Unfortunately, even doctors have a really hard time diagnosing Autism. Ask yourself, what would a diagnosis of Autism do for you? Like many have expressed here, we all have our areas of strength and weakness. You are obviously aware and working on improving or compensating for your areas of weakness, which is more than some people can say. I say keep finding resources to help you where you need it. If those resources are coming from publications about Autism, and you find them helpful, then keep using them. If you think a diagnosis would help give you peace of mind or would enable you to be admitted to different social or community groups you think would be helpful, then I say talk to your doctor about your concerns.
Life with limited pragmatic skills can be tough, but I'm sure you'd math circles around me. Best of luck!
This is very good advice. As I mentioned before, my husband is probably autistic but at this point a diagnosis wouldn't do much for him- he's spent his first 40 years on the planet realizing he's different from other people and coming up with ways to "pass" as normal.
Yeah, that's the approach I had been taking. But the domain of sexuality in particular, which I know is tough for awkward people in general, has been a persistent problem for me.
Well, I'm in my fourth year of Psychology now and I know this might come across as bragging, but last year I found out I'm pretty good at diagnosing people (or at least, better than 90% of my classmates, but they're idiots who call Asperger's Syndrome 'Asparagus Disease'). However, out of the things that I read here, I'm unable to diagnose Asperger's. If I had to guess what you'd be suffering from, based on what I know and what I'm reading here, I'd rather say you have Avoidant Personality Disorder, maybe comorbid with Social Anxiety Disorder. That means you mostly think you're socially inadequate and you underestimate your social skills, which makes you avoid social situations. I just need more information about you to consider an Asperger's diagnose. However, people with Asperger's often have a typical way of talking and typical body language, so if you really want me to consider it, you could upload a video where you just talk about regular stuff. I could get a long way with that and be more certain about my theory that you don't have Asperger's. You don't need to do it if you don't want to, I understand, but until then I stick with Avoidant Personality Disorder.
"Avoidant" is not a term I would use for myself. I am more cautious about putting myself out there online than many younger people, though.
At work, I have been known to be quite out spoken. I've yelled at my boss despite him telling me to calm down, I've sent angry e-mails to the CEO of my own company of 90K people. On pannels and discussions, I am sometimes overly vocal when I think people are wrong. I can be quite insistant about my own view of things despite much effort to see others point of view. Before my recent heartbreak, I was going dancing 4 of the 7 nights of the week. Although, I admit that social situations can cause me anxiety, it mainly because I am not sure what to do, not because I am afraid of people. Also, extremely loud places in social situations stress me out a lot more than less loud places. I usually bring ear plugs when I know in advance.
So far, the people who voted seem to believe I am not an Aspie, but I have found many of the reasons given are fairly dubious:
1) Many of the high functioning folks do not in fact get recognized till late in life, often when their children are suspected to have Autistic tendencies. Not just [MENTION=2]Ivy[/MENTION]'s husband, but there are many videos on the AutismSpeaks and ASA websites that talk about these stories.
2) It seems like there are many many of those on the spectrum who do seek to improve and find ways to compensate, and do care about fitting in (see video on sub-types below).
3) I don't believe it is inherently bad to be on the spectrum. There are problems, and there are gifts. I would not like the stigma. But if there are resources that help, then I can use them. I am weighing the pro's and con's of the labels. If they are rather inaccurate labels, I think it would be unlikely to helpful. I suppose if there are support groups without requiring labels, that would be better.
I made this when I still had an interest in typology. If you want to do TinyChat, I would be willing. But right now, this is the most "face" I am willing to post (semi)permanently online:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWGNBuAqK-8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8j80S3KOA4
Here is an Aspie for comparison, she is talking about "sub types":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-Z4iqrezAU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h9q1WgOhR24
Also, apparently as a toddler, I would spend a lot of time lining up objects and I used to throw temper tantrums when people messed up my patterns (my aunt had a recording). Actually, even as a teenager, I would get upset if a project I was working (that others may not have recognized as project) was messed up. I think part of the reason I do not get as upset now, is that I've gotten much better at convincing people of what I believe. My dad also tended to complain that I did not interact with the other kids enough on the playground.
For a long time, people used to tell me that I "didn't react," and they found this annoying. I now have a routine, of head nodding, and asking follow up questions. To be honest, I approach much of the social situations as if I were running an object oriented program with polymorphism built in. 1) Acknowledge and/or reflect emotion ("That sucks" or "That's awesome" depending on positive or negative. If not sure, ask. "Did that hurt?", "That must have been gratifying, huh?"--also, I know I can leave off the "huh"). 2) Relate experience that seems similar to what has been talked about. 3) Interject jokes when I see or hear a "trigger". (Though I do this less often now, because that has gotten me in trouble. Also, I have a trigger suppression list that "decorates" my natural automatic responses.)
Former roommates have complained that I did the "staring" thing. Others have told me that I don't make enough eye contact. Frankly, I am still experimenting with frequency and timing of eye-contact. I also was taught this little trick..."if you look at someone in the eye brows or forehead, they will think that you are making eye contact." So now, it really is just a matter of experimenting till I find a pattern that works.