Hi everyone! My name is Kelerak, and I have Asperger's syndrome. That sounds like an odd intro, I know, but it's really the best way I think I could introduce myself and my dilemma without sounding too "woe is me" about the subject. With this, I want to delve into my personal experiences with this diagnosis, so I can learn how to relay my thoughts into words, and so I can actually find myself while writing. I also would like to note that anything I say about how I experience/deal with Asperger's is only particular to me, and I don't want my experiences to be THE experience that people would have. I wasn't officially diagnosed with Asperger's until when I was 18 years old. That put me through almost all of my schooling not knowing that there's a reason why I acted the way I did/do. I knew SOMETHING was different about me and how I talked to people, as I had very few friends and would get overwhelmed by group conversations. If I did actually converse with people, I preferred doing it with just one or maybe two people. Any more than that made me feel like I wasn't actually there and had nothing to contribute. That still rings true to today, honestly. I'm not sure why I wasn't tested until way later in my life like I was, as it would have answered so many questions about myself during school. At best, I believed I was just shy and soft-spoken, or at worst I believed there was truly something wrong with me mentally and there was nothing I could do about it. I'm glad I know now about my condition, but I really would have liked to have known earlier. With the (albeit very brief and not very descriptive) backstory out of the way, I'd like to go into the different ways I live with this condition. One of the primary issues I have is with talking, especially socializing. From my perspective, a lot of people are easily able to come up with responses off-the-cuff and able to just roll with it. My responses feel forced; they're often incomplete thoughts I have when speaking, and I'll trip over my words because something either sounded wrong, or there was a communication error between my brain and my mouth. It's like there's a DSL connection in my brain, that often hiccups and gets interrupted, where a lot of other people have fiber-optic connections in their brains. How I often deal with this (especially when talking to people I don't know) is to try to figure out patterns and defaults for my responses so I don't sound like I'm trying to force my way through a conversation. To give an example, I'll list the conversation I normally have when getting a coffee at Starbucks: "How are you doing today?" >"Doing all right, how are you doing?" "I'm doing good! What can I get started for you?" >"Could I get a grande Pike Place roast, please?" "Would you like room for cream?" >"No, thank you." "That'll be [price that I can't remember]." >I pay. "Would you like a copy of your receipt?" >"That won't be necessary, thank you." Ideally, this is how I like all my conversations to go: there's a pattern, and I have a response to each question I'm asked, almost like going through a dialogue tree in an RPG. When someone tries to make small talk with me, i.e. complimenting me on my clothing, asking what my plan for the day is, etc. that usually throws me off. I've gotten better about it since I have a better idea of when to expect it, but it feels like I quickly have to come up with a response and nothing I say sounds right. Was what I said a natural end to the conversation? Did my tone sound okay? Did I sound like I was trying to dismiss them? Thankfully, with the advent of the internet and online chat, I can find my voice via text, as the pressure is off to come up with anything immediately (though there are instances where I do have that issue, especially in group chats). That means I can type something out, look at it, and revise it as needed before I hit "send". Most chat clients also have an "edit" button too, so I don't have to freak out whenever I use the same words twice in a row somehow. Another thing I struggle with (and am still trying to figure out how to get around) is with regulating information in my brain. Of course, I have an issue when there's too much information for me to process at once and I'll go into "panic" mode. This is a huge reason why I can't play RTS games or MOBAs: there's a lot of information to consider and you need to make those decisions quickly. I can't think of a single time where I was playing League of Legends and wasn't on the verge of a mental breakdown because I couldn't handle everything happening onscreen. Top that with not feeling like I was contributing much in the way of conversation with the friend group I was playing with, and it was absolutely miserable, often followed up with some sort of existential crisis. Not only that, though, I also came across an issue where I don't have *enough* stimulation or information to process through. When I was working as a chat support representative, I *needed* something to listen to while chatting with customers. It had to be a song of some kind, something where I didn't actually need to pay attention to what's going on, or else that would be too much information for me to process and I'd need to stop everything I was doing so I could recalibrate. One more facet I'd like to talk about is something called echolalia. Echolalia is where a person will repeat what someone else is saying or has said subconsciously. This is usually how children learn to speak, but is common with people on the autism spectrum. How I experience this is that someone will tell me or ask me something, and then I'll repeat that statement or question to internalize it or to buy me time while I come up with an answer. It may not even be something directly said to me, rather something that is said and I'll repeat it for little reason, often from something I watched. For example, I'll just quote Teen Girl Squad to myself, almost like I'm reciting it (and it's usually from this episode https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugqniGO4IJc). It's advantageous to me, as it makes things easier to memorize for me, but I would see why people would get annoyed by it. Unless people suddenly are cool with me saying "HI DANIEL" in the same way Connor does in Detroit: Become Human whenever I see/hear a Daniel. In any case, I'm glad to get all of that written down. I may have more to write about regarding this subject in the future, so I hope to revisit the topic soon. Thanks for reading.