Should I tell my boss?

[Cosmic Light]

I've never mentioned actually having AS to anyone at work. At the time I was hired, I got the job fine and managed to make a good impression. I haven't yet really gotten my diagnosis then anyway. I just strongly suspected it. I finally did get said diagnosis but still it never seemed I had to tell anyone at work, the boss or otherwise. Hey if clearly I seem NT enough it's not questioned, why bother with it. I like my job, the customers like me, I get alone fine with coworkers, (I've been practicing social type things for so long I'm normally quite good at it. I do have to think more about it though than people normally would and I would burn out if I did it for too long at a time.) The thing is though as my coworkers and boss get to know me more and more, it's becoming clear to me that we have slight problems here. I've been unofficially sighted for behavior more than once. Of course once confronted about it, I'm always more than happy to fix the problem, except I can't actually see what I did in the first place. So of course these things just keep happening again, mistakes and demands for correction that i cannot possibly meet without a better hint.

I'm coming off more and more as defiant and immature, and causing trouble when in my own mind i am only doing my job and doing it well. I'll go into work and I'll start a task i see needs doing. I'll throw myself into most anything with interest only in doing it perfectly and efficiently. Of course it never ceases to shock me when weeks later I'll hear that all the while I've been wrong somehow and i never knew. I try to fix it and this only makes it worse. Then my behavior starts to slip a bit. I'll call things exactly as i see them (typical aspie trait of course,) and anyone on the other end of that, then tends to look at me with that 'What's with her?' kind of look.

I'm not concerned over losing my job or anything. For all the little problems that arise from time to time, I am still a good employee, and am strangely well liked. Overall, it's clear by now though that they must be talking about me and times and lost for explanations, asking how to possibly get things settled well. I'm not motivated by common things that most would be. I don't work harder and harder because I've been threatened or rewarded. I work hard at something simply because I want to. You could threaten me, but that woudl jus tmake me mad which would make me sloppy and prone to mistakes. You could offer rewards, but I'd take that often as condescending. There are so many other little oddities too, and I do sympathize with my poor sometimes confused coworkers. I'm not sure what the right and fair thing to do might be. Fair to them? Fair to me? Is it as ideal as it may seem to simply pose as a somewhat odd and hard to predict NT? LOL, I've done it for years afterall anyway before i knew I was doing it. :wacko::lol:

 

[Arashi222]

I haven't really told anyone at my work either. They've known me for so long that my oddities are just noted and sometimes I get the weird looks too. I've had a couple of meltdowns over the 11yrs I've worked at my company. Its hard but I think its still up to you to decide if you want to tell people fully about your AS or not. Or just explaining symptoms like sometimes this bugs me or sometimes there are times when I don't know I've made X mistake.

I have told I think a total of maybe 5 people at work. But these except for one person were people I felt would be all right with it. I am not treated any differently in their eyes because they know me. Maybe its something just to think about. I know for me it wasn't the right thing to broadcast it. I think its a very personal choice on who you tell and why.

 

[Kelly]

I think maybe tell your boss that you have a disorder that causes you to misunderstand things sometimes and that if you make a mistake you need it pointed out clearly otherwise you may not understand what it is you did wrong. Maybe use examples along the line of "you know when I did this 'odd thing'(use example) that's part of my disorder, part of who I am, I can't help doing these things or acting in certain ways". If your boss wants to know what it is then you can either say you'd rather not say or just be upfront and tell them that it's an ASD, give your boss a brief outline of symptoms (using examples if possible). Just make it clear it changes nothing, that you just wanted to explain why you may appear a little odd or not seem to follow orders properly, your not doing it on purpose it's just the way your brain works.

Good luck