Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi everyone,
I'm in my mid twenties and finding things harder than ever. I really struggle with social skills and although I've always been told I'm "just shy" I've always known something is not right. Despite having outgrown the awkward teenage years I still find it incredibly difficult and confusing holding a conversation with pretty much everyone apart from very close family, even some friends I've known for years.
I've never been like other people, with strong interests and beliefs, not understanding or agreeing with social norms but recently become more aware of just how odd I am (must look for patterns in reg numbers, must always have car windows open even in January! etc...). I think I might be autistic but I'm terrified of going for a diagnosis to be laughed at and told l am just shy and a bit strange. I work with autistic people and although realise it's a spectrum disorder, I am nowhere near as affected as them. I think I probably come across as a little eccentric, lacking in self confidence and very shy.
I am really struggling with self confidence and self doubt and think a diagnosis would probably pull me out of the hole I've dug for myself; but am I just socially awkward, unusual, and looking for something to take the blame?
I guess I'm asking how autistic do you need to appear to get a diagnosis??!
Thank you for your input lostmyway.
I think I have the opposite problem to you. If I am being honest, I shower 3 times a week, sometimes less. I either have to be visibly dirty, or I have to be able to smell myself. When I do have a shower, I put it on pretty well the hottest temperature setting and the highest flow rate, otherwise I still feel dirty (or I don't feel like I've washed would be a better way of putting it). If I were you, I wouldn't follow me around, haha!
I have a similar problem with my beard. If it is too long, it curls round into my mouth and is really annoying, and also gets dirty with food. Hate it. But I also fiddle with me beard a lot. I like to make individual hairs into rings between my finger and thumb. It makes a pleasing click when it pops out from between my fingers. I have had a beard for so long, I'd feel naked without one.
What sort of maths are you studying? and to what level? I did the same with physics. I bought a text book and would read through chapters and the answer all the questions about the chapter. I recently let that slide, l I got to the section on gravity, which I found to be really boring. It was also the same time I started researching autism. At the moment, I spend every night reading about people's experiences on here or wrong planet or similar. I will go back to the physics, the following chapters are all interesting. Mechanical waves, thermodynamics etc all good stuff.
Does it bother you that you don't go out? I guess I am asking, should I be worried that I don't really want to go anywhere?
I can remember having that problem at school, and to some extent these days still. I can't necessarily tell what is wrong with my hand-writing sometimes, but I think you hit the nail on the head when you say 'rough'. Additionally, if I make a mistake at the top of a piece of paper, I start again on a fresh piece. The previous piece is relegated to scrap paper for doodling or something.
Same with the editing. I have edited everyone of the posts I have written so far (at least twice for each one).
Martian Tom
I do that in a slightly different way. I try to quantify what people say. Apologies if the next bit is disgusting. I heard that you can die cliff jumping, as you can get an enema at such high pressure it causes a massive bleed. I used Bernoulli's principle to calculate the pressure change across a rectal orifice, when doing a cannon-ball jump from a 10 metre cliff. I made some assumptions, like: no air resistance; landing rectum first; instantaneous opening of rectum to guestimated diameter of my poo (that is the only gauge for rectal diameter I could think of). Anyway, for this highly idealised situation, it turns out the water enters at a pressure of approx. 10 atmospheres. The exact number is wrong, but the order of magnitude is probably correct. Multiples of atmospheric pressure. Yikes!
If you really were pressed for time, why did he a) waste time by stopping you from working, b) not come and help? Or were all staff members expected to unload 12 pallets each?
In a similar vein to not liking to be looked at. I don't like people taking photos of me, I feel quite uncomfortable. I don't really know why.
I read the wikipedia page. I think Bartleby and I would get on well. I have actually said those very words to someone I worked for. Haha! He wanted me to go to Portsmouth for 7 days, staying in a hotel whilst I built a steel building.
But the comment you quoted makes me realise why I had to retake my English GCSE. The things the words don't say, I just don't get.
Having researched autism a bit, something that comes up quite often are sensitivities. Do you guys have any? What are they like?