Aspies For Freedom

My first post on AFF outside my own introduction, and it's a rant.  How very like me.   :twisted:

First of all, AARGHHH!!!  I have tried at least twenty times to tell my mother I have AS, and every time I get the same answers!  She tells me I'm stupid, that it's ridicoulous to think I might be autistic, that she knows more about it then I do (which is ridiculous, as I've been doing research almost non-stop for ages), that I'm normal, I just have to overcome these "little problems" of mine so that society can accept me, otherwise I'll never get anywhere with my life.  Well, excuse me, but I have given this a lot of thought and I know what I'm talking about, and I'll thank you to listen to your only daughter when she tells you something this important!  And I have my whole life planned out already, college chosen, courses chosen, and I know exactly what I'm going to be:  An author.  I've already started writing my first novel!  I'm not some kind of lazy idiot who's going to drop out of highschool and never get anywhere with my life!  I KNOW WHAT I'M DOING!
And who are you to say that I'm not autistic?  Do you know how I feel?  No, because you only ask when you're in a good mood, which is rare.  Do you know how I think?  No, because you never ask; you just asume I'm like you.  You asume you know it all already and don't bother to make sure.  You wave away all my oddities as being, "normal for a teenager", saying, "You're just going through a difficult time, that's all", and "Sometimes we try to convince ourselves we've got some kind of problem because we like feeling different" and all that B******t.  I know who I am, and what I am, and you know nothing about it.  I'm tired of you laughing at me; I'm tired of you telling me I'm wrong, wrong, always wrong.  If you won't listen to me, fine.  I won't bother trying anymore.

Ahem.  Not sure why I slipped from directing it at 'her' to directing it at 'you', but it's aimed at my mom, in case you couldn't tell....  Not that she ever visits AFF.

sigh....

Once again, frustration has brought me here.  It's almost the weekend so the forums are quiet.  I'm off work this weekend so I'll have lots of unstructured time, for good or for ill.  My counselor at the vocational guidance place didn't get back to me yet.  I thought I might have been talking to the psychologist there today, getting at least an off-the-record assessment, but no, I waited all day, called back twice, it must have been too busy a day for anyone to get back to me.  I know, I am a selfish, demanding little b****.  I have so little patience with this not knowing.  I went to the blog site of a certain outspoken autistic activist (not someone from here as far as I know).  In one blog she criticizes people like me, un-dx'd adults who can't wait to validate their membership on the autism spectrum by getting their official labels.  Is that what people think of folks like me, who just want to get some sort of scientific verification of our own suspicions?  If I am on the spectrum, I am probably the least affected one here.  No sensory issues, no motor problems, no specific learning disabilities, no speech delays that I know of though I'll be asking my father on Sunday.  (Happy Father's Day, oh, by the way, can you remember back about 38 years and tell me whether I had any speech delays?)  My school records, kindergarten-12th grade, were lost years ago ( :evil: ); my copy of my medical records appears to start at about age 5 (where the hell is the rest of it?); I've been analyzing myself, dabbling in self-diagnosis, since I was 14, and STILL, at 40, I don't know what's making me different, except that 1.) I can't remember ever being otherwise; and 2.) I seem to meet too few autistic criteria to belong on the spectrum.  I've BEEN in therapy, I've tried the antidepressants, the ADD meds help superficially but deep down I still travel through life only semi-engaged in it, and now I find out that a member of the autism community thinks people like me are only seeking a dx out of some desire to preen on the forums and bask in our new identity?!  Well, my identity is that I am @#$%^&* weird, always have been, yet I function too well to be obviously diagnosable as one thing or another, I am beyond frustrated at not seeming to fit ANYWHERE, and I am trying to show respect for the experiences of others here by not co-opting a label or identity that doesn't rightfully belong to me, THAT'S why I want a diagnosis.  Also, I am LOUSY at most people-centered aspects of work, I am slow to learn new skills & routines, I very much need the help of my state vocational-guidance center, and the more I know---and THEY know---about WHY I am the way I am, the better they might be able to help me, and, perhaps, the more sense I might be able to make of my own oddly coccooned life.  Would I want to be "cured" of whatever makes me different?  Still no.  I just would like to know what exactly it IS...and learn to harness its powers for good.  Preferably while I'm still young & beautiful... :lol:

That's all for now.  Have a good weekend, everybody.  Feedback welcome...

Bah!  Landlord is coming sometime soon to renew our tenancy.  The place looks like a bomb has hit it and I hate housework!  One day I'll be able to afford to get someone else to do it for me...possibly.

Stupid doors,windows,surfaces,walls etc all need cleaning, why haven't I done this more often so they don't get so bad?

:whizz:  

(me running away from my flat)

Esor

Bit difficult for those who aren't eligible to vote in the US.

Went around trying to get a decent pair of earmuffs so that I can cut out my next door neighbour's stupid muzak, which is playing right now. She's got one of those boomy bass systems which really drives me up the wall and always plays this techno crap and the noise gets right into my chest and I BLOODY HATE IT. Why, when I live in a town where every second shop is a sports shop / ski shop do they all tell me I can't get any earmuffs until winter. Do I have to put up with stupid loud noises through the walls for so long??

Um. Maybe. Don't know.

(She's bloody well playing it again. Never going to get a quiet weekend in this way!)

Yes I think it is.
They all have exactly the same beat which sounds like "doof doof", over and over and over.
It is incredibly annoying.

You have to pay to use a phone to call the police? That's terrible!

I'm going to rant about my boredness! Last year I set about finding out what was different about me from other people and it kept me pretty much entertained through out the whole year whilst I started alot of research from basically nothing. By december I had ended up with an AS diagnosis and probably knew more about AS than the guy who diagnosed me. I then carried on reading about it for a while, but I have slowly come to a point when my daily experiences of life are what will let me learn most about AS. And since I don't have many experiences I have grown quite bored.
My other interests have failed to sustain me sufficiently due to the way I go about following them (I take it in a really slow manner, since I don't like to do things unless I feel the time is perfect and I don't like things to end).

So what is next for me? I'm not sure, maybe I'll try to get a girlfriend to fill up the time when I am not doing anything else at all, plus it'll allow me to learn more. But due to the facts that I only actually know one girl and I don't know anywhere to meet new people, and  since I am unbelievably useless at the whole meeting new people/flirty thing, mainly because I don't like talking at all to people I don't know, and I cannot recognise when flirting is occuring.
I'd really like one just to see what all the fuss is about.

Sorry guys. Personally I'm getting a little tired of everyone else simply continuing the animosity where Joeker left off.

Actually, Timelord, LFA is a very subjective catagorization, and different doctors stick people into based on different criteria.  The only major connection between these criteria that I can see is that *most* LFAs are nonverbal or partially nonverbal (or echolalic, or have other major speech impediments).  While it's true that a mentally retarded autistic will automatically be labeled LFA, it is NOT true that all LFAs have low IQs.  Take a look at Amanda Baggs (http://ballastexistenz.autistics.org) and Joel Smith (http://www.thiswayoflife.org/blog) if you don't believe me!  They are both considered LFA and both are quite intelligent.
As with all things in autism, it's not apropriate to generalize that any one group of autistics are "all" this or that way.

Just like to say, I have come across loads of evidence here that lots of self-confessed LFA members and exmembers are intelligent - like hrick and wilky and droopy and others - just by their writing. Just thought I'd mention...

(Sigh.) Oh never mind. Go right ahead.

Not really a fair fight to attack someone who no longer has the means to defend him/herself, mind you.

I should say not!

(Hi I been off for a while - about eleven days - because my stupid modem wasn't working. Stupid modem!!! And being tired from working eleven hour shifts. But mostly it was the stupid modem. )

I said you should have come to Adelaide!

Why do teachers think they can motivate students with that "You have disappointed me" line? You are in school to learn, not to please others.  She should have explained to you what kind of answer she expected, maybe given you an example of a better answer.