Just using Asperger's was definitely oversimplifying things. Many of the issues she has are things that a typical person with Asperger's Syndrome would have adapted to by the time they were a young adult. Having something like ADHD on top of that, however, would definitely be more like she is. Though the bits during the beginning in the cafe weren't totally inaccurate either. Autistic people tend to get overwhelmed with sensory stimuli but that typically doesn't mean they're less attentive to things that are going on that's directed at them. That part in particular would be far more likely to be ADHD magnifying the sensory overload issue.
shadesofgreymoon posted:
Most people with Asperger's have a difficult time understanding what is and isn't proper behavior. It's sort of a key point of it. While most women with it learn early on how to mask their own "different" behavior by imitating what they see around them, that is only mimicry without a deeper understanding of the motivations and social constructs.
Girls with Asperger's are actually a lot more difficult to even diagnose in the first place because they tend to adapt a lot earlier than boys do. My highschool had a homeroom class that specialized in dealing with autistic students, the overwhelming majority of whom had Asperger's rather than another autism spectrum disorder, and in my 4-1/2 years there (when I first transferred in, it was a more general alternative school for the district so there were a fair few middle schoolers), the class only had a grand total of two female students to a whopping 30-40 male students.
I remember when I was in school I was always confused about how people acted. When I was in elementary and middle school I would sit and just watch people, and literally take notes to try and at least solve the mystery enough that I could "fake it till I make it". Now I'm super good at mimicry and I can blend in with just about any crowd, at least in a more cursory sense, but deeper relationships tend to escape me. It's just how I am, and it won't ever change.
I did this myself too. Though I still find it extremely exhausting to deal with regardless. It's why I was considered the role model for the other students in the autistic class the entirety of my time in highschool and was the first one put on the integrated track taking more classes with the rest of the school's more normal students. (More normal being subjective though since it was an alternative highschool for the district for a reason, lol.)
last edited at Nov 16, 2019 1:16PM