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Chuck
le concierge de muse'e imaginaire
Joined: Feb 26, 2007
Posts: 1893
Location: with you :)
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 Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 9:43 am Post subject: |
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| blessedmom wrote: | ...Who in the world ever accused you of not being smart?  There are many, many kinds of SMART and you have the best kind. The "make people feel fully understood and validated" type of smart. The deep-thinking philosophical type of smart that most intellectual people don't "get". |
Thanks Laurie!  Your heart fills Canada - maybe all of North and South America. I don't think I could write a better definition for you than the one you kindly gave me above. You describe yourself very well. I hope you recognize that in yourself.
People called me 'stupid' all of my life. On some level I always knew it wasn't exactly true. Then again, my life stupidity announces otherwise! 
But thank you.
Chuck |
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computerlove
...I feel nostalgia for things i've never known...
Joined: Jul 11, 2006
Posts: 3753
Location: Male, Mexico, Graphic Design
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| Posted: Sat Jun 23, 2007 4:10 pm Post subject: |
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I don't want this thread to end  This is one of the best threads I've ever read,
Chuck, Sedaka and ZanneMarie, you three are great, love your words and greatly
admire each of your experiences that you share with the rest of us in this forum, and always learn something each time I see one of your comments.
_________________
One of God's own prototypes. Some kind of high powered mutant never even considered for mass production. Too weird to live, and too rare to die.
"Anyone can do it" Mimi wo sumaseba
"Hottest avatar on WP." Comet
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Sedaka
Searching For My Catcher in the Rye
Joined: Jul 17, 2006
Age: 26
Posts: 5218
Location: In the recesses of my mind
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| Posted: Sat Jun 23, 2007 5:01 pm Post subject: |
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| Chuck wrote: | | Sedaka wrote: | yeah im learning to roll with the punches...
im not too sure how much i would divulge... does she tell em straight up about AS?
i can do ok looking at people... i look at one eye and usually we have something they want me to look at... so it's not too bad.
but i do get eye contact moments. |
Dear Sedaka,
I'm glad that you're learning to roll with those punches! (Your aikido training, perhaps? ) I know that you are very smart.
My sister divulges everything that she feels comfortable sharing with her classes, which is a lot more now that she's 50 than she did when she was your age. (There is only one thing she isn't comfortable divulging, and so neither will I - but it isn't her Asperger's). The first time she decided to open up, she was scared to death. Would she lose her job? Would her students accept her? Would it be unprofessional? Would there be complaints?
She found out that they loved her for it! She became a real person for them, someone willing to accept and share herself, and they saw that she would also accept them for who they were as well. (She wasn't doing a good job of hiding it prior anyway! ) People started opening up in her classes. They now felt comfortable asking her questions, especially seeing how she joked around about her own "problems", and many began admitting that they themselves also had autism, Aspergers, ADD, auditory and speech problems, etc. Now whenever she discusses a particular "disorder", any in the class who have it are encouraged to provide their life perspective about it. The learning is made memorable and real, and not just "from the book". She could be herself, get that part out of the way, and be free to assist her students in understanding and loving the cousework.
My sister has eye contact problems that are very severe. I have learned to deal with it somewhat - but can still get"brain freeze" when it happens! If you figure out how to solve this problem, please share it with me! (Although, honestly, I just think it's funny when it happens now).
_____________________________________________________________________________________
Aside: I hope that you don't think that I think that you need my help - it probably seems to you that I'm always "diving in" when you post!
I must divulge the truth so that you understand what's been going on. And first and foremost, please forgive me if I have ever offended you - I would never intentionally do that. And I hope that what I am about to say won't make you uncomfortable or embarrassed. So, on to the explanation:
Until I became too old to do so, I always wanted to have a little girl! I would have loved to have raised a daughter. Of course, that never happened. I started reading your posts and getting to know you: an intelligent, very kind and somewhat quiet, yet funny and slightly quirky aikido biology lover! WOW!!! If ever I would have had a daughter, I'm sure that she would have been very much you. So I have been following you around fascinated by the person that you are, until it dawned on me that it may seem to you like I'm stalking you at this point. Please forgive me if I have creeped you out!!! 
It was just very nice for me to have had the opportunity to see through you who she might have been. Meeting you, I know and mean in all sincerity, I would have been very proud and honored to have been her dad. You are a wonderful person! I'm very impressed by who you are. I hope that you will never change. But change is inevitable, and you will change, as everything does. In your case, the outcome will surely be a masterpiece!
Best wishes to you, Sedaka, in whatever life path you decide to travel! I hope that you will have a long, fun-filled, happy life - however you define that for yourself.
Chuck
If you ever need my help with anything, please feel free to ask. Not that I think you need it, or ever will!
PS. I may still respond occasionally to your posts, as I am always interested in your thoughts. Unless I am making you uncomfortable. If so, just let me know, and I will stop.
Take care my friend! |
thanks for the kind words
im lucky that i get a RA for my PhD program though i'd still be fine with teaching... i'm actually going to astart researching autism. there's a friend here at my neuro program that i've told about my AS (have only told a few profs here) and they just got a PI job to research autism and got me an opportunity to jump in the field. i'm going for it start this aug out in VA... not too long after i defend my evo devo MS project here in OR
see you're from nash... im actually from KY lol
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Sedaka
Searching For My Catcher in the Rye
Joined: Jul 17, 2006
Age: 26
Posts: 5218
Location: In the recesses of my mind
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| Posted: Sat Jun 23, 2007 5:06 pm Post subject: |
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| Gromit wrote: | | Sedaka wrote: | | that passage was refering mainly for when i teach... depending on the interaction required for the lesson... sometimes i feel like i may be coming across as if i don't know what im doing... |
I teach, and I worried about it before I started, but it's been OK. Big classes (200 or so) are no problem, smaller classes can even be fun, if I can get the students to ask questions occasionally. Look at it like that: I get to talk about my special interest for hours on end without having to back anyone into a corner, no one is offended, they even like it when I am enthusiastic, and I get paid for it! It's the administration and the grading which bore me so much, my toenails curl up.
The answer to your original question depends on whether you mean has it made a difference to how I judge myself (none) or has it made a difference to what I do (yes). Once I saw the pattern of what was going wrong (before I ever heard of AS), the only practical option I saw to minimize harm both to others and to me was to avoid close involvement.
If I had known earlier, I think I could have developed tolerance to some normal behaviours, and I would have had more opportunity to learn what I would have needed to make myself more compatible with the norm. Then I would have had other and better options. But after some years of adaptation I am OK with avoidance, so it has worked out just fine. The adaptation process is a bit rough, so in that sense I have been harder on myself.
Gromit |
i think what stresses me out... is that i've always noticed that i ask different questions over subject material than other people... like they're "stupid" questions...
so i feel really antsie about trying to figure out where students are going to ask questions and what problems they would have.
once i got that... i can have fun with the class.
forgive me if im reposting this idea lol
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www.pubmed.gov
www.sciencedirect.com
http://highwire.stanford.edu/lists/freeart.dtl |
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Metal_Man
Deinonychus
Joined: Feb 04, 2007
Age: 41
Posts: 327
Location: A higher state of existance
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| Posted: Sat Jun 23, 2007 5:22 pm Post subject: |
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Knowing I have AS has made things so much easier for me. I finally have an understanding why there are so many things that no matter how hard I try I will always fail miserably at them. On the other hand there are things I can do that nobody else can even come close to be able to doing. I now know that when it comes to socializing I have to do things on my terms and my terms only. At work I have learned enough things to keep the NT's happy. I have only told the people closest to me about my AS and they have been very accepting. It certainly explains why I am the way I am.
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Just because I don't care doesn't mean I don't understand. Homer J. Simpson |
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Chuck
le concierge de muse'e imaginaire
Joined: Feb 26, 2007
Posts: 1893
Location: with you :)
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| Posted: Sun Jun 24, 2007 10:15 am Post subject: |
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Sedaka wrote: "...im lucky that i get a RA for my PhD program though i'd still be fine with teaching... i'm actually going to astart researching autism. there's a friend here at my neuro program that i've told about my AS (have only told a few profs here) and they just got a PI job to research autism and got me an opportunity to jump in the field. i'm going for it :) start this aug out in VA... not too long after i defend my evo devo MS project here in OR."
Yay! :) good for you and congratulations! I know that you will go far in your research - may end up helping all of us! Bravo, Sedaka! But most importantly, I hope that it will be exciting and fun for you, and an avenue to open up your intellect's passions. Best wishes on this new adventure!
Sedaka wrote: "see you're from nash... im actually from KY lol"
Well I'll be! I live 20 minutes from Kentucky - I actually live in Millersville. I shoulda figured we were neighbors! :) Glad you're coming back down south. Virginia is pretty - I used to work for the State Water Control Board there in Richmond, when I had in my mind to get into something involving oceanography/ zoology. Life went a different direction. But I'm finally steering my own boat for a change!
I wish you well. Never stop laughing!
Chuck |
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Sedaka
Searching For My Catcher in the Rye
Joined: Jul 17, 2006
Age: 26
Posts: 5218
Location: In the recesses of my mind
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| Posted: Sun Jun 24, 2007 3:08 pm Post subject: |
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the research im going to be doing has to do with a mutation that demonstrates variable activity within the hippocampus of autistic mice/rats (mice/rats that show autistic behaviors) within a certain developmental period when they're young. hippocampus is associated with autism and certain similar cognitive dysfunctions (not my word, lol)
learning the dynamics of how this works will hopefully define a timeperiod for interventions with the education of children. i also hope that learning more of the behaviors and neuronal workings of these autistic mice/rats will help in creating some teaching methods that are catered to working with this kind of phenotype... which will hopefully be applied to real life...increasing learning abilities at this critical point in development for children.
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Gromit
Phoenix
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Joined: May 20, 2006
Posts: 519
Location: In Cognito
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| Posted: Sun Jun 24, 2007 3:22 pm Post subject: |
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| Sedaka wrote: | | i think what stresses me out... is that i've always noticed that i ask different questions over subject material than other people... like they're "stupid" questions... |
No, that's not a liability, that's an asset! Most good science starts with questions others haven't thought of. I wish I were a lot less normal in that respect.
| Sedaka wrote: | so i feel really antsie about trying to figure out where students are going to ask questions and what problems they would have.
once i got that... i can have fun with the class. |
You will find out soon enough what the usual questions are. If you don't know an answer, say you will look it up and get back to them, then do so. They need to learn anyway to distinguish between what they know and what they don't know, and not to lie about that, either to themselves or to others. You might as well set them a good example. You will be good for them.
Gromit
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They looked at one another in incomprehension, two minds driving opposite ways up a narrow street and waiting for the other man to reverse first. |
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Sedaka
Searching For My Catcher in the Rye
Joined: Jul 17, 2006
Age: 26
Posts: 5218
Location: In the recesses of my mind
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hartzofspace
Red Dragon
Joined: Apr 15, 2005
Posts: 3801
Location: In the basement, with the 'nomalies
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| Posted: Sun Jun 24, 2007 8:28 pm Post subject: |
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Now that I know about the AS, I think I am far more kind to myself. And while I think that I am more isolating than before, most of the reason for that is because of physical challenges. I give myself permission to say, "I don't have to care." If I want to smile and greet someone as they approach, I will. If I don't feel like it, then I don't have to. If they feel bad, that's their problem. I am not here to make people feel good. Most of the time, in these street etiquette scenarios, I find that someone has greeted me and passed me before I even noticed. I used to beat myself up for that. Now I say, Oh well. My thoughts had me captive.
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"However gradual it looks from here, look if you like, but you will have to leap." |
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