<p>peter_parker, this reply is for you:</p>
<p>Even though your last message on this thread was not addressed to me, I felt so offended when I read it that I have decided to respond to it almost as if it had been addressed to me.</p>
<p>"I’m majoring in psychology (only undergrad, but meh). I think it’s unlikely you have any social disorders - you have to consider the fact that you may THINK you have them or WANT to have them as a convenient excuse to give up or rationalize how things turned out as they did. "</p>
<p>Even if TA thinks she has “social disorders” or wants to have them, it doesn’t mean that she doesn’t have them. You remind me of a psychologist I saw one time: very hesitant to diagnose me with anything other than depression. I knew I had something else, something deeper than depression, I just didn’t know what, and thanks to that **** I spent many years feeling distrustful, almost paranoid, of psychologists. I eventually mustered up the courage to see a specialist and was diagnosed with a personality disorder along with other conditions. Denying that mental problems exist is not going to make the patient think that he is normal and all of a sudden be happy and functional. That approach might work with a patient with an IQ of 90, but what if the patient is not daft? Is the anxiety that you will cause the patient by denying what the patient knows is the truth, justified? I want you to think long and hard about that question because many of you “psychologists” and psychologist-wannabes clearly don’t understand human psychology as well as they think they do.</p>
<p>“Social disorders certainly exist - Autism obviously does.”</p>
<p>You acknowledge that social disorders and autism exist and yet you brush off TA by telling her it’s unlikely that she has a social disorder, after ALL the desperate pleas for help she has made on this forum. Is it unlikely that a random person walking down the street has a social disorder? Yeah. In TA’s case, however, it is obvious that she has something. In fact, she mentioned in another thread that she was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome (a form of autism) along with other disorders.</p>
<p>“But some things are more dubious - for instance ADD and ADHD were almost certainly made up disorders - but I wouldn’t go trumpeting that around, it’ll anger a lot of people. I’m not going to go into it, but the diseases came out a year after “Ritalin” was born and pharm companies needed a disease to go along with it, otherwise why would people buy the drug “to focus” better? Tell them they have a disorder and make them buy meds, that’s this country for you. Anything for dollars here, folks.”</p>
<p>There are no medications for Autism or Asperger’s Syndrome.</p>
<p>“Some diseases hardly seem relevant. Like social anxiety disorder, which is pretty vague. Who doesn’t get nervous in some social situations? The “disease” is merely a collection of symptoms that basically say you get anxious frequently in social situations. IOW the symptoms are the disease are the symptoms. Hey, maybe the person gets anxious because they have a negative self-concept, their parents yelled a lot as a child, there was a history of bullying at a young age, the person has negative expectations. It’s not a disease anymore than being sad a funeral is a disease or running out of gas is a disease. Yes, it is a problem that has come up. Labeling something “a disease” is just a convenient way to take away accountability and offer quick-fix drugs.”</p>
<p>Whether people get nervous in social situations or not is not the point. When a person gets so nervous in the most simple social situations to the point that they can’t function, that’s when it is said that the person has social anxiety. Feeling emotions is not the same as having a mental illness. The problem is when those emotions are so pervasive and so exaggerated that the person can’t function.</p>
<p>“So let’s just say you don’t have any disease here, at all. If you haven’t been diagnosed with it, then you don’t have it.”</p>
<p>That’s your cure for all the diseases in the world right there: stop diagnosing them!</p>
<p>“Even on the remote chance that you do have a disease, are you going to be walking around with that crutch your entire life, or try to improve your situation regardless? It’s irrelevant here.”</p>
<p>Her having a disease or a condition is not irrelevant at all. If she knows what she has, perhaps she will obtain adequate help, the type of help that might actually work with a person who has what she has.</p>
<p>“YOU CAN CHANGE. If you want different results, start changing your behavior.”</p>
<p>It’s not so simple when your brain is literally not wired like that of most people. Also, emotional problems and other social handicaps such as inability to express ideas coherently or read social cues will make it almost impossible for TA to learn to socialize like normal people do.</p>
<p>“Or option B, attempt to wallow in a pity party and pretend other people are going to care about your long-term life in a meaningful way (everyone cares about their own direction).”</p>
<p>Or option C, TA needs to figure out exactly what she has so she can get adequate help. Ignoring that she has a problem won’t make it go away.</p>
<p>“The fastest way to acquire social skills is to throw yourself out there, throw caution to the wind, and live on risk and vulnerability.”</p>
<p>False in this case. How do you know that TA has the mental capacity to learn social skills by means of observation and trial and error? That approach might work with neurotypical people, but TA has Asperger’s Syndrome. Your advice simply shows that A you haven’t been reading TA’s messages or B you lack basic knowledge of Asperger’s Syndrome.</p>
<p>“You sound like you might be pretty timid now. You are afraid people are judging what you are saying, what you are doing, yadda yadda. Everyone experiences that to a degree. But you have to go out there and talk to people.”</p>
<p>What if she can’t come up with anything to say? What if the only thing she is good at talking about is some random, obscure subject? Is it socially appropriate to approach strangers and lecture them on obscure subjects they probably don’t care about?</p>
<p>"Strike up conversations with strangers. Just say anything. What’s the time? Where is X? What is that you’re reading? Hey, cool shoes. "</p>
<p>That’s the opener. And then how does she sustain the conversation? What does she need to say to keep it going? Where is the script she needs to follow?</p>
<p>“TAKE RISKS.”</p>
<p>TA needs to take into account the amount of emotional damage she would suffer if she takes a risk and fails. In my opinion, a life of trauma is not something people should gamble with.</p>
<p>“Become closer to aquaintances. Exchange numbers, talk to them more often, call them up and invite them over or out to do something.”</p>
<p>They are going to tell her that they are busy, or that they have plans, etc. The few times that they will go out with her (I’m being optimistic here) it will be solely out of pity.</p>
<p>"Meet people. Stop walking on eggshells and put yourself out there, there are awkward bumps along the way, but that’s the point — you learn to deal with them. And soon when you become more socially skilled, everything just becomes easier. "</p>
<p>People with Asperger’s Syndrome and other social disabilities don’t learn social skills the way “normal” people do.</p>