7-27-12 Why is everything in life so hard?

[Tamar]

As a psychology major (B.Sc. as of last month), I'm tempted to weigh in on a diagnosis for Ronnie, but the thing is, the more one studies psych, the more one realizes diagnosis of mental disorders is far from an exact science. While there's clearly something maladjusted about his personality and behaviour, and there are at least several disorders or syndromes in the book that could match them, I'm hesitant to do so because we've still only just been introduced to him. So just as I wouldn't feel comfortable giving an assessment or diagnosis of a real-life patient or client in the first, say, twenty minutes of knowing that person, I don't think I can confidently do so with Ronnie.

That said, because Ronnie is a fictional character, we certainly can't do him any harm by diagnosing him, so just because I hesitate to, doesn't mean others should! It is an interesting discussion.

[Artemisia]

Well Tamar...you're always welcome to diagnose me :p

But, yeah, we can't really diagnose a fictional character very well when we just start learning about them.

[Bardlp]

@Tamar -- True. And not all maladjustment qualifies as a diagnosis. Ronnie could just be a jerk who also happens to be bad at people. Like that joke I stole from SP goes, "His special need is to be a little jerk".

Or we could settle on PDNOS for the moment.

[unavoidablytiger]

My best friend's older brother has pretty severe Asperger's. He's the only person I've ever met who has it, so I really couldn't generalize either, but I do know that all he wants to talk about are things HE has a deep interest in. Video games, comic books, his dog... He's a sweetheart, but I've had him literally just smile, turn around, and walk away in the middle of a sentence if I've suddenly started talking about something he isn't interested in. He definitely wouldn't have sat still or listened long enough to even get to the part where Ronnie felt insulted.

This. I only know one guy with Asperger's (my older brother) but my experience is right in line with this. Loves loves loves to talk about his big interests, and very little else.

Sitting silently and constantly analyzing what other people are saying? Holding back emotions until he snaps and punches someone? Big fat NO on that. The lack of empathy and social problems that I mostly see with my brother come from him literally not taking in the social cues people are giving him. He is oblivious, and as a result does NOT spend any time analyzing what other people said or did, because it just never registered in the first place. He's a lot more likely to assume someone is his friend than his enemy, because he can't see when people get annoyed with him.

Buuut... I have seen my brother slip into some sort of defensive mode if he had been bullied or yelled at, where he would glare and stalk around and be willing to assume that everyone was being a jerkass. Kind of like he didn't see the signs of violence beforehand, so he has to keep a wall up against everyone because he can't see it coming. But this was a reaciton he had only if he had been bullied severely enough for it to be unmistakeable (violence or yelling in his face). And he is super quick to forgive, even when he shouldn't.

*shrug* Just my experience. I think if Ronnie is an Aspie, he's an abused Aspie.

[EagleEye]

So I think this is probably an unpopular opinion, but I wanted to just chime in with my view. I actually felt better about Ronnie after seeing this particular comic. I know his practical concerns are all rather self-centered, but that's the kind of thing you'd think about in this situation. I doubt he has any idea how badly he injured Michael, which may explain his lack of concern. Obviously "goatee guy" has already made it a "big deal" if he's gone to the hospital, so I don't think Ronnie has any clue. Plus he is full of doubt, wondering whether Michael actually just wanted to be friends and sort of calling himself out for "always assuming". Far from ideal, but at least it seems to me that he realizes he did something wrong on SOME level, or that he at least misinterpreted the situation.

Basically, I think it's progress. A tiny amount, but progress.

[Jace]

Hmm. The 'practical concerns' list makes me wonder if that's just how he thinks most of the time. Seems like a call back to the analytical way he was judging people in flashback...

And then it all goes out of kilter when he tries thinking in less neat lines, on less quantifiable subjects.

Yeah, I'm not picking that Ronnie WANTS to be a jerk, he's just really, really bad at socialising, at the very least. Never quite fit in and so never really learned to relate... And probably never lashed out before, hence the euphoria. Really, he strikes me as fairly emotionally immature and introverted to the point where he possibly can't even connect cause and effect... ie, he punched Michael, and that's what Hank is there about...

Honestly, I wonder if I might have ended up that way had things gone worse.

[CJ]

My younger sister has Asperger's:

"People with Asperger's are generally neat": HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHALOLROFLMFAYOUARETOOFUNNY.

Are there people like that? Sure. But getting my sister to take a shower on anything resembling a regular basis is a headache, and even then she doesn't wash properly. She doesn't like the way the water feels. She doesn't like brushing her teeth because she doesn't like the way it feels. There was a period when I was in high school (and, honestly, still today) where I will refuse to hug her if she smells. And when I say smell, I mean she reeks of sweat and other things. And her room is, well, let's just say "disheveled" at the least.

Other quirks of hers:

"Likes to talk only about things their interested in." Gods, if we could get her to talk at all. And if she does talk, it's not exactly about "what she's interested in." It's more "I think this is funny and I will tell this joke every five minutes but I will deny that I am telling it every five minutes." For example, today she went driving with my dad (she's got her permit). She, unfortunately, passed the mailman six times. So when she came home, the first thing she said was "There are TOO MANY MAILMEN. That's all I'm saying." And proceeded to say that "randomly" every five-ish minutes for the next two hours. But if you want to talk to her while she's lost on her computer/in her music, she will scream her head off for bothering her because she does not want to deal with you.

She does very much live in her own world, and believes certain things about this world vehemently, particularly things about herself. If every person in the room tells her that she is yelling too loud, she will proceed to yell "I'm not yelling. You are all lying!" Because, in her mind, she isn't yelling, and you are simply perceiving the situation wrong.

She also misses getting bullied most of the time...we think. I mean, I'm sure she sort of gets some of it, but either a lot of it goes over her head, or she ignores it because the information is useless and thus ignored. She misses a LOT because she lives in her own world. She's very detached, and very happy within her own mental space.

As for Ronnie being Aspy, well, there's a lot of different kinds, as you can tell by the various testimonials so far. But one basic Aspy trait that I can't tell with Ronnie is this: looking people in the eye. Most people with Asperger's cannot look at you in the eye while talking. They look at other things, other directions, or around you. But I don't think Ronnie does that, or maybe I just haven't noticed.

*Shrugs* Just sharing.

[Valerie]

My best friend's older brother has pretty severe Asperger's. He's the only person I've ever met who has it, so I really couldn't generalize either, but I do know that all he wants to talk about are things HE has a deep interest in. Video games, comic books, his dog... He's a sweetheart, but I've had him literally just smile, turn around, and walk away in the middle of a sentence if I've suddenly started talking about something he isn't interested in. He definitely wouldn't have sat still or listened long enough to even get to the part where Ronnie felt insulted.

This. I only know one guy with Asperger's (my older brother) but my experience is right in line with this. Loves loves loves to talk about his big interests, and very little else.

Sitting silently and constantly analyzing what other people are saying? Holding back emotions until he snaps and punches someone? Big fat NO on that. The lack of empathy and social problems that I mostly see with my brother come from him literally not taking in the social cues people are giving him. He is oblivious, and as a result does NOT spend any time analyzing what other people said or did, because it just never registered in the first place. He's a lot more likely to assume someone is his friend than his enemy, because he can't see when people get annoyed with him.

Buuut... I have seen my brother slip into some sort of defensive mode if he had been bullied or yelled at, where he would glare and stalk around and be willing to assume that everyone was being a jerkass. Kind of like he didn't see the signs of violence beforehand, so he has to keep a wall up against everyone because he can't see it coming. But this was a reaciton he had only if he had been bullied severely enough for it to be unmistakeable (violence or yelling in his face). And he is super quick to forgive, even when he shouldn't.

*shrug* Just my experience. I think if Ronnie is an Aspie, he's an abused Aspie.

He might have IED?

Anyway, it's worth saying that autism is a huge spectrum that covers a huge area of intelligence, social interaction, etc. I have two siblings, a niece, and a cousin with it. (Holy shit, what is in our genes!?) The niece is four, so I don't know how much of her behavior can count toward this conversation, but she's a sweetheart and very emotional. (Again, maybe because she's four.) My sister (11) is high-functioning and has fascinations that stick. She loves the weather. That's her big thing. My brother (20) is very low-functioning and has fascinations that stick. He loves analog clocks, light switches, and ceiling fans. (Fun fact: I didn't have analog clocks at home as a kid because he always broke them. I didn't learn how to read them until like middle school.) My cousin (who does not have an official diagnosis yet but therapists have been speculating that he is autistic in some way) is somewhere between my brother and sister, in terms of high/low function, and and his fascinations change, but are always intense.

So when we look at autism in its various forms, we can see that intelligence varies, ability to be social may vary (even if only superficially), fascinations can either stick or change, there may be verbal/physical tics or there may not (such as stuttering, overly formal speech patterns, mixing up words, flapping hands, etc.), and so many other things. The only thing that really seems to be consistent (from what I gather) is that their mental processing is different. Autistic people do analyze. They remember things that are odd to remember, by neurotypical standards. So Ronnie's behavior by sitting here and trying to figure out what just happened might be something an actual autistic person would do.

And maybe Ronnie's had therapy for it and got a bad therapist. One that said something like, "I know you don't care, but just sit there and listen anyway or you'll be rude." If he is autistic, he's clearly on the high-functioning end, for the fact that he's in college in the first place.

(Please note that I am deff not a professional on this. I just have experience with a handful of autistic people and have read about it a bit.)

[Valerie]

It occurs to me that I could have just added to CJ's post. She hit some details that I missed.

My younger sister has Asperger's:

"People with Asperger's are generally neat": HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHALOLROFLMFAYOUARETOOFUNNY.

Are there people like that? Sure. But getting my sister to take a shower on anything resembling a regular basis is a headache, and even then she doesn't wash properly. She doesn't like the way the water feels. She doesn't like brushing her teeth because she doesn't like the way it feels. There was a period when I was in high school (and, honestly, still today) where I will refuse to hug her if she smells. And when I say smell, I mean she reeks of sweat and other things. And her room is, well, let's just say "disheveled" at the least.

A lot of autistic people are touch-aversive, so they don't like the way lots of things feel. When my brother gives hugs, he has to have full-body contact, which is awkward for me. I assume he simply doesn't like pressure being on one part of his body.

My sister, when she was younger, hated wearing clothes. It took us a few years to get her to wear them. She does it just fine now, though she seems to dislike bras. (But who doesn't?)

Other quirks of hers:

"Likes to talk only about things their interested in." Gods, if we could get her to talk at all. And if she does talk, it's not exactly about "what she's interested in." It's more "I think this is funny and I will tell this joke every five minutes but I will deny that I am telling it every five minutes." For example, today she went driving with my dad (she's got her permit). She, unfortunately, passed the mailman six times. So when she came home, the first thing she said was "There are TOO MANY MAILMEN. That's all I'm saying." And proceeded to say that "randomly" every five-ish minutes for the next two hours. But if you want to talk to her while she's lost on her computer/in her music, she will scream her head off for bothering her because she does not want to deal with you.

This is the same as my sister, to a T. She talks more than your sister, it seems, but she holds onto things that she finds funny and repeats them often. (Not every five minutes for two hours, but closer to once or twice a day for a year or more, if she sees the person that originated the joke.)

My brother, on the other hand, is non-verbal. He is in a developmental center and they have been getting him to talk more, according to my mom. (I haven't gone to see him in a few years, so I'll have to take her word for it.)

As for Ronnie being Aspy, well, there's a lot of different kinds, as you can tell by the various testimonials so far. But one basic Aspy trait that I can't tell with Ronnie is this: looking people in the eye. Most people with Asperger's cannot look at you in the eye while talking. They look at other things, other directions, or around you. But I don't think Ronnie does that, or maybe I just haven't noticed.

My sister and cousin are able to look people in the eye. This might be something that varies.

[Bardlp]

Eyecontact is a cultural artifact, too. In Western cultures, it's viewed as "trustworthy" most of the time and "threatening" some of the time. In most other cultures, it's the other way around. Even with our ideas about eyecontact, Westerners tend to not do it as much as we think we do. I know I tend to look at peoples' mouths far more than their eyes, but that may be due to my hearing more than anything else.

[Valerie]

While we're on the topic, if anyone is interested in learning a little bit more about how autism affects people living with it, this forum helped me get a little bit more perspective on the matter. I mostly just lurked a little bit and posted one topic asking about sibling relationships a while back.

Neurotypical people seem to be welcome, but it's probably best to look around first and get an idea of what you should or should not say, to avoid upsetting anyone. On the other hand, I'm sure the people there would be willing to answer any questions about autism that you may have.

[retrophrenologist]

He might have IED?

Ronnie is a suicide bomber!!!

Sorry, I couldn't resist.