How do you define you AS/ASD??

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Most days I try not thinking of it as a gift or a curse, rather, a difference, a different variation of strengths and weaknesses from "ordinary" people, however, there are some days when I'm fully aware of the fact that at its core it is a disorder, and a difficult one to live with.

Neurological disorder here.

I've found befriending disabled people to be the solution to this. My two best friends both have cerebral palsy.

This. So I voted 'a neurological disorder', which is more a burden than a gift.

28% say a gift.

They obviously don't have AS.

I'm sick and tired of being the loner idiot who everybody sees as odd.

How the hell can that be a gift????????????????

Last edited by piroflip on 13 Jun 2012, 8:42 am, edited 1 time in total.

I don't classify my AS as ANY of the choices. It is not a neurological disorder. It is not a psychiatric disorder. It is BOTH, as are all of the DSM diagnoses. The proper term is "neuropsychiatric disorder," and the fact that the DSM-5 plans to use the term "neurodevelopmental disorder" just sickens me. I just submitted all of my DSM-5 critcism feedback (comments close on Friday), and one of my rants was on them planning to actually use the term "neurodevelopmental disorder" for autism and ADHD and the like. How is schizophrenia not a neurodevelopmental disorder of late adolescence/early adulthood? And if ASDs don't have a psychiatric component, why are they in the American Psychological Association's diagnostic list?

Excuse me, but that is not true. Sure Asperger'a has challenges, but some of us have gifts from it. How can you deny those of us whose restrictive interests (as a result of Asperger's) has allowed us to become experts, or nearly experts, in those areas---in such ways as to be deemed gifted? As a gifted intervention specialist I happen to know that the kids in our school systems that have Asperger's in addition to academic giftedness are entitled "twice gifted." And in many ways it is very difficult to tell the difference between a child with Asperger's and a child who is academically gifted. Academically gifted children share many of the same challenges as children with Asperger's. And children with Asperger's share many of the same gifts as children who are academically gifted.

I have accepted the many challenges Asperger's has given to me. I have no friends in the general sense of the term. I have many sensory issues. I am challenged by eye contact. And there are other challenges too. I rarely go to any social event because of the awkwadness of social situations. While I rarely played with the neighborhood children when I was a child, I instead chose my special intense interests as my friends. I became so fascinated by roller coasters as a child that I quickly memorized the statistics of every roller coaster in North America. As a child I became so fascinated by the gadgetry on electronic musical organs that I had to have one, so my parents got me one for Christmas one year. I played and played and played it---not so much for the music as the complexities of all the tabs and switches and what they did to shape the music---it had become an incredible special intense interest (as defined by the sources on autism). I became very good on the organ, and by the time I was in high school I was playing music (trombone and keyboards) professionally. The organ helped teach me the music theory I needed to excel on the trombone (the instrument I played in the school band). I was selected in high school for the gifted program---gifted from Asperger's, not because of academic giftedness---which I later learned after researching my old school records and analyzing this with the center that diagnosed me with Asperger's several years ago---a center that is an expert in the diagnosis of Asperger's---a center that also recognizes and encourages the recognition of gifts in the autism spectrum, while at the same time encouraging therapy for the challenges of autism.

As all people (on the autism spectrum or not) have challenges, they too have positives that can be developed into gifts. And people are allowed the liberty of accepting their challenges and focusing on their positives and seeing themselves as gifted. And we with Asperger's are allowed to view Asperger's as a gift if we have gifts that it has given to us.

Neurological difference. (Voted neurological disorder, but prefer "difference.") Some days the want to cry answer fits, some days the gift. But most days are neutral, and it's just a different way of being. I don't notice the difference as much as other people seem to.