Hello all, this is going to be very long, i applaud your patience in advance if you are able to read the entire way through this.
I'm James, 27, male, from Australia. I may or may not be an aspie. I suppose in a way i am here to see whether or not i should bother paying to see a psychiatrist and actively seek a label or continue to live unsure. I do see a clinical psychologist for issues associated with my arrested development and off-and-on depression, he merely said when i asked if i could be an aspie that it is "possible".
A friend of mine with whom i went to high school and university began calling me an aspie of his own accord a while ago, which prompted me to do some reading and find out what he was actually talking about. It sparked a bit of an epiphany. Reading descriptions and testimonies, i felt like i was reading an authorised biography of me. Online tests invariably tell me that i am very likely an aspie. I have done a few. The most recent one yielded:
Quote:
Your Aspie score: 132 of 200
Your neurotypical (non-autistic) score: 66 of 200
You are very likely an Aspie
There is also an image associated but i am unable to post it as apparently i have to make 5 legitimate posts as a spam filter.
As a youth, i was odd. I cycled through friends, having only one at a time until the age of nine, when i was one of two kids selected from my grade of one-hundred and fifty fourth grade students to go to a school for academically gifted kids. My father later confided that he got "the shock of his life" at this turn of events. Admittedly i hadn't done spectacularly well up to that point. I was a prickly little pear; for example i lost a friend over my insistence in correcting his pronunciation of words like "supposed" (instead of "esposed") and "ask" (instead of aks). My own grandmother, with whom i lived, called me an arrogant s**t at the age of ten. I know this because i eavesdropped, and was profoundly hurt by the revelation. She's right of course, i am an arrogant s**t and continue to struggle to rein this side of myself in. I often fail.
Anyway, from a young age i was obsessed with a few things. I loved maps and frequently spent hours poring over atlases and world fact books my grandfather owned. I memorised all the countries, all their capitals, and to this day can draw all the flags of the world from memory, and a free hand map of the world with fairly accurate political divisions.
I have excellent long term memory for dates, numbers, facts and trivia. I remember pi to about 60 places and could easily continue to memorise more if i saw a practical point. It started out only with science (especially astronomy) and geography but my range of interests has broadened considerably to include just about everything excluding fashion and pop culture. I adore trivia nights, and a local quizmaster affectionately dubbed me 'rainman' just two weeks ago. I have memorised the entire periodic table including many details for each element not typically included.
After completing primary school i was also admitted to an academically selective high school for gifted children and performed well. I remained awkward, but it did help being amongst so many other eccentrics and oddballs. Even in this school, i was always "one of the nerds". I vividly remember from the age of about 13, after a verbal stoush with a friend, reflecting on how often i had come into conflict with others throughout my life and resolving to be a 'nice guy' from then on. It was a major turning point, and i did exactly that. In the foolishness of youth, i strove to become more popular, and regretfully estranged myself from some of my better "nerd" friends. The slow climbing of the ladder culminated in befriending essentially the entire grade of 150 students by the time i graduated at seventeen. I had one clumsy romance with a girl over whom i obsessed and lavished far too much affection and far too little communication on, and was devastated at its collapse after four months.
The point of describing all of this is i am wondering whether during this period i was actually just striving to emulate normalcy, or whether i was just blooming into a proper adult. Thinking back with fresh context, it's just possible that i have merely conditioned myself to be able to "fake it" around people. I find it especially easy to go into "charming young man" mode around people much older than me. I enjoy the company of my father's intellectual friends more than people my own age. Is this common?
I have anger and rage issues. I became close and eventually sexually involved with a friend who is a sociopath according to her therapist(s), and one day when her antics just went too far i snapped, screamed with burning white rage at her the point that she was frightened i was going to attack her. As soon as it came though, it was gone and i felt deeply ashamed and embarrassed, and remain so to this day. It is the second time in my life i have raged at anyone and while i can honestly say the thought to do violence never entered my mind, i am shocked that she thought i was about to. We (wisely) have never been involved sexually again.
I have trouble remembering people's names and faces. Some people look very distinctive to me, but many just become a blur. I volunteered for a study into prosopagnosia at Macquarie University last year and did so poorly that they requested my return for further testing.
For a few years (between the ages of about 10 to 13) i had the need to tap out every syllable of every conversation i either heard or partook in using the four fingers of my right hand, with my mind on checking to see if the total number of syllables would be a multiple of four. I would even alter my sentences to ensure that end. I never told anyone about it, resolved to break the habit and finally i did stop doing it. I don't know why this obsession came or why it really did eventually go away again.
I have exceptional hearing and audial memory, am obsessed with all forms of music, can replay entire songs and symphonies in my head from beginning to end and am an excellent mimic. I do impressions for people's amusement and that has become the core of my sense of humour.
There are many things i do that do not seem to fit the norm for ASD people.
I can be disingenuous. I lie from time to time, sometimes with good reason, sometimes for no apparent reason at all. I am not particularly good at it (sometimes downright embarrassingly clumsy) but i have found that as time goes by, i am able to do it with more relative ease, especially when well prepared.
I love team and individual sport. I am clumsy and uncoordinated, but i am patient with it and enjoy training, have excellent reflexes and can run very fast. I enjoyed rugby and continue to play soccer as a goalkeeper and competitive snooker.
I seem to act believably enough as NT. I am certainly eccentric, and while i don't particularly like looking into people's eyes, i also don't seem to have a strong aversion to it either. Prolonged eye contact (more than a couple of seconds) does make me feel uncomfortable, but if i do want to keep the impression that i am not discomfited then i will just stare at the bridge of their nose instead. Even so, i have a several wide circles of friends and can do OK with meeting new people. No better than OK, but certainly not terribly.
I'll leave it at that, i could probably go on for hours, if anyone's got any thoughts or insights or anything to say in the way of advice i would love to read your replies.
09 Dec 2012, 2:33 pm
