A while back my friend
Sandee, who is a special education teacher and is therefore trained to observe
emotional disturbances in children, asked me if I have Asperger’s Syndrome. She
had been watching my behavioral patterns and reactions to stimuli for a while
and thought I showed several of the major symptoms. I had never even heard of it,
but I looked it up and agreed that it certainly sounded like me. In January
2008, I saw a professional psychologist who confirmed that I have Asperger’s
Syndrome. In short, I have had a mild
form of autism all my life and never even realized it.
While on one hand this news is disquieting—how many other things about myself don’t I know?—on
the other hand, it comes as a relief. Knowing that I have Asperger’s is the
Rosetta Stone to understanding my personality. I finally understand some of my
stranger habits, my mental quirks, and why I reacted in certain ways to certain
events in my life. For example:
* I have a hard time reading other people’s emotions
based on non-verbal cues, such as facial expressions. It also means I usually don’t notice if women
flirt in a subtle way with me. So, ladies, if you think I’m clueless--it’s
because I am!
* I tend to be socially inept. I am not an unsociable misanthrope,
but have a large number of acquaintances and few very close friends. It goes
without saying that I tend to avoid the dating scene.
* I usually have great difficulty making small talk
with strangers—or even friends, especially if I haven‘t seen them in a while. One
of the dead giveaways that I am slightly autistic is my problem maintaining eye
contact with people when conversing.
* I loathe crowded places; therefore I tend to avoid
social events at all costs. (As my friends of long standing will attest, it is
like pulling teeth to get me to attend parties, concerts, or movies.) I will
attend if I absolutely have to, but I don’t enjoy myself unless I am with
trusted friends and tend to leave early in any case. Even if I go somewhere and
have a good time, I’m still reluctant to do it again. However, this wish to avoid crowds does not mean I am
flatly antisocial on an individual level. I rarely seek people out, but if
approached I am friendly though shy.
* I tend to like routines (such as the obsessive,
almost surreal amounts of research I do for my books, not to mention the long
lonely hours required to do the actual writing, all of which constitutes a “fun
time” to me) and can become highly resentful if the routines get disrupted for
any reason.
* I need lots more “alone time” than the average
human. In fact, I have a marked tendency to withdraw into myself on occasion.
Unfortunately, people sometime misinterpret this to mean that I am angry with
them or bored.
* I have a tendency toward obsessive-compulsiveness
(very mild in my case, thank God).
* I tend to be more comfortable writing than talking
in person or on the phone. I almost never call anyone unless I absolutely have
to. My friends will testify that while I am always happy to hear from them, I
very seldom call them.
Now that I know the name of the culprit, I detect his fingerprints everywhere in my life. I can see its influence on my writing, which tends to be fact-based rather than strictly imaginative. Asperger’s even explains the difficulty I have sleeping and the constant black depression that plagued every waking minute of my teens and twenties, and which mysteriously vanished when I reached my early thirties and has never returned. (The psychologist explained that it was probably around that time that I finally got accustomed to the effect Asperger’s was having on my personality and worldview.)
So what is the treatment, you ask? There is none! It
can’t be treated with drugs or therapy, so I’ll be the way I am the rest of my
life. On the other hand, as the psychologist noted, the fact that I have successfully
taught at a university for nearly twenty years indicates that I have conquered
my Asperger’s to a great degree.
I
don’t want to give the impression that Asperger’s is all bad. If you must have
a mental disorder, it is the one to have. It is mild and not debilitating
(except in a social way), and can be downright advantageous. In many cases it
actually paves the way to success because the typical “Aspie” is a hard worker
and becomes so obsessed with one thing that he/she becomes an expert at it. (Bill
Gates for one, and probably a great many scientists. Some biographers think
Mozart and Einstein had it.)
Other positive aspects of having Asperger’s:
Contrary
to popular belief, people with Asperger’s are not like robots. They are as
emotional as anyone else, but they have hard time expressing it. The flip side
to this is that Aspies are unusually sensitive about hurting other people’s
feelings because they are afraid that what they say will come out sounding
blunt or rude.
Aspies
just love their routines, which many people find annoying, but the positive
spin is that they are very dependable.
Folks with
Asperger’s often have a childlike quality which at least some people find
appealing. Not surprisingly, many Aspies get along famously with children.
Aspies are
often slightly (or even severely) obsessive-compulsive, so maybe you can get
one to clean your house for you.
Aspies
find it difficult to make small talk. So if you can engage in free and flowing
conversation with someone who has it, then you know for certain he/she is truly
comfortable with you and not just faking it.
Aspies
hate crowded places, so if you ever make a fool of yourself at a party, your
Aspie friends probably won’t be there to see it and laugh at you.
As one of
my friends puts it: Aspies are “the least likely of all males to
be caught in a titty bar.”
Aspies
usually don’t recognize subtle flirtatious behavior in others. That means we
tend to have miserable love lives, but there is a positive way to look at it:
we stay out of romantic trouble more than most people.
Best of
all, Aspies have an abiding and doglike sense of loyalty, even to the point of
absurdity [funny you put it that way, since I think "aspie" sounds like a dog breed" --webmaster]. If you make friends with an Aspie, he/she is likely going to be your
friend for life.