I have Asperger’s Syndrome as well. To be honest, I’m proud of it and I’m glad I’m not the only one on these forums to have it. I do have problems concentrating and listening in class, but I’m good at subjects like Art, I.C.T and Science. I can be good in other subjects too if I try.
Oh my gosh!! I don’t want to offend you, LaD, but that’s awesome!! If you have it, we could talk so much!!
Geoff: I’m excellent at art, English, and Biology. However, I can’t read music(and I’m a band nerd 
), and I can’t do even simple math. My Pediatrician says I have an IQ that is way above average, but I don’t think IQ tests are accurate, so I’ll never know.
Oh, it’s incredible the number of members that have that kind of symptoms here. And I’m glad that you all talk openly about it! You’re very brave.
I feel some sort of identification with you guys, cause I know how it feels to be different from the majority of people. Mine isn’t a medical condition, though, just plain weirdness 
Ah, Aspergers.
Diagnosed at the age of 4 with it, I was isolated from the rest of my classmates for the entire elementary school. Before the age of 6 I needed ESL, and before the age of 10 I needed a tutor. In grade 4 my most favorite teacher introduced me to classical history, ironically, during a class about the Middle ages. I was to play the role of Augustulus, the last emperor of Rome. It seemed that I was a late bloomer. Still, I never had any friends until Middle school.
Was tested twice for the gifted program, managed 96 percentile in the first one and 88 in the second. Unfortunate medical complications had stopped me from going into the gifted program. Had a favoritist teacher who just happened to hate me in Grade 5 and 6 and succeeded in singlehandedly destroying my drawing skills. I never drew another shaded picture again.
Struggled with depression in Grade 7 and 8 as my parents separated, pressure mounted, and my social life expanded beyond my control. Managed to break free from it in Grade 9 when my parents got back together. Began a new rapid interest in history, writing, and science, increasing my knowledge around tenfold. Dealt with death threats in Grade 10 and 11 from various people. In Grade 11 I managed to get a scholarship to the University of Toronto. Still, my social life lagged behind me.
Honestly, I’ve really never had a problem with not having too many friends in high school. The fact of the matter is that many of these people will only be vaguely remembered by you in later years and sometimes they’re just plain trouble. I managed to evolve a superiority complex, actually, in Grade 9 and 10 trying to reassure myself. Grew out of it in Grade 11 but still generally avoid people, if only because I don’t like most people. I find that I can easily keep up multiple groups of friends which don’t interact with each other.
The way this worked is that each of my groups of friends witnessed a different aspect of my personality. This allowed me, as long as they didn’t meet up, to assume that each aspect of myself was the ‘real’ way I acted and I could more easily express myself.
Really, Aspergers has helped me as much as it has retarded growth. In all honesty I don’t think it was ever much of a problem and I only truly realized I had it in grade 8. It allowed a different perspective of the world for me and allowed unparalleled memory capabilities as well as intense focus.
I share your pain…
Since we got to the hard part of the ‘special’ thing, it seems i have a godly gift for the drums, ever since I was young i would always learn how to master the banging repitition of a drumset, and using FL Studio, i realized i was gifted in all aspects of the drums, whether i was using a drum machine or using electric drums or actually playing a full drumset. I’ve made some wicked sick drum beats, some that I had thought up originally that came from other bands way before I came up with that drum beat. But i’ve been able to work around some new different patterns and rhythms in such a awesome way!
I’m academically gifted, i’m too academically gifted, and I’m a grinder, one who tends to get work done as quickly as possible, as effectively as possible. My literature, my novels, my photography and my music all show how fast i can work without interruption.
A question out of curiosity. How is Aspergers diagnosed?
Generally by a trained Psychologist and/or Psychiatrist. No, the wikipedia article on ‘symptoms of Aspergers’ is not a valid diagnosing tool.
Oh, no, I wasn’t implying that.
No, I didn’t think you implied it. I just find that people use wikipedia as a source for diagnosing mental illnesses. Which is bad.
Oh, of course.
But I read in here that someone didn’t get the diagnosis cause it’s expensive, so I thought it was something too complex.
I actually have find it strange that we are using a euphemism to describe what is essentially a mental condition.
Please bear in mind that I am not discriminating against people with mental disorders. One of my closest friends is a girl with cerebral palsy, and I fully empathise with such people. I myself used to have OCD during my teens (and to a mild extent, I still do).
But the use of ‘special’ to describe mentally-disabled people is as patronising as saying ‘vertically-challenged’ for short people, or ‘big-boned’ for fat people, or ‘African-American’ for Black people or ‘hearing-impaired’ for deaf people.
It is positive-discrimination in a sense. We shouldn’t be using fancy words to make people feel good about themselves if we want to treat everyone equally. We can be honest and forthright in our descriptions without being insulting.
If someone takes offense at calling an apple an apple instead of ‘a delicious sweet red fruit’, they are probably being too sensitive.
Well, “special” has been a long used term for it. There are even “special” schools.
I don’t think its meant in the sense of IV’s “superpowers”, but about “special necessities”. As you said, it’s positive discrimination, and it’s important that it exists, as not everyone can be treated equally.
Agreed, I forgot to realise that people with disabilities need to be treated differently because they have different needs (ramps, hearing aids, slower pace of teaching, etc.).
I suppose what I’m arguing for is a change in semantics or language use. I understand that ‘special’ has long been used in contemporary culture and is a shorthand for ‘special needs’, which is a perfectly ordinary phrase.
But it just comes off as patronising to me when it is used in the context of this thread title, like who here is ‘speh-shul’?
Maybe if it was written as “Who here has Special Needs?”, it would come off as less pretentious. I understand that saying ‘disabled’ or ‘impaired’ or ‘retarded’ can be putting it in a very pessimistic sense.
My birth country Malaysia, for example, has a governing body called ‘The Spastic Children Association of Penang’. It’s near my grandparents’ place, and when my siblings and I were young and innocent kids we would always laugh when we drove past the school and its huge signboard with the wheelchair figure and the word ‘Spastik’ in Malay.
Of course, now that I’m older, I realise it’s not something to be laughed about, but to be appreciated as part of the diverse human condition. It has now since been rebranded as ‘The Cerebral Palsy (Spastic) Children Association of Penang’, but if you ask me, I always preferred it’s more honest and less-Politically Correct name.
It’s calling an apple an apple. And that’s nothing to be ashamed about.
Who here’s Awesome?
Well, with all this debating about the thread’s title, I noticed there’s a typo. There’s one apostrophe that shouldn’t be there.
I didn’t realize that another of my titles was offensive. I’ll fix this one too…
How about gifted? But thinking about that, it seems too sacrilegious…
Technically, I have a little bit of a visual disability if being near-sighted counts.
This thread was intended to be about people with Autism, Retardation and related mental disorders, but appearently that is “offensive”, so now my thread is about whatever us wrong with anybody. Great. 
Don’t take it that way, IV.
I don’t think TDIT meant it was offensive, he was probably just discussing semantics 