Anyone NOT a "little professor" when you were a kid?

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Joe90
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24 May 2022, 6:12 pm

I hear all this about Aspie children being little professors or something. What does this mean exactly? And if it means what I think it means, I wouldn't say I was a little professor.

As a kid I was a timid wimp. I was scared of everything, but I didn't know a lot. I didn't have any specified interests I fixated on or would spew out intelligent facts about (of course all kids have those moments but I mean I didn't do it more than a normal kid would).

The thing that made me unique was my anxiety about fires. Whenever I went to somebody's house I would ask if they had a trip switch, which my mum told me was a safety thing where if there's any electrical equipment that was faulty it would blow out all the electric to prevent a fire. I was just so worried about things catching on fire. But I didn't know anything about fires or electronics and I wasn't prepared to research anything. All I needed was reassurance from adults, and then I was happy.

I was a timid, nervous little girl that was afraid of everything; dogs, the dark, horror movies, balloons, old houses, thunder, my uncle, big empty fields, electric bells, clowns, dolls, injections, springs, dandelions, being alone, having diarrhea, cobwebs, Mr Blobby...loads of things.

I grew out of a lot of these fears before the age of 12. But definitely I was not a little professor. If I wasn't scared, I was crying or whining instead, and if I wasn't crying or whining then I was very hyperactive and playful.
What sort of child were you? Were you a little professor that high-functioning Aspie children are supposed to be?


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Where_am_I
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24 May 2022, 6:17 pm

I can relate to a lot of that!

I was extremely shy and barely spoke to anyone but my immediate family.


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24 May 2022, 6:32 pm

I'm not.
Instead, I'm just that moody kid who's exponentially emotional.
While everyone's fine with that, I'm not. It's fricking toxic and no one's helping me.

Not shy, not timid, not fearful, not even well spoken by any means to ever considered that resembles a "little professor".
Neither did a lot of socializing, sports, reading... Any extracurriculars, really, I don't fit.

It never helps that my household is poor enough to not expose me to a lot of things, let alone able to keep up with anything I would've liked.


But the volatile sort who's either very happy and playful, or very angry and violent.

The rest are assumptions of how smart, nice, talented, brave or even how rich I'm.
Everyone's just intimidated at me as a child one way or another.

In reality, it's just miscommunication.


Because I never cared enough to be sad or scared or embarrassed or even hurt.
I just hate my emotions enough to ended up limiting myself to very happy and very angry. Nothing about being sporty or nerdy.

Nobody is able to make up their minds about it. And so am I it seems and that never helps.

I'm just a kid who's too emotional and not eloquent enough to express whatever I got, while having to stop myself from doing something stupid because of that emotionalism and I hate it.
Everyone has the patience for me. I myself don't.

I'd rather be one of those little professors or philosophers.
The closest I get was 'English speaker'. :roll: Who then all did assumed I was raised from abroad or something outrageous.


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Last edited by Edna3362 on 24 May 2022, 6:40 pm, edited 2 times in total.

IsabellaLinton
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24 May 2022, 6:36 pm

I don't have Aspergers or HFA so I don't think this applies to me, but I didn't speak enough to be a little professor.
(I have moderate Autism).

As a child I presented with mutism, high anxiety, and then PTSD from abuse. I was a little professor on the inside though. I was always very analytical, curious, and motivated by books and learning. Every time I had a new experience I thought to myself about how I would write it or explain it to others, even though I didn't have the capacity to be that expressive.


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Fern
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24 May 2022, 6:44 pm

Joe90 wrote:
I hear all this about Aspie children being little professors or something. What does this mean exactly? And if it means what I think it means, I wouldn't say I was a little professor.


Same. Never once as a child did I get called "little professor" even though I am indeed a professor now. :lol:

I'm not sure, but maybe if I were more masculine-presenting people would have seen my childhood monologues about obscure rodents or ant lions as professorial. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that they didn't since the patriarchy is strong in academia. I was a little girl, so being like that just got me called "a know-it-all" or "likes the sound of her own voice" or "won't shut up."



League_Girl
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24 May 2022, 7:04 pm

I never was a little professor.


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DavidJSNSW64
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24 May 2022, 7:32 pm

I was but I got a poor result when I sat the HSC (major final exams in NSW schools). I sought out knowledge in my own way in my own fields of interest. I also didn't perform well under pressure.

Things are different now and I have several university qualifications. But I don't really fit in with institutional ways of doing things.



kraftiekortie
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24 May 2022, 7:48 pm

I THOUGHT I was a "little professor."

In point of fact, I was pretty average.



lostonearth35
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24 May 2022, 7:52 pm

More like "a little artist".

More like a little *temperamental* artist, but my parents didn't like to believe in that stereotype.



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24 May 2022, 7:56 pm

I was a little professor as a kid.
I am a little professor as an adult. :nerdy:



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24 May 2022, 8:09 pm

I was definitely not a little professor as a child.


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24 May 2022, 8:16 pm

A little professor means that the aspie child is incredibly mature in speech ability and is excessively knowledgeable about his special interests and is capable of having academic and intelligent conversations about them.


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jimmy m
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24 May 2022, 8:18 pm

I was not a little professor when I was young and growing up. I went to a few special education classes for kids that needed help. But when I entered high school, all that changed and by the time I graduated from high school, I was known as the class genius.


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24 May 2022, 8:26 pm

jimmy m wrote:
I was not a little professor when I was young and growing up. I went to a few special education classes for kids that needed help. But when I entered high school, all that changed and by the time I graduated from high school, I was known as the class genius.


It shows. 8)



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24 May 2022, 10:06 pm

No, I was what they called "painfully shy" and my grades sucked.


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LisaM1031
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24 May 2022, 10:59 pm

I was a pretty stereotypical “little professor” actually. I had advanced vocabulary and letter/number synesthesia where I would do fast mathematical computations in my head. I would memorize movies and TV shows without putting in any effort. I had several interests that I cycled through, I think mainly it was dinosaurs and outer space. I was also called “shy” but only in certain settings. I was actually more comfortable around adults because they all seemed to think I was a genius, while my peers just thought I was odd and standoffish. I was also pretty physically inept (bad at sports) and sometimes didn’t have the common sense that someone “so smart” should have had. Yeah…..I think I was pretty textbook looking back.