Prepare to enter the wild and wooly world of an adult with Aspergers Syndrome, a form of autism characterized by intellignce, quirks, social difficulties and downright strange and oddish behaviours.

People with Aspergers generally are high functioning in everyday life but have great difficulty connecting with others due to the inability to read faces, body language and subtle verbal clues. They also tend to take words literally and have a hard time multi-tasking.

Oversensitivity to touch (clothing has to be soft and often the tags removed), light (do not leave home without the sunglasses), sound (loud noises and noisey places are avoided), taste (many Aspies have quite a limited diet and are frequently very picky eaters) and smells makes the everyday existence more of a challenge.

Fasten your seatbelts and come on in...
To find out more about what Aspergers is..please check out my earliest blog entries

Saturday, June 11, 2011

The Dichotomy of Aspergers


Lately, I have come to realize why it feels that I live in a bipolar quandary of consternation. Aspergers seems to be a living, breathing dichotomy of contradiction. Allow me to illustrate my point.
I often appear aloof and distant yet am extremely sensitive and deeply and intimately in touch with my emotional state.
I try and be the most strategically prepared for any event yet frequently exhibit no impulse control. I thoroughly explore every aspect of an upcoming conversation yet have been known to blurt out rude and inappropriate remarks.
I can become completely and supremely focused and knowldegable on one singular, obscure subject which few can comprehend yet I have difficulty figuring out what to cook for dinner. And you don't even want to know how long it takes me to figure out what to dress myself in each day or how I have to set alarm clocks all over my house to remember to be alert to when my kid gets off the bus or when someone is stopping over or when I have to leave to do something on time. And there is the plethora of sticky notes throughout my house in order to remember to do this or that and set this appt and cancel that subscription. Yup, still the dumbest smart person you will ever know.
I am quite aware of some of my physical tics yet can also forget about others personal space and have startled many a friend or acquaintance with completely unexpected physical contact. OMG, my poor friend...she came up behind me at school and I hadn't seen her in weeks and when I turned and saw her, I was overjoyed and grasped her in a huge hug completely forgetting that she is not a touch person. Thank the good Lord she just smiled and was not offended. Trust me, it happens a lot. And most of the time, I am at a complete loss as to being able to control myself.
Its as if I am always hungry yet have no clue what to eat. Indecisive. Impulsive. Befuddled.
I crave solitude but fear being alone. I mean, comeon...how does one make any sense of that?
I push people away and lock the doors but I also beg for them to knock.
There is a reason I sit and ponder and have no clue as to which direction to take. And I think...that I have always pretty much lived in this state.

I want people to talk softly yet I fly off my handle and can launch into loud, obnoxious tirades.
I acknowledge my emotional side yet can easily tromp all over someone elses.
I am forever trying to protect myself yet invade others boundaries.
Thoughtful and thoughtless. Heavily controlled, regulated but prone to impulsive outbursts/ outpourings. Very intense and completely subdued and malleable. How does one reckon? How can one accept that their world is such a dichotomy? That black is right but so is white? I am the pot calling the kettle black. Its hard to....accept that this is just who I am.
Sometimes Aspergers isn't easy to live with. Somehow I need to find some peace among these pieces:)