How were you perceived as a young child?

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while i am still working on my outline to show for a therapist, there is still one thing that makes me hesitant. according to my parents when i was young (??-7 years old maybe?) i was 'the perfect child' as opposed to my younger brother who was tested at a very young age for autism (the school pushed the issue). he never smiled for pictures/his behavior when he was a baby made people ask my mom if 'something was wrong with him'. things like that. wouldn't i have acted more like my brother if i was/am autistic? this is the single thing that puts big doubts into my mind.


it brings up a lot of doubt. or i'm thinking maybe since my parents were wrapped up in other things besides their children (either themselves or jesus/their troubled relationship and impending divorce) they have flawed memories of this time. but even my aunt tells me i was outgoing and cheerful when i was very young (before school age), and i trust her observations/judgment. everything about AS explains so much, it's just this one thing that makes me doubt it all.


my parents always say "what happened to you?!" as if i was good at the start of life but then faltered. isn't it extremely common for people with AS to have been considered 'difficult' baby or children? certainly during middle school years and beyond i was, but before that i'm not sure. this has been something i think about everyday. i could go into more detail but i'm trying not to make a text wall. i'm not sure if i should even bring it up to a therapist or not sometimes. maybe i should try harder to be 'normal' instead.


how were you when you were a small child? and how did people perceive you? was there any difference between before school and once you started it?

What happened after you got a little older?
Did you become more shy and less cheerful and outgoing?
When did you develop any stereotyped behaviors?

My parents knew from a young age that I was "different". I don't know if they suspected I was autistic until I was diagnosed though.

Other people just thought of me as being this smart kid. I was praised a lot for my intelligence as a child.

as a child i was very shy most of the time and was always hiding behind mom.
i also did the usual autistic things like lining up toy cars and what-not.

i'll also add i was a big drawer and at the time was seen as rather talented, and was good at math as well.

As a child I was perceived as intelligent, shy, moody and strange. Or so I've been told since I don't remember a lot of my childhood, or, as a matter of fact, my teen years either.

Shy, gifted/intelligent, somewhat offish with strangers, pedantically well-mannered (nearly to a fault), sort-of robotic appearing to outsiders, serious.

this shrink thought I was autistic, that shrink thought I was schizoid/schizotypal, yet another thought I was mentally ret*d.

I was a compliant child and well-liked by adults because I generally followed the rules. I was also smart and could engage in adult conversation. My social skills among peers, though, was quite different.

I was shy around everyone. The question that I got from my mom was "Why are you always so serious?" No one thought I might be on the spectrum, though looking back I see that I had a lot of characteristics, including stimming, talking at length about my special interests, and not playing pretend.

Aspergers wasn't a diagnosis when I was in school, and I definitely would not be thought to have classic autism. So, any problems that I had were considered due to being "too smart for my own good."

My mom has also complained that as a baby, I would not cuddle.

I think back and remember some of the other kids who were in the top classes in high school with me, some smarter than me. They didn't all have the social problems I did. There was/is definitely something going on besides "being smart."

I was seen as being somebody who was somewhat hyper, yet serious about certain things. I didn't want to play with more than one kid (unless we had to in order to fulfill the quota of a baseball or football game.). I liked talking to the old ladies on the park bench--they always said nice things about my father. Sometimes, I liked talking to the old ladies better than playing with the other kids.

I didn't like to run while I played. When we played Batman and Robin, I always wanted to be Commissioner Gordon, so I could sit down and not run.

I had a bad temper if I struck out in baseball, or threw a gutterball in bowling. I used to get thrown out of places for my temper.

i was perceived as smaller than adults i guess.

^^^ Pretty much the same as that. I was a very quiet kid.

I was perceived as "very sinful" by my parents.

When I was a child I was very hyper but mostly kept to myself when I was around other kids. Instead of hanging out with the other kids, I mostly hang out with my Uncle.

the only thing i can think of, is once i got to 2nd grade, i learned to be very quiet and follow directions. in daycare and kindergarten the other children shunned me and i cried everyday my mom dropped me off. by 1st i was a little more accepted but mostly written off as a 'stupid kid' since i would be pulled out and given one-on-one lessons teaching me how to read. i got in trouble a lot from the teachers and kids were easily annoyed with me. so yes i became more shy, i was tired of getting in trouble for reasons i didn't understand!

as for stereotyped behaviors, there was a lot but people almost constantly told me how 'shy' and 'quiet' and 'mature' i was, so i just associated my behaviors with that. (i should note that i'm transgender, so i was brought up and seen as a little girl, not a boy. which i think may factor into this) it wasn't even until this year that i realized i stim. i did have a special interest in elementary, bats. in middle school: neopets. i still had the same problems socializing with kids my age, but i compensated by being quiet and essentially letting them treat me like a doll. i would cry a lot in school because i was overwhelmed, but didn't have the words to explain it so i still got in trouble from teachers/the nurse quite a bit. out of school it was easier for me to be with adults than children my age etc etc, this week has been rough and i'm running out of brain steam, sorry.

basically, once i was of school age, my behaviors and thought processes, i can see that yes i was different from other children and had 'stereotypical autistic behaviors'. it's just before then that i'm not sure about. i can's stop obsessing about it, i want to be absolutely sure before i take this to a therapist. i'm rambling but i just can't stop thinking about it my brother and i are so similar nowadays, though he seems to know how to cope better and is even going to college (while i went for a semester and failed), but if they suspected it of him and not me when we were small, maybe i'm wrong about all this.

I was always very quiet, kind, empathetic, easily swayed by emotions, smart, a bit weird. Or at least that's how I remember.

I suggest that you ask your parents or other family members for detailed list of behaviors that were typical of you instead of how they perceive you in general as perfect or quiet or mature. It is the behaviors that psychs are looking for when diagnosing autism, not how a young child is thinking, which would be hard for anyone to recall and articulate accurately.