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20 Jun 2010, 10:10 am
leejosepho
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20 Jun 2010, 10:18 am
spooky13
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Joined: 14 Jul 2009
Age: 61
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Location: Drifting through the fog of reality
20 Jun 2010, 10:21 am
Firstly, happy birthday! 
I don't think there's any magical age that spikes symptoms, you are however entering pubrety, that in itself is something that will make things seem worse at times.
20 Jun 2010, 10:35 am
20 Jun 2010, 10:46 am
CockneyRebel
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Age: 51
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20 Jun 2010, 10:54 am
20 Jun 2010, 1:56 pm
20 Jun 2010, 2:45 pm
21 Jun 2010, 2:51 am
21 Jun 2010, 3:43 am
JakeGrover wrote:
I just turned 12 a couple of days ago. Everybody has said that my AS is spontaneously worse all of a sudden. Is there some sort of age milestone where it suddenly worsens?
Nope. That is the one thing about AS that is fairly well known. AS is what it is from early childhood onward. It doesn't suddenly appear (though it may take a bit to be seen when you finally reach the age were social situations make it more apparent). And it doesn't "get worse" though you might encounter situations you haven't before that bring your symptoms to a more visible level. If anything, over the long term (decades), it might appear to become less pronounced, but that is probably more due to learning coping and adapting skills, not to the lessening or "improvement" of the Asperger's. Aspgerger's, as far as anyone knows, doesn't lessen or disappear. We just get better at learning to live with it.
My guess is that the same thing is happening with you that is happening with my sons. They range in age from almost eleven to almost fourteen.
The differences I'm seeing in them is probably the same with you.
You're becoming a TEENAGER! (Dark foreboding music plays suddenly) Do us all, and your parents a favor? Don't use it as an excuse to act like many teenagers act (obnoxious and/or disrespectful). I mean, it's probably going to happen anyway, but just if you catch yourself doing it, stop, apologize, and PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE don't just shrug your shoulders and say, "I can't help it, I'm a teenager!"
You've got a gazillion hormones racing around inside you right now, making you feel, and sometimes even act a little crazy. It's NORMAL. Even NT kids go through it. You're in for a bit if a bumpy ride for the next few years. Just hang on tight, breath, and if your parents give you advice, LISTEN to it, no matter how strongly you feel you don't want to!
Peace little man. May we welcome you into adulthood very soon. Much sooner than you think!
21 Jun 2010, 3:54 am
21 Jun 2010, 5:11 am
I also have a tip for you good sir: being Autistic also means you have a greater chance of being a "female repellent"; don't take it personally...people are gonna jump at the chance to target you now since they'll be even more insecure around each other than they ever were before.
Just be you, do what you do, and don't let the peer pressure get to you; you can rise above all of them, and the best part is...yes, there is someone out there for you.
What's even better is that your "female repellent" will repel all but the right one. Yes, it's a built-in system designed to weed out all the wrong ones! It may seem discouraging at times, but it'll be a far greater ally to you in the long run than you may ever realize
21 Jun 2010, 5:19 am
Descartes wrote:
Like everybody else said, you're on the onset of puberty. You're about to go through a lot of changes that will inevitably impact your behavior. I wasn't diagnosed with Asperger's until I was 12, and that's about the same time my behavior started changing.
+100
Puberty is like an Asperger's Atom Bomb.
As opposed to an Asperger's Firecracker.
prepare to be blown away
.
21 Jun 2010, 7:38 am
21 Jun 2010, 1:48 pm
Exclavius wrote:
At 12, you're before the time when many of us really started facing the things that caused Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, which leads to nasty anxiety issues... Mind you, by 12, most, if not all the causes of my PTSD had already occurred.
In many cases it is not the "trauma" itself that burns and etches in our minds forever, it is the way society views that traumatic event. Even more so, it is how you think society will react. This is most obvious is sexual assault and molestation cases, but it is true about every traumatic event.
You need to learn now, before it is too late, how to deal with what society expects of you, and no dwell on how different you are from what society expects. If you let it bother you, if you let people saying you've gotten worse bother you, that will have an impact on you for the rest of your life. Don't let that happen.
Be proud of the way you do things, don't try to conform to the way others do things. But do try to find a bridge to help you relate to those that do things other ways. It's not just your responsibility though. Others around you, if they're worth having around you, will also need to learn ways to bridge that gap.
But now that you are 12, you will be more able to develop coping skills. Maybe those that have said you're getting worse are expecting those coping mechanisms to already be in place, and in not seeing them yet, see you as worse. If it's your friends that say this, It is just as likely that they are changing rapidly at this age, and the changes in thinking and actions in you will not likely be the same as what happens in them. I know it certainly wasn't for me... My friends became far more distant for quite some time as I hit puberty.
I can only give you one bit of advice... Don't convince yourself that you want what your friends want, when you don't really want it. Doing so makes you into an adult that no longer can figure out what he himself wants, and what he thinks is expected of him.
In many cases it is not the "trauma" itself that burns and etches in our minds forever, it is the way society views that traumatic event. Even more so, it is how you think society will react. This is most obvious is sexual assault and molestation cases, but it is true about every traumatic event.
You need to learn now, before it is too late, how to deal with what society expects of you, and no dwell on how different you are from what society expects. If you let it bother you, if you let people saying you've gotten worse bother you, that will have an impact on you for the rest of your life. Don't let that happen.
Be proud of the way you do things, don't try to conform to the way others do things. But do try to find a bridge to help you relate to those that do things other ways. It's not just your responsibility though. Others around you, if they're worth having around you, will also need to learn ways to bridge that gap.
But now that you are 12, you will be more able to develop coping skills. Maybe those that have said you're getting worse are expecting those coping mechanisms to already be in place, and in not seeing them yet, see you as worse. If it's your friends that say this, It is just as likely that they are changing rapidly at this age, and the changes in thinking and actions in you will not likely be the same as what happens in them. I know it certainly wasn't for me... My friends became far more distant for quite some time as I hit puberty.
I can only give you one bit of advice... Don't convince yourself that you want what your friends want, when you don't really want it. Doing so makes you into an adult that no longer can figure out what he himself wants, and what he thinks is expected of him.
I absolutely love this!
In fact, as I even used to tell people: "just be yourself; the more you sell yourself out to try to be like other people, after a while you'll forget who you even are; don't let that happen"
And yes, it's true that if you let it happen, you won't know what you want....well, here's something else I used to tell people "most people don't even know what they want for themselves, let alone for you". Remember that, too.
One final point about what he said: the best thing to do is be the best you that you can possibly be; strive for excellence in the things you love..it'll put you over the top with ease.
21 Jun 2010, 4:20 pm
