My brother might be an aspie too

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I really don't know how none of us saw it before. It's probably because he is so different from me and we neglected to take into account the fact that autism manifests differently in everyone. He took an AQ test and got a score of 34 which is in the aspie range, although I brought it up with him and he doesn't think that it's likely that he has autism.

My family is definitely not the most neurotipical bunch, and that all comes from my mom's side of the family. My dad is NT although he is quite a nerd, my mom and 11 year old sister have some minor autistic traits but they are for the most part normal, my 17 year old brother has ADHD, and my 13 year old brother is probably an aspie like me as I have already mentioned.

It definitely would explain a lot of he were autistic. He is definitely a lot like Spock, he has little desire to do social interaction, he is not very expressive, he is very obsessive, he has some executive functioning problems, he has needed speech therapy in the past, he has had sensory overload problems in school before, he really doesn't care about how he looks, and he has some unusual skills.

As I said, we are different in a lot of ways. For example I think in pictures and patterns which causes some language impairment because I have to constantly "translate" everything I say from pictures into words when I'm speaking, but my brother thinks in language which allows him to rather easily be very persuasive and articulate. He is very good at strategy to the point that he wins at least 95% of all strategy dependent games he plays, nobody likes to play with him any more because we already know who will win. I often play against him but my executive functioning problems are worse then his and I rarely win. He is also very good at school to the point where he skipped two grades and is taking college classes along side high school, and he will have a bachelors degree by the time he is 16.

We have started talking about trying to get him a diagnosis, and I'm interested to see how this all plays out.

Good luck in your quest.

It's not necessarily a bad thing to be an Aspie; in certain situations, it might be advantageous.

He seems like he'll be able to accomplish much, even with the diagnosis.

Just be a guide for him, for you've had similar struggles.

Good luck with pursuing the diagnosis!

Impressive that he'll have a bachelors degree by the time he's 16!

I think my brother has ASD too but it's hard for me to put into words why that is. Whenever I describe him to someone who doesn't know him they just say 'he sounds like any teenaged boy'. People who have met him tend to indicate that he's a little 'behind'.

One of my friends recently told me that he has aspergers. He discovered his condition after learning I have it. What a coincidence.

I was actually diagnosed because my first grade teacher has a son with Asperger's about my age (that I later became friends with) and she noticed that I was very simelar to him, suggesting that my parents look into it further. I also have two friends right now who suspect that they are be aspies because of me. I definitely do seem to attract social outcast type people like me, so that would make sense.

An update on this situation: we have decided not to pursue a diagnosis for my brother because although he has a lot of autistic traits he is not really disabled by it and he has never really needed any special accommodations. A diagnosis wouldn't really help him much if at all and it would be more trouble then it's worth even if he ends up getting it. I shall remain the only diagnosed aspie in the family.

Had a similar situation last year with my cousin who might as well be my brother. Turns out he just has some ADD.