Hullo Tim!

I have attended an employment training course targeted at people with
Asperger's and it is there that I confirmed the theory that there is
no one diagnosis of Aspergers.

As in the Neuro Typical population, there is a range (or "spectrum")
of characteristics of people with aspergers.

There were six people in our group and we were ALL different. One
person was a good communicator and had worked in retail sales.
Others
were "bookish" and shy. One was quite an extrovert with their own
way
of dealing with things.

My particular difficulties are face recognition and trying to
read "hidden" signals and expressions, for example I cannot tell when
someone is bored by my conversation. However, these vary from day
to
day, some days when I feel stressed or under pressure, the symptoms
get worse. Other days when I am well, people begin to wonder what my
problems are.

So what I am saying here is do not listen to Doctors who try to tell
you that you are (or not) on the autistic spectrum if you exhibit (
or
do not exhibit) certain diagnostic characteristics.

I have also read on this message board that some people have not seen
a list of characteristics some of which supposed to be exhibited by
people with asperegers.

In my humble opinion (and I am not a doctor or expert on this) the
list supplied by Roger Meyer is the one that I can relate to most of
all. You will find it in his book, Aspereger Syndrome employment
workbook,

http://www.rogernmeyer.com/as_employment_workbook_index.html


If you would like to see an "on line" list of these characteristics
try

http://www.josef.org/aspergers.html

and keep scrolling down until you reach the bottom of that page.

For a range of impressive surveys and their results based on these
criterea, try

http://www.spacehost.us/~aliki/autism/results.php?mode=4

where the Roger Meyer list is given with results to questions based
on
his impressive list of possible characteristics.

It is only when I read Roger Meyer's books that all my problems
suddenly "clicked" into place like a jigsaw.

I still do not think that I am fully autistic or have asperger's
syndrome (my psychiatrist insists that I am NOT on the spectrum) but
the traits listed by Roger Meyer resonate very strongly with me, and,
when under pressure I start to exhibit many of the traits described
there.

Sorry to go on at length and sorry for all those tedious links.

Hopes this helps some of you who have been posting on this message
board. Nice to see it "springing into life" again!

Yours for aye

Jannie