When did you realize that you're different for the 1st time?

[ImAnAspie]

I've always known that i was different.
It's not something that upset me. In fact, I'm very happy about being different. I always felt I was born on the wrong planet. My firstmemory of feeling this was around 5. My sister used toinsist iwas anAllen. She still does! My whole life I've believed that aliens would come and pick me up.
I've always been very different and i've always enjoyed being different i never got bullied because I spent most of my time in the library ALONE and i love being who I am!

 

[Nadador]

I started to realise I was different around 7 or 8, when I found my first and lasting special interest. Other kids would have their things they liked to do, which would come and go in phases, but I was completely immersed in mine and was content to spend all of my time on it, even if it meant missing out on other opportunities or being alone all of the time. In my solitude I found my own inner language for the world around me, and the usual ways of expression I saw demonstrated by others made less and less sense. I cared very much about my studies and wanted to talk about school subjects with my mates, who found that weird. I saw that I approached nearly everything differently from my peers. When I started manifesting those differences outwardly, it got me into some trouble at school. I was happy to be as I was except when others were clearly unhappy with it. I was caught between wanting to please and resenting efforts to make me conform.

At one point I remember sitting there and wanting to tell my doctor that something was wrong with me - that I felt completely different to everyone else. Then I thought that it would be stupid to say that because I couldn't describe the "symptoms" or tell him what exactly the problem was, and thus he wouldn't be able to help me or "prescribe" anything for it (does that make sense to anyone?). I knew I was different but didn't know how.

This does make sense to me. Perfectly. I had a moment like this as well, when I was diagnosed with "chronic nervousness" at around age nine. I wanted to tell my parents and the doctor that the anxiety was only the tip of the iceberg, and at least partly caused by the great sense of difference I felt, but I didn't know how to explain myself. Almost fifty years on, it can still be very hard to articulate.

I would psych myself up and keep repeating in my head to just talk normally like everyone else but as soon as I got to school I became mute.

I can relate to this. I had similar talks with myself for a time, just after I started a new school at age twelve. I would look in the mirror and more or less tell myself, "Act normal today. It isn't that hard. Everybody else does it." Didn't work.

other kids talked and laughed while a song was playing while i was lost in the song, fascinated by it.

This, this, this! I remember feeling so much more involved with things I saw, heard, and learned than my peers. I didn't understand how everyone else could be so casual about things I found so deeply intriguing.

I got formally disciplined at school once for lying down on the classroom floor to take in a lesson. It was a subject I enjoyed, and I thought I would get more from it if I could just relax on the floor and close my eyes to listen. I gave it a try, and was bewildered when my explanation wasn't enough to clear things up with my parents or school authorities. My insistence that I did it so I could be a better student only made things worse. I didn't understand why they wanted me to be sorry for it.

I also had an extremely messy desk during elementary school. No matter how hard I tried, my desk would become unbelievably messy and disorganized.

Had I been in your class, there would have been two desks tipped over by the teacher. My desk is still a mess today. I wouldn't want it to be otherwise.

 

[Moviefan2k4]

I was very young, probably eight or nine years old, when I first noticed people tended to ignore me more than they did other kids. I stayed pretty silent during the earlier years of my life, until my family started asking me to voice my own thoughts. After that, they couldn't get me to shut up again...and it's been 25 years. I get very frustrated lots of times, when I see my mother treat me differently than my sister on various levels. My sister is vastly more independent than me, both mentally and in action. She's three years my junior, but acts ten years my senior. I often get fed up when she does things like sending me job listings on email, or mentions me living on my own (which I am terrified of, having tried it twice before). Neither she nor our mother really understand me deep down, though I do think Mom tries harder in that regard. When I first told my sister I had Asperger's, she immediately dismissed it as an excuse to "avoid growing up", and that continued mindset has widened the gap between us. I still love her, but I can't talk to her much about this. She just shrugs, and goes about her business.

 

[Ferdinand94]

In retrospect, I always felt different, sort of. It wasn't something I could point at, yet it was clearly there.

For example, every time my father would take us to McDonald's, at some point in the middle of our meal he would ask me to go to the counter and get a refill. My immediate answer was ''Can't she (one of my sisters) do it?''
It was especially hard for me to communicate with strangers, and I was terrified (I still don't know why) of cashiers. Adults were a problem for me too, it was like my vocal cords disappeared every time I had to talk to a ''grown up''. My father of course would get mad at me because he assumed I was trying to be disrespectful and problematic, but I was only scared.

Also, my sisters were always telling me to ''get a life'' because apparently I kept copying them. What else could I do? I was 5 years old and had no clue on how to behave normally, I needed instructions, very specific ones otherwise I couldn't do what I was being asked.

But yeah, with the years my family noticed my logic was different, but they didn't do or say anything about it because I would never cause trouble at school or anywhere. I wasn't able to get along with my sisters, but my parents only thought this was typical among siblings, so... to this day they still don't know about my diagnosis.

 

[Vanilla]

I can't remember the very first time, but I remember various fragments.

I can remember being quite young, and talking amongst a group of girls (not sure our age, but we were in primary school). Suddenly, they all seemed to have reacted to something one of them had said, and I couldn't understand why. I asked, and they all looked at me. It was like they all shared in on a secret, which I had somehow missed. They simply told me it was obvious. That was one of my earliest memories, where I felt genuinely stupid

Another memory was when I was also in primary school. I can remember the teachers getting the students to dance; or what they thought was dancing. All the kids would jump up and down excitedly, or turn in circles, on the spot. They all seemed to be having so much fun. I simply couldn't understand why, as it seemed somewhat boring to me. That's one of my earliest memories, where I felt I was too old for my body.

 

[Pondering]

I actually had no idea that I was different from everybody else until I turned fifteen. I never got a professional diagnosis. I am high functioning enough that neither my peers, friends, or family noticed. One day I came home from school and one of my family members showed me an article about Asperger's. Almost every sign of it applied to me - about ninety-five to ninety-eight percent of the signs I could relate to. It was a big 'ah-ha' moment when I realized that I had Asperger's all along.

 

[alien girl]

I think I was somewhere between 2 and 2,5.basically that's when I had my 1st opportunity to communicate with other kids.I remember looking at them and wishing to play together but I couldn't understand their rules of communication. Later for the next 7 years I kept telling myself, that's just because I keep meeting the wrong people. Only at age of 9, when processing issues became more obvious as well, I had to admit that I wasn't like others. At that point I thought that there's something wrong with my brain and I was on a mission to figure out what it was.

What about you guys?

kindergarten age, i couldnt understand how the other kids felt, and they looked like robots to me. i didnt understand why they laughed, why they hung together, didnt always understand what they said, couldnt make myself understood. and the things that bothered me a lot seemed not to touch them, as if they were untouchable.

i couldnt understand their play and social rules either. and was lost in the magic of music and animals, while for them it seemed like something in the background. i was living among aliens, and they scared me...

 

[Vanilla]

kindergarten age, i couldnt understand how the other kids felt, and they looked like robots to me. i didnt understand why they laughed, why they hung together, didnt always understand what they said, couldnt make myself understood. and the things that bothered me a lot seemed not to touch them, as if they were untouchable.

i couldnt understand their play and social rules either. and was lost in the magic of music and animals, while for them it seemed like something in the background. i was living among aliens, and they scared me...

Oh wow, I suddenly remembered my kindergarten experience after reading yours. I can even remember the garden I used to play in, and the art tables.

 

[Cali Cat]

I can't pinpoint a specific time when I first knew I was different. It just always appeared to be the case. I was very uncomfortable around people other than my parents from the time I was born. I didn't have siblings, and didn't really have many playmates until I got to school, so there was little by which to judge myself. When I got to school, I definitely knew something was wrong. I just couldn't figure out if it was with them or me. I didn't much care either as I felt most kids my own age were idiots. (Yeah, I was a bit arrogant.) I'd usually befriend another of the class misfits, and we'd keep to ourselves as much as possible. Outside school, I associated more with adults or older kids.

One particular incident occurred that made me realize I was different in intelligence from other kids. I was given a test in the 6th grade that indicated I was capable of 12th grade level reading and composition and 10th grade level math. My IQ was tested, and I scored 125. Everybody (except my parents, sadly) were all excited about it. There was talk of me skipping grades, but my parents thought it best not to push me. Bummer.

 

[Progster]

In my first year at school, at some point my classmates discovered that if they teased me, I'd lose my temper really quickly, and they thought that was a good laugh so they did it even more, which made me lose my temper or melt down all the more, so a vicious circle was born. I could never understand why they were picking on me, why I was a target? After all I had no physical differences. So I used to shout "Why? Why me?" at them. This earned me the nickname of "Why". They used to stand round me in a circle and shout "why" at me. Since then I always had a sense of being separate, being different to my peers and wanting to do my own thing.

 

[robertwnielsen]

In my first year at school, at some point my classmates discovered that if they teased me, I'd lose my temper really quickly, and they thought that was a good laugh so they did it even more, which made me lose my temper or melt down all the more, so a vicious circle was born. I could never understand why they were picking on me, why I was a target? After all I had no physical differences. So I used to shout "Why? Why me?" at them. This earned me the nickname of "Why". They used to stand round me in a circle and shout "why" at me. Since then I always had a sense of being separate, being different to my peers and wanting to do my own thing.

Progster,

Although I didn't have kids standing around me shouting "Why" at me, your story sounds an awful lot like mine! (Kids discovering that if they teased me, I lost my temper really quickly, and they thought that was funny, which made them do it even more). I wonder if that's a common problem for all Aspies?


But, like you, I ended up mostly wanting to do my own thing, because just like you, I felt different from my peers.

 

[Progster]

Progster,

Although I didn't have kids standing around me shouting "Why" at me, your story sounds an awful lot like mine! (Kids discovering that if they teased me, I lost my temper really quickly, and they thought that was funny, which made them do it even more). I wonder if that's a common problem for all Aspies?


But, like you, I ended up mostly wanting to do my own thing, because just like you, I felt different from my peers.

Yes, I think it's quite a common experience, certainly Aspies get more than their fair share of bullying.

 

[OdinTheAardvark]

From quite an early age I have felt that I am different, but I have always rationalised it: "perhaps everyone feels like this", "we are all different, just in different ways".

Then I tended to find other explanations: I was a private school pupil who was raised on a council estate - of course I felt different, and couldn't completely fit in to either environment.

But as the years went on, I realised it was something in me that made me different - not necessarily better or worse, just different. I'm so pleased I now understand what that something is.