Depressed After Aspie Meeting

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There has been something of an informal aspie meeting taking place at my venue every Sunday. A bunch of aspies just happen to show up every Sunday at our weekly cookout. and a lot of it is sorta linked thru WP....and then there are regular members of our gang who have nothing to do with WP who easily fit the criteria and then other people with other issues and NTs and random neighbors from down the street...all hanging out together around the fire pit for a great big neurodiverse hootnanny.
..But people do go off and talk about aspie stuff.
My venue is a very big, neat, wide open space and we have lots of stuff to play with, and we are right near the railroad track for all the people interested in trains.

Last night, a long-time acquaintance (and Aspie) brought along his HFA teenaged son, so it was good for him to be able to consort with the others and be in an all-accepting and non-patronizing environment.

An interesting observation is how different we all are from each-other.

I am happy, because i have wanted to have some sort of neurodiverse group thingy at my venue for a really long time, and this is the closest we have ever had...But it can get kinda chaotic because it is such a mixed group and there is drinking and smoking that happens.

I would not change the Sunday cookout, but I guess it would be good if there were a more "formal" meeting where a broader age range of people could feel comfortable and whatnot.
Still..it is a step in the right direction, I think.

Anywhoo...
This is different from the one aspie group meeting I attended where I almost had the meltdown. It was TOO formal..and it was way across town and I don't do well outside my comfort zones and the lights and carpet patterns and hard little chairs drove me crazy, and I was so overwhelmed that I could hardly talk.
They are supposed to be changing the lights though.

i could echo a lot said here.

as much as my spiritual training and lifelong sense of social justice whips into a frenzy about any kinds of comparisons that plot people on a hierarchy, i was unsettled when i went to a support group, both because i felt disconnected and because i realized that i was being mirrored for some of the things that i have trouble with.

i became concerned for a while that going to a group was making my symptoms worse because i was identifying more with them.

ultimately, the biggest issue emotionally with hanging around an aspie organization was the comments "you don't look/seem aspie". while i'm only on the way to getting assessment, there were other aspies there who were diagnosed, who got the same comments. we after all aren't immune from the stereotypes.

yes. diversity, ultimately. but facing what are even remotely common challenges in myself is tough. i can land into despair, if i don't keep a balanced view of myself - as highly intelligent, artistic, caring, capable, awkward, inept, occasionally non-verbal, obsessive, weird. and no, the last parts of this list are not the 'bad' parts. placing my traits on a hierachy would also be dangerous.

to me the idea of 'kindred souls' is projection of a desire, mostly.

You folks do realize that even as vastly different as we are here on WP for the most part all of us here are higher functioning. I say this because the majority of AS people I know in real life do not have the gumption to even post on WP as they are so extremely anti-social/stuck in their own little world and hate everyone else or are scared of others even on the internet.

So perhaps WP is the support group for the higher functioning, though the ultra high functioning ones like the scientists and doctors can't be bothered to associate with us. I don't blame them if I had a life like that I would stay busy with work and not have time to post. I only post out of boredom and also WP is only place I know to post about random stuff as we discuss things like movies and hobbies here too. WP is not solely AS discussion.

At the same time we can't get stuck on comparing ourselves to one another here on WP either. For one the majority of people here are self diagnosed so we don't know if the persons we are comparing ourselves to really have AS or not. Plus if they have co-morbid conditions it does also change their AS presentation.

I envy the ones not addicted to WP.
I wish I wasn't so.

Did you happen to help any body else in the group that you were lucky enough to be with?

My first time going to the 'social group' for adults with AS was actually a good experience. There were three men there, one 7 years older than me, two 2 years younger than me. We really clicked, and I felt happy leaving. No NTs whatsoever, and therefore, no shut-ins either.

So, there was a Halloween party that I missed because I was going out to a movie that night.

When I went for the second time, the two NT women who run the group were there, as well as a couple who brought their daughter (about my age) who was pretty much non-verbal. On the upside, at least the 29 year old man from the first time was there.

One of the women told me about the Halloween party, saying that "we managed to get a couple of the people who are confined to group homes to come". Makes me really glad that I didn't come to THAT one.

So the rest of the night was uneventful. The ladies ask me about myself, act surprised when they find out that I actually have a life, with plenty of awkward silences.

I might go back this month, but I don't know how much I'll bother in the future. The 29 year old who helps run the group could really use some company, though.

I have some experience with parents of aspies that are too persistant.

For example, I went to the family potluck that my provincial group was holding. And there was this one board member who wouldn't let up with trying to get me to give my input regarding this 'drop-in centre' that they were planning for 18+ aspies. I was having a conversation with another higher-functioning woman (who was one of the two token aspie board members) who was a student teacher. I felt that the conversation was really involved, so I didn't really care to come over and give my input regarding this drop-in centre (which I would never attend anyways).

Afterwards, she approaches me and says "WELL, it seems like you were too busy to come and give your opinion. So, how about you fill out this form regarding what you'd like to see at the drop-in centre." And of course, they were things like "support group", "scheduled events", "social skills training" and "independant living skills". Considering that this drop-in would be one hour a week, possibly on the other side of the city; I decided that I would likely never go.

So I told her "Oh, I don't think that I would have the need for such a service." She asked me to elaborate, which I then said "I think that others would have greater need than I would." To which she said "Oh, so you want to only interact with people who are on 'your level'?" Kind of forcing me to agree to a ruder statement than I originally intended to make.

...And then she called over a lower-functioning girl to come talk to me. Introducing her by saying "I think you have a lot of things in common, and a lot of differences. And I think that it would lead to a lot of understanding if you two were to talk for a bit." That was really awkward. We could only talk for 30 seconds, because all she could say was "Oh, it's SO HARD. It's SO HARD." To be honest, I'm not into a giant pity party. I could understand her saying that her life was hard if she had to live on her own and pay her own bills. But considering that this was a ~20 year old who lives at home with mom and dad, I'm a bit more hesitant to really believe her.

It was really an attempt by that woman to scare me off. I get the impression that a lot of the NT women who are involved in that group just wanted to scare me off. It seems like the woman's tone changed towards me as soon as my mother mentioned that I'm self-diagnosed. I'm still kind of mad that she kind of used that girl as a 'tool' to alienate me, though.

^^ those who are used to being the 'saviors' of the poor unfortunates get all prickly when the 'poor unfortunate' speaks for themselves.

Merle

I feel the same way, too, Ever since I've been on WP, I could never fit in with most of the people here because they're more higher-functioning and have a lot more outgoing lifestyles and personalities than me.

am sometimes go to a similar sort of thing to meetings,a NAS day centre for LFAs,it costs 'hundreds' per day but get that funded by SS,not allowed to go there without two staff and don't have two to one or a car every day to get there so rarely am able to go.
some of the auties there have three to one [meaning three staff to just them] and some don't even get one to one so there's a lot of difference,am don't have any interest in interaction with others,but its good to know there are others like self or worse and are not a one off 'burden' sent from hell like what LD support staff announce to others closeby to hear them.

about support groups/meetings of any conditon or illness or disease,they are very likely to have more severe people there because they are 'support' groups,maybe could start a meet up group for independant auties and aspies and avoid using the word support in title.