At what age did you have the self awareness to know you're different?

[Fade2black]

For me it was at about 6-7yo. I felt the same as everyone else, but I realized I was different in the way peers behaved toward me, and at this time I knew I didn't fit in. At about 15yo, I realized I had no friends and others didn't want to be friends with me. Again, I felt like everyone else and had average looks. It was about this time I realized that people either avoided me or used me. For example, a classmate would ask me if I wanted to eat ice cream. I would say yes, and they would say something like. "great, can you go get me some too?" And I would, without even knowing it, be duped into buying ice cream for someone who had no intention of anything but tricking me into buying ice cream. My professional career was like this, too. No friends, only people who would tolerate me and, that was because they were forced to by being around me at work. Salespeople always honed in on my difference and be my best friend right up to the point of money changing hands, then they're gone not even saying thank you. Going through adulthood, I always wished I was invisible.

Ironically, and despite being well on the spectrum, it wasn't diagnosed until I was well over 50 years old.

At what age did you have the self-awareness to know you were different?

 

[BrokenBoy]

14 years old.

 

[Trophonius]

I feel slightly odd: 10 y/o.
I'm pretty different to other people of my age, it doesn't feel good: 16.
I'm very different than my peers, I hate it: 20.
I'm a monster: 25.
I'm different but that's okay: 27.

 

[GadAbout]

Ten.

 

[Fino]

Somewhere around 14-15, after being told by a therapist.

 

[Wolfnox]

Young five or six.

 

[SusanLR]

Age six when I started school.

 

[Progster]

First year of primary school. I was teased by other kids, and I shouted 'why?' at them, because I knew I was being singled out and treated differently, but didn't know why.

 

[Autistamatic]

As soon as I started school and was forced to pretend I couldn't read and didn't know the alphabet by teachers who told me "you don't want to stand out because the other children won't like you."

 

[OrangeSquash]

I was probably around 10/11 when I first realized that either I was different, or that everybody else was different to me.

I struggled through school, college, work... I started exploring why I felt so different I think late 20s, but just thought "Ill catch up". I started taking myself more seriously when I turned 30, and was diagnosed when I was 34.

Pursuing a diagnosis was the best thing I have ever done.

 

[Bolletje]

I think it was when I was around 10 years old, when kids started teasing me for my interests and my vocabulary. It wasn’t until I was around 14/15 that I started to feel very alienated for no discernible reason.

 

[Sarah S]

I always knew i wasent like the others from say 4 when i got my first diagnose.

 

[Khendra]

Neat question. I started to really notice it in my adolescent years. I was happily oblivious to it in my childhood years. I was a quirky tomboy nerd who was quite happy and had no idea I was weird...heh heh.

 

[Pats]

A hard question. In many ways I always thought everyone was pretty much like me, either just luckier or a little better able to do some things - like make friends. I never singled myself out for being bullied - assumed those people treated everyone mean. Or didn't understand why some people might get so upset when being teased, I didn't - if others were laughing I was more at ease - less threatened - so I'd laugh too and try to do even more funny things. I thought they were laughing with me, not at me.

But I guess in my teen years, I knew I wasn't like all the other girls who worried about how they looked. Looks more important than comfort. Worried about having a date. I preferred to sit in my room and paint black light posters. That part of my differences remained with me the rest of my life - my interests never matched my peers interests.

When I started working I just figured I was more of a loner, while others needed people around them. Even working at the hospital, I always found a corner to sit in to do my paperwork that was kind of hidden. And I knew how much I hated crowds or parties, but listened when others told me they didn't like it either, but come on. I'd go with them and they'd be right in middle of everything and I'd be trying to shrink into a wall or the furniture or find a hiding spot. I didn't understand if they felt the same way, they just must be able to handle it better or something. But when I found myself reacting the same way amidst my own kids and their families, it dawned on me that maybe it shouldn't be this bad. And that's when I realized there was something there that was not the norm. And that was about 5 years ago. lol

 

[Nervous Rex]

Around 13 or 14, when I realized that thinking was hard for others and a lot of them didn't like to do it. I wondered how they could spend all their free time talking about sports and other things I considered to be meaningless. I also noticed that they did things like physical activity, sports, and socializing naturally, but those things were hard for me.

I wondered why my brain was different than other people's, but I told myself that everyone's brain is different than everyone else's. Partly true, partly excuses.

 

[Crossbreed]

For me, 6yo [1st grade]. I read well ahead of everyone else in the class. Later testing said that I was gifted. I thought that was all there was to it until my [ASD1] diagnosis at 45. (It is common for geeks to be ASD, due to asynchronous development [another form of neuro-diversity].)

 

[Rasputin]

I became aware I was different at an early age, but not necessarily in a bad way. I excelled in school from elementary school all the way through to my Ph.D. But I have been a loner all of my life. I never experienced bullying, however, because I was bigger, stronger, and more athletic than the other kids. I was also tested and found to have high intelligence. I was, however, socially very shy and realized that my family was dysfunctional. My father left when I was four, and my mother suffered from depression, became a hoarder, and was institutionalized for a period of time. So I tried to keep my family secret, and did not allow other kids to know me. I was highly motivated to be "better" than everyone else academically - thinking I would be rewarded with a good job far, far away. My obsessions with academic excellence and physical fitness left no time for developing friendships or dating, until several years after graduating college. I have over the years overcome most of these issues, but am still obsessed with health. I have been married the past 27 years, have a Ph.D. concentrated in business, technology, and psychology, but still.do.not have any close friends. I did have a very close friend for a number of years, but he passed away 3-4 years ago. I am now 61, and have not been formally diagnosed with anything. However, I am "different" from the norm.

 

[Rasputin]

For me, 6yo [1st grade]. I read well ahead of everyone else in the class. Later testing said that I was gifted. I thought that was all there was to it until my [ASD1] diagnosis at 45. (It is common for geeks to be ASD, due to asynchronous development [another form of neuro-diversity].)

You sound a lot like me.

 

[Gracey]

On starting primary school.

apparently one had to remain in the school building absorbing dross and obediently following commands until an older person showed up to take you home at home time.

who knew?
escaping was common place initially.

the whole day in this building with odd routines and seemingly senseless rules stretched on forever.

Morning assemblies were dull as dishwater. Sitting cross legged on waxed parquet flooring for any length of time was cold, uncomfortable (my polyester skirt didn't help)
and the smell was overpowering.

The nuns labled me insolent and wicked for constantly questioning "why?"

A little while into having to turn up and stay in this building all day,
I eventually noticed the other children.
they were everywhere
and didn't appear to be getting corrected as often as I was.
thus began my first study.

I was sent to see the headmaster to be disciplined so often I could tell when he'd had his white hair cut.

I was removed from that primary school and sent to a different one.
The teachers there liked to explain "why", no matter how many times I asked.
The children at this school moved around in herds and smiled and laughed more.

 

[Progster]

Morning assemblies were dull as dishwater. Sitting cross legged on waxed parquet flooring for any length of time was cold, uncomfortable (my polyester skirt didn't help)
and the smell was overpowering.

This is what assemblies were like for me, too, and I hated them. I also couldn't see any point to them. I started to skip them at one point, but eventually I got caught and go sent to the headmaster.