Different but not AS

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This thread is for people on this forum who have severe problems due to being very different from NTs, but the difference is not well described by the description given for the autistic spectrum, nor anything else in the DSM. While planet NT (Earth) may be the wrong planet for us, it seems that planet AS is also the wrong planet. We are doubly alone. Perhaps we can meet on this thread. Please tell me about yourself.

As the initiator of this thread, I am willing to answer any question about myself you may have.

What sort of "symptoms" do you have?

I don't think I'm severe, and my issues are not in the DSM (except for anxiety), but one of them is in the ICD, apparently (since that's what I was diagnosed from). I thought that I might have AS, but I got diagnosed with central auditory processing deficit after a long struggle for AS assessment, and I still don't think I fully see how it has affected me. I do feel out of place on WP and elsewhere. But I have other issues as well.

Do you think your issues are severe? If they are severe and you can't get diagnosed, something really messed up is happening.

My condition is severe , but it is not found in the DSM or ICD, unless ASD can include me.

Some things about me:

1. My core defect is with interface with the environment. Social problems are secondary to that. I can be a very good, warm, caring, affectionate friend, as long as that person does not demand that I interface with the environment, e.g. I cannot have a job, or drive a car, or go to school, etc. I can never live independently.

2. I never wanted to play games, or do playground swings, slides, sports, etc. I panicked if anyone tried to pick me up. I have no interest in gossip, social dynamics, conflicts, or stories where anything goes wrong. I do not like active interface with the environment.

3. I cannot socialize with a stranger because we have nothing in common psychologically, and they expect me to be more environmentally connected than I am. My age and gender also gives the wrong signals. But I can socialize very well when it is close and personal; then I can be very warm and caring. But I never get the chance to get close, and I cannot function superficially.

4. I am extremely intelligent conceptually, but I have a poor short-term and working memory. My interests are theoretical; I have no interest in practical things. I educated myself to a very high degree in the library, but cannot do well in a school.

5. My psychological make-up has not changed since early childhood. I can remember infancy easier than I can remember the past week.

6. Not only do I find environmental interface painful for myself, I am not interested in it for anyone else either. One result of that is I have no interest in the conflicts and struggles which is the plot of every story I have ever heard of. At the age of four I was horrified to see people at work.

7. I have powerful empathy; I sometimes feel their pain more than they do. I could not hit someone even in play.

8.I am extremely sensitive to who I am with. To be with some people would be truly unbearable to me, and to be with others would be the highest pleasure possible for me. I am overwhelmingly sensitive to faces.

9. I am also profoundly different from NTs in almost every psychological area. For example, my "sexuality" would be rated "G" , infants are extremely repulsive to me, etc, etc...

I call my condition "Brain in a Jar". I was born that way, and I never change.
I have a blog about my condition: zylon2.blogspot.com

I don't know why you think you don't have Asperger's, but I didn't read all of your blog. Retaining very early childhood memories is something associated with the spectrum, and, anecdotally, at least, asexuality seems to be more common for people on the spectrum.

As for your socializing, it may be warm and caring, but does it come naturally? Do you have to think about how to act? Do you script, do awkward things, get misinterpreted, or end up with people close to you upset without your knowing why?

A crucial question is why can't you interface with the environment. Is it overwhelming?

Atypical play is also common; the meaning of this depends on what you did as a child instead of the playground, etc.


On your blog, you posted:



That doesn't seem like empathy; that seems like an example of poor ToM. You were projecting your trouble with the environment onto those workers.


Sensitivity to faces is a reason some people have given for lack of eye contact.

Seems pretty aspie to me. I'm a little curious why you don't think you belong.

I'm a little concerned that some of what you say is contradictory... #6/7 for instance (loosely paraphrased) "I don't care about other peoples struggles but I'm very empathetic"

Sounds a bit like sociopathy as much as ASD... (which is NOT the horrible thing the movies have taught us it is... or... it doesn't have to be, I suppose...)

Obviously I recommend you to do some more research and then talk to some people.

Whatever "it" is... and I apologize if this is a little abrupt, but I'm pretty sure it IS in the DSM, and you aren't helping yourself by assuming like it isn't.

Zylon, were you once tested for ASD and told you didn't have it?

Also Zylon, if you are struggling and want to get support to live a independent life and get better, I would look for a therapist to see and tell them all your symptoms. I am sure you can still get a diagnoses.

There's lots of Asperger's/autism in what the OP says.

The blog says he was officially diagnosed with Asperger's.

If I remember correctly, didn't he say it didn't fit so I assumed it meant it was the best they could do for a diagnoses for closest match for his symptoms?

I read his blog a while ago.

Answers to Ohkabaka, League girl, and Starkid:

Starkid asked (SK): As for your socializing, it may be warm and caring, but does it come naturally?

Zylon replied (Z): Yes, totally natural. But first the person must trust me enough to allow it directly. And since no stranger can, and everyone is a stranger...

SK: A crucial question is why can't you interface with the environment. Is it overwhelming?

Z: Yes, input from the environment can be very overwhelming. Output to the environment is very unnatural, difficult, painful, and my brain “cannot see it clearly”.

SK: Atypical play is also common; the meaning of this depends on what you did as a child instead of the playground, etc.

Z: I liked to be in certain places (the beach), and to be with certain people, and to hear certain music and experience certain foods. I was also interested in science and philosophy. I pretended about strange creatures and going under the sea to enchanted places and other realities.(All thought and no action)

SK: That doesn't seem like empathy; that seems like an example of poor ToM. You were projecting your trouble with the environment onto those workers.

Z: All empathy is a projecting of the empath’s instinctive assumptions on to another. It is not possible for one person to really feel what another feels. That is an illusion. Since NTs have the same instincts as each other, their empathy will be accurate. But the NTs empathy toward me is very often not accurate at all, just as mine was not accurate with theirs (I hope!).

Ohkabaka said: I'm a little concerned that some of what you say is contradictory... #6/7 for instance (loosely paraphrased) "I don't care about other peoples struggles but I'm very empathetic"

Zylon replied: I care very much about other people’s feelings. What I meant was that I am not entertained by stories about people’s struggles, or about games with winners or losers. Seeing such stories just hurts me due to my empathy. Seeing what entertains NTs makes me see them as sadistic. I take no pleasure in the struggles of anyone, real or fiction.

League Girl said: Also Zylon, if you are struggling and want to get support to live a independent life and get better, I would look for a therapist to see and tell them all your symptoms. I am sure you can still get a diagnoses.

Zylon replied: I have been in therapy, both individual and group, for many years. It does not help; they are not set up to give me the help I need.