TIL I'm autistic



  • Continuing the discussion from But wait, you don't have to be smart to be a programmer:

    @Maciejasjmj said:

    I was amazed at how reasonably written and stylistically fine that post was by your standards, then I saw you were quoting for most of it. Oh well.

    They still sound like used snake-oil salesmen, though.

    Ok, I'll try to emulate that then. At least it would be a step forward.

    I find out that I'm autistic. That explains a lot.

    I always thought autism was crippling.

    And ironically, I'm actually overly social. Apparently being hindered socially doesn't mean you avoid social interaction. It can mean that you approach social interaction in a confusing way.


  • FoxDev

    @xaade said:

    I always thought autism was crippling.

    Only in severe cases
    @xaade said:
    Apparently being hindered socially doesn't mean you avoid social interaction. It can mean that you approach social interaction in a confusing way.

    Among other things, correct ;)


  • kills Dumbledore

    From what I know about autism, that would explain some stuff about the way you come across on here.

    @xaade said:

    ironically, I'm actually overly social. Apparently being hindered socially doesn't mean you avoid social interaction. It can mean that you approach social interaction in a confusing way

    Autism inhibits understanding of social interactions, it certainly doesn't mean you're introverted. You might find yourself talking at cross purposes with people because you don't understand what they're saying, due to unspoken, assumed social standards; and they don't understand you because you don't conform to the same standards. You can learn to consciously do some of the things that come naturally to neurotypicals, or just be aware that there will be misunderstandings so you can nip them in the bud when they coome up.

    @xaade said:

    I always thought autism was crippling.

    Absolutely not. It's nothing like RainMan (he actually had FG Syndrome), and unless you have a very severe form (unlikely if you've only just been diagnosed) you can get by absolutely fine. My fiancee works with Autistic children, feel free to PM me of you want any specific information, I'll help if I can



  • It was really freaky.

    I watched a video on the symptoms, and I'm like...

    check,
    check,
    check,
    check,

    Ok, this is either like a really bad horoscope, or the reasons I like Sheogorath are a little different than I realize.

    Hindrances:

    Flashing lights make me lose balance.
    I can't stand when one tile is out of place in a pattern.
    I get very strong emotions (was beginning to think I was bipolar).
    I never feel like I'm completely understood, so I repeat things over and over in 50 different ways.
    I look at people in the mouth and not the eyes. (I think this has to do with a language processing disorder, so I watch the mouth to lip-read in the holes).
    I'm very gullible.
    My range of pain is incredibly small. If I get a paper-cut it hurts like hell. If I break a bone it hurts much less than I expected.

    Benefits:
    I can completely visualize a 3d object in my head, including spinning it at any angle and animations. I can see a car and visualize it's full shape including making up parts, all simultaneously.
    I'm extremely empathetic. (which ironically is also a symptom. It can go either way)

    I'll finish the list later.


  • kills Dumbledore

    @xaade said:

    I get very strong emotions (was beginning to think I was bipolar).

    Conflated more often than you might think.


  • Banned

    @xaade said:

    I never feel like I'm completely understood, so I repeat things over and over in 50 different ways.

    Looking back at my arguments with @RaceProUK, I'm afraid I can be autistic too...


  • FoxDev

    @xaade said:

    I watched a video on the symptoms

    Which has led you to a conclusion that may well be correct; still, I wouldn't rely on self-diagnosis. If you think you really are autistic, get a professional to check; they'll be able to tell you for sure. Or at least as sure as anyone can be when it comes to the workings of the brain ;)


  • kills Dumbledore

    @RaceProUK said:

    I wouldn't rely on self-diagnosis

    QFT

    Self diagnosis of anything brain related is very easy and can be dangerous. When I was depressed, I was looking through the NHS list of mental illnesses and deciding I had all of them



  • @RaceProUK said:

    I wouldn't rely on self-diagnosis

    Meh.

    Something's fucked up, but honestly I make it by just fine.

    I don't feel like spending a bunch on money to be told.... you're weird, but it really doesn't inhibit you; have a nice day.



  • @xaade said:

    Meh.

    Note: that without actual diagnosis some will take STRONG exception to referring to yourself like you have been. Easy to blow them off if you want, but avoiding it may be easier.


  • FoxDev

    as someone with an actual autism diagnosis i'm going to state my official stance on that:

    "Meh, so long as @xaade/Subject X is using the self diagnosed term as a focal point to improve themselves and not playing the "woe is me! i'm autistic so you must treat me special!" card i don't really care. Addendum: with or without the actual diagnosis playing the "woe is me! i'm autistic so you must treat me special!" card will cause me to tell you to GTFO. because playing that card is not cool.



  • @xaade said:

    I don't feel like spending a bunch on money to be told.... you're weird, but it really doesn't inhibit you; have a nice day.

    People pretending to have conditions they have absolutely no diagnosis of is the worst. It's like Hitler-bad.

    Use words like, "I suspect I might be" or "I have some of the symptoms of", but until you've had a medical professional take a look, do not claim to be autistic. It's hugely insulting to those who actually are.

    (Similarly, don't pretend to have a gluten or peanut allergy when you don't. If just just don't like the flavor of a food, you can say you dislike it without pretending to be allergic to it. It's ok. But the enormous numbers of allergy-fakers are leading to a world where nobody will take an actual peanut allergy seriously, which could easily lead to accidental deaths.)

    RANT!


  • Java Dev

    @Jaloopa said:

    Self diagnosis of anything brain related is very easy and can be dangerous. When I was depressed, I was looking through the NHS list of mental illnesses and deciding I had all of them

    That sure sounds like a symptom of depression :D


  • Java Dev

    @accalia said:

    Addendum: with or without the actual diagnosis playing the "woe is me! i'm autistic so you must treat me special!" card will cause me to tell you to GTFO. because playing that card is not cool.

    QFT from a fellow person with autistic spectrum diagnosis.


  • FoxDev

    @PleegWat said:

    @accalia said:
    Addendum: with or without the actual diagnosis playing the "woe is me! i'm autistic so you must treat me special!" card will cause me to tell you to GTFO. because playing that card is not cool.

    QFT from a fellow person with autistic spectrum diagnosis.

    👋 We could form a club 😆
    We don't need to form a club; I'm joshing ;-‍)


  • FoxDev

    Others may disagree with me on that point of course.

    although this

    @blakeyrat said:

    don't pretend to have a gluten or peanut allergy when you don't.

    needs to be QFT.

    I've worked foodservice and i know the hassle that the kitchen needs to go though when they are preparing an allergen free plate: prepare single serving from scratch, with tools that are freshly cleaned and sterilized, do not prepare any other food while the allergen free food is being processed, and a whole host of other things that basically mean the whole kitchen grinds to a halt until that allergen free plate heads out to the customer.

    that holds up *EVERYONE's food, and annoys patrons who have to sit through the delay. If you're not alergic then either choose a place that doesn't even serve the food you don't want or just tell the server you don't like that food and they'll deal with it. if you claim an alergy when you don't have one is just being an asshole of the highest caliber.


  • FoxDev

    @RaceProUK said:

    We don't need to form a club; I'm joshing ;-‍)

    who is this josh?

    -_-


  • FoxDev

    @accalia said:

    who is this josh?

    Joshing === joking

    It's a British thing ;)



  • @xaade said:

    I find out that I'm autistic.

    Who diagnosed you?


  • FoxDev

    @RaceProUK said:

    @accalia said:
    who is this josh?

    Joshing === joking

    i knew that, but facts are :barrier: to :rofl:


  • FoxDev

    True. But it's also something I realised is probably not that well known outside the UK, so… think of my answer as a PSA or something ;)



  • @RaceProUK said:

    @xaade said:
    I always thought autism was crippling.

    Only in severe cases

    90% of autistics are also mentally retarded. The 10% who are not are said to have Asperger's Syndrome.


  • FoxDev

    @tharpa said:

    90% of autistics are also mentally retarded. The 10% who are not are said to have Asperger's Syndrome.

    [Citation needed]


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @RaceProUK said:

    It's a British thing

    Not only.



  • @xaade said:

    I find out that I'm autistic.

    One of us! One of us!


  • Java Dev

    I have gotten the impression over the years that people are overzealous to apply the 'autistic spectrum' label. Specifically, it seems that being oriented towards social sciences is the norm, and anyone who is instead oriented towards the exact sciences and thus less socially apt is likely to be labelled as autistic spectrum at some point.

    I'm not very good socially. But I can internalize the inner workings of a 100kloc codebase in frightening detail. I don't see this as a handicap.



  • @Jaloopa said:

    Absolutely not. It's nothing like RainMan (he actually had FG Syndrome), and unless you have a very severe form (unlikely if you've only just been diagnosed) you can get by absolutely fine. My fiancee works with Autistic children, feel free to PM me of you want any specific information, I'll help if I can

    Misconceptions abound. 90% of autistics are also mentally retarded. The 10% who are not are said to have Asperger's Syndrome.

    So when you hear that the prevalence of autism is increasing, it's quite hysterical, actually. In early decades, many people with autism were not diagnosed as such, because their mental retardation seemed to make it irrelevant.

    I was a counselor with the developmentally disabled for several years.



  • @PleegWat said:

    and anyone who is instead focused towards the exact sciences and thus less socially apt is likely to be labelled as autistic spectrum at some point.

    By a medical professional, or Shelly the admin assistant?

    Being "labeled as" is meaningless if the person doing the labeling doesn't know what the hell they're talking about.


  • I survived the hour long Uno hand

    Literally all but two of those hindrances apply to me, and one is debatable (am I gullible? I'm not sure I'm qualified to assess that myself :) )

    One of your two benefits also applies.

    Far as I can tell, I'm not autistic. I have a lot wrong with me, including dyscalculia and some form of anxiety-based something or other I don't have diagnosed. There's such a thing as emotional oversensitivity, pain tolerance varies widely by person, and a processing disorder can often bleed over into secondary effects.

    In short: get checked out before you start declaring yourself definitely something or other. It's not all that expensive if you have insurance, and there's about 50 million things they can try to help you adapt and adjust before you say "it doesn't inhibit you, have a nice day".

    Hell, I recently got screened for a condition I don't want to go into, and just finding out I wasn't X made a huge difference. I could feel confident I'd learned something about myself. They also gave some advice on how I can cope with the things that led me to think I was X, and some other specialists I might want to see later if I feel up to it. It was overall a positive experience.


  • Java Dev

    By me, experience expert, diagnosed autistic spectrum, and severely doubting there's anything wrong with myself.

    It's well possible I mentally flag people as 'about as autistic as me' or 'more autistic than me' where a professional would disagree. I also do know I act more socially awkward in environments where I'm not at ease, but I can't really compare on that because I avoid such situations.

    So yes, you're probably right on that front.



  • @RaceProUK said:

    We could form a club

    I thought this was the club.



  • They apparently have relabeled Asperger's Syndrome as "High-level autism" these days.


  • FoxDev

    That's the case in the DSM IIRC; other references may still maintain a separate entry


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @accalia said:

    needs to be QFT.

    Of course, the kind of person who would lie about an allergy wouldn't likely care about inconveniencing everyone else; xe got ziers.



  • @Jaloopa said:

    Self diagnosis of anything brain related is very easy and can be dangerous. When I was depressed, I was looking through the NHS list of mental illnesses and deciding I had all of them

    My abnormal psych professor said that this was extremely common among students in his course, even without the depression.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @PleegWat said:

    I have gotten the impression over the years that people are overzealous to apply the 'autistic spectrum' label.

    Yes, doing that is a way for someone to excuse poor interpersonal skills, IME.

    "Oh, I'm an Aspie, so you have to put up with my jerk behavior, or you're discriminating against me."


  • FoxDev

    @FrostCat said:

    the kind of person who would lie about an allergy wouldn't likely care about inconveniencing everyone else;

    then they also should not be surprised at being delivered my gauntlet bu my second. for such a person has no honour and i will prove it upon the field of honour!

    </hyperbole>


  • FoxDev

    @FrostCat said:

    "Oh, I'm an Aspie, so you have to put up with my jerk behavior, or you're discriminating against me."

    to which would i say: GTFO until you learn why playing that card is a bad thing., and before you complaina bout it here's my current diagnosis. see that moderate to sever aspergers diagnosis there? Good. now don't complain about opression based on disability because i've got the same "disability" and i'm telling you that was unacceptable"


  • Java Dev

    @FrostCat said:

    "Oh, I'm an Aspie, so you have to put up with my jerk behavior, or you're discriminating against me."

    As mentioned here before, you being an aspie is not my problem. It's your problem. If it turns you into an unworkable jerkwad then you have as much place in a crowded office as a wheelchair bound person has on a high-rise construction site.



  • See I'm an asshole, but at least I own-up to it.


  • FoxDev

    @accalia said:

    by my second

    You called?



  • @RaceProUK said:

    @PleegWat said:
    @accalia said:
    Addendum: with or without the actual diagnosis playing the "woe is me! i'm autistic so you must treat me special!" card will cause me to tell you to GTFO. because playing that card is not cool.

    QFT from a fellow person with autistic spectrum diagnosis.

    👋 We could form a club 😆
    We don't need to form a club; I'm joshing ;-‍)

    I'm beginning to think we're all crazy here.


  • FoxDev

    @anonymous234 said:

    I'm beginning to think we're all crazy here.

    That's because we are all crazy here ;)


  • FoxDev

    @anonymous234 said:

    I'm beginning to think we're all crazy here.

    For better or worse there is a statistically significant correlation between the two traits.*

    * "crazy" and IT i mean



  • @DCRoss said:

    I thought this was the club.

    I thought My Other ForumTM was the club. It's a pretty small forum but we have ... must be at least a dozen, maybe more, regulars who've said they are.

    I'm a sort of honorary member, since most of the autistic people and people who know autistic people think I seem autistic, including someone who told me they'd been assuming I had a diagnosis and just hadn't mentioned it and someone else who's also training to be a psychologist and gave me an official internet diagnosis.

    I'd kinda like to get someone to diagnose or rule it out, but I feel awkward about it. This is partly because I don't think I need help really - or only related to specific things that may be related to autism if I'm autistic, like my social anxiety. So I feel like I'd be kind of a fraud, and if the person I saw asked 'so what do you actually want from this?' I'd have to say I'm just satisfying my curiosity. I don't like to bother people.

    It's also partly because self-diagnosis of anything, but especially of autism has quite a stigma to it. There are plenty of people with undiagnosed autistic spectrum disorders, but there's a lot of people saying they 'think they're autistic' and some of them are rather silly about it, to put it mildly, so they get a lot of backlash. And I'm aware how easy it is to think you fit the symptoms of something, especially a psychological thing, because you see everything through the lens of your own experience. So I'm afraid of getting a diagnosis of 'everyone feels like that' and feeling very very silly.


  • FoxDev

    @CarrieVS said:

    feeling very very silly

    Eh, better to know for sure and feel silly AFAIC ;)


  • I survived the hour long Uno hand

    @CarrieVS said:

    This is partly because I don't think I need help really

    This feeling I definitely relate to. I wouldn't have done any sort of learning disorder test if my mom didn't already have a general processing disorder test she got training on how to administer as part of her gig tutoring dyslexic kids, and while it wasn't fine-grained enough to specify dyscalculia, my results are definitely consistent with dyscalculia. And yet, I find myself wondering what would change if I went and got a second test done? I'm pretty decent at adapting for my deficiencies already. But then, I'll never know if it can be better if I don't try. So sometime when I've got less doctors visits in my schedule I'll probably go get tested.



  • @RaceProUK said:

    Eh, better to know for sure and feel silly AFAIC

    Nonono it's not.

    I ... people would think I'm the sort of person who goes round diagnosing theirself with stuff and wanting special treatment.

    Or that I'm just unable to cope with life even though I'm perfectly normal and if I suck at stuff it's just because I'm useless. And they'd probably be right. And however kind and diplomatic they were about giving me my official diagnosis of Drama Queen-itis, I'd be sure they were thinking that and I'd certainly be thinking it about myself.

    I can't even get therapy for my social anxiety, because it turns out social anxiety is a :barrier: to explaining all this stuff to a stranger.


  • FoxDev

    Hmm… not really sure what to say if I'm honest. I will say though that if people are going to judge you negatively because of a genuine medical diagnosis, then they're probably not really worth knowing ;)


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @blakeyrat said:

    See I'm an asshole

    Don't worry, that'll probably be a disorder in DSM VI.


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