If you missed Part I you can head over here and read about how I perceived pregnancy and my thoughts on the stereotypes that are shared around the net. Today I will talk a little bit about things that I would have done differently in my pregnancy and other random thoughts.

My only pregnancy regrets are really my own fault, and the ones of my lazy self. Regrets might even be a strong word but it is things that I would do differently next time.

I used to sort of work out before I got pregnant. It was this daily 10-15 minute ordeal trying to not be such a lazy bone all the time. Right after conception I was too sick to do it anymore so I took a break for three months. Yet instead of going straight back into my “workout” routine I somehow dilly dallied for two more months. Two months of muscle strength that I could really use right now. Basically at around months 7 or so my back started hurting and by month 8 it got quite bad. I have always had back problems so I was expecting it, but boy why did I not start doing my back exercises earlier? 

It just shows that not being depressed and more motivated than usual does not suddenly make me this super human but just a less depressed and more motivated lazy self. I have a wonderful physiotherapist that I sometimes see for relief but she is not free on a daily basis which is what my pain level dictates at the moment. I know I would have had back pain even with the extra two months work out but I simply feel like I could have done more and exercising while in pain is really not that fun. But I am happy to say that I have consistently done my exercises for a few months now! Semi success I call that.

Don’t wait until the last month to fix your place up

Unless you really have solid reasons, I recommend getting things ready before you are 9 months along. Why did I wait this long? Well maybe because impending parenthood is still very surreal to me and I’m still not even sure if there is a human in me or an Alien that will promptly beam itself into a space ship once it has exited my body.
Not only would I be semi screwed if it would come out now (the little monster came out a week after I wrote this article actually. The day after I finished fixing my apartment) since my place is a mess and I still need furniture, but my body is not happy with the level of activity I have right now. My pregnancy was quite wonderful and I didn't even feel pregnant until about 2 weeks ago. That is the exact moment I realized that it could come out any day now and I need to get going with the fixing.

Just before hitting 9 months my body decided to be really really pregnant without any warning. 
So now I have a lot of organising to do while feeling like a wobbly Totoro. I should have done it earlier, I really should have.

Me trying to turn around in the last few weeks

Don’t feel obligated to share the news

I am a very private person (even though it might not seem so here) and I didn’t really tell anyone I was pregnant until just now (now being 2 weeks before birth). In fact Johnny was the one who thought it was time to announce the pregnancy. And so was Mother. It took me 7 months to tell my best friend, so you see I am weird that way. Not that I am not happy to share, I mean I am super happy since this is one of the best things that has happened in a long time. But to me this is my pregnancy, my body and I neither want to share it nor let other people feel they have a right to it. 
So far the monster is not someones grand child, or niece, but my belly alien. 
Not even that. 
It isn't even my belly alien but I have a giant moving parasite inside of me that may or may not come out as a human (the humanity is yet to be confirmed). 

Or not human

Then things might possibly be different, maybe it won't be mine anymore but ours (so far it feels like Johnny and mine only). But for now it is not mine but ME. 
I am very happy to have finally announced it but I am just as happy to have kept it a secret until now. 

So this is not really one of my regrets but more one of Mother's. The lesson is, don't feel obligated to share the news with people who either don't care or would be negative about it.

It is a fact that not everyone cares about people being pregnant, that is not horrible, just normal, some people just don't, but that doesn't mean they should drag you down if they can't be at least decent enough to faint some sort of happiness for you. Or maybe I should rephrase that to: Why would you tell someone you know doesn't care just so they drag you down? Because you probably feel obligated to do so. Why? Society I assume. 
Then there is the people you know will likely react negatively to your pregnancy and all they would do is make you feel bad about something you are possibly very happy about. 
Who the heck are these negative not caring people you ask? Probably family members I assume. Well, Mother did not heed my advice when I told her that certain people who may or may not share my DNA should not be let in on the news for her own sake. But as usual (my Mother is an oversharing kind of person in general) she couldn't hold it in anymore and told the not-carers and the ones that reacted quite negatively. The outcome was that everyone felt bad, Mother, me and possibly also those haters. Now she admits it wasn't worth it at all and I realize that telling those kind of people is not something I would do in the future. 

Now I have this picture in my head of people that are supposed to care about me (because society dictates it) saying things like “Was it planned?”, or  “Why would they get a baby in the first place?” to “Are they even capable of raising it?”.  Not a pretty picture, don't do it to yourself my dear people. Spectrum bias can be quite harsh and strangely enough usually from people who are pretty clueless about it. The people that really know us and my ASD specialists/therapist are super happy for us and all say we will be great parents and that being on the spectrum actually could give us some advantages. And in the end isn't it all about love? 
Well I got plenty of that to throw around!

Random Pregnancy Observations

Boy I was so pregnant in the first few months! I felt like the most pregnant person in the world the moment the sperm hit the egg. I was waddling, my boobs felt all kinds of odd, I couldn't lay on my stomach and I was very nauseous. I was prepared to get a very pregnant pregnancy and be the most stereotypical pregnant woman ever. My family was commenting on how pregnant I was and that I already had a bump before I finished month 3. And then it all went away once I entered the second trimester. Quite strange to be honest. Suddenly I didn't feel pregnant at all anymore, not even when my belly started getting bigger and bigger and was not hideable. ( I was still hiding my pregnancy in real life when I was 6 months pregnant. I got a kick out of that!) 

As you can see I was very inconsistent with the pictures, even forgetting a few months

Then at the 8 and a half months mark the pregnancy hit me again. Between the back and the rib pain ( I don't know why this one took me by surprise), I also started to go to the bathroom quite often including during the night. Something I had avoided for most of the time. I am happy to announce that my body took only a few weeks to get used to the interrupted sleep pattern and I am now passing out right when hitting the mattress again. WOOOOO! 

The weirdest symptom I recently got is the way my body feels though. Internet told me that I would get loose joints (it has been telling me that I would get them by month 6) but when I got them I was not prepared for how odd that feeling is. I feel like a semi broken marionette. Or not very well made rag doll. It is the oddest feeling. Sometimes I think I will stand up, walk and just fall apart.

But the emotional side effects of pregnancy are still spared (and never came after all). Even those pesky nightmares. 

Pregnant women are suppose to have weird and very vivid strange dreams, often riddled with nightmares. The thing is that I always had very vivid and strange dreams so I have not seen a change in that. I have had some pregnancy/baby related ones but they were very rare. My dream to nightmare ratio hasn't changed either.

One thing I recommend though is that you might want to carefully select what kind of info you acquire when it comes to pregnancy, birth and parenthood. 

Being on the spectrum, I want to know every single detail so I can be prepared, but reading too much too fast was really hard on me. Pregnancy is the most human thing I have ever done. I have never felt this human and normal in my life. And it feels like birth and the weeks after might be some of the most humiliating experiences I will go through (yes and no. It was really not as bad as I feared). 
I have noticed that many people with ASD have troubles with regular human things, like digestion and such. They have troubles letting go of a certain amount of control, and letting other people take over for them. I am not a prude person but I don't like strangers, especially don't like being touched by them. Just the thought of strangers touching my private parts makes me feel like I have given up a piece of me and my dignity. Not a nice feeling. These are some of the emotions that went through my head while reading all of this new info. Not that I was scared of the pain (more intrigued really) but I was scared about being human, and giving up some of my dignity that carries me through life. I am simply not the kind of person that accepts this kind of stuff as normal because I am just human (or am I?).

I have never been like this. I quickly realised that I needed the info but only in little bits and pieces with lots of time to work through it in between. At this point I have not gotten any new info for over a month and I feel strangely chill about it all. I am positive that birth is going to be fine and that even if the weeks after are hard and I might not get an emotional connection with the creature, that it is also normal and it will come with time. (the birth was fine, the weeks after too. I even connected with the monster straight away). 





I think going to the hospital, asking lots of questions and making it clear to my midwife that since I am on the Spectrum, in order to have the most relaxed birth possible, having some requirements are sort of mandatory.  I feel super confident now and am not afraid at all anymore. Even though I am not of the hippy variety that thinks positivity fixes everything, I definitely believe that negativity is no good. And I worked hard to not have any in my surroundings. I am planning birth as best and vigorously as I would any other trip so I would feel the most comfortable possible. I want to know all the variations and situations that might ensue and my snack and goodies bag is bigger than expected (Internet said you won't need food during labour so I packed quite little. Big mistake. I was starving and needed much more food than what I had). But if it makes me feel better and more calm why not. Now I just hope I am not being completely naive about the whole situation (thankfully I wasn't).

I would love to hear some pregnancy/birth related experiences from my fellow Spectrum peeps.

How was it for you? Did you relate to the usual stuff you read and thought my experience was really foreign to you?

First I have to admit that I don’t really think that the subject of pregnancy (especially mine) is very interesting at all. I always wanted to have children but somehow the thought of actually having to be pregnant first never crossed my mind. Then I got pregnant and suddenly I wanted to know more about it and what mysterious changes might be waiting for me month to month.

So after reading a whole bunch of articles in the like of “Ten things I never knew before being pregnant”, or “Best and worst things about pregnancy” I realised that I can not relate to any of these tales of impending motherhood.

I then decided to research how pregnancy affects people on the Autism Spectrum and unfortunately could not find anything either.

That was of course the moment I knew I had to write this post. After all, how could I complain about the lack of info on pregnancy with ASD without sharing my own account for future searchers just like I was a few months ago.

So as a little background info. I am 9 months and one week while writing this (who knows how long it will take me to upload it of course) (update: Little monster was born a week after this was written. She is now 1 months old) and I waited this long because I am honestly still waiting for some of those pregnancy symptoms I am supposed to get (I didn't). But since my due date is imminent I wanted to at least get this down and if those symptoms still show up I can always edit this post (I did).

(Me being dorky at 9 months in the Karel Zeman Museum in Prague)

My point of view is basically this, I know I am a little odd and unique (people tell me all the time at least) and I am aware that since I am on the spectrum, neurotypical people and their life experiences are often a foreign concept to me. Yet, when I am told how things are or will be by a gazillion people my first thought is (though skeptical) “Well, that many people can’t be wrong, one never knows!”
So this is why I am sitting here today with a seemingly different pregnancy to the ones I have researched, yet am still prepared to get that typical pregnancy experience in the last few weeks everyone is talking about.

Don’t get me wrong though, I am still human!

That means that technically I have a lot of those wonderful and sometimes pesky pregnancy symptoms that one is suppose to have while trying to grow a tiny little alien creature inside ones belly.

Only that all those symptoms are physical. The ones that seem to have completely missed me are all those emotional types of changes and things that a soon to be raiser of bundles of poo is supposed to have. I guess the first one is easily noticeable already. I don’t really care for babies or find them cute, and being pregnant hasn’t changed that at all.

So here is a sort of coherent list of things that I have experienced that I think might be related to being on the spectrum and things that have missed me completely.

Everything baby Baby BABY!!!!

If you click on the pic there is an article I relate to quite a bit!

I feel like this is a pretty obvious symptom that most people know about. When someone is pregnant they get sensitive to scents and lots of things make them feel sick.

Funnily enough I have been told I am like a pregnant women for most of my life due to my scentsitivity. Now I know of course that besides having an acute scent detector, I also get sensory overload since I am on the spectrum. So this little side effect actually did not affect me at all. 

I noticed so little difference about how I felt about scents that it is really negligible to mention. 

I am generally a very cravy person but somehow the moment I was inseminated all my cravings poofed away. I had a hard three first months to be honest and was not able to eat, drink or live hardly at all. Luckily I didn’t vomit but the nausea got the best of me and left me in bed for most of the time. I always had a very sensitive stomach though and not eating well and regularly, affects me a little worse than most. So I was not surprised when this happened. 

After the first trimester the nausea disappeared ( it felt like it was never going to though) and food was back on the menu. Strangely, until now, those famous cravings never really came. Maybe it is because I was so cravy before that this was a piece of cake or maybe because I am not depressed anymore and my previous cravings were of psychological nature. (Monster's out and still not cravy!)

Here is an odd one that I never read about before, but from the moment of conception I wasn’t depressed anymore. Which is honestly an incredibly strange feeling since I had been depressed for the past 17 years. I admit that I had been doing a lot of work fighting depression the year before I got pregnant and with the help of a therapist I was doing some really good head work. 
Yet the depression disappeared the moment my breasts got sore and the nausea came over me. 

It is really strange to describe, but wow I did not remember at all how good it feels to be “normal”.

This made me realize that ASD is really not something I have issues with but depression and anxiety is what really messed with me and my life. 
Now that I know how much easier things can be when I am just being me sans depression, and how much self hatred and self doubt can take a toll on you, I am determined to not let this happen to me again. 
I am aware that when my hormones dissipate again that my depression could very well come back. (Luckily my hormones are still keeping me depression free and I didn't even get the baby blues!)
But now that I know how it feels without it I will fight tooth and nails to get rid of it as fast as possible.

So for all those peeps that have been depressed so long they can’t remember what it is like without it anymore, don't give up hope. Keep fighting and one day you will beat this sucker! 

I know it is easy to say, since it kind of magically happened to me, but one does not have to get pregnant for it (especially since you are more likely to get more depressed instead), yet can be achieved all on its own. And as I had mentioned I was really close to getting there myself before all of this, and honestly some life circumstances means that this depressionless state might have also come from changes and fulfillment of wishes instead of being 100% hormonal. I shall have to analyse this subject in the future though to be able to come to some better conclusions.

I also have high hopes that my birth will be chill thanks to pregnancy brain and that it will make the first few weeks after easier to handle.

Nesting aka putting a label on completely normal behaviour

So pregnant women are supposed to get this nesting instinct. Not sure really what that means but from what I have seen on media it does not apply to me. At the same time people say I am nesting. 
I mean yeah I am deep cleaning the house (something we started before conception yet never finished), I am organising my place (have you seen this mess? We have been fighting our depressions for years to be a little neater), getting rid of stuff I don't want (my to sell piles have been steadily growing for two years, selling them with a newborn won’t be a priority), as well as both making more space while buying more stuff (new human in the house needs both space and stuff). So my conclusion is, why call it nesting when it is simply common sense to prepare your place for a new roomie? 
Is Johnny Clyde also nesting? Was I nesting when I started my to sell pile two years ago or decided to deep clean because our place is a mess? Not sure. 
Maybe I just don’t understand the concept of actual nesting or maybe it is a bogus word that they throw around. You tell me…

Fetal movements are the best thing EVAH!

I have to admit that before I felt the little parasite move I was incredibly eager to feel it. 
After all, this is my first child to be and everything is new and exciting. I tried to pay very close attention to my body and googled for days how the first movements feel. In the end everyone had a different description so here is how the very first movements felt to me. 
Twitches. 
You know when sometimes random body parts start twitching, like your eye or other random bits. That is exactly how it felt to me. Sometimes it was just one twitch and sometimes it was several in a row.

That time was pretty neat! I was so excited every time it happened and couldn’t wait to let Johnny feel it, since he was on a month long work trip (we made a feature film actually!) at the exact time the little monster decided to make itself noticeable to the outside. 

But then it didn't stop anymore. And the movements became hard, so hard that by month 6 it was kicking my laptop off my belly. 

Yep, it felt like having a bear rave in my belly!

Now I don’t know how normal that is, but to me it felt like an incredibly active and strong creature, and I started to believe Johnny's promise from last year that he will put a demon in me. 
So ok, I admit it here and now, it kind of bothers me and people do not seem to understand that at all. 
I am saying this because there might be someone else being totally over that belly ruckus, feeling bad about it. The few people I told that I am not super happy with all these movements, reacted in a way that made me feel that they thought I was being crazy, and the movements are the best thing ever. 
So don’t let yourself get guilt tripped if you do feel this way. In the end, I am happy about the activity since it means the creature is strong and healthy and it is comforting knowing 24/7 that all is well, but this is still my body after all. I don't need someone kicking me in the ribs for months on end or forcing me to the bathroom because they think my bladder is a football. And honestly sometimes it is plain scary. At 6,5 months Johnny thought I was in labour because I exclaimed “Oh god, it's trying to come out” at a particularly weird and active kicking moment. Little demon simply liked to sometimes eel dance horizontally so strongly that it really felt like it was trying to bust out my belly right there and then. 



Besides feeling uncomfortable, that is really freaky and something I can do without. Also internet said that in the last few months it won't move as much as it has less room, but this little thing makes room for that!

Crankiness and mood swings galore

Not sure if this is an actually occurring symptom or simply a stereotype. But besides the usual sensory overload crankiness (which has actually diminished in the past months) I have had no mood swings or other irrational and strange new behaviours. I do have to say that I got a new and improved no-nonsense attitude though. It had been brewing before the pregnancy but since I was a depressed self-hating, self-doubting mess it was quite hard to implement. I always imagined myself to be a no-nonsense mom so that together with that new found insight, I was not surprised I was finally able to implement it better. How this manifests is that I am faster to say no to things or walk away in a negative situation. Before hand I was very patient and just tolerated most things since I don't want to hurt anyone. But if you are only negative to me and my life, I now see no point in going through that for no reason (besides being nice but is that really enough?). I guess the maternal protection instinct kicked in there too, since I really don’t want negativity in my future monsters life either.

Chillest of the Chill

Dem hormones I tell you! I have always been a calm person, but inside I am usually a hot mess. 
I worry too much and I stress a lot as well. I get anxious so easily that I banned myself from thinking 6 months ahead into the future because I would get too wrapped up to even realise what is happening around me. Now I am as chill on the inside as I am on the outside. Instead of stressing out how bad of a parent I might be and that I might drop the little demon on the first day and scar it for life, all I can think of is that babies have been raised by clumsier people than me and lived, so all is well. 
It is honestly astonishing the things I can brush off at the moment. 
It makes me quite happy since I expected to be a huge mess while being pregnant, plagued by horrible thoughts and worries day and night. That the opposite happened was a lovely surprise.

I am so chill that it swaps over to the people around me which made for a mostly calm and stress free pregnancy. All I could wish for really.

Even though I would have no issues with a tiny demon

And then there was the pesky pulse

I read that pregnant women not only have more blood but also a stronger heart rate. That is dandy and all, until I started feeling and then hearing my own pulse. It's funny since I asked a few people (doctors and midwife) if what I was feeling was my pulse and most responses were that humans can’t feel their own pulse. It is indeed a weird answer since I can very well feel my pulse if I touch my wrist or neck. Any who, the new feeling was in my belly area. I could feel it on the left and right and it felt odd. The bad bit was when I tried to sleep though. I could hear my pulse and it was very distracting to be honest. Swish, swish, swish, it went while I was trying to listen to my audiobook at night. Sometimes a position change would make it less audible but mostly it just got louder the quieter the room became. 

My midwife told me that I must be quite sensitive since I notice so many subtle changes during my pregnancy. Well, yeah I am. 
I am on the spectrum after all, and noticing subtle changes is my thang. 

This is it for part I. In the next part I will talk a little about Pregnancy Regrets and Random Thoughts. So stay tuned!

If you have any thoughts on stereotypical or completely unexpected pregnancy symptoms let me know!

 I lived my whole entire life thinking I was ‘normal’ (whatever that means).

I knew that for myself, I was odd. I never identified with anyone, I never felt that anyone ever felt or thought the way that I did, but I was convinced that I appeared completely normal and regular to everyone else. I’ve always been called weird, which never bothered me, but when people call each other weird because they don’t like their sauce, the word ends up not meaning anything to me. 

So I was weird, like everyone else. I didn’t know they meant I was actually weird, as in different than they were. So until I was 22 I lived my life like this. I didn’t know why I cried at movies at different parts than everyone else, (I watched the beginning of Up like a statue, unfazed, but when they’re sitting on the curb at the end counting cars….I lost it) I didn’t know why it took me months to be able to speak to people like they’re humans (I went into every new school and job knowing that I wasn’t going to be able to talk to anyone until at least 2 months, and probably another 6 months until I feel comfortable enough to talk about myself) and I especially didn’t know why I just could not relate to a single soul. Literally no one around me felt the same way I did about things, because I’d ask them and they’d laugh and say it’s weird. I’d ask them “you know how everyone loves pretty images, like trees in moonlight and such..but do you ever look at a tree branch in the moonlight and your stomach almost starts to hurt like your body is trying to remember something important that could change your entire existence and you don’t know what it is but you feel like crying, like there’s an entire life you’ve left behind that you just can’t remember just because this branch and this wind and this moon all met in this one specific part of your vision like the is is the universes language and we just can’t understand it yet?” And it’s not a joke, I am completely serious, but I laugh along because I am embarrassed by their reaction. 

I’ve been going to therapy for the first time in my life this past year and have been diagnosed with mental illnesses which completely caught me off guard. You live your whole life thinking you’re normal, then doctors tell you you’ve got social phobias, depression, PTSD, and Aspergers (possibly more to come, time will tell ;D ) Whew, that’s really hard to admit even still. 

I denied it at first. 

There was no way. 

I was like everyone else, it’s just my way of thinking is different, but it turns out I’m not the same. 

I was embarrassed. I thought I must be stupid, because in America we’re taught that neurodiversity (mental illness) means you’re stupid. It means something is WRONG with you. 

Something that needs to be corrected. 

But besides that, I was embarrassed for another reason, and that’s you’re fault.

My whole life I’ve been living with these things without knowing it, but I’ve been soaking in all your jokes and insults along the way. Your jokes about mental illnesses. Your jokes about killing yourself because you lost a match in your game, your jokes about how autism is a polite word for retarded (I hate that word), all these jokes hit me all at once the second I was diagnosed. 

So thanks a lot for making me embarrassed to be who I am and who I can’t help to be. 

I didn’t get the jokes then and I certainly don’t get them now.  

So it took me a really long time to get over that, and I accepted it. 

I accepted myself again. 

I realized that all my weirdness and the way I look at the world and my artistic ideas and my personality are all me, not my neurodiversity. The only reason I think the way I do is because of me. All of my thoughts are mine, not my neurodiversity.

However, mental illnesses effect people in different ways and that needs to be respected. 

Just because my depression doesn’t cause me to want to jump out of the window (I think this has more to do with my immense fear of death, though) doesn’t mean people aren’t constantly having thoughts of suicide with their depression. 

Side note: Stop comparing mental illnesses. 

Your depression will never mean more to me than it does to you, as mine will never mean more to you than it does to me. There’s no reason to compare, I see it happening a lot and it’s very sad. I think the most respect you can give someone is simply taking them serious. Don’t be an asshole and laugh at the 13 yr old girl posting pics of herself crying because you think she wants attention. 

So now that I’ve admitted it, if I do indeed post this, I want to sometimes talk about my experiences and bust some myths and such. So this time I want to talk a bit about having Aspergers. 

So, I have Aspergers and it’s not funny or fun, really. 

First I want to say that people with Aspergers are not all the same. 

So I am only speaking for me here. 

There’s a lot of things that I simply can’t do because of Aspergers. A lot of people are shy or introverted, but for me it’s extreme. Where sometimes you might be able to coax a shy person into singing karaoke, I’m likely waiting at the park next to the bar because I can’t handle being inside.

 It’s not just the social anxiety, it’s the noises. I hear in 2D whereas most people hear in 3D. 

This means that basically all noises hit me at the same time around the same level, so a car driving by outside is as loud or sometimes louder than your voice. I can hear the fridge buzzing constantly and a fly on the wall distracts me from what’s being said on TV. It’s not that I can hear better than you, I just can’t control it like you.  

With 3D hearing you’re able to separate the sounds and actually tell where they are coming from and kind of control the volume. So already bars are a nightmare for me. The music is loud, the people are loud, clanking glasses, spinning fans, forks knives plates, shouting, the tv, chairs scooting, all of this going on at once for me and I’m supposed to try and listen to what you’re saying so that you don’t think I’m a freak with bug eyes in my own little world. It’s not hard, it’s impossible. It is actually impossible. I do try, and I enjoy myself when I’m able to do it, go into social places and have fun. Play pool or whatever, after a while I am able to relax. 

But you probably have no idea what it’s like to buy tickets to your favorite musician who you’ve been idolizing for years and when you go to stand in line to get inside you feel like you’re going to puke because you’re already surrounded by the people you’re about to be enclosed with in a small room with super loud music and everyone is dancing (dancing is very strange to me) and it gets to be too much and sometimes you leave the line. You don’t get to see your favorite musician, you waste your money and your time and you feel like an idiot. This stuff happens to me all the time. 

I’ve never really had friends, I was that kid in school that everyone liked and you’d high five me in the hallways but we’d never talk or hang out. I had a few friends that I’d occasionally drift in and out of friendship with and that was nice, I appreciate that they accepted that I wasn’t a reliable friend. I’d stop talking to everyone in that circle for a year or more and then just pop up again. 

I can’t help it. 

It makes me never able to keep friends and I hate it. 

I’m lonely, always have been and probably always will be. I try so hard to keep relationships going but I just can’t. I can’t always bring myself to go to social events so I stop getting invited, and then I’m not in the circle anymore. 

Constantly alone and I hate it. 

I remember this one example, I was invited to one of my only friends wedding, I was asked to write a song for them to walk down the aisle for. I was extremely nervous but so incredibly honored that I was actually able to overcome myself for the wedding. I arrived early, set up my guitar to perform, and just sat in this chair the whole time. I didn’t walk around or talk to anyone, just this awkward guy wearing a suit 2 times too big just sitting there. People came up and talked to me and I couldn’t look at them, felt so stupid. So the time comes and I play the song and I sit in that same chair for the remainder of the ceremony, the second the “kiss the bride” stuff is over I was gone. Everyone lined up for food and I grabbed my guitar and held it in front of my like a shield as I fled down the stairs, not even able to talk to my friend and congratulate him. I fled to the park and sat on the bench for two hours because I was too embarrassed to show my mom that I didn’t stay for the after wedding stuff. That isn’t funny. 

 It isn’t all bad, though! Aspergers. 

I am able to solve complex things easily. A lot of people think inside of the box, some people think outside of the box, and I’m kind of off in the ethereal not knowing the box exists. 

Which is nice, I think. 

For me. 

It allows me to not be constrained with the obvious answers. Sometimes it inhabits my common sense, though. I do admit. (Ok, often. Ok…daily.) If I drop a glass my first instinct might be to go to the store, buy a bunch of duct tape, come back and cover the whole floor with strips of duct tape, then peel it off along with the shards. When the obvious thing would be to sweep or vacuum. I am able to recognize patterns extremely easy. I can kind of turn it off and on, so if I watch a movie I can turn it on and predict the entire movie, not just the ending but everything in between. (to the amusement of my fellow viewers) depending on the movie of course, just based off of movies of the same genre or the style of the writing so far with like a 90% accuracy. I don’t like to do it because I don’t enjoy the film anymore, but I am able to. Which can be put to good use sometimes ;D 

I also have a super unbiased look on the world, which is extremely nice. It’s difficult to explain, but people with Aspergers tend to be incredibly non judgemental people. This goes from viewing a women’s opinions the same as a mans (society seems to have a very hard time with this) to speaking to a child or baby as if they’re an adult. Which can get confusing, obviously. The best way I describe this to the few people I’ve told is that if there is like a 3 yr. child in the same room as me, I’m going to be incredibly shy. I’m not going to be able to look at this kid in their eyes, or talk to them. Even though I know they don’t even have a developed memory yet. I’ll have the same reaction as if they were 30, not 3. Eventually I might warm up a tiny bit, and I’ll have a conversation with them. I’ll talk about the planets not as if they’re an exciting art project but as I really see them even though the conversation very well could be over the childs comprehension. Baby talk doesn’t exist for me. 

A comparison I like to make is if you take a neurotypical person and sit them at a table in a Psychiatric hospital, they’re going to talk to everyone as if they’re a child. “Oh I see you’ve got crayons there, do you like to draw then? Why don’t you draw me something.” 

It doesn’t make you a horrible person, but it’s automatic. You automatically think of yourself as better than they are, or if not better, higher. Like a different level. I don’t. I will sit at that table and have the exact same conversations I’d have with you. (whoever ‘you’ may be) 

I’m obsessive as well. Which so far has only been mostly positive for me. Luckily I’m obsessive about art. So about 5 months ago I decided it was time I learn to animate. I sat down for about 14 hours each day for three days and taught myself how to animate. The thing is, I didn’t even realize it. I didn’t even think about it, it just happened. I learned one thing, experimented for a few hours, moved onto another idea, and it just branches out like that. It doesn’t stop, and so by the end of it I just kinda stood back and said “huh! I know how to animate now!” 

That’s very useful for me. It allows me to work like a madman, I generally work on my art around 13 hours a day when I’ve got something to work on and I don’t even realize it. I don’t eat when I should or sleep when I should or take breaks at all, which is something I’m trying to work on. 

Ok I wrote too much. Which is another thing, I don’t know when to stop. If I find something interesting, I’ll just talk and talk and talk so I’m going to stop for now. I sincerely hope that someone out there finds this useful, and I want to tell you that people are incredibly stupid and ignorant and whatever or whoever you are, you’re amazing. Even if you have to spend some time wondering how you can possibly be amazing with all your flaws, I promise you that you are indeed amazing. Especially if you read all of this ;D

I’ll try to bring myself to write more, you can follow me here if you’d like

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