The Department of Neuropsychiatry at Keio University School of Medicine in Tokyo found that individuals with Aspergers have higher fluid reasoning ability than typical individuals and have a superior fluid intelligence. I have a high fluid reasoning ability and fluid intelligence. Give me a random object and I will tell you 100 things you can do with it in a few minutes. Coming up with ideas and thinking out of the box is easy for me. I see things at multiple levels and view multiple ways situations and circumstances can be adapted and made better. I am an expert ‘fixer.’
As I see things so rapidly, I try to find balance and keep my mouth shut, even as my mind is going a thousand miles an hour with ideas. This is one of the reasons it’s hard for me to work for someone (work) or to problem solve with people (teamwork). And another reason I’d rather write than speak.
In a state of increased thought, if I open my mouth, I come across as a know-it-all. Or I am over-emotional and use the wrong words and may seem baffled, unclear, or unsure. I exaggerate. I speak in extremes. I forget all the communication rules of right and wrong. I become more and more ‘Aspie.’ I become frustrated. I become aggravated. I react and act in a way I am not proud of. I feel overwhelmed and I overwhelm.
Then some react to me, thinking I want attention or to be right, or they assume I have a plan or agenda or outcome. But I don’t. I am the way I am because I have to get the ideas out of me in order to function. In order to breathe. I let go of the toxins in my mind by verbally processing. If I can’t, something builds up within and I can’t concentrate.
I have slowly learned ways to adapt. I have stopped giving personal advice, almost entirely. I will gladly share my experience but not offer out solutions to others. I just don’t anymore. It doesn’t feel right or good. But I still run into trouble when I have a job to do, especially one that requires research, creating, or educating. I just don’t know when to stop, what my boundaries are, and what is really needed and not needed. Everything seems urgent and important. And all these cool connections and ideas formulating in my head seem necessary to share.
And so it is with much effort that I still struggle to understand the concepts of ‘too much’ and ‘overboard’ and the ‘last word,’ and so much more.
I grow tired again and again. ~ Sam, Everyday Aspergers
Everyday Asperger's 
I have this issue too =)
Oh my, I rather go to Home Depot than clothing stores, because I always find several ways of use for simple things such as wires, screws and wood boards. It seems like I never buy anything for the purpose it is made for, I just see what I can do with it, if some thing is already made to it’s final shape it tends to bore me, since it does not stimulate my brain…
and the items that come home from Goodwill and good luck to the person who asks me why because it isn’t the item they see but my new hanging charging station, when combined with those decorative brackets I found on sale and I’ve done this, and this, and… etc, etc…
🙂
I thought you were writing about me there! I too prefer writing to talking, except I get frustrated because my arms get too tired and I hate typos and phone calls are a nightmare, especially when someone expects or wants you to agree with them when the facts don’t allow you to but it is their very strongly held emotional position and it all gets uncomfortable. But show me a process or a method that someone is using and I can easily see the easiest way to do it, and work out ways to do things differently. Maybe not hundreds of ways like you Sam, but I totally get what you are saying. I love this blog, even though it probably isn’t written for me, it says what I think a lot of the time and you are just plain wonderful. As for the personal advice, people are bad at accepting other people’s advice generally I find, and unless you can ‘hook them in’ emotionally sometimes they never get it. I used to know a life insurance salesman who said “You have to back the hearse up to the door and let them smell the roses” in order to persuade some people.
Keep doing what you are doing though. It helps so many and is lovely to read, I love coming here and it is a shame you live so far away as I would love to meet you. But me in America would be like a fish in honey; not only would I find it difficult to function, I’d also make a great feast for all those bears!
oh YES and YES again 😉
I like the way you describe the toxicity that builds up if you don’t get your stuff out. What about the analogy of a pressure cooker? I WILL explode if I don’t find a way to let off steam…by expressing my thoughts…
…and YES again to you saying its better to write.
Much cooler delivery…of course it is, as I go over it and over it again and again until I’m satisfied…just like with my collages. Perfect clarity. I always surprise myself 😉 verbal delivery is fraud with emotion to the extremes….
I TRY not share my ‘useful’ ideas when other’s tell me their stuff.
A dear friend said to me yesterday: ‘well, its like offering a three course meal when they are NOT HUNGRY’. I GOT IT!
…and also, she didn’t just say a meal…three course meal!…hahaha that’s me, always too much. my partner says: ‘your trouble is, you don’t know when to stop!!!’
Anyway, I had shared with him what my friend said to me….then, last night, I was on one of my monologues, when suddenly he puts his hands up in the air and sais: ‘NOT hungry!!’
so funny 😉
I love that analogy, Sabine!
I know 😉
Dear Sam
Was very happy to read your post today. I was thinking that I was being self indulgent in believing I have AS. The words you have written have helped me think that Yes I do have it and I am not just “Bad”.
Carol
I love this! this is me…and it get can so very tiring. I verbally process with my best friend and she is fine with all of it…but every few years I accidentally step on her toes a bit in something she really believes in and know I annoy her. It is to her credit that she sticks with me…and funny enough she has become more Aspie in her thinking even though she is total nuerotpyical because we talk on the phone for hours every day for the last 9 years!!! And I have become a tad more Nuerotypical at times in my perspectives. I know I am lucky. My husband has also learned so much about me and I really pushed him the first few years even when he was annoyed to understand my intents with blog posts like yours and books like Aspergirls or Nerdy Shy and Socially Inappropriate…so now I have at least two people in my life who never accuse me of being too much- to them I just AM. Sometimes I still feel like I am too much but then I realize that even that is a matter of perspective and I need to be WHO I AM with a small group of people and mask with others just like you said…I stopped giving advice to most people- but then I have to tell my husband what type of advice I would give in said circumstance or else I feel like I will explode. It works nicely with my kids too because they respect my advice.
I think you explained this perfectly…we can seem so much like we want the last word, or to win, or to be right but its totally not that at all!!!! Thank you for explaining this !
Hope you find some glimmer of energy soon. I support you.
I’ve found a partial work-around to when my Mr. Fix-It side kicks in. I just start asking questions. “How would you feel about–?” “Do you think that this would–?” “Would — work?” For most people, it makes them feel involved, or that you’re deferring to them rather than telling them what to do. Worst case scenario, they think I’m asking rhetorical questions and find it condescending, or think that I’m too needy and can’t think on my own. The latter notion amuses me a good bit, but I still try to avoid causing them to feel like that.
very nice.
Sam, you are a precious gem. I almost always identify with you. I also enjoy hearing the ramblings of responses to your posts because I know it’s a safe place for me to eXplain to my heart’s content. Love it!
wonderful :)))
I have learned not to give out personal advice unless asked for. Then I make sure they can handle it by saying, “Do you want an honest answer or a b.s. answer. I won’t give out b.s. so the question is rhetorical, but gets my point across. Keep blogging! You are helping a lot of women on the autism spectrum, including me.
My mind is also running very fast. I am @ times almost completely lost inside my own thoughts and imagination, even when trying to focus on the news or a conversation. Through personal experience of 35.5 years, I am tired of mentally or physically trying to fix problems for people who may not even want help. Their drama is not my problem. God is in charge. This last part helps me refocus. No matter how we look to ourselves or the world looks around us, God is ultimately in charge. Matthew 11:28-30 is a great reminder of this, that *He* is available to help us lighten our load.
Thank you Sam from a mother’s heart. Awesome post.
🙂
It happens in my writing as well as in my talking. But if I stop letting it out, if I stop telling my truth my brain feels like it wants to explode. I may have to let it happen someday, just in order to be “nice”
yes…. explode feeling. I get that. best to you
Reblogged this on We Called Him Lucky and commented:
What an interesting read. I learn something new everyday!
❤️
great 🙂
Reblogged this on autism.beauty.combines.
If you can take it and focus it, there are not limits to what you can achieve.
agreed!