New To This Site, Feeling Confused

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hi. i've not been diagnosed with AS, but i've sort of wondered about my own atypical behavior/perspectives since elementary school. and, i sort of suspected that i'm a likely suspect, ever since i first started researching the syndrome. i don't know what i can tell anyone about my situation that'll make people think i'm AS or not. i took some autistism self-assessment quiz online, and it scored me pretty high, meaning it said i'm on the borderline of HFA or AS. People have always told me that I'm strange, but i am strange, and there's a lot of strange people who aren't AS. I've also always had some rather singular ways of expressing myself verbally, but i usually get positive feedback about all of that. still, i just read the whole page on wikipedia about AS, and i've got lots of the symptoms or whatever. I'm verbose, pedantic, prone to using obtuse metaphors (i think of 'em as parables, and people usually respond favorably, but whatever), my speech is characterized by unusual tones, and i used to have a lot of trouble with speech volume, but people have managed to quiet me down this past decade. i tend to do some stereotypy, really boring shhh that i shouldn't want to do, such as memorizing the latin names of fish or obsessing over bicycle components and "building" and pricing theoretical bicycles on online bicycle parts distributors websites, only to empty the cart and start anew, sometimes building a virtually identical bike. truth be told, i usually end up buying a lot of bike parts, and these planning sessions seem helpful. but it is weird. and, you should see me play video games. it's often a very bizarre ritual. i also sorta bounce my knee a whole lot, and i'm often completely unaware of it.
anyway, wikipedia pointed me here, which is kinda cool because i always used to tell myself, whenever i felt really anxious, that i'm on the wrong planet or that i'm from another planet and basically other variations on that whole theme. not in a literal sense, but i just *feel* that way. nowadays, i'm 31 years old, recently engaged, pursuing a master's degree, and i work well over 50 hours each week with developmentally disabled kids, many of whom are on the spectrum. i enjoy my job, and i'm halfway through getting my mse in elementary special education. when i tell people that i think i've got AS, many of them tell me it's because i'm exposed to autistic behavior so much, and i'm just being empathic. which might be true, but i don't know what it means, in terms of the big picture. sure, i've seen kids in residentail settings where they look at the same 15 seconds of footage on a cartoon DVD over and over and over again, in slow motion, double speed, forwards, backwards. they may do this for up to the entire half hour of "free time". now, i don't do anything quite like that, but i get pretty close! anyway, when i tell my fiancee that i think i have AS, she says i might be right, but it doesn't matter. when i tell my dad about it, he says "geez, you might be right. you were a pretty strange and difficult kid." whatever, i feel like i'm doing reasonably well right now, with a solid start on my career path, good health, passable self-esteem, etc. but, i do suffer from a lot of social anxiety, and i'm working hard at speaking more typically for next year's job interviews.

so, i want to know if i've got AS. i think that not knowing/thinking about it as a kid and in my 20's was helpful, but now that i'm on more solid ground, it might make sense to look at possible causes of my aberrance so i can better approach life and understand myself. i don't know if i want a formal diagnosis because i don't want medical/insurance companies dragging me down pharmaceutically or professionally, plus i've always done my best to avoid medication despite anxiety, depression, and bipolar disorder. but i feel like i need to know exactly what's up, you know?

sorry for the massively long post. i have a lot on my mind right now, and i just tried to get it out. i know nobody wants to read a novel on these things, and my future posts shall likely be shorter. any thoughts or feedback, or even just simple "welcome"s are much appreciated.

-rob

Welcome OtherRob!

Hi Rob,

Perhaps your empathy for your students is BECAUSE your AS and not the other way around? Anyway, I can relate to the desire to understand why you are the way you are...I like learning/understanding too....seems to be more of an AS then an NT trait based on my limited contact with both populations.

Anxiety,depression and social anxiety are very common for a first DX of people with AS. Makes a lot of sense when you realize that you sensory sensitivities, Non-verbal learning issues or auditory processing can limit some of the human communication that NT's have access to(like living in a country that you only speak 20% of the language of others...I think many of us compinsate by being more dependent on the one way we do communicate...verbal/written language.)

I don't know if your AS but there is a lot of information available here and by google(unfortunately, most of it is about "kids" but even that can give you some insights because if you are AS you were born that way and can probably see examples in your childhood) .

Welcome

To WrongPlanet!! !

i thought i already posted this, but whatever. if this is a duplicate, my apologies.


i took another aspie test, and this wierd diagram is what came up. it tried to post it here, but the admins won't allow any u.r.l's to be posted, on account of spam. thoroughly reasonable policy, in my opinion. anyway, the diagram is something that i, personally, find difficult to fathom. i scored high in "hunting"? what? there was only one hunting-related question in the quiz, pertaining to a fascination with traps, which i don't really have. i've used minnow traps to gain information in some intellectual pursuits, but i've never been fascinated.

anyway, the score is pretty cut and dry. I scored 127 out of a possible 200, and the site tells me i'd likely be diagnosed with AS. i don't know if these tests are very accurate, but there it is.

thanks for reading. and, to those of you who've welcomed me, thanks for the prompt and friendly responses. Krex had asked if my empathy for my students is a result of AS, rather than the coworkers' suggestions that my empathy is making me feel like i might have AS. i think there's something to that theory. i once shocked some coworkers and delighted this kid i work with by showing him a more efficient way to do stimmy shhh on his computer. (involving the "control" button, for more rapid opening of new pages on word. control&n. rocked his world. and i knew it because i'd done similar nonsense. hey, it's his computer, and it's arguably fun. but some people frown on such teaching.)

-rob

Nice to meet you, rob.