Undiagnosed aspergirls

So... I do sometimes wonder about some of the people around me, who display some autistic tendencies. I know that there must be significant numbers of undiagnosed autistic women my age walking around, who have no idea why they have difficulties sometimes getting on with their peers, or why they get in trouble for being too outspoken at work.

I can think of two women I've met in the last 6 months who I've seen getting themselves in trouble. Both of them don't seem able to stop themselves from saying things they really shouldn't have said, when they thought they were being humorous.

It raises a lot of sympathetic feelings to see somebody doing that, because I know the slightly lost feeling when you let yourself go, thinking that you're belonging in a group, then suddenly it all goes wrong, and you know you did something wrong, but you don't know what or why you did it. Worse still is when you go on your merry way, thinking everything is hunky-dory and as soon as you've gone, everything falls apart, and you only hear about it hours or days later, when it's too late to fix it, or explain anything, and you're the baddy.

I see that lost, hurt, uncomprehending look on their faces, and I want to help. I remember some of the things that people have said to me and about me over the years,

"You do know you come across as quite aggressive?" (age 19)
"She's over there crying her eyes out, while you're over here partying." (age 30)
"You're very masculine aren't you." (age 42)
"so now you're writing a novel! I never know what you're going to come up with next." (age 43)

These are all branded on my soul, along with many others similar. Not knowing why things were going so badly wrong was so much worse than knowing. I wish I could fix it for those women, or at least explain to them that they're not alone. If this blog reaches one such woman and helps her to understand herself a little better, that will be more than enough reason to write it!

With thanks to Rudy Simone, for having the courage to write such an amazing book, that tells it how it really is, and helps Aspergirls to reflect on their lives.