For whatever reason, I've always felt like I'm inherently faulty. Not necessarily like I'm not good enough, just like I'm not quite right.
This literally goes back as far as I can remember. I don't know if it's because I've always had a health issue, because my oldest sister used to read me Edgar Allen Poe as bedtime stories (which had more positive effects than you might think, but still explains a hella lot), because I was so much younger than my siblings I was practically another generation and, therefore, the odd-man-out, or what. I just never felt totally at peace with the world around me. With my immediate family, sure growing up, sure. With my immediate family now, sure.
But for years, I just felt ... off. Like I had a latent defect, something just under the surface, like there was one thread if someone caught just right, would unravel my entire being and expose me as a fraud.
Kindergarten was hell. At home I did just fine, I could read, I didn't need to nap, I (felt like, anyway) I could effectively converse with all the adults and near-adults around me. But kindergarten was another story. Suddenly I'm surrounded by ... kids ... and I have no idea what to do with them. I made a few friends after a while, and friends I still treasure to this day, but it was hard. I always felt like I was struggling to say what I was expected to say, and not what I wanted to. Well, after I learned to not always say what I wanted to anyway, because that proved real quick to be very offputting to other kids and teachers alike. I shaped up fast. But I still remember being very annoyed in kindergarten that I had to learn how to color, how to paint, how to write my name (I knew all this already, I'm booooooooooored!), and being annoyed at mandated napping. (What? I don't nap. I have no need for such things. Gah!)
I was not athletic or coordinated in the slightest. Which was okay. I had far more fun sorting patterns in my own head than I did running down a field. Sweating felt yucky. I had far more fun playing games with myself like, find a word with all the vowels or words that had letter patterns not ready apparent to others. Like ace! Ace was composed of every other of the first five letters of the alphabet! Not only that, but if you numbered the alphabet, those letters also match up with the first three odd numbers!
Yeah. I'm a dork.
Eventually, though, like I said, I learned to keep this $hit to myself and socialize like a good girl. I learned how to be a people pleaser. Didn't mean I stopped doing this stuff in my head, I just tried a little harder to keep it there. I learned funny, though. If I could pop off with something funny, people would like me, and probably still think I was strange, but in a better way. I would say there were quite a few years, though, where if I didn't say something funny, I just tried hard not to say much at all.
Ah, life lessons in grade school, eh?
This carried through for quite a bit of my life. The games in my head, drawing patterns, sorting my M&M's by color and number of pieces (dark brown was usually the most abundant, and would be the bottom of the chocolate pyramid). And when I focus - holy hot damn, I can focus!!!
Although I have to admit generally, I have a horrific time doing just one thing at a time. I fidget. I glance around the room. I can keep eye contact just fine, but sometimes, if I'm not doing something else as a distraction, I'll start to feel very weird, I'll focus in what feels like too intently on that person's eye, and I'll begin to make myself uncomfortable, and wonder if I'm making him/her uncomfortable, and then I'll fidget more, and I have to wind things up shortly after that, if I can.
There are a few people in my life, outside my immediately family, I've latched onto immediately. And at this point in my life, the folks I grew up with - it's kind of effortless. I can be charming, witty, well-read, etc. Sometimes I can go too far and just be so weirdly pop culture excessive I've alienated my audience, though. I'll never get over the day I brought mashed potatoes to a pot luck, could only find a platter to put them on, so shaped them like a big mountain and walked into the buffet room staring intently at the plate and saying, "This means something." I was so disheartened when no one understood the Close Encounters reference, I just kind of slunk into my chair for a bit.
So, where am I going with this series of vignettes?
As it turns out, our son's been diagnosed with Asperger's. It's on the low end of the autism spectrum, and can make incredibly smart people with difficulty in social interaction. As the psychiatrist is going through all of the information with us, I'm sitting there fidgeting, glancing around the room, sorting things through in my head. A few minutes into the meeting, the psychiatrist pegs my husband as a potential Aspie. Not a shock to either of us. As we're going through further, though, she points out some of my behaviors also. It caught me off guard, but John thinks it actually makes total and complete sense.
And when I think about my history, I suppose it does. I don't think I ever remember feeling anything but awkward. But it's not a bad thing.
At least, now that I have perspective through my son. To me, the boy is perfect. Okay, so he refuses to potty train and he can be a little shit at daycare if he doesn't get his way. But at home, he's so huggy, and loving, and snuggly. He speaks with these wonderful, adorable, very articulate and deliberate sentences. He's amazingly smart. He hums classical music to himself when he plays. He's so mellow and easy-going, I nicknamed him "The Dude." And boy, that boy really pulls the family together.
So if that's Aspie, and if I'm Aspie, then it's not a latent defect. It's far more beautiful than I ever realized.
