Today I would like to tell you about special interests which is a thing, people with Asperger’s often have. It might sound like having normal interest in things but in my opinion I would say it is not similar so I have made a little comparing here before I will talk about it. I am not sure if all Asperger’s will agree with me but like I said it is my opinion and feeling about it. For the record at the moment and for a long time my special interest has been China.
| No. | NT interest | Asperger’s “Special” interest |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | Can learn new things about it | Often learns something and then does not care if right or wrong |
| 2. | Can talk about other things | Really wants to talk about it and often cannot stop |
| 3. | Can have more than one interest | Often only one at the time but can change over time |
| 4. | Can ‘snap out’ of it | Sometimes we get so focused we forget time and place |
| 5. | Covers a ‘whole’ area | Can be very specific |
Lets start with number 1. row. I often feel that if I have learned something in my special interest I cannot just change the ‘facts’ about it even that something new tells me otherwise but I have had different subjects as special interest over the years so is now more open to new facts and it does not ruin my mood or other things about the subject. I feel the 2. row gives itself meaning but to clear up any miss understanding I feel if I get started on my favorite subject it is sometimes hard for me to stop again and together with 4. I feel it is often hard to not focus on even we might be hungry and everything. Row 3. first of all it is not entire clear but I feel Asperger’s can have interests which are not special interest like NT’s but I feel it is needed to say that it is not the same. As like I already said, it is a bit more than just being interested. As for row 5 it means that if a NT is interested in cars then maybe the Asperger’s special interest version can be that he like a certain brand or maybe even deeper a certain car part like the breaks. It is a bit like watching a movie, Asperger’s see the details but NT see the whole movie.
As you can see it can be very different and of course I am not saying that NT’s cannot be really interested in a certain subject as well.
Story time
To end this post I would like to tell a short story about my special interest back when I did not know I had Asperger’s or knew about special interest for that matter. The story starts in primary school in 5. grade. My danish language teacher at the time presented me for the idea which was a booklet where you was allowed to write down everything you wanted from plant to the animal kingdom and everything else. My special interest back then was space so wrote a lot about it, actually I wrote so much that my danish teacher wanted me to write something else so she banned me from writing it. But since I was so interested in it I could not just stop myself from writing more but I was not stupid as I did not want her to punish me, so I created some pages I called the ‘naughty’ pages and inside them I wrote everything I wanted about space that I wanted. Time went on and one day my teacher of course caught me but because of my funny work-around she could not stop laughing even she wanted to be a bit angry at me and instead she gave up and allowed me to write even more about space.
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You but different 