Autism/Asperger’s Awareness in Women – A Teenagers Perspective – Written by Marnie

“I wrote this for an all-girls group I am part of and thought that maybe I should share it and see what others have to say. Be nice ok. It took a lot for me to be able to talk about this.”

“Autism and Asperger’s displays itself very differently in woman than it does in men.

Most Autistic traits in males are very obvious, they don’t hide them and it’s very clear.

With women, we actually subconsciously try to hide it, it’s in the female nature to fit in; you may find you mimic your female friends in different ways.

For example, you might copy certain phrases they use, figures of speech, accents, physical stances and behavioural habits.

I, for one, used to copy my friends self-harming and it wasn’t to get attention, it was because I assumed this was normal behaviour for other girls.

When I was in primary school I tried to fit in by soaking up every bit of knowledge about makeup and hair that I could because at the age of 7 years old I thought  this would stop girls from picking on me.

It didn’t work; it made them hate me because I knew more than they did.

Go figure.

I ended up hanging out with all the boys, playing rugby, play fighting and developing a very masculine attitude towards sports.

I LOVED running, I ADORED horse riding and even at a young age I felt that the ache that you get after a long trek on horseback, was the best thing in the world.

Even at the age of 11 I had this attitude, hell I even secretly loved the smell of sweat.

I also loved the smells at my friend’s farm because it smelt right.

I was still trying to fit in with the girls though, so I started wearing a bra to get noticed and saying that I had developed a crush on the boys, even though I hadn’t.

To me, boys were just there to be jumped on and knocked around and generally enjoy a good old rough n tumble with.

When my only female friend and best friend moved down to England I changed.

I wouldn’t speak to anyone because I felt as though someone had wrenched something out of my chest.

The girls who picked on me realized that I was extremely vulnerable so they took me under their wings and then threw me in the dirt for fun.

So I turned to books and the Harry Potter books saved my life.

I would sit and read ALL the time, hell I learned to walk while reading, write and kick a ball all at once.

I had a talent for reading and literature at school and was a total bookworm but I couldn’t do maths if my life depended on it. This made school very difficult for me.

In primary school I had a very nasty, abusive teacher and this together with the fact that I lost all my grandparents in the space of 5 months, meant that I fell behind in my school work.

I was moved to the Secondary School in the next village because of how horrendous the bullying of me had become.

The school there was filled with kids who were mostly brought up out in the middle of nowhere, on farms, so I got on amazingly with them!

Unfortunately at this point I had stopped horse riding due to my parents using it against me to get me to do simple things like cleaning.

I got bullied for a while during my first year there but I soon learned to stick up for myself, realizing the teachers here would actually do something (the head in primary school ‘solved’ bullying with a group hug and when physical contact scares the shit out of you anyway, it does not help) and the teachers didn’t look down at you.

In second year I had a fantastic English teacher who figured out I wouldn’t do homework but if she gave me clear instructions during class and made it interesting, I could get it done in 30 minutes flat.

She was, and still is, my favorite teacher. She was feared by most students but I adored her, she understood me.

I still struggled with maths and it caused me many issues.

I adored art, I wasn’t good at it but I loved it, especially my friends artwork because it was beautiful and I liked to just sit and look at the seniors artwork because it never failed to amuse me in one way or another.

I didn’t do well in P.E. because it meant someone was telling me how to do sport and that someone would be watching my every move, but I was exceedingly good at skiing, badminton and running.

If a teacher suddenly changed what we were going to be doing, it often ended in a full-scale meltdown because it made me uncomfortable.

By this time, my parents had noticed that I was becoming withdrawn, depressed and generally not my usual self.

So, I was being looked at for depression but I had too many happy moments to be ‘properly depressed’. Then I was being looked at for Bipolar disorder and this is when things got really interesting.

The woman seeing me about this was puzzled, I showed all the right symptoms but in her eyes something didn’t match, there was something missing.

Sure, I had insane mood swings but I also had social anxiety issues, if I got stressed I became physically ill (usually cystitis).

I was exceedingly intelligent but the knowledge was there in dribs and drabs, it never encompassed the whole of anything, rather it was filled by all of the  peculiar facts I clung to simply because I liked them.

I acted like a sponge for knowledge, though remembering that knowledge was a huge issue.

I showed signs of dyspraxia (Sp) and dyscalculia (sp) but not enough to make a definite diagnosis.

Then my little brother got diagnosed with Autism and they asked about me, mum said she had a light bulb moment and it all made sense.

Never getting over losing my one good friend, being easily distracted, not being able to handle large social groups, loud noises sending me into over drive and causing catastrophic melt downs, too much noise leaving me seemingly deaf, being scared of touch unless it’s invited by me, loving soft fluffy things, being overly sensitive to smells but not minding natural smells like body odour and farm smells, finding comfort in the company of animals more than people.

Well, the list goes on but it’s scarily hard to describe to a stranger what you are like when it takes 17 years before your problems are even noticed.

And Why?

Simple, males with autism have very prominent signs because the ‘hierarchy’ within men isn’t so severe.

Us women will do almost anything to fit in and to try to seem normal, so the girls with autism or Asperger’s strive to be like the others, to be ‘normal’, so it masks the majority of the signs.

They used to think Autism was less common in women but recently they’ve realized that the problem actually is that girls get misdiagnosed.

They get accused of being Bipolar/Manic Depressive or having attention deficit disorders or of just being plain weird.

You are NOT weird if you have an Autism Spectrum Disorder/Condition, you are different, you see the world differently and you have an AMAZING eye for truth.

You take things literally a lot, can’t tell the difference between sarcasm or being bullied at times, sure but you know what?

All you want is the truth; you strive for people to be honest, you NEED control, perfection and order or it stresses you out.

Nothing wrong with that.

It makes you YOU.

There are many other ‘disorders’ that pile on after you find out you have this, please don’t worry, its part and parcel of this amazing gift you have.

You may be ‘weird’ and you may feel like you don’t excel in the things you want to excel in but do you know why? It’s because people like us, have a tendency to be truly talented at something amazing.

You get autistic people who struggled with literature and creativity but are amazing at science, maths and things really involving raw intelligence.

Then there are autistic kids (like myself) that struggle with raw intelligence but adore literature, writing and using your creativity in art or music.

I still haven’t accepted myself for who I am because when I got diagnosed, I lost all of my friends.

I found out the hard way that they were judgmental and easily lead by a bully.

You may feel weird but I promise you, you are an amazing person.

You have such a unique way of seeing the world around you; you don’t need to fit in with that crowd of popular kids because they are false.

You like the truth, you need it.

I know this seems like a ramble but it’s how my mind works. Due to having Asperger’s I don’t really answer questions straight up, I ‘waffle on’, as one of my other English teachers was fond of saying to me.

But please, never be ashamed of having Asperger’s or Autism or of being on the spectrum at all.

If you have family members who are on the spectrum, please respect them; be honest with them because all they want is the truth.

Don’t make promises you can’t keep, if you break a promise to someone on the spectrum, it’s kind of like you broke the law.

Respect that we can be very edgy about our ‘personal bubbles’ at times while at others you might end up with us scrambling onto your lap for a cuddle simply because we are cold and you happen to be warm and squishy.

Respect that we don’t like loud noises, we can’t concentrate on more than one sound like most people can and it will confuse us.

Respect that we may have habits like, rocking, spinning, jumping, dancing, humming, snapping fingers and making silly noises.

We don’t mean to be annoying but when we get excited or depressed these things calm us down or express our need to show you we are excited.

Respect that if you have something colourful and pretty we might take it from you or stare at it because we have become entranced by its beauty.

Respect that if you take us outside where there are flowers we will insist on running through them, touching them and we will get upset if you take us away.

Respect that if you smell good we might sit and sniff your hair or we might stare at our food simply because it smells amazing.

Respect that we might not eat something because it looks ‘funny’ or its texture is ‘squelchy’ or just plain wrong.

Sure we can be as weird as all get out, but I can promise you this, we will have you in stitches laughing at our oddities and tendency to turn around and whisper rather loudly “look at that woman’s make up! She looks like a walking talking orange!” or “You smell funny” and then walk off like nothing happened.

Don’t be offended, we don’t mean to be nasty; we are just honest and a little strange.

I hope this adds a little insight.

I hope you all read this and find it helpful or that it at least puts a smile on your face.
Marnie”

“DISCLAIMER: This is written from my point of view as a girl with Asperger’s Syndrome If you are a teenage girl please DO NOT SELF DIAGNOSE all of a sudden based on this information, please. It’s the worst thing you can do; having issues doesn’t make you cool.”

You can view Marnie’s original post and more of her amazing writing at: http://vampirefreaks.com/journal_comment.php?entry=8355153&fb_source=message http://www.wattpad.com/28148017-autism-apergers-awareness-for-woman

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• WASP Women’s Asperger’s Syndrome Awareness Page – For those who understand (seventhvoice.wordpress.com)