Greetings everyone.
I am 54 turning 55 too soon.Lived my life for my first 50 years working with my Mom sharing the place.We lived independently of each other until the last of the 50 years, when she became disabled and I had to look after her... I promised her I wouldn't send her to an institution (care home).She died of complications when i was 50, and I've been living alone in the world for the first time.You see I'm single with social autism (Asperger Syndrome) and have never had to truly be independent, so i don't know quite what to do with this independence.It is a culture shock... losing your trusted 50-year life's companion (she was a best friend). I'm not a momma's boy, but I've known too little of life to know what to do with it.I figure I grew up in a bubble of family life that kept my recently-diagnosed Aspergers happy... the need for isolation from too much social contact than one can stand.It's not a matter of being anti-social, or I wouldn't be here today. Just non-socialized.I speak up well when spoken to, but cannot do more than superfluous conversation with strangers.
Aspergers is genetic, a different brain wiring from the neurotypical. Fewer connections exist between the amygdala (first organ the spinal cord hits, works the fight of flight response) and the frontal lobes, giving my less control over the amygdala.The amygdala is the part of the brain that pulls your hand from the hot stove burner when you accidentally touch it before you are even aware that you touched it and say "that was hot!"So social things, for some reason, are subject to the emergency response of the amygdala instead of rhyme and reason, for the most part.Asperger's different brain wiring also differs in many respects from the so-called "normal," giving us an inability to understand social things you lucky neurotypicals know from birth.We don't get most social cues, bodily or facial or vocal or situational.
Aspergers is on the Autistic Spectrum (or range of affectedness) on the mild end. We are loving and as affectionate and empathic as anyone else. Our difficulty is that we don't know how to show it. That's why most Doctors and Researchers (who are mostly not aspies) think we are uncaring, unaffectionate and have no empathy. Only an aspie can give you the truth on that.The good part is that social skills can be learned like one would learn mathematics, step by step.The bad part is I am also stricken with generalized anxiety disorder and social phobia. That makes life extremely difficult, and the learning of social skills very painful.
Happily I can report I've gotten along with everyone I've worked with, except for those who didn't want to get along. One always finds some of them. I have an excellent work ethic and work record.We aspies have an advantage over you majority of neurotypicals, in that our ability to concentrate is second to none. I go or sit to work and plain go for it. I have to be told it is quitting time unless I notice I've gone over time.This has put me in good standing with my employers over the years... no I don't suck-up. I make a point of that and anyone who knows me could tell you I don't.
Having grown from birth needing to "fit in" with these neurotypicals we don't understand, we become very loyal, devoted, and loving friends. We also generally grow up with a high code of honesty rare in today's society. I've never figured out why, but that's an aspie trait, so I live with it sometimes to my own detrement.We only have so much "social energy" to bring to an interpersonal encounter, and depending of the person, we may get drained quickly or slowly. I drain very quickly. So parties and picnics and what "normals," if anyone is normal, call fun, we call social hell.They drain us completely for days on end, so we need days of isolation to piece ourselves back together again and re-energize.I myself joined a Church... where safer to learn to socialize? For i was only diagnosed on March 12, 2013, just before the new Doctor's Diagnositic Manual came out that eliminated Aspergers as an official diagnosis for some reason. I guess health care money. More and more people were being diagnosed, especially in their adulthood, and I personally think they wanted to prevent further diagnoses. That may sound paranoid, but why else eliminate a diagnosis?Still the asperger community continues, because the diagnosis is a real one involving real people and real suffering. The young are most affected, and often become suicidal because they feel like a stranger on a planet they don't understand. I believe we've all grown up that way. Me, not knowing I was an aspie, was simply called "oh that's just him" to explain my odd behaviours. My late parents never did seek any diagnosis for me. It would have been nice to start on the road to normalcy in my youth, like so many youth have been before the diagnosis was taken away. Now they like me will have to grow up suffering in secret.
In my fourth year on my quest for normalcy, many complications have to be beaten. A big depression, anxieties, panic, and phobias, developed since i did not know why I was so different inside from "everyone else."The diagnosis put an explanation to my life's problems. They can truly be sorted out now, but it is hard to teach this old dog new tricks. Semi-retired and a mess, but with HOPE for the future!
I am not Asperger Syndrome. I am a person who has a genetic syndrome that keeps me from understanding social things.My best recovery, though the syndrome is incurable, is my Goal.
Thank you for reading. xpax
I am 54 turning 55 too soon.Lived my life for my first 50 years working with my Mom sharing the place.We lived independently of each other until the last of the 50 years, when she became disabled and I had to look after her... I promised her I wouldn't send her to an institution (care home).She died of complications when i was 50, and I've been living alone in the world for the first time.You see I'm single with social autism (Asperger Syndrome) and have never had to truly be independent, so i don't know quite what to do with this independence.It is a culture shock... losing your trusted 50-year life's companion (she was a best friend). I'm not a momma's boy, but I've known too little of life to know what to do with it.I figure I grew up in a bubble of family life that kept my recently-diagnosed Aspergers happy... the need for isolation from too much social contact than one can stand.It's not a matter of being anti-social, or I wouldn't be here today. Just non-socialized.I speak up well when spoken to, but cannot do more than superfluous conversation with strangers.
Aspergers is genetic, a different brain wiring from the neurotypical. Fewer connections exist between the amygdala (first organ the spinal cord hits, works the fight of flight response) and the frontal lobes, giving my less control over the amygdala.The amygdala is the part of the brain that pulls your hand from the hot stove burner when you accidentally touch it before you are even aware that you touched it and say "that was hot!"So social things, for some reason, are subject to the emergency response of the amygdala instead of rhyme and reason, for the most part.Asperger's different brain wiring also differs in many respects from the so-called "normal," giving us an inability to understand social things you lucky neurotypicals know from birth.We don't get most social cues, bodily or facial or vocal or situational.
Aspergers is on the Autistic Spectrum (or range of affectedness) on the mild end. We are loving and as affectionate and empathic as anyone else. Our difficulty is that we don't know how to show it. That's why most Doctors and Researchers (who are mostly not aspies) think we are uncaring, unaffectionate and have no empathy. Only an aspie can give you the truth on that.The good part is that social skills can be learned like one would learn mathematics, step by step.The bad part is I am also stricken with generalized anxiety disorder and social phobia. That makes life extremely difficult, and the learning of social skills very painful.
Happily I can report I've gotten along with everyone I've worked with, except for those who didn't want to get along. One always finds some of them. I have an excellent work ethic and work record.We aspies have an advantage over you majority of neurotypicals, in that our ability to concentrate is second to none. I go or sit to work and plain go for it. I have to be told it is quitting time unless I notice I've gone over time.This has put me in good standing with my employers over the years... no I don't suck-up. I make a point of that and anyone who knows me could tell you I don't.
Having grown from birth needing to "fit in" with these neurotypicals we don't understand, we become very loyal, devoted, and loving friends. We also generally grow up with a high code of honesty rare in today's society. I've never figured out why, but that's an aspie trait, so I live with it sometimes to my own detrement.We only have so much "social energy" to bring to an interpersonal encounter, and depending of the person, we may get drained quickly or slowly. I drain very quickly. So parties and picnics and what "normals," if anyone is normal, call fun, we call social hell.They drain us completely for days on end, so we need days of isolation to piece ourselves back together again and re-energize.I myself joined a Church... where safer to learn to socialize? For i was only diagnosed on March 12, 2013, just before the new Doctor's Diagnositic Manual came out that eliminated Aspergers as an official diagnosis for some reason. I guess health care money. More and more people were being diagnosed, especially in their adulthood, and I personally think they wanted to prevent further diagnoses. That may sound paranoid, but why else eliminate a diagnosis?Still the asperger community continues, because the diagnosis is a real one involving real people and real suffering. The young are most affected, and often become suicidal because they feel like a stranger on a planet they don't understand. I believe we've all grown up that way. Me, not knowing I was an aspie, was simply called "oh that's just him" to explain my odd behaviours. My late parents never did seek any diagnosis for me. It would have been nice to start on the road to normalcy in my youth, like so many youth have been before the diagnosis was taken away. Now they like me will have to grow up suffering in secret.
In my fourth year on my quest for normalcy, many complications have to be beaten. A big depression, anxieties, panic, and phobias, developed since i did not know why I was so different inside from "everyone else."The diagnosis put an explanation to my life's problems. They can truly be sorted out now, but it is hard to teach this old dog new tricks. Semi-retired and a mess, but with HOPE for the future!
I am not Asperger Syndrome. I am a person who has a genetic syndrome that keeps me from understanding social things.My best recovery, though the syndrome is incurable, is my Goal.
Thank you for reading. xpax
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