Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi there, I'm new here. A pretty calm, chilled and relaxed character I think
As far as I can tell having Aspergers is pretty good really... it's like being a human upgrade, able to excel at pretty much everything which is why large companies and government agencies actively seek out people with these traits.
I'm a high functioning Aspie who began life completing jigsaw puzzles picture side down, and progressed on to the whole university and career thing, buying a house, settling down with a nice and very compatible woman etc etc.
Everything was going quite well until an incompetent doctor got involved...
So following a series of their medical incompetence, beginning with stomach problems, progressing to Gluten/Dairy intolerance and ending in a condition known as ME/CFS I now find myself about 5 years on, a very active, physical and practical mindset locked inside this constantly fatigued body which doesn't perform much better than an 80-90 year old's.
Not sure whether it is an Aspie trait or not but I view this as a fixable problem which needs to be solved and remain confident of fixing myself
Work has proven to be too much of a challenge with the limited energy of the ME/CFS condition though so have had to say goodbye to my career, house and long term partner and focus on creating my own forms of income which is challenging at times, but also exciting and has been full of learning new skills which is always good.
I guess I came here to understand if any other Aspies suffer from ME/CFS and to speak to anybody who does.
And I'd also like to understand if anybody has found ways of earning an income from home and would love to learn how as I'd like the stability of a normal job really, only it would have to be a work from home job.
And also, while I'm here, and after spending half a lifetime of only ever knowingly being in contact with non-ASD people I'm very open and keen to get to know some other beautifully minded Aspies to try and see if we're all on similar wavelengths to each other. It would be great to make some friends on a similar wavelength if such people exist
Hiya
Welcome to the forum.
I'm an aspie bloke - mid 50s - I, like you can do everything - I'm a CEng, nuclear physicist and rocket scientist -I developed ulcerative colitis about 20 years ago when my life was getting too complicated and I wasn't able to manage the stress.
I developed CFS some years ago after a period of unbelievable stress - it ruined my life and eventually cost me my job when I just couldn't manage full-on active days. If it was a gentle, desk/computer day, I was knackered when I got home - an active day meant I couldn't get out of my car when i got home - sometimes had to crawl to the front door.
I left work 5 years ago (they paid me off) and since then, using my aspie super-power of organisation and measuring my body, I've found I can plan my energy consumption to do pretty much what I need to do and fit in the down-time in the gaps - but only if I run my calendar to my clock - I can't work to other people's schedules without a lot of preparation. Planning a day out with friends means I need to pre-sleep and have a couple of quiet days before and afterwards to restabilise back onto my calendar.
On the plus side, in the last 5 years, I've completely refurbished a house - just in very small, well planned steps at a time.
It's all about managing the energy available vs. what you want to do.
Nice to meet you. Also a fellow engineer here. If you want to share your knowledge on nuclear physics I'm more than happy to learn. I followed more of a motorsport path in life, although really wishing I'd continued down the medical route instead of being tempted by the engineering world
Nice to meet you - I'm a pan-nerdist so pretty anything technical floats my boat - I used to manufacture radio pharmaceuticals with a well-known big company (very hands-on with the guts of cyclotrons) but I have more than a passing interest in motor-sport - my friend manages touring car teams and is into a few other types of racing. My fascination is with suspension systems and grip levels.
I'm into all planes and cars - embarrassing levels of nerdism there - and models - Technical Lego, RC, Airfix, Hornby - you name it.
How do you manage your CFS?
Also, The Beast (from The Chase) saying, "Go with ya gut!"
This discussion reminds me of Yakult ad, where a Singleton dates a Physics Nerd.
It's more subtle than just adrenal glands - it's all about us being basically the same as monkeys in the forest - low stress most of the time until the tiger jumps out - the body goes into hyper-drive - cortisol, adrenalin - everything kicks off - shutdown unnecessary systems and prepare for damage control / bleeding and to ignore pain and - things like tunnel vision, immune-system switch-on, speeded up thinking and - voiding of bowels to dissuade the attacker - and then if they survive, it's back to normal stress-free life again.
Unfortunately, us aspies do it totally backwards - we're all about stress, stress, stress, stress and then a few hours of relaxation - and then back to the stress-grind again the next day and the next - it soon completely wrecks the body - from there on, you're just painting over the rust.
Also remember seeing something about there being experimentation with rats on reducing stress hormones. The things ontop of the kidneys produce stress hormones so the experimentation simply removed some of those glands.
While I admire your in-depth analysis of your position, I'd disagree with you - There's a lot of thought into linking the gut with the brain - like a second mini-brain - so stress is the key to almost all gut-related issues being triggered - how the biology works from that is just fire-fighting trying to rebalance the damaged system - things like Tumeric would need to be taken in unmanageable volumes to actually have any effect.
Stress does really bad things in your body - and as aspies can't process stress, we're screwed. bowel and digestion problems are really common for us..
From an engineering perspective I'm also wondering whether the Corona effect exists in neurons and conduction pathways in the brain too... possibly from either an over-volting incidence/scenario or from demyelination effects caused by lack of nutrient absorbtion or perhaps demyelination caused by something else in the myelination process being hampered in some way :/