A question about Aspergers thread aimed at all autistics

Post Reply New Topic

First off I don't believe in Aspergers my diagnosis is ASD.

Getting that out of the way I think we all have a pretty good idea what section of people we are talking about.

Anyway I am 40 and am good at my work which is a repetitive job which suits me fine.

Ok here is the question looking straight at myself I think I have the emotional maturity and understanding of a child does this sum up a lot of us?

Like I siad this question is aimed at all board users the only reason I mention Aspergers Syndrome is that while being able to work my emotional understanding presents a hard to grasp paradox to regular people not on the spectrum.

Opinions?

Also if anybody wants to clean up my akward post please be my guest.

Deprivation of a proper childhood and puberty due to bullying and social isolation kind of put my emotional development in the freezer so to say, so I understand what you are saying.

I can't get those phases back so I don't think I will ever truly be able to mature like a normal person would, I feel like I'm just getting hardened by the years. My mental, rational thinking took over the emotional side and so when I ever truly get emotional I revert to childish tendencies. I used to be ashamed of it but now I will just accept it as it is.

I agree.

Aspergers and HFA are the same thing. They just used to be considered separate diagnoses under the DSM-IV, with the only real difference being the lack of a speech delay and a higher than average IQ for Aspergers. These differences aren't enough to make it a separate condition in my opinion, and in my case, I had a speech delay as well as a higher than average IQ, so I really don't know which one I was diagnosed with 15 years ago. They were interchangeable enough that I was referred to as having either/or, and nowadays I just say I have "Aspergers" since the vernacular use of the term describes me better than the vernacular use of "autism".

What work do you do? I'd love something repetitive that I could be good at, I keep trying to do baking because I'm good at it but I can't chat at the same time with 2-3 other pastry people so I end up getting ousted.

I don't have very advanced emotional maturity at all, I can't say it's that of a child but it certainly isn't that of a 37 year old woman.

Don't know about everyone else but it's true for me.

Warehouse order picking using voice pick.

There is a permanent staff that are on pretty good money and agency staff are used on minimum wage to make up the shortfall.

In the two years I have been there out of countless agency staff only two of them have been taken on by the company and given a permanent contract I am one of those people.

A bit of Autism and OCD can be a real advantage in this kind of job.

Yeah, I tend to think of myself as a very mature little 10 or 12 year old pretending to be 30.

30 is a great age, by the way! The 20s were hard; it felt like there was SO much that I had to "catch up" on if I ever wanted to succeed in a similar way as my peers, and people expected me to hurry up and do something. But when I hit 30, I felt more secure; I was so far behind that I could relax 'cause I'm not really even in the race anymore...

My emotional development is shot to hell also because of bullying and having a rough childhood. I was bullied by my entire class, even my teachers during my elementary days. I also think other bad experiences in life have contributed a lot to my emotional delays. I still have tantrums, despite being 25 going on 26. D: If things don't go my way, then I freak out. I think part of it is due to my dyspraxia though as well.

Some days, I can have a good emotional development. You could say it's teenage level. Other times, say a bad day, it ranges from that of a two year old to a five year old. I also have a low IQ as well, and I think it contributes to my delays as well.

Maturity involves a lot of different areas and level of mine varies greatly depending on what area of maturity we are talking about. As S in ASD refers to spectrum this is the definition of the condition. Although you might not recognize it here I have rarely lashed out when I become angry. I probably have held it in to much during my life and am trying to learn to "Let It Go" a little more. In that regards I am mature. Should somehow I get in a relationship, having never done that I would be 40 years behind my partner in a whole bunch of areas of maturity. I believe my lack of relationship, marriage kids etc has put my maturity behind in a lot more the just the types of maturity needed for a relationship with a partner but with all relationships with other humans including work. Because of that, overall I am probably immature for my age.

Sums me up.

Think I am starting to have a pretty good understanding of autism and myself.

That's me too,

Loki if you would not have said this I would never guessed. I am not questioning you about it at all because you know yourself best. But from our correspondence you seem to me like a very intelligent, eloquent, well spoken young lady. So I hope you can be encouraged that I could not tell that you had a low IQ. I say that as a great compliment to you. And don't get me wrong, I can respect anyone high IQ or low IQ because I respect people by the content of their characters. But Loki, personally, I find you very intelligent and I really enjoy our conversations.

Well, it's possible my IQ could be higher. It mostly affects how I learn, not how I function. XD I'm just slow at learning new things each day, and I also struggle a lot with math and reading comprehension.

I'm probably more emotionally mature than most people I know. But I imagine I don't come across that way because I have a bit of flat affect, so it probably seems like I'm suppressing something.

That makes sense. Our intelligence can vary greatly in different areas. But even though you may struggle where you do, your areas of strength are very strong and definitely make up for areas that are weaker.