Do You Have Asperger Syndrome?

Until recently, I had never heard of Asperger's Syndrome until a work mate said that he thought some engineers might suffer a mild form of this, including themself.

Asperger's Syndrome has quite a few characteristics, and one of which is difficulties with social behaviour and being unable to see the subtexts of social interactions. I must now say that I think of it, some engineers do suffer this syndrome. Stereotypical engineer's behaviour may be mistakenly seen as just being nerdy and so into a particular topic, but it might actually be a physical problem.

I think I know a few people who may suffer a very mild case of Asperger's. I say this because they just seem to not be able to read the social signs at all. I know that when a particular person I know starts talking, I completely shut off now and don't hear a single word. I've learnt to do this due to experience. When I first met them, I actually talked to them, but as more and more time passed by, I found that the stories just kept getting repeated. The person loved to talk, but would not hear much of what I said back, which I thought was very rude at the beginning. This person is able to talk through a whole lunch time non-stop while no one else said anything. They did not even seem to notice, switching to new topics all of a sudden when no one had said anything. I just got so bored and hence now just switch off.

I avoid talking to this person now as I don't really want to be bored by endless topics that I have no interest in. I don't start conversations but still find that they will talk to me. I think I am displaying all the signs of disinterest that I can possibly think of, but they just don't seem to see the signs. I'm not making eye contact at all, I've got my body turned away, I don't acknowledge that I've heard what they say with any sounds at all, but none of these signs seem to get through. Even when I turned away to talk to someone else, the person tapped me on the arm and wanted to finish what they were saying even though I'm clearly not interested. When I'm in conversations with other people, they will just interrupt and totally hijack the conversation and I would not get a word in. Usually I just walk away now.

It's not the person's fault. A work mate told me that they suspect that they have Asperger's syndrome because they will just keep talking and not even realise if people are listening or look bored. They said they just don't see the signs at all and therefore doesn't feel self conscious that they are boring someone. Generally, you can pick up very quickly whether someone is really listening to you or already lost interest in a topic, but Asperger suffers don't seem to have this skill. Hence they may actually seem rude to other people because they will keep going even when the other person has shown total disinterest.

I talk a lot too, but hopefully I don't have Asperger's syndrome. I think I know when people are looking bored and I will stop. Although sometimes when I talk about topics that really interest me, I do keep going on because I'm so enthusiastic about it that I may be possibly boring people. Hence, after finding out about Asperger's, I now ask people "Is this boring you, tell me if it is, I won't be offended", to which people will say yes or no. Fortunately it seems to be a lot of nos, so I think I don't have Asperger's syndrome.