I've heard that people with AS often have learning disabilities associated with that.
I tend to be very slow to pick things up at first, like it takes a while for all the pieces to fall into place. Once they do I tend to do okay. I was the last kid in my class in 1st grade, out of 30-something kids, to be given the books to start reading (there was a series of books and we had to start at the first book, but there was only a limited number of "first books" so the smart kids got them first and the slower kids got them when the smart kids had finished). I remember one of the girls in my class at that time saw my mother pull up in her car to pick me up from school, and felt the need to run over and tell her that "142857 is always the slowest at everything".
Once I started reading I basically read everything I could get my hands on. Within a year I was reading at almost an adult level, I was the only kid out of 2 classes in 2nd grade who maxed out the reading test at a reading age of 12 years and 10 months (about double my actual age at the time).
Much of my life has gone a lot like that, I often struggle with new concepts. It almost always takes a while for the pieces to fall into place.
At some level it has been an advantage. I can go through a lengthy technical or business document and things that don't make sense basically jump out at me, whereas other people are looking at it from a "higher" perspective and tend not to notice. While I am poring over every detail trying to make sense of it in detail first before the concept behind it starts to come together in my head. I have always been good at mentoring junior programmers and at explaining computer-system related issues to non-technical people, because in order to explain things I am able to break them right down into easy-to-understand concepts and components.
I tend to be very slow to pick things up at first, like it takes a while for all the pieces to fall into place. Once they do I tend to do okay. I was the last kid in my class in 1st grade, out of 30-something kids, to be given the books to start reading (there was a series of books and we had to start at the first book, but there was only a limited number of "first books" so the smart kids got them first and the slower kids got them when the smart kids had finished). I remember one of the girls in my class at that time saw my mother pull up in her car to pick me up from school, and felt the need to run over and tell her that "142857 is always the slowest at everything".
Once I started reading I basically read everything I could get my hands on. Within a year I was reading at almost an adult level, I was the only kid out of 2 classes in 2nd grade who maxed out the reading test at a reading age of 12 years and 10 months (about double my actual age at the time).
Much of my life has gone a lot like that, I often struggle with new concepts. It almost always takes a while for the pieces to fall into place.
At some level it has been an advantage. I can go through a lengthy technical or business document and things that don't make sense basically jump out at me, whereas other people are looking at it from a "higher" perspective and tend not to notice. While I am poring over every detail trying to make sense of it in detail first before the concept behind it starts to come together in my head. I have always been good at mentoring junior programmers and at explaining computer-system related issues to non-technical people, because in order to explain things I am able to break them right down into easy-to-understand concepts and components.
