If you were honest with yourselves, how many of you hate having this condition?

[Ken]

I found some more old school reports from school today, from when I was 10. It seems in all my primary (elementary) school reports the teacher always wrote every little detail of my behaviour in the classroom and it made me out to seem more Aspie than I thought I was.
Tell me, do teachers sometimes bend the truth a little on school reports because they know they have to put something but aren't always sure what, so they just put something like "Misty is getting better at talking to the other children" or other stuff like that? I mean, I have a good memory and I remember interacting a lot with the other children and having friends and getting along in group work in class, etc.
Maybe the teacher was afraid that if they'd just wrote "Misty ain't as Aspie as her diagnosis says" then I might have lost the help I was getting in school? I do know that due to lack of funding you do have to exaggerate sometimes in order to continue getting support.

Ugh, I wish I'd masked the stupid Asperger's instead of the ADHD. I spent all my energy masking my hyperactivity and trying to be a well-behaved student. I've never really masked Asperger's. How do you guys actually do that?

Apparently, your school was far more official or professional than mine. My school was very "backwards". My worst bullies were the teachers. They delighted in bullying me. They would set things up for my failure and encourage (always successfully) to get the class to laugh at me.

I never knew I was autistic. The school diagnosed me as retarded. I never knew anything about masking. I just tried to hide. I guess my masking was to never look up, never draw any attention. Of course that was a problem in itself. Once a teacher marched, stomping towards my desk, jerked me up by my shirt and told me, with great anger and disdain, to "stop being so dull". I had no idea how to respond or what to do.

My school did not have any support or help for autistic children. The term autism was not known. Neither did they have any help or support for retarded children. But, they sure had fun bullying them!

 

[Misty Avich]

I was never the teacher's favourite, and one or two teachers didn't seem to like me in my first few years at school. From age 9 onwards I didn't seem to have issues with teachers so much. The teacher I had when I was 5 hated me and would always make me the scapegoat. I remember when I clumsily pulled a chair back as the teacher's assistant (TA) was about to sit on it and she fell to the floor. The class teacher SHOUTED me so loudly that the whole class went quiet. I remember walking backwards as she was towering over me shouting at the top of her voice at me, I was cowering and shaking and sobbing. I didn't even know what I had actually done to cause her to be that angry, as what I did do was only an accident and it bound to happen in a class of 5-year-olds. I remember having to stay inside while everyone else went out to play, being forced to apologise to the TA in front of the principal. Then at the end of the school day the teacher took me to my mum and told her what had happened, and then my mum was angry with me. Being only 5 I kind of believed that I had been naughty because the adults all thought so, so I didn't stand up for myself. But deep down I knew it was an accident and didn't deserve to be punished and shouted at like that in front of the whole class. After that day I developed a fear of being shouted at in front of everyone and so tried my best to be a good student, which was why I masked my ADHD so much.

After I received the crappy diagnosis the teachers may have been more understanding but the other girls still labelled me as retarded and even became afraid to be seen with me because they thought they might "catch" Asperger's. I tell you, kids and diagnoses do not mix. If you are getting your child diagnosed, please make sure their classmates are not told, because it can really wreck their social life at school.
My husband's friend has a 10-year-old with dyslexia, and he gets embarrassed about the label and doesn't want to be known by it and doesn't want his classmates to know. Obviously they all know he needs help with reading and writing, but because there are a few others in his class who also need some extra help it doesn't single him out so much. But add a label into the equation and he'll suddenly become contagious and embarrassing. So he prefers it because kept between him, his close family, and his teacher. That's what I wish my diagnosis had of been.

 

[Jonn]

My school did not have any support or help for autistic children. The term autism was not known. Neither did they have any help or support for retarded children. But, they sure had fun bullying them!

My teacher tormentor is long dead, but I did have a fantasy of finding her grave and pooping on it.
No, I have no desire to do it any longer.

 

[Jonn]

Being only 5 I kind of believed that I had been naughty because the adults all thought so, so I didn't stand up for myself.

5 seems to be the "perfect" time for incidences that scar us for life.

 

[Crossbreed]

With some exceptions, I was a teachers' pet. Since I picked up most lessons quickly, I would help others who sat next to me.

Like me, one of my sons would often extrapolate more from the lessons than was originally intended.

 

[Neri]

I hate my ritual abuse experience.

This. Although I don't exactly hate it, because it's been a singificant factor in the formation of my amazing, creative, compassionate and resiliant character, the long term abuse situations I've found myself in, until recently, really have been sucky in a lot of ways. I wouldn't change anything though, I love who I am and I love my life and what I've made out of the cards I was dealt.

 

[Jonn]

This. Although I don't exactly hate it, because it's been a singificant factor in the formation of my amazing, creative, compassionate and resiliant character, the long term abuse situations I've found myself in, until recently, really have been sucky in a lot of ways. I wouldn't change anything though, I love who I am and I love my life and what I've made out of the cards I was dealt.

That is a very positive attitude.
I am glad you are embracing the silver lining.

What I said was really hyperbole, while being supportive of a friend.
I am actually quite stoic over the situation, but it frustrates me that so many are ignorant of what is actually happening in the world.

Establishments gaslight, and as a person who respects the Truth, I do like to highlight the corruption from time to time.

I hope you have settled into your new environment, and getting proper support, now. <hug>

 

[Misty Avich]

I feel like all my Asperger's is is having so many pathological fears and phobias and hypersensitivities to my own and other people's emotions. If you can even define that as Asperger's.

 

[Jonn]

I feel like all my Asperger's is is having so many pathological fears and phobias and hypersensitivities to my own and other people's emotions. If you can even define that as Asperger's.

Spoiler

Damn!
You are a mess!
Welcome to the club.

 

[mw2530]

I like the few exceptional talents it has given me but I hate how it has caused significant isolation throughout my life and has destroyed any chance at a romantic relationship.

 

[FayetheAspie]

I like the few exceptional talents it has given me but I hate how it has caused significant isolation throughout my life and has destroyed any chance at a romantic relationship.

I would not really say "any chance" but I do think it depends on finding someone of a similar neurotype who has the same or very similar special interests.

 

[mw2530]

I would not really say "any chance" but I do think it depends on finding someone of a similar neurotype who has the same or very similar special interests.

I guess so far that has been my experience. So it is hard to think that the future will be any different.

 

[Crossbreed]

I would not really say "any chance" but I do think it depends on finding someone of a similar neurotype who has the same or very similar special interests.

I guess so far that has been my experience. So it is hard to think that the future will be any different.

My wife turned out to be ADHD, so it can happen!

 

[Boogs]

I guess so far that has been my experience. So it is hard to think that the future will be any different.

That's psychological - the past is known, and we've survived it so far, the future is unknown and we fear the new because we haven't survived it and don't know if we can (because it's new, no past experience to measure it by). So we are evolved to rely on the known and spurn the unknown, unless or until we have little choice and must find new ways of living.

There's a real part of this in that old ways are old because they are the most successful ways found so far.
The new is a real risk, but again without that risk we'd stagnate and die out, it's a balance with feedback (if we start to die out we are forced to find change).
So generally we are attuned to thinking the past reflects the future (I'm simplifying to some degree) and this is the safer default way to think (whether that's real or not) because we fear to contemplate the unknown. It can be safer and easier to assume our needs will not be fulfilled, but that paves the way to always being unfulfilled. If it's genuinely accepted then that can be one solution, but if that's not possible then change (or death) is the only possible escape (plus some luck, but everyone need's that, NT or ND alike).

 

[Crossbreed]

That reminds me of,
“Yesterday is history,
tomorrow is a mystery,
but today is a gift.

That is why it is called the present!”

 

[Cutesie]

I hate autism or whatever it is that I’ve got. At the moment, I hate having discovered objects that help me cope. I’m in a psych ward, and they’re not letting me have the things that can make being here more manageable. I’m as suicidal as I get, and I already banged my head against walls a few times - something that I am better able to control outside.

 

[vergil96]

I hate autism or whatever it is that I’ve got. At the moment, I hate having discovered objects that help me cope. I’m in a psych ward, and they’re not letting me have the things that can make being here more manageable. I’m as suicidal as I get, and I already banged my head against walls a few times - something that I am better able to control outside.

Did you tell any of the staff? Maybe they can adjust your meds, help manage sensory stuff or something? Get you a single person room? Get you something to stim with instead of self-harm?

A piece of practical advice: act your worst when asking, appear distressed and overstimulated, this is more likely to get help.