't get it. If they haven't experienced it and they can't see it, it isn't real.

I feel like I'm in a body that isn't mine.

For me, it feels like I have the intellect of an educated adult but the emotional maturity of a 12 year old. (That is how I have explained it to people.) Everything affects me like a ton of bricks dumped on my head. This explanation doesn't include a lot of the details, like sensory issues, etc, but for me it explains why I can't deal with people and feel so easily hurt and lost.

I wish people knew that having Asperger's isn't that much different than anything else in the sense that everything has a parallel. Not everyone with Asperger's is going to be literal. Not everyone with Asperger's is going to be creepy, or a stalker. Not everyone with Asperger's lacks a sense of humor. Not everyone with Asperger's is going to become a great scientist, or is interested in science. It's like beer goggles for social cues. It doesn't mean Helen Keller was an Aspie.

I would explain Asperger's as feeling like being an alien trapped on earth; like you're always on the outside looking in on everyone else.

I wish people understood that no two people with ASD are alike and that even if someone does not fit a particular ASD stereotype, it doesn't mean that person doesn't still have significant challenges in his/her life.

That I have serious sensory issues and I get stressed when there is too much going on.

i wish there was a physical sign or birthmark of some sort that lets people just know your an aspie. my life would be so much more simple explaining the condition seems impossible it like people dont try to understand anymore they just make up there mind.

That just because I could do x yesterday doesn't mean I can do it today (most notably speaking/engaging).

I explain it as having to concretely learn social skills that others intuitively pick up on. To the person with an ASD, it is like a second language that they need to be taught. They also have very personalized views of the world, which can manifest in a singular focus and often, the world they see is often the only world they know.

That my special interests make me happy and that attacking a person on or off the spectrum on the account of their special interests is a form of bullying.

Being on the spectrum, I feel that ASAN and Rethink Autism are much better organizations to support and get involved with, than Autism Speaks.

That wearing different clothes and having a different hairdo than most people does not make me ret*d. It means that I'm an androgynous person who likes an earlier time and/or decade.

I've got a crush on someone, and I know that he likes me back and will ask me out sooner or later, but I'm really worrying about telling him about this cruel thing I've got. I know I'd have to tell him if he does ask me out, because although I am generally good at hiding it, sometimes I accidentally do or say something odd, or I know that when he talks to his friends, I will just stand there and never say one word to any of them, then go back to being a chatty person again once they've gone, which some people find quite strange, especially for a female. Or sometimes it may look like I don't want him to have other friends by not interacting with them. Sometimes people can be like that, which I'm not - I just get shy and a bit phobic of speaking up in a group of people who I don't know. But anyway - I just get very discouraged of telling people, especially a boyfriend. I really fancy this man, and I really want him, and I know he is NT, and unless he's got a relative with AS or better yet Autism, he's not really going to understand what it is, so that'd mean I'd have to go all around the houses, and I hate having AS as it is, without having to sit there and go through it all with someone who I just want to be happy with. Yes, I know telling people will make it better in the long run, but it's still awkward, because it depends on how they feel about it too. He might not want to go out with a girl who's got a disability. ''My girlfriend's got something wrong with her'' might not be what he wants to feel, whether we get along anyway or not. Sometimes NTs can be very closed-minded like that. But it might just be me thinking that. To him, it might not matter one way or another really. But it's still awkward. And he might just know briefly about Autism, and just misjudge me by only half-understanding 2 of the traits, like for example, ''Aspies don't feel emotion'' and ''Aspies get intense obsessions'', and then that might make him think that I don't really have proper feelings for him, and just might be an intense obsession, which might be off-putting for him. I am a bit crazy over him, but the real feelings are there. I am not asexual nor emotionless at all.
I suppose I might be able to get away with saying that I just suffer from an anxiety disorder or depression or even a personality disorder, but still make out I'm an NT. Yeh, I'll do that. NTs are more likely to understand that sort of thing, more than a labelled spectrum disorder. I know a lot of NTs myself who suffer from depression or high anxiety disorder, and they can seem like they're behaving odd at times.