Life with Aspergers

Apologies for this not being the usual discussion post - it's some computer instructions for parents instead. I had to provide these instructions for my cousin so I decided to make them available to everyone. If your child is having difficulty with their writing, you can provide a lot of cheap custom material to help them by downloading the FREE National First Dotted Font from CoolFonts. Procedure (for Windows XP - Similar for other versions of Windows) PART 1: INSTALLING THE FONT Download the Font from http://www.coolfonts.info/font-3338-national_first_font_dotted.php Copy the font file somewhere onto your PC eg: C:\TEMP Click START, CONTROL PANEL Then double-click FONTS if you can't see fonts, then Control Panel is probably in Category view - in which case... Click SWITCH TO CLASSIC VIEW and then double-click FONTS From the menu, select File, then Install New Font . Change the Drive Letter to where you saved the font (eg: C:) Change the folder if necessary to where you saved...

Comorbid conditions are "extra problems" that go hand in hand with Aspergers. There is still a bit of debate over whether these conditions exist separately or whether they are actually just facets or side-effects of Aspergers. Personally, I tend to favor the latter explanation for the most part although I'd agree that some of the stronger comorbids probably are stand-alone. Comorbids can include a host of mental, adaptive and emotive disorders such as Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), Schizophrenia, Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD and ADD), Depression, Anxiety, aggression, Learning disabilities and several other disorders, phobias and conditions. Some comorbid conditions don't show themselves until adulthood and every aspie has a different combination of comorbid conditions various strengths. This is a problem which makes Aspergers difficult to diagnose. Often, one or more of the comorbid conditions is more noticeable than the others and will be pic...

I've just completed this quiz and figured I'd share my results. I don't know how scientific it is though, so take it with a pinch of salt. Personality Disorder Quiz created with QuizFarm.com You scored as Schizotypal. Many believe that schizotypal personality disorder represents mild schizophrenia. The disorder is characterized by odd forms of thinking and perceiving, and individuals with this disorder often seek isolation from others. They sometimes believe to have extra sensory ability or that unrelated events relate to them in some important way. They generally engage in eccentric behavior and have difficulty concentrating for long periods of time. Their speech is often over elaborate and difficult to follow. Schizotypal. 100% Obsessive-Compulsive 95% Schizoid 70% Borderline 65% Antisocial 65% Dependant 60% Avoidant 55% Narcissistic 30% Histronic 30% Paranoid 30% ...

Aspies are often described as unfriendly, yet we (reportedly) have the unique ability to be friendly with everyone regardless of physical characteristics such as age or color. So why are we perceived as being so unfriendly? The Early Morning Aspie-Initiated Hello In the morning as I stroll through my office to get a cup of coffee, there are always a lot of people with their heads down doing work, looking for things or otherwise engaged in activities. Interrupting them to say "Good Morning" makes no sense to me. In any case, how do I know if it's good? and don't they already know that it's morning? Usually, I'll truncate my "sayings" to Hello, or Morning, and even then, I'll say it very quietly. I just don't get it you see. Half of the people in my office will ask me a work-related question at some point during the day and I'll often greet them with a "hello" then. The other half usually don't ask for help and can probab...

A few weeks ago, I had an amazing figure of 85% unemployment for aspies left on my blog in comments. I disagreed and decided to put it to the test. I did a fairly unstructured and not necessarily reliable survey and came up with the following figures; Survey Results Of the 90 respondents, 48% were employed in either full-time or part time positions and a further 26% were studying. The remaining 26% was split into 2% housewives/househusbands, 13% not looking for a job and 11% unemployment. The 11% figure is probably slightly higher than global unemployment figures but isn't significantly higher. In the graph below, the red areas indicates unemployment, blue indicates employment and green indicates study/school. It seems obvious to me that the Aspergers condition alone is not sufficient to prevent an individual from obtaining and keeping a job. What Types of Jobs can Aspies do? Probably the best thing that an aspie can do is to find work that is either related to their special inte...

Parents of children on the spectrum are often very concerned that their child has "no friends" or very few friends. This post is about how we make friends and how they play   The Right Kind of Friends Kids on the spectrum tend to stick to only a few really close friends. They may have lots of acquaintances (and they may feel like they're all "friends") but in reality only a small number are real friends. When it comes to spectrum friendships, like tends to attract like and you might be surprised when your child finds a friend that shows autistic traits, learning difficulties, co-conditions such as ADHD or traits such as anxiety. It's not that all kids have these differences, just that your child will seek out others who can best relate to them.  Image by Frank Winkler from Pixabay Of course, not all friends need to be neurologically similar to share characteristics. A good example of this would be children with "English as a second language". Th...