Evolution

When I was a kid, I was lazy and disruptive. I spoke out in class, I didn't do my homework. I would stare off into space or out the window. Obviously I had some kind of attitude problem that could be punished out of me, that is if I weren't so stubborn. But I showed them! I stayed lazy my whole life and dropped out of college several years later. I guess we see who had the last laugh!

Many years after college, I found a book called "You Mean I'm not Lazy, Stupid or Crazy?", or something like that.
Continue reading.It was a book about Adult ADD. Ironically enough I could only get thru the first 3 chapters, but at last I knew there was a reason for my problems. Oddly enough when I was a kid, I didn't just like getting punished, or act out because of some hidden resentment for my mother. Over the years I had come up with many answers to many questions that I just didn't have answers too. Explaining how I was bored in school, or didn't feel as if I had to do homework, as if there were someone who could give me a good enough reason to overcome my aversion to the task at hand. The truth is, that it didn't make any sense to me either. I knew then, and I know now that just doing it and getting it over with is so much better than putting it off. Incidentally, I'm writing this at work, where I probably should be doing something much more constructive. Obviously, this knowledge hasn't done me a lot of good, since I have failed to act on any of it. I have developed a great many coping devices, and I've been lucky enough to find gainful employment where my tendencies aren't crippling. I feel like I'm just squeaking by, but judging by my reviews, I seem to be excelling. I think it's just a knack I have of finding employers with very low expectations, but I could be wrong.

Lately, I seem to be coming to the realization that there's much more to this story, and to me than I thought. I've been reading up on Asperger's Syndrome. It's a form of Autism, and I'm guessing it's the main reason why there are so many more diagnoses of autism lately. I have a feeling that the numbers have always been as high as they are, but before it was just never recognized. Aspies, as they seem to be called, were often just dismissed as shy, or awkward. Dorks and nerds and the like. After reading up on this, and taking a test or two, I'm pretty sure I fall into this category as well. The only problem is, I can find a lot of places that tell me I am an Aspie, but I am not finding many that tell me what I should do now. I mean it's nice to know that there is a reason that I'm so bad at life, and the fact that I'm doing as well as I am gives me a sense of pride and hope, but over all, it doesn't do me a whole lot of good.

I guess the next step is to seek out some professional somewhere and make it official, and see what they have to say. Though I'm reluctant to do so. I seem to have a great deal of social anxiety, I'm not sure if this is part of Asperger's, or part of some other problem I have, but it makes me hesitate. Also, I'm not sure what they can really do. I don't want to go on any type of drugs, and frankly it would be hard to convince me that they have any that work. I don't want to play trial and error with my brain, there's just too many things that can go wrong. And of course there is always the worst possible scenario. I go there and I find out that there's really nothing wrong with me. That I'm just a lazy emo and there's really nothing more for me to do except get my head out of my ass and get to work.

I'll keep looking and let you know how things are going. I'm kind of excited, like an explorer sighting new land for the first time. but then I think about how many of those explorers got eaten by natives the moment they landed on the beach.