Thoughts on "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time"?

Ah, just asked this question myself, hadn't spotted this. I personally found it fascinating. I really enjoyed it, as someone still struggling with whether the Aspergers diagnosis fits for me (I was diagnosed in very unfortunate circumstances and by a health professional not truly qualified to offer the diagnosis who then did not tell me the traits she observed to base this on) personally I can relate to parts of this book, I feel overall though for me at least it is far more pronounced if this was agreed to be a fairly universal representative of "high functioning Aspergers" as the I internet (never a reliable source I know) tried to tell me it was. I would presume that this is less functioning? I do t know, the people I know in real life do not struggle this far, though they are older and that may be a large proportion of that. 

To me the part that rang the most true was that the recurring sense of alarm he feels when he notes that his thinking is impaired when he becomes stressed. I do this myself, when pushing myself more than I know I should I realise I am beginning to struggle with what should be simple (telling left and right) that the things that push me to this are difficult social interactions more than anything else. Some of the general anxiety parts in general, reading it I began to realise that while I do not drum, if overwhelmed I walk, long distance and part of that is rhythm which makes it comforting. I wear headphones when I do this and have increasingly when struggling to function taken to wearing them without music, so mute the world a bit and as an excuse not to talk to people. Also a tendency not to look at people narrow my vision, focus ahead. Normally with the dog is enough, but when very stressed I need to walk without him as he is more distraction than I can take and stops it being as effective at calming me. 

I have never really been a maths brain, but I could relate to schedules, I do not need this all the time, but if I become overwhelmed stressed or feel impaired I find it helpful to make a similar style schedule to the one he does. If I did have a "savant" skill it would be in how things are made, I can picture and dismantle things quite clearly in my head and I believe this may be unusual. 

Also a weird one, the "when I need to go to the toilet I need to go very rapidly" that is quite true for me, never quite wet myself and always just assumed it was because I drank too much coffee haha. 

He is also very unaware of the thoughts of others, never even considers them really. Where as I find myself spending a huge amount of my mental energy analysing my own thoughts and wondering what the thoughts of others are. I have a similar reactions to being deceieved by close people, I have experienced what would likely be more harmful and traumatic things from people who were close to me but still lies, deception and betrayal similar (though not that extreme) where still far more harmful, disturbing, unsettling, damaging, world cracking than any of those things and I wonder if that is an Aspergers trait. 

For me I would think that possibly I am just not so visual based but more texture, touch based. I can relate to becoming physically ill when distressed before becoming aware of the emotional problems, though I have been working on that and have generally gotten better at emotional awareness. Which may be more unbringing based than an Aspergers thing as shows of emotion particularly distress are still punished in my family. Just rambling now, and realise this thread is old so there now be no interest but yes I was fascinated by this book.

Ah, just asked this question myself, hadn't spotted this. I personally found it fascinating. I really enjoyed it, as someone still struggling with whether the Aspergers diagnosis fits for me (I was diagnosed in very unfortunate circumstances and by a health professional not truly qualified to offer the diagnosis who then did not tell me the traits she observed to base this on) personally I can relate to parts of this book, I feel overall though for me at least it is far more pronounced if this was agreed to be a fairly universal representative of "high functioning Aspergers" as the I internet (never a reliable source I know) tried to tell me it was. I would presume that this is less functioning? I do t know, the people I know in real life do not struggle this far, though they are older and that may be a large proportion of that. 

To me the part that rang the most true was that the recurring sense of alarm he feels when he notes that his thinking is impaired when he becomes stressed. I do this myself, when pushing myself more than I know I should I realise I am beginning to struggle with what should be simple (telling left and right) that the things that push me to this are difficult social interactions more than anything else. Some of the general anxiety parts in general, reading it I began to realise that while I do not drum, if overwhelmed I walk, long distance and part of that is rhythm which makes it comforting. I wear headphones when I do this and have increasingly when struggling to function taken to wearing them without music, so mute the world a bit and as an excuse not to talk to people. Also a tendency not to look at people narrow my vision, focus ahead. Normally with the dog is enough, but when very stressed I need to walk without him as he is more distraction than I can take and stops it being as effective at calming me. 

I have never really been a maths brain, but I could relate to schedules, I do not need this all the time, but if I become overwhelmed stressed or feel impaired I find it helpful to make a similar style schedule to the one he does. If I did have a "savant" skill it would be in how things are made, I can picture and dismantle things quite clearly in my head and I believe this may be unusual. 

Also a weird one, the "when I need to go to the toilet I need to go very rapidly" that is quite true for me, never quite wet myself and always just assumed it was because I drank too much coffee haha. 

He is also very unaware of the thoughts of others, never even considers them really. Where as I find myself spending a huge amount of my mental energy analysing my own thoughts and wondering what the thoughts of others are. I have a similar reactions to being deceieved by close people, I have experienced what would likely be more harmful and traumatic things from people who were close to me but still lies, deception and betrayal similar (though not that extreme) where still far more harmful, disturbing, unsettling, damaging, world cracking than any of those things and I wonder if that is an Aspergers trait. 

For me I would think that possibly I am just not so visual based but more texture, touch based. I can relate to becoming physically ill when distressed before becoming aware of the emotional problems, though I have been working on that and have generally gotten better at emotional awareness. Which may be more unbringing based than an Aspergers thing as shows of emotion particularly distress are still punished in my family. Just rambling now, and realise this thread is old so there now be no interest but yes I was fascinated by this book.