I'm kinda sick of hearing about Aspergers as a "disability." It is a "difference" for sure, and growing up I had every. single. symptom. Undiagnosed because it wasn't even named until I was a senior in high school. So I was depressed, felt outcast, like an alien, who just couldn't communicate with the creatures on this planet I was on.
I never was on a sports team, never dated, didn't have many friends. Instead I would tape cartoons and go home and watch them in slow motion and record the movements so I could draw animations. I escaped the world through art, and that carried into my college years. I almost had a boyfriend there…poor guy had no idea what he was up against. Whatever I was interested in, I was an expert in, to the exclusion of everything else. It nearly ruined me, but then I found a career where concentration, doing things the same way over and over and near ritualism are actually something that others have to work at. So I was awesome at my chosen field.
Then I heard about Aspergers, because my boyfriend of 4 years had about enough of me and was trying to figure out why my "communication" wasn't what he needed in a relationship. I took all of the tests and scored at the far end of every chart, every time, again and again.
Here's the deal.
There is no "disability." A lot of people on earth are wired with DC Power. What you see is what you get. Input=Output. Then there are some of us with AC current that just can't plug into the power outlets the world provides. We come without a rectifier to help us translate our wiring to yours. So instead of telling us we have to accept that we're disabled, instead people need to see that they are not built like the others in the majority. You have to learn to slowly build your translator….your transformer rectifier that translates our AC to the world's DC.
But you can't expect them to change. It's an inherent wiring difference and it's for a reason. Kids/people wired in the way society has labeled "Aspergers" are uniquely suited to things that others are not. Only they can do what they can do and if anything, it's the job of the parents and teachers to help the find what that purpose is, not feed them with the lie that they are disabled.
Yes there are different subset levels and no one is the same, but one thing is for sure. People with the label known as Aspergers are not stupid and understand when they are being called "deficient" and "less than the others." They need to be talked to differently, interacted with differently and what may seem like something stupid to someone "normal" like a loud noise, could be earth-shattering to someone with a different neural wiring.
Being the majority doesn't make something "right" and being a minority doesn't make something "wrong." Fact is, if you called me on the phone what you'd hear would be less than impressive, but because writing slows my thoughts down to the speed of my hands, I can communicate in a way that I can't verbally.
I'm just saying. Take it from someone who has learned to see this as a HUGE advantage, rather than a detriment. I'm socially "dysfunctional" by every definition, but what I have done in my life is far in excess what people think of when they hear "mentally disabled."
If I could say one thing to every kid with Aspergers, it's that there is nothing wrong with you. You are tuned to a different frequency that the others can't receive. It isn't about medication and forcing you to "be like the others." It's about realizing that "Aspergers" people can do things that others can't, and it should be something they learn wear proudly.