Aspies For Freedom

Well, for the most part, anyway.

I did testing at some neuropsychology center a couple weeks ago, and today I got to see what they concluded about me. They said I didn't have dyscalculia or ADHD, and that it was Asperger's instead. The doctor, once he heard about how "crazy" one side of my family is, and particularly my grandfather, stated that it is strongly genetic and runs in my family.

The only problem is that while we were talking about how I match the traits perfectly, he was hesitant to explicitly state "Natalie has Asperger's Syndrome" on a piece of paper because apparently I am not severely disabled by it. Even though he acknowledged I have all the traits, the fact that I am not depressed that I don't have very many friends or that I am not terrified enough of loud noises to never go anywhere (etc.) means that I don't have a severe disablity. I agree with that for the most part... I never considered myself to be significantly disabled, mainly because I have an extremely high tolerance for discomfort, am very disciplined, and have learned many coping mechanisms over the years.

If, however, I do have severe issues at school in the future, he could write something up that would allow me to get help. Really the only thing the schools can do, however, is just give me extra time on tests, which we both agreed would not help me because my problems lie in processing information initially. He said that it might be a good idea for me to try something called "biofeedback" to help with my processing problems. The way he explained it is that they hook electrodes up to my head and I control a computer with my brain or something, which seems weird to me. He said that it would change my brain permanently (although apparently for the better), which makes me hesitant to try it. I am fine with who I am now. I will have to do more research before I even consider something like that.

Still, in the end I am basically just glad to hear from someone with a Ph.D that I have AS, and that I am not just some kind of hypochondriac (which is what some people would think of me). I have self-diagnosed myself with various things in the past (anxiety disorder, endometriosis, costochondritis, and some other things), but I am a very skeptical person and so far all of my diagnoses have been correct.

I've been through "the same thing". I don't have an "official diagnosis", but the guy agreed with me and wrote me a report from our metting with my symptoms and it also says that I "exhibit symptoms of Asperger's". During our conversation he said he agreed with me on my self-dx.

I wonder how many other women have experienced similar situations. I feel that if I was a male I would have gotten a DX a long time ago, because many of my behavioral traits are less acceptable in men than they are in women (i.e., being bad at sports, being frightened by loud noises, cutting tags off clothes, and whatnot). I believe it is much harder to be diagnosed with AS as a woman than as a man.

I agree

Also, he said that another reason I am not severely diabled is because my obsessions are actually useful, as in I can make a career out of them (which I intend to). He said he has met AS people who are obsessed with things that can't really turn into a career (like Disneyland or a specific battleship or something), and that can be very disabling.

That's not to say I don't have "useless" obsessions of my own... Everyone who knows me has learned for the most part not to mention MythBusters when I am around, because it's difficult for me to shut up about it once I get started.

I agree totally with the above.

I'm glad for you that you have a diagnosis, pity he didn't write it down though.

Hello,

Yes, I have never considered myself disabled, either. In fact, I believe I may not have even received the diagnosis had the neurologist not observed me at school on a very “off” day, just purely by coincidence (I only get those “off days” every two months or so now, although they were slightly more common when the neurologist observed me a year ago).

I don’t really have any obsessions which cannot be pursued as a sustaining career, either. Most have to do with general creative writing and general earth sciences.

I love Mythbusters, although I am not obsessed with it. However, I think if I saw the show “Smash Lab” on the Discovery Channel, I could get an obsessive interest in it (I have yet to see the actual show).

Congratulations on the unwritten diagnosis, by the way!

Will

Thanks for the replies.

I've watched a couple episodes of Smash Lab... It's not too good. It looks OK on the commercials but then when you actually have it on you're like "What the hell is this and why am I watching it?". There are two main things that bother me about Smash Lab.

First, as the name indicates, really the only thing they do is find ways to destroy things. They do that on MythBusters, but not all the time in every episode and they (attempt to) put some sciency stuff in there as well. Watching things blow up on speed cameras gets old fast. With MythBusters, you don't know exactly what's going to happen (though admittedly it is usually possible to make some good predictions), but on Smash Lab you know what the ultimate goal is right from the beginning so there is no incentive in watching the entirety of the episode.

The second thing that bothers me is just the cast on Smash Lab. It's easy to tell they don't know each other personally, and that makes their interactions kind of awkward. On MythBusters, though, everyone was pretty much friends with everyone long before the show began (except for Kari I think) - Adam and Jamie have known each other for like 15 years or something; Adam, Tory, and Grant all worked on a bunch of movies together like the Star Wars prequels and Galaxy Quest; Adam and Tory used to work for Jamie's special effects company, and Jamie and Grant competed with each other on Battle Bots; etc - and therefore it's actually interesting to watch them together. I find the woman on Smash Lab to be very annoying, and the three guys are boring and exactly the same (I honestly can't tell them apart).

It seems like it could have been a great show, but I think it has been very poorly executed. Also, I feel that television producers have just overestimated the average American's fascination with large explosions. So far I don't think I've read any good reviews about Smash Lab, and I think it will be cancelled or significantly "remodeled" once they finish playing the episodes that have already been produced (I think there are ten). The Discovery Channel website created a Smash Lab forum for pretty much no other reason than to let people complain about it, because they were so flooded with angry emails after the show aired. It's kind of funny and sad at the same time.

http://community.discovery.com/eve/forum...3341990149

Well, I can see I've rambled on again...

Well, how disabled do you have to be, to get the Asperger's diagnosis?  I'm sure many people fit the bill there, but if I can use AFF as anecdotal evidence, I see quite a few people on here with DXes who have a job, who drive, who go to school, who have a spouse/kids etc.

For those (like me) who don't have significant sensory problems, are there other areas that they would have looked at, such as social difficulty/anxiety issues, or... what do you think?

Did they look at comorbid issues, at all?

I'm sure it greatly depends on who is doing the diagnosing... Some doctors probably require you to unable to do anything at all in order to get a diagnosis, while others may places less emphasis on the "disability" part as long as the symptoms fit. I agree that there are some officially-diagnosed people on here who seem to be even less disabled than I am, and that's perfectly fine. I don't see why someone would need to be crippled by a condition in order to have it, because how "disabled" someone is often has a lot to do with the environment they are living in (i.e., if my family wasn't able to afford the tuition for my alternative high school, I would probably be a lot worse off than I am now).

As for comorbid conditions, they just asked me about all the usual stuff - "Are you depressed?", "Do you have anxiety?", "Do you have concentration issues?", etc.

I'd have a check for each one of them, although doubly so for anxiety and triply so for concentration.  But, in your opinion, are comorbid issues considered part of Asperger's (e.g. would it have weight toward an official DX?), or something unrelated?

Sorry, I'm always full of questions...  

I think people with AS might be more likely to have such issues due to the way they are often treated (particularly with the depression and anxiety), but it is not necessary. I don't consider my anxiety, which manifests itself as a specific phobia, to be related to my AS at all - it's just sort of a coincidence that I happen to have both.

I reckon it'd be impossible to tell, Batman.  One Aspie might have anxiety or depression as a co-morbid, because they've been picked on so much over the years, while another might actually have it hardwired into their brain as part of their suite of neurological peculiarities.  (Hey, I've got hardwired anger, so it's possible!)

I'm one of these independent yet diagnosed people.  I reckon there's two reasons for that... the first is I was lucky with my current psychologist.  He's an Aspie himself, and has  done work with Tony Attwood, so he's pretty open to the concept that you can have Aspergers and not be disabled.   And secondly, it depends which bit of my life you look at.  I work, I live by myself, I keep food in the pantry and don't let dishes pile up in the sink (much).  Sounds great.  But my non-work life is a complete shambles (can something that doesn't exist be a shambles?) and I define myself through my job much more than is healthy or normal, so it's actually not so great.

I remember reading that anxiety is one of the most common comorbids for AS, so I reckon it would count toward the requisite "disorder" area of diagnosis just as much as sensory processing issues would.  If anyone reads this and thinks it's incorrect, please let me know.