5 Things I Always Hear When I Say I Have Aspergers

I don't know if this happens to any of you, but whenever I tell somebody that I have Aspergers, I always here one, two, or all of the five statements listed below. These statements infuriate me to no end.

1. Oh wow, you really pass. I wouldn't even tell that you had Aspergers until you told me.

2. So are you like Rainman? What is 1,445 divided by 13?

3. You're really good at math. Autistic people are excellent with math, and logic.

4. You seem perfectly normal. I don't understand why you're having such difficulty following such a simple conversation.

5. People grow out of Autism/Aspergers, it's just a childhood phase.

I've said #1 to a friend...I just thought he was really quirky and awesome and had a strangely good memory for odd yet interesting facts!

But then again, I've also known a student who only has one ear and it took me a year and a half to notice that he only has one ear... so.... I'm not really sure what that says about me!

I get the same "Oh, you totally don't act depressed" when I tell people that's how I'm feeling. Or if I go "I need to leave I am going to panic" I get the "But you look like you're doing fine!". It's annoying and just makes you feel like you've been thrown into a cookie cutter that you don't fit in to.

Number two made me laugh because I had someone ask me if I had any super amazing intellectual abilities; sadly I do not.

I know this may not apply to everyone, but for number three I am actually very good at math and have won a scholarship for placing advanced in my school. I have never met anyone who assumed I was autistic for my math skills nor told me my math skills came from autism.

I told 3 of my friends that I have Asperger's; two of them said that "I'm perfectly normal, it's only in my head because I am obsessed with such things", and the other one gave me a quote from a so-called mental health website (which is more like an explicative dictionary) which went on like "since every kid behaves like that sometimes, one ought consult an advised opinion". All of that happened right after I told them about the psychiatrist, so their replies made me feel like an idiot. I hate them sometimes.

One person told me there was nothing wrong with me and could not understand why I was single (I'm in my 30s) and unemployed.

When I first brought up the possibility to my wife, she said "you don't act like the kids at school", "you just never share things with me", "you stop talking to me when we fight", "you are supposed to know what to say", etc... I don't have any intention of telling anyone else.

Number three really gets me, because I know one Aspie who is lousy and math and yet can draw anything freehand.

I was ok at maths in school, but not a bloody genius with it by any stretch of the imagination.

When I got my diagnosis, my family and best friend were actually pretty understanding in some ways. They all said it "made a lot of sense" and "explains a lot". The only niggling worry I have is sometimes when my mum talks about it, she says things like "I just hope you can get some semblance of a normal life now" or things like that. I know she is saying it for the right reasons, but it does put a lot of pressure on me as I'm not sure yet what the outcome is going to be.

I mean, I'm 28 now, it's not like knowing is going to wave a magic wand and somehow get me out of the house and back into employment over night. I'm never going to be a 'social butterfly', or want to be the centre of attention, I'm always going to worry excessively over things that don't really matter to other people. For me the diagnosis is more of a "well maybe now other people will understand that I'm content the way I am".

...I'm autistic.
Like, yeah. "high functioning" autistic. [whatever that means]
I've been diagnosed and rediagnosed numerous times.

When I actually try to talk to people about this, I get reactions along one of two paths:
That I actually should have been diagnosed with asperger's [no, not really. how I function NOW came from working really hard at it and I didn't talk until pretty darn late.]

OR, more often, I'm wrong. My doctors, even the experts in the field, were/are wrong. All the neuro testing is wrong. All the things that were apparent as a kid, wrong. My difficulties that i experience even now but work really hard to accomodate and move around? WRONG.

So like, I end up defending my diagnosis instead of being able to talk about my experience.

I am completely invalidated in every way because I don't resemble rainman, but have worked really hard to make the world something I can move around in, and so I must be wrong or [my favorite:] LYING FOR ATTENTION.

Most of the time?
This is from people who don't know their *** from their elbow when it comes to psych in general, developmental issues specifically.

it's very very frustrating.
So now, I don't talk about it very often at all.

It's really only the past several months that I will talk about it at all but in a limited capacity.

But that means that part of me kind of didn't exist for a long time and to a great extent still is neglected. So I have little to no support for many of the challenges I encounter.

But it's not a big deal because I pass, haha.

People don't understand that for those of us on the spectrum, "passing" takes like most of our energy everyday, whereas "passing" for an NT takes very little effort on their part.

Like, I haven't gone entirely nonverbal for a few years, so I'm completely average, yeah?
HA

No. 1 reaaaaaaallly aggravates me! I told one of my (now really really good friends) that I had asperger's and his reaction was "you don't seem like you do!".... how the heck am i supposed to reply to that!?!?
anyways, now that he knows me a LOT better, has admitted that I definitely am somewhere on the spectrum. Although I do have to say that, he has been my only TRUE friend. One that has loved me, stuck by me, and truly been there for me and i now know that he really would do anything to help me. he's also learned that he's just going to have to explain all his "sarcasm", "expressions" and any non-music related "jokes." to me.

One thing that really bugs me, is actually something I just read on these forums. It's when people say things like "oh everybody has that problem" or something like that... Like that somehow should make all of my problems go away because, after all, billions of others have the same things and don't let it get in their way.

I know exactly what you mean. This is exactly why I don't like telling people my problems. When I get a response like that I feel worse.

My son is 10 and is a "high functioning" autistic. I have heard "so, what can he do?" People think that all children with autism are savants. My son is 10 and small for his age and is developmentally delayed. He is sweet kind of immature and clueless. He seems perfectly fine to me until I interact with a typical 10 year old, 9 or 8 year old for that matter. I worry for his future. I worry when I see him interact with other children because they can be so evil. He is in public school and in the third grade I had to have the teacher explained to the class what artist is so that they would be kinder to him. I don't know if I should let him go and mingle with difficult children: or protect him and keep him only around the ones I know that will be kind. Please tell me what do you all think.

For 2 and 3, tell them (as politely as possible) that Aspergers isn't a parlor trick.

Doesn't it occur to people that if one is depressed it is quite possible they don't want to 'act' depressed and if they are going into a panic they don't want to act like they are going into a panic.

I know at least with me I do try to act less depressed when I am depressed and I most certainly try to keep my cool if I am getting panicky...doesn't mean its not occurring just means I don't necessarily want to effect everyone else with it to.

The math one really irritates me though, I've never had anyone say it to me but it's still very ignorant. I recently found out I likely have a learning disability in math and I was always terrible at it. I never really got help for it though I think teachers assumed I just wasn't trying since I was pretty good at most other subjects.

Math-related: has any of you been told "you could be very good at math!" though you were close to hating it?

I have some serious deficiencies in math. When I was assessed a few months ago I seem to remember him saying that I possibly have a learning disability for math, but that since it isn't affecting my life any more he wasn't going to diagnose me with one. None of this was news to me, I had failed many math courses in University. Ironically when I transferred schools many of my CS courses were turned transferred as math courses. When I graduated I was one course away from having a math degree.

My daughter was pretty clueless to the teasing going on. She found her own set of friends who were nice and the ones that werent, well, she just wasnt 'aware'. Now that she is in 8th grade she is beginning to understand. NOW I keep an eye on what is going on and protect her only because she cannot handle the stress. she is 'aware' now that she is different. She is now more vulnerable. But I am not a bully parent in the school either. I make sure she has a close relationship with the guidance counselor and we monitor what is going on in school that way. Hope this helps.

I think these are legitimate complaints, however I think it is important to look at the motivation of who is saying it. When someone tells you that they didn't even notice and they couldn't tell you had it, you have to realize that not everyone is an expert on autism. They don't know what to look for and they are doing their best to pay you a compliment. Their way of paying you a compliment may be horribly stupid, but they just want you to know that you come across as someone who seems well adjusted, which means that you are doing something right.

Err... I'm willing to maybe give the benefit of the doubt and consider that the motivation of 1-3 may amount to benevolence+ignorance.

Numbers four and five are pretty invalidating though.
I mean, basically four is "what the heck is your problem with this simple thing everyone else can do so easily?"

Five is "not a big deal, it was a childhood phase, dramadramadrama"- people say things like that all the time. It is not an effort to make you feel good, it is because they think ASDs ARE a phase, so not something to consider as any type of legitimate issue for anyone over the age of twelve, really.

I would say invalidating, yes.

I wasn't the only one who actually had to solve this before reading further, was I?

I've had no 1 a lot of times, usually in the same conversation as commenting how how I must be intelligent because of the fluid way that I talk (or write), so they think I mustn't have any problems. Whenever I try to explain how Asperger's makes me feel, I've often got the cheery response "well, we are having a conversation now and you are doing fine!" which is probably meant in the same complimentary way, but nevertheless serves to sort of invalidate whatever I'm trying to say to them.

Haha, nope I solved it too, though using a calculator and then promptly closed it because it resulted in odd numbers... I have a weird thing with odd numbers, I don't like them.

Yeah, I think one of the hardest things to deal with, is other people not caring/understanding/realising that if we come across as 'normal' it's because we've put a lot of work into it. It's not that we're on the same level as them, we've just had to put ourselves through a lot of stress to appear that way.

This is something I struggle with. Just because I perceive, feel, and process emotions (both mine and others') differently, and don't show commonly accepted/expected outward expressions of what I'm feeling and thinking, doesn't mean I don't *have* emotions. People reject me for not being 'normal' while accusing me of being the insensitive one. And I'm the one that should be in therapy?