a touch of aspie...

I know that mental Health Awareness day has come and gone, But I received a letter from someone that (after having on my site I have Aspberger's Syndrome) I was one of those people that am not really affected by it ( I have a mild form of this Syndrome) It got me thinking in what all I have been thru with this syndrome to touch topics on how mental Health affects people, especially the people who have it.

I know that as I have, many of you people are affected with a Mental Disibility (you don't have to present it here) that you have, or that someone else has, and you are living your life around this "thing" that affects you in some way or another. In many ways, my Disability, has been both a blessing and a curse. My blessing is that I have been able to help people around me with my "Gift" of knowledge of Computers (or what I know), and the curse I have, is that I am very socially withdrawn. This is apart of my Syndrome.

I have been ridiculed for my disibilty all thru-out my life and have been even in danger because of my disibility (High-school bullying until I am a bloody-pulp) And many of you have been affected by your disibility in ways that may put you in danger. I am not going to use this as an excuse saying that "I can't work (Because I can!!)" or "Pity me, I have a disibility" I am giving an FYI out there those that do not read enough into the disibilty or do not try to look at it from the person with the Mental Health Disibility, and go off saying to people that have a mild form or the disibility "You are an exception to the mass because I don't think it affects you enough"

While working, I have been harrased by these people who cannot even make the simplest exceptions for me to do my job in whatever I am doing because they don't think my Asperger's Syndrome is severe enough to affect me in my work environment. That's because they have never experienced what It is to have something that changes the way they think thru-out their life, even if it is just a 'small' thing. They go off and spout that I cannot possbily have a disorder that would affect the way I operate in a minute-by-minute pace even if in just a small time period.

And I am not giving an excuse for people who have disabilities to sit on their butts and do nothing and claim that they can't work, IF THEY CAN! I am merely suggesting that people should try to experience what it is that the person around them has in a daily basis to see how much a simple thing affects us. I see this was too often of a case in my School years (1st grade thru end of highschool)
I am a very high functioning person with this (dis)ability, and have been denied provisions or help with my schooling because it was not severe enough to make me eligable for tutoring and other special accomidations. That's because these people have never had a son/daughter/other relative with a disability that affected him/her as much, unless the child/person was affected by it so much, that they were labeled 'incompetent' (as I have heard one of the councelors label a special needs child *Shudders*)
And it does not affect you over a short term run of what you have in front of you at this moment. Let me give you a brief history:

Nebraska, USA has one of the most poorest health care systems out there. I have been in at least 7 hospitals over my life, and of all of them, none of them has NOT affected me, as in such, I cringe about the time I passed away in those places. It gives me nightmares when I have to go into them for a medication readjustment. This was up until I was 17, when they found out that what they thought they were doing was "Behavioural Corrections" was actually a part of my syndrome. Now, seeing as I have a lite form of this, I was treated, because of the symptoms I have, as a person that had been defiant all my life, because I was not as 'Social' as the other patients, and it was enforced upon me to change something that I cannotchange.
This has left me with some bitter feeling with some of those "Quacks" that call themselves phsychiatric professors that just read books and do not interact or try to 'understand' how this disibilty affects people. Same goes for people in the real world that love to make assumptions. They don't even try to understand about what a disabled person is dealing with, whether the person has it a little, or a lot. I have found that I have been denied jobs because I have told people that I have this, because the employers don't want to deal with it. (I don't require too much accomidation. I just need to be told bluntly about some stuff, and I may need a breather when I have panic attacks (another thing I have time-to-time)

People should at least find out and show some curiosity as to what these people need and how you (The person without the disibility) should interact with the person that has it, to make it easier for everyone. I don't think many people with the disibility would ridicule you for asking about what they have, and how it affects them. You would be surprised what little accomodation these people need, and in fact you may learn something.

To get to the point, It doesn't hurt to step into the others shoes and figure out for yourselves how something so little, can affect you so much. I am not pointing fingers here or giving excuses, I just thought you might want to hear from someone who has a little experience of what a Disibility that is small, affects them so big

links that are relevent to what I am, and a portion what I am talking about:

autism
Aspbergers Syndrome
other mental health disorders

oh, and I encourage you to find someone that has a mental health disorder, you might be interested in really how different it is between the world you are in, and they world in which they live. they can tell you some fascinating stuff into how the human brain works. a lot of them knwo quite a bit about what their disorder is, and how it affects them

P.S. It is not my intent to belittle anyone, or accuse, or make fun anyone, and it is certainly not my intent to do an "In your face" tactic.