Do I have ADHD and Asperger's? Or just ADHD? (long post, hope you like to read)

[fracturedstory]

Originally Posted by Geno

How often do you think in words? Almost never? Rarely?

My mind is very visual at times, I'll oftentimes imagine my future(or sometimes past) as if it were a movie in my head, playing scenes more dramatically or doing things I'd never actually do, played in a way that makes me look like the hero every time. If I was thinking about the past I'd think about what it would have been like if the situation went perfectly(not in a depressive, ruminating way), if I'm thinking about the future I'll imagine it going perfectly. I'll also sometimes imagine myself in a completely ridiculous situation that'd never happen even in a perfect world. Thank God for being able to do that, the above was what I did in school to fight off the urges to jump out a window and run anywhere else but there.

I'm not sure if anyone could do the above or if it's "abnormal". People always say I'm great at painting out scenes and pictures with words.

I think in words with sounds, voices to be more precise. I have an uncanny ability to remember a person's accent exactly as I heard it in my mind, which is why when I read or write I can sometimes hear the voice of Stephen Fry. Not just him though. The first chapter of my book was written in a Colin Baker dialect. It's a bit annoying at times. I want the whole text of the book to flow together.

I don't normally see words written in my mind like someone with AS was explaining to me one time. The most I do is see a word with colours going through it. The colours my mind sees when it think of a word.

Like (yellow) for (shades of green) example (yellow/orange/brown).

I'm an action hero in my mind. Sometimes I think about things going the worst possible way so that it couldn't happen in real life. OK, that doesn't always work out. One of these actually turned out just like I saw in my mind, with less blood.
Being visual does help being a writer and artist, except you want a perfect replication of what you saw in your mind. I actually had to learn to write like a verbal thinker because I just couldn't write down the detail because I thought everyone could see what I saw. I still think they can hear the voices I hear when they read one of my blogs or a chapter I've been working on.
My only way of falling asleep at night is to see a story in my mind. The more repetitive the better.

[fracturedstory]

Originally Posted by Assumption

Hmmmmmmm. As you know, I've been thinking about myself a lot lately (along the same lines as Geno). I think I'm probably not AS/-pergers, just BAP, but still. I just noticed that I was feeling the textures on the end of the tv remote with my lips 30 minutes while watching the Sopranos (I don't know why I watch that show, I never have any idea what's going on! It's probably just the accents but I can never follow gangster movies/tv shows).

What is the meaning of the social reciprocity criterion? I understand the concept of sharing and tit for tat, but am almost never motivated to ask people how their lives are going during a conversation. Usually they ask me, I ramble a bit, and then the conversation ends. When I do remember to ask them, I find it difficult to feign interest in the answer (unless it truly is interesting!)

Self-diagnosing AS seems pretty much impossible to do reliably. Also, I think it's even harder to do with adults because they may have learned some of the social skills they lacked as children. Looking back to myself as a kid, well, I remember feeling like a total outsider. Everyone thought I was a complete geek/nerd of the worst sort. But I don't remember THAT well exactly how I thought/behaved - it's too long ago - and we can't thoroughly assess 1990s-Assumption without a time machine

OK ramble over.

Hmm, I'm not real sure. Are you capable of talking about things besides your interests? The lack of motivation could be anything. I mean I need a single dose of Ritalin at times to even reply to a person. I'm a lot better now because I've been on it for so long but before there were no thoughts while I was around people, besides that brief social anxiety stint.
With AS it's not that you don't want to talk but have difficulty. You can't relate to the other person. When you do talk it's one sided, monologuing and not even looking for replies unless you asked a direct question. Two-way chat is still hard for me. It's like reading lines from a script.

One thing I've been thinking of recently was a time when a more socially aware person with AS said people can adjust their personality to different situations. I've never been able to do that, and when I can it's completely involuntary and it's not done in a constructive or conscience way. I put on accents of my favourite actors as the characters they play and it really does not fit into the social situation. And most times I'm quoting them in full character. Mannerisms an all. We could be sitting down for lunch and suddenly I start putting on a perfect imitation of Tom Baker as the Doctor. And I'm probably wearing the scarf. And I'm just responding normally to the conversation (although trying to skew closer towards something about physics) but as Tom Baker.

[Geno]

I also have what you could consider "meltdowns". I'll remain calm until someone or something pushes me over a certain point(which no one ever does except sometimes my girlfriend or some relatives) of anger and then I lose it and either...
A. If alone and the situation makes me feel bad, start bawling uncontrollably for a while.
B. If another person is at fault, I'll usually start yelling at them shouting very hurtful, low blow, even evil things I don't mean. (Example? "I hope you ****ing die", etc.) In only two extreme cases did I get violent. Luckily these people know I don't really mean it when I do say stuff like that.
I'm curious, how are autistic meltdowns different from this? (I honestly don't know.)

I'm the same way as you with doing accents. I've amazed people with my perfect and realistic British, Southern US, Irish, Italian, Mexican Spanish, Indian, South African, French, German, Russian, and Scottish accents.

[daveddd]

Originally Posted by Geno

I'm diagnosed with severe combined type ADHD, which my pdoc says is "one of the most extreme I've seen in all my years". After looking up Asperger's syndrome in the DSM, I seem to just barely make the minimum requirements for a diagnosis. (I have all of the symptoms of ADHD in the DSM, though) Is it possible to have both? Many of the AS qualities I have could be attributed to ADHD as well, but one or two can't.

Problem is, I've heard people with AS usually have little to no desire for a lot of friends and generally don't like people very much other than their parents, they're unable to see when people are getting upset/annoyed, they lack compassion, they're very out of touch with their feelings, and they make decisions solely based on logic without taking emotions in to account. Oh, and they strictly adhere to routines.

I love people, they just don't like me back most of the time, which ended in developing bad social anxiety. I push people's buttons sometimes because I'm an attention seeker, but I can clearly see that they are, in fact, annoyed by my behavior. I've always had intense interests, but I don't constantly discuss it with others constantly like many AS people do, unless they have an interest or semi-interest in it. I'm more compassionate than most people, I can't even watch gory things on TV because all it'll do is depress me because I can't help but put myself in their shoes. I have no problems detecting sarcasm either.

I'm more in touch with my emotions/sensitive than any guy I know, I prefer intimacy and romance(with a girl I actually like) over sex and, at 19 years old, know there's a massive difference between infatuation and love, and I would be totally fine with getting married right now and staying with the same girl forever. (provided I actually did love her.). I cry a LOT, because when no one is around I make no effort to hold back because crying actually DOES make me feel better after.

I do use logic far more than most people, but I don't ONLY use logic. I take feelings in to account too.

I don't know if this has to do with AS or just more severe forms of autism, but I had no developmental delays and actually learned to do things earlier than most kids, except for of course ADHD related stuff. And finally, I don't only not follow routines, but I dislike them and prefer to just do things whenever I want to/whenever they need to be done without an exact time.

The asperger's traits I DO have? (I'll put a ** next to the ones that I don't think are associated with ADHD) I sometimes stare at people without noticing I'm staring(although I'm not actually focused on them, just zoned out.), I interrupt people a LOT, I often forget to make eye contact although I'm getting better at it**, I think visually a lot, significantly more than most NT people do, but not to the extent many people with AS I've seen and I think in words often to*, I disliked people around my own age until I was a teenager, because no one could hold an interesting conversation. As a result I'd get along better with adults/older from when I was 5 to even now(although this may just be attributed to my IQ being 135.). If something is going to happen that effects me, I go crazy unless I have at least a rough estimate as to when, "soon" is never good enough**, I have an incredibly strong interest in pharmacology and have spent hundreds if not thousands of hours reading books and reading articles about it(although I don't discuss it endlessly with people unless they show an interest).** Oh, one more. I'm an inflexible thinker according to most people, but I don't think that's true because almost all of my views are based on logic.**(This doesn't contradict the above, my decisions are based on emotions and logic. I'm referring to things like: I believe war is pointless unless somebody invades your country because all it does is kill people and drain money from the economy, and I'm agonistic rather than religious or atheist because no point of view has provided proof.)

The fact I can very easily put myself in other people's shoes and am as in touch with my emotions as I am would make me discount AS as a possibility instantly, if it weren't for the ** symptoms up there. Could those things be either:
A. lesser known ADHD symptoms too
B. a coincidence
C. I have a case of Severe ADHD with very mild aspergers?

What ADHD symptoms typically wouldn't be found in Asperger's? Which Asperger's symptoms typically wouldn't be found in ADHD?

adhd with social anxiety can resemble aspergers

do you forget to make eye contact or is it anxiety provoking?

i am also a concrete thinker, that can be adhd, depression, or a personality trait of an intelligent person

[daveddd]

is your panic disorder sensory related?

[Geno]

Originally Posted by daveddd

is your panic disorder sensory related?

1. Eye contact is not anxiety provoking during conversation.

2. No, my panic attacks are mostly for no reason or for little reason.

[daveddd]

Originally Posted by Geno

1. Eye contact is not anxiety provoking during conversation.

2. No, my panic attacks are mostly for no reason or for little reason.

sounds like adhd, but who knows

more and more distinct subgroups of adhd, autism , aspergers and PDDs are popping up everyday

[Assumption]

Originally Posted by fracturedstory

Are you capable of talking about things besides your interests?

Yes, I'm capable of doing it. I just find it hard, sometimes. I'll get an urge to talk about it and will divert the conversation towards that topic.

I mean I need a single dose of Ritalin at times to even reply to a person.

I definitely haven't had that (though sometimes I don't "get round" to responding to what people say... I hear it, take it in, but just don't get around to answering. I'd assumed that this was an inattentive thing.)

that brief social anxiety stint.

It's entirely possible I have social anxiety (and maybe this is the source of my "wrong planet" feelings). I do tend to whisper to strangers in hallways. Haha.

With AS it's not that you don't want to talk but have difficulty. You can't relate to the other person. When you do talk it's one sided, monologuing and not even looking for replies unless you asked a direct question. Two-way chat is still hard for me. It's like reading lines from a script.

I find it hard to relate, at least to some extent. I generally have an idea what the social rules are that people are following (but sometimes get that wrong) but often I just disagree with the rules - for instance, because they're arbitrary fashions rather than actual ethical prescriptions for behaviour.

Example from a couple of weeks ago: I was looking at participants' data (anonymous) and noticed that one participant mentioned her cycle was 44 days long. To my office dates I said "WOW! 44 days! That's much longer than average!" They both found it really offensive - the guy (half jokingly, I suspect) said "I hate you so much right now" and said that I may as well have been saying "Centipedes never have 100 legs!" and that I was "dehumanizing" the participant. I still don't get it. The participant wasn't in the room. Her identity was protected by a veil of anonymity. And 44 days is a big number!! I had no idea that there was that much variance in such things. Seriously, that's like 150% of the average.

One thing I've been thinking of recently was a time when a more socially aware person with AS said people can adjust their personality to different situations. I've never been able to do that, and when I can it's completely involuntary and it's not done in a constructive or conscience way.

This is called "self monitoring". It's a personality dimension on which people differ. I am pretty sure I'm an extremely low self-monitor. I strongly dislike lying, or misleading people in any way. I can't act at all. I don't think I'm very good at "social smiles" (I suspect that they generally come across as a kind of grimace) and I'm not at all photogenic. I'll generally tell people what I really think, even if it hurts me to do so. For example, I completely botched a job interview a few years ago because I went into a LOT of detail explaining to the potential employer that I wanted flexible hours, and that my previous employer had arbitrarily changed my hours on me and that I didn't like that. Guess what? I didn't get the job. :P

[Assumption]

Originally Posted by Geno

"meltdowns".

I've been wondering about meltdowns too. And seeing as FracturedStory is being so helpful I thought I'd pitch in and add a few thoughts of my own.

So, I've always been prone to "temper tantrums". I'm not sure if they're just tantrums/angry outbursts or meltdowns. I've noticed recently that sometimes I start feeling angry without realizing it. My wife can actually detect it before I start to feel it, actually. She'll say "what's wrong" and I'll reply "Nothing. I'm fine". Often, the first hint that I'm heading towards bad-moods-ville is that I find myself cautioning myself in my head: "Sylvie's husband, be understanding/supportive towards Sylvie. She needs your support. Don't get frustrated." It's weird when the thought pops into my head, because I don't yet FEEL frustrated. It's like there's a nonconscious part of me that has registered frustration, but I'm completely oblivious to it (possible Alexithymia??) But I've learned that generally, those kinds of thoughts are an early warning sign - some time over the next few hours I'm likely to completely lose my cool, potentially over something quite little, and turn it into a huge, unnecessary argument. And often, after I get started, I find it difficult to calm down again.

Sometimes the bad mood actually lasts until I go to bed.

I'm not sure if they're due to a sensory overload, to be honest. Fractured, I actually posted something about this itchy thing I get in the sensory forum if you feel like taking a look. It's good to get advice from someone knowledgeable. I'm not sure if the itchiness thing is psychogenic, but I do know that when I'm having an "attack," I'm super emotional, cannot deal with people talking to me, want to be left alone, and about the only thing that ever helps me get through it is to hyperfocus on a hobby (and even that is of only limited help).

[rockydaydreamer]

I've been wondering if I have aspergers too, but I've been in denial, mostly blaming my problems on ADHD and possible social anxiety.

For example, if we look at the DSM, the first section covers issues with non-verbal gestures, peer relationships, sharing enjoyment, and reciprocity. I don't have much of an issue with non-verbals, but I wouldn't say I'm perfect at expressing myself. However, having peer relationships is hard when people in my developmental level generally don't seem to like me. I don't share enjoyment with others because it seems pointless. I sometimes seem to lack social or emotional reciprocity, but it's not because I lack the ability to read social cues or emotions. My problem is that I get easily distracted in my own little world. So far I only seem to have two things mentioned in the first section of the DSM for Aspergers (I would only need two in that section anyway).

The second section of the DSM deals with routines and rituals. I seem have a preoccupation with one or more stereotyped and restricted patterns of interest. However, I don't follow very strict routine or rituals. I'm not aware of doing any repetitive movements that couldn't be ruled out as simply fidgeting. I may have mild echolalia/echopraxia, but it's not something so bad that anyone has really noticed. I don't usually focus on detail (although ADHD meds seem to make that happen). So I only have one or two things I could say I have in section two of this dsm.

Section III has to do with having difficulty functioning in society or at work. I don't work and I'm socially inept. Section IV says there's no significant delay in language. I couldn't talk until age 2 and a half, so I could be more HFA. Section V says there's no significant delay in cognitive development or adaptive behavior. I don't have delays in those areas. Section VI says criteria isn't met for another pervasive developmental disorder or schizophrenia. It's possible I'm a highly functioning autistic and I definitely don't have schizophrenia.

[hanikamiya]

I think that the main problem with eye contact is that we have five ways of communicating:
-> verbally with the content of our voice
-> with the inflection of our voice
-> with our body language
-> with our facial expressions
-> with our involuntary expressions, especially eye expressions

Now, the content of words is easily controlled, and you can lie most easily with words alone. Voice, body language and facial expressions can be controlled to a certain degree, but that costs a lot of working memory.
Involuntary expressions do show a bit in voice, body and the general face, but they dominate the expression around the eyes.
You can't hide it when your pupil dilates, and it's terribly hard to control all those tiny movements your eye and the skin around your eye makes.

The information conveyed with the human eye is very detailed, and because it's more involuntary than other communication lines, it means that it also is more often different from everything else the other person is trying to convey.

If you have problems with working memory and/or sensory filters, having to make sense of a person saying one thing and their eyes saying something completely different is difficult.
NTs can either usually process both, and figure out they person is hiding something/lying, or they can suppress one channel of communication based on what they want to believe. Non-NTs may have problems with either one or both.

It gets somewhat better with training, when you can observe people, make assumptions about what they want to do, and then observe what they do next to prove your assumption right/wrong.
It gets worse with anxiety because anxiety blocks "extensive" sensory processing. And that bit already isn't working well in people with ADHD.


And that is unpleasant. So, I for one avoid eye contact. I know I'm supposed to make eye contact but I don't feel any desire to unless I really like a person and am fascinated by their entire expression (it could be a crush or it could be me wishing to be able to paint beauty, or both), or I feel completely safe and relaxed around somebody. But even then it used to be only short and rare moments.

But that means I have little practice understanding eye contact, which means I'm bad at it, which means I avoid it even more. Now, thanks to my job I see several hundreds of faces every single day, see those people interacting, have to interact with them, and when there's nothing to do for a moment I don't have anything else to relieve my boredom than watching other people interacting.
I've become much better at reading people's faces and their eyes, and I find it easier to make eye contact now. Until I'm exhausted, that is.

[Assumption]

Actually, I was quite sure that the voice is the "leakiest" channel of communication...

It's not my area of expertise though. But I just checked and my old social psyc textbook agrees. Perhaps there's been more recent research done since the research cited in there, though?

[Geno]

Originally Posted by Assumption

I've been wondering about meltdowns too. And seeing as FracturedStory is being so helpful I thought I'd pitch in and add a few thoughts of my own.

So, I've always been prone to "temper tantrums". I'm not sure if they're just tantrums/angry outbursts or meltdowns. I've noticed recently that sometimes I start feeling angry without realizing it. My wife can actually detect it before I start to feel it, actually. She'll say "what's wrong" and I'll reply "Nothing. I'm fine". Often, the first hint that I'm heading towards bad-moods-ville is that I find myself cautioning myself in my head: "Sylvie's husband, be understanding/supportive towards Sylvie. She needs your support. Don't get frustrated." It's weird when the thought pops into my head, because I don't yet FEEL frustrated. It's like there's a nonconscious part of me that has registered frustration, but I'm completely oblivious to it (possible Alexithymia??) But I've learned that generally, those kinds of thoughts are an early warning sign - some time over the next few hours I'm likely to completely lose my cool, potentially over something quite little, and turn it into a huge, unnecessary argument. And often, after I get started, I find it difficult to calm down again.

Sometimes the bad mood actually lasts until I go to bed.

I'm not sure if they're due to a sensory overload, to be honest. Fractured, I actually posted something about this itchy thing I get in the sensory forum if you feel like taking a look. It's good to get advice from someone knowledgeable. I'm not sure if the itchiness thing is psychogenic, but I do know that when I'm having an "attack," I'm super emotional, cannot deal with people talking to me, want to be left alone, and about the only thing that ever helps me get through it is to hyperfocus on a hobby (and even that is of only limited help).

Sounds kind of like me. I won't notice how ****** off I'm getting until I get pushed over the edge, then suddenly I essentially beat the **** out of the person verbally in a short time, then I'll always feel incredibly bad for what I said and apologize profusely. Sometimes I'll say things I do mean but would never say, sometimes it's more extreme and I'll say things I don't mean just because I want revenge. But I almost always feel bad after unless the person truly, truly deserved it, which is rare. But when they do, I'll feel GOOD AS HELL after.

I also had echolalia as a child, but only when I whispered it, and only did it knew no one was in earshot. It got less frequent with age, and completely stopped by puberty.

OH! Another possibly AS-related thing I have is, I can't understand people for **** if in a room with lots of noise sometimes. (Such as the school cafeteria, a school bus, loud music playing.) I'll say "what?" and they'll need to repeat themselves a few times unless they're speaking at a high volume. Otherwise the noise of the person speaking just blends in with the background. This isn't really bad if I'm having a conversation with someone, but if someone comes up to me in a place like this and asks me a question randomly, I'll say "what did you say?" 3-4 times before I hear you.

example:
Person at party with music(how i hear it): mmm mmmrmmm m?
Me: What?
Person: MMMM MMM MMMRMMM IS?
Me: I'm sorry, I can't hear you, talk louder. What?
Person: DO. MMM. KNOW. MMMM. THE. MMMMMRM. IS?
Me: Do I know where what is?
Person: ARE YOU ****ING DEAF? I SAID, *leans close to my ear* DOOOO. YOOOOU. KNOWWWW. WHEREEE. THEEEE. BATHROOM. IS?
Me: Oh, it's over there. *points*

[hanikamiya]

Originally Posted by Assumption

Actually, I was quite sure that the voice is the "leakiest" channel of communication...

It's not my area of expertise though. But I just checked and my old social psyc textbook agrees. Perhaps there's been more recent research done since the research cited in there, though?

Afaik, just as body language and facial expressions are, it's leaky, but it can be trained to become more convincing when you lie.
Which is why actors and politicians get voice training.

Those movements around the eye are much harder to control/train away.

And, what's more important for us is that we can look away from people's eyes, but can't listen away from their voices.

[fracturedstory]

*Breathes in and out*

A tantrum is where you make a fuss over not getting your own way. A meltdown is when you explode because you can no longer control your emotions.

People with autism have low frustration tolerance, much like in ADHD due to a dysfunctional limbic system, and probably other areas that deal with emotion.

People with autism have severe sensory issues, different processing of stimuli (all at once), and lack the right words when they get stressed out plus having such intense uncontrollable emotions leads to the screaming, kicking, punching meltdown.

I actually had a 2 hour long meltdown when I was in so much physical pain that wouldn't end I just wanted it over. A meltdown doesn't usually last me 10 minutes so this was something different. I kind of got a taste of the severe side. You're in so much anguish and you can't see an end. People with autism also have a longer sensory memory than usual so all these uncomfortable sometimes painful senses linger with them.

When people have a meltdown due to being put over the edge it's not as common as it is in autism because it doesn't take long for them to break. It depends how rigid their behaviour is and whether they try to hold the meltdowns off but they can explode suddenly or it takes a lot of things stressing them out until they can no longer hold together.

I may be out of commission tomorrow or at least absorbed in my projects, or the new Stargate app. So I may not get on til late tomorrow.