Aspies For Freedom

Well, it only took about four years of wrangling with my previous GP and then the PCT but I made it!

I've been assessed as having Asperger's Syndrome (albeit atypical because I don't have dyspraxia and my communication problems aren't so severe) and I was also told that it sounds like I might have met the criteria for ADD as a child.

Congratulations

Congratulations on your diagnosis!!

Yes, my congratulations too.

Actually, Dyscalculia (math dyslexia so to say) is very common among Aspies, according to various studies (I believe Chris Gillberg did a lot of work on this). The math genius thing is an autism cliche, not reality.

I tend to agree. The highest level of math that I took in college and that I could understand was Calculus IV. I took higher level classes in probability theory but couldn't understand a single thing. Same thing happened when I took advanced physics classes. All the talk about time light cones and gaussian surfaces really blew my mind.

Yep, I mean I could grasp basic physics without thinking, but then it got abstract and I was utterly lost. I took a pharmacy course for a year and the physics lectures just freaked me out, even though by the end of the year I had worked out enough to actually be quite good at it.

Mind you, our lectures were a bit... odd. One day the professor climbed to the roof of the lecture room and threw a (foul!) pumpkin dressed in a cycling helmet all the way to the floor through a hatch in the ceiling. I don't think he ever explained WHY he did that...

Just to add, I guess I was also very lucky in the (oral no less) exam because

a) The other prof took it and he seemed more approachable and
b) The questions had to do with light waves and how they reflect in water, which even though we'd never discussed that in the lectures was something I could figure out on my own

Batman55 says -

1) I don't take things apart and try to figure them out
2) I'm extremely stifled by Math
3) My interests aren't that "scientific"  
4) I don't have major stims

[/quote]

1. I take things apart and seldom put them back together.
2. Beyond the basic's of math I'm also completely lost.
3. Same as me.
4. My self control reduces a lot of my stims while in public places.

You seem aspier than me actually. I was officially diagnosed at 41.

Welcome, Batman55!

Congratulations on the DX. I'll be persisting and pushing to get mine this year.

I know what you mean - although my overall IQ is slightly above average, and even though when I was little I was thought to be 'gifted' (I am I guess but not in the way they thought, I just have my own way of learning and doing things but not that of a gifted NT) and mostly got good grades without trying until I entered High School, I have always had a more 'unconscious' way of learning than most people. I never wanted to go to university but teachers & my parents flipped at the thought, they just didn't understand that it was becoming impossible for me to emulate the knowledge at a more and more complex level the way I had done (mostly self-taught) in earlier years.

Indeed, in my diagnostic report the psychiatrist specifically mentioned that a lot of people on the autism spectrum struggle a lot more (because of this reason) in high school.

It isn't, but a) I am sure you have talents that I don't have,  plus in the end I guess having a faster processer also had its bad sides - it made people's expectations a lot bigger, so that by the time I really couldn't hack it any more nobody believed me!

Well I think you said it quite well when you mentioned a "faster processor". I had 4 years in high school to get used to having to 'fake it', although my grades did slump a bit in the second year at college. Plus from what I gather, college in Switzerland is much closer to school structure-wise than it is in many other places, so the change wasn't as big as it would be in most countries.

Plus I suspect the fact that Swiss college education is far broader than in any other country I know of also means that there is simply no time to reach too complex a level in most subjects. Yes, the material was more difficult than in HS, but we did more subjects than you do in college elsewhere, so the material is easier to emulate than if you only had say 3 main subjects that you spent 3  to 4 years dealing with.

Here in the UK you do A Levels in a handful of subjects, whereas in Switzerland you still have almost all the subjects that you had in high school, so the formula for getting through exams etc. is still more or less the same, there is no major change, you just have to work a bit more to cram it all in and spew it out again when you're prompted to.

Which is easier in some subjects than others - I did brilliantly in my written maths finals because we were given old exam papers to practise on. I am good at emulating patterns so if I am given a chance and if there is a formula to it then I can become very good at solving tests provided I am given enough examples to cover every type of question in an exam.

I'm good at doing tests, but I only truly learn (as in, actually comprehending something and being able to remember it after the test) when I can learn by doing and by experience, with practice and through interests, which normal education just can't do.

I know in a way I was lucky to have been able to "fake it" for so long in school but with hindsight I think overall I would have gotten a lot more out of my education if my lack of genuine (and long-term, conscious) comprehension had been recognised back then. It's incredible how easily your difficulties are disregarded as long as you can still perform well in the areas that don't really matter (e.g. perform well in tests and who cares about the fact that you are spending increasingly more hours every day confused and overwhelmed in class, that you are getting increasingly lower grades in oral tests and participation because you can't answer questions that require comprehension and because you can only access your knowledge when you are prompted in a specific manner, and can only reproduce this knowledge in writing but it is denied you when you try to speak)

I started having a few problems with comprehension by 5th grade but because my scholastic results were still generally good, I was able to "fake it" by methods such as saying I'd lost my homework book (to hide the fact that I didn't do the homework for one area because I didn't understand how to do it) or by overcompensating with good written assignments.