Empathy

Another thing I'm curious about. Aspies are supposed to lack empathy? You seem to me unusually empathetic.

These were the words in a mildly-amusing-as-well-as-flattering private message from someone I am friendly with online. Yes, the pervasive myth that people with Asperger's Syndrome lack empathy is still making rounds. It reminds me of some kind of abstract Hydra: That is, instead of cutting off one head just to watch two grow in its place, I clear up the "Aspies don't have empathy myth" for one person just to to have to clear it up for two more people. It is a myth that has gone viral and just seems impossible to stop.

Do Aspies lack empathy? The problem is that the term "empathy" has two very different meanings. Here's dictionary.com's definition:

the psychological identification with or vicarious experiencing of the feelings, thoughts, or attitudes of another.

In other words, the definition can be interpreted in two ways: 1) Cognitively understanding that someone else is suffering (or joyful); whether or not the person cares about these feelings is a different question entirely. 2) The visceral reaction someone gets when seeing someone else suffering (or being joyful); that is, he's suffering (or joyful), so I'm suffering (or joyful) too, or  Unfortunately, when most people use the term "empathy", they use it in the second definition I am referencing: they believe that the Aspie knows that the other person is upset or joyful but simply does not care.

Reasons Why Many People Believe Aspies Lack Empathy

1. Difficulties with cognitive empathy are mistaken for lack of sympathy 

Yes, it is true that people with Asperger's Syndrome sometimes have problems with cognitive empathy, which is one thing that gives rise to the myth that they lack sympathy, more specifically, for another person. Sometimes Aspies do not realize that somebody else is upset. Or perhaps they do understand that the other person is upset but cannot quite understand why (depending where on the spectrum they are!) and the upset person thinks that they are self-centered and don't care how other people feel. Often, once the Aspie realizes that the person is upset, he or she cares just as much as any neurotypical person would. Conversely, sociopaths have a lot of cognitive empathy-- and they exploit others' emotions for their own selfish whims.

To give a very concrete example of this phenomenon in my own life, I need look no further than my horrible years in middle school. More times than I can count, I would approach a crying friend (and I use the term loosely, because they were fair-weather friends!) and ask her what was wrong. Her other friends would glare at me and ask, "Where have you been all week?" Because I missed subtle cues that something had been bothering a friend all week and did not realize it until she was doing something obvious-- crying-- the other girls thought that I didn't care, that I was only concerned about myself. Middle school is often the worst for girls with Asperger's because girls at that age tend to form relationships based on emotional intimacy, secrets, etc., rather than a shared interest, such as a favorite movie. The social dynamics become more intense and demanding. Boys that age are more likely to form friendships around shared interests-- it is for that reason (and more) that I wish I had tried to befriend boys at around that age. I had much more in common with them in terms of interests and styles of social interaction. Today I find that I generally get along better with men than with women (unless it's in a setting with like-minded individuals; then gender makes no difference).


2. We find it exhausting to be social butterflies

My very neurotypical mother is a high school teacher. She learns all of her students' names very quickly. She gets to know each kid individually and knows all their likes and dislikes. Years later, if she runs into one of her students again, she usually remembers him or her. I could not do what she does. Ever.

In my years working at summer camps, I bonded with a few kids over common interests. For example, if a camper wanted to learn to draw, we would bond over that because it was something concrete I could teach them. Or they could at least show me their drawings and I would be interested in seeing them. But I have difficulty pretending to be interested in a little girl's love of princesses, for example. I was not one of those counselors who knew everything about each camper, and it always took me forever to learn everyone's name. I'm also terrible with faces, which didn't help matters.

Fortunately, many of these kids usually liked me because they thought I was fun and funny. In a video I shot during my CIT year at Camp Negev, some 11-year-old kids are jumping up and down and shouting, "We love you, Julie!" But I don't remember the names of most of the kids that I've worked with. My style in terms of working with kids involves a very narrow, usually impersonal focus. Kids who wanted to bond with their counselors on a more personal level usually went to their other counselors. Unless, of course, the kid has psychological/neurological issues. Then they came to me. Kids with such issues usually liked me, probably because I understood them better and could give them better advice.


3. We react differently than neurotypicals to another's joy or distress 

If somebody I barely know at work, for example, tells me that their mother is in the hospital, I do not gush with emotion. I think it's unfortunate, but I am not overwhelmed with emotion at this news. I say, "Oh, jeez. I hope she gets better," and I forget about it ten seconds later. The expected reaction-- from both sexes, but I think women especially-- is to react viscerally, or at least pretend to. That is, people are expected to at least seem extremely upset even if they don't know this person. And sorry, I think a lot of the time it is just an act if the person doesn't know the other person well. It is a social ritual to stay in others' good graces. Same with the social ritual where everybody tells a new mother that her baby is "perfect". Sure, some people mean it, but I think a good portion of them are lying, just saying what is expected of them. What do I say? I say what I mean. I tell the new mother that she's going to be a great parent.

The thing is, I sometimes question my own capacity for empathy. When something bad happens to a friend, I try to console him or her. But I do not get emotionally involved with the friend's issues. I just try my best to help. Am I in the minority? Do most people get emotionally involved? Do they get a visceral reaction, feeling the ache of the friend's breakup (for example) as if it were happening to them? I don't. And also, do I try to anticipate the possibility of hurting another's feelings or annoying them in some way because I genuinely care about their feelings, or am I just trying to avoid trouble for myself? Or both? I really don't know. And why do most people try to avoid hurting or annoying others? Does avoiding trouble for themselves factor in as well? I really don't know either.

I am more likely to get visceral reactions when I see a suffering animal than when I see a suffering person. I once broke off two pieces of bagel to give to two pigeons. One larger, dominant pigeon ate his share and stole the other pigeon's piece. When the smaller pigeon tried to eat his own share, the larger pigeon bit him. This made me really upset. I wanted to kick that bullying pigeon away from the little pigeon. I tried to feed the small pigeon again, but the same thing happened. I tried scaring the larger pigeon away by stamping my feet. It didn't work. I threw a piece of bread a few feet away so the larger pigeon would have to chase it. Unfortunately, the smaller pigeon gave chase as well, so I was unable to feed the smaller pigeon separately. It made me so angry that this little pigeon was barely able to take a bite while this alpha male (or female? I don't know what sex it was) got his way because he was bigger and stronger.

As for suffering people, I rarely get visceral reactions where they're concerned-- unless it involves children, particularly children who are victims of bullying. And I suppose the pigeon incident ties in nicely to my visceral reactions for the children who are victims of bullying.


4. We find ourselves in very extreme circumstances that makes it look like we lack empathy

The obsessive crushes I've discussed in a few blog posts immediately come to mind. Most people are able to move on if they think their crush is avoiding them. I simply couldn't. But I knew that it was also wrong to be pushy towards these guys that I liked. It was this constant balancing act, a psychological war in my mind to try to figure out how to allow myself to interact with them without being too pushy. As for the times I waited for them outside of buildings at summer camp and on my Israel trip, that was the end result of the warfare in my mind. On my 1997 Israel trip I didn't say, "Hey, you know, I think I'll wait for Charlie outside a building. That's not weird at all. That sounds like a great idea." Of course I knew it was weird, but I was just experiencing intensely powerful emotions that I couldn't handle. As a friend from that trip put it: "You were so gone over Charlie that you didn't know what to do." But to the observer it looks like stalking and lack of respect on my part. Even the following summer back at camp, in 1998, it was not enough that I implemented strict, assiduous controls for myself to make sure I did not fall into those same behaviors again (also discussed in the above linked post). Why? Because in the last week  or two of camp I did fall into those behaviors. People commented that I seemed self-centered for hyperfocusing on these crushes, and they did not realize that it was not a conscious decision. It was that my brain was hijacked by neuroterrorists, as I call it, and I just didn't know what to do.

In other circumstances, such as trying to navigate middle school and having to watch my every move lest others start trash-talking me, people would ask me, "Why are you so focused on yourself? Why don't you ask other people how they're doing?" Because when your emotional survival depends on not becoming a target for bullying, the last thing on your mind is how other people are doing.


5. We don't always relate to what upsets others or makes them happy

I get a strong, visceral reaction from seeing victims of bullying suffer, from seeing children with psychological/neurological issues suffer, and from seeing animals suffer. I do not get a visceral reaction from hearing that my friend is having problems with her boyfriend. I've never been in a relationship and cannot relate directly to this. When I try to help, I tap into my issue of obsessive crushes to try find something relatable, but that is the best that I can do. I really cannot deal with a friend's relationship drama, and I don't want to (though I want them to feel better, of course), and they probably shouldn't come to me anyway because I have no good advice for them. But I suppose I am flattered that they do come to me.

In terms of joy, I really cannot relate to the joy a parent feels when having a baby. I can't even imagine feeling joyful about having a baby. And if I had any doubts about my declaration about not wanting kids, they were torpedoed when I began having recurring dreams about being pregnant and feeling horrified (in a couple dreams, I had the baby and thought, "What am I supposed to do with this?") The only time I really cared when someone I knew had a baby was when my cousin gave birth. But it wasn't this whole motherhood-is-an-amazing-and-rewarding-and-beautiful thing or a babies-are-so-precious thing. It was more of, "Oh, cool.  This person I grew up with is having a kid. It will be fun to watch him grow up."

The Irony

Now wait a second. Isn't it only natural that people tend to empathize with and therefore sympathize what they can relate to? Most people can relate to relationship drama and babies, and so most people are going to have the expected reactions. On the the other hand, most people can't relate to a lot of what I have been through. The girls in my middle school could not relate to my inability to see that another girl was upset, and so they could not empathize with how my confusion tormented me. Most people cannot relate to needing space from games of social football, so to speak. They cannot see why such a thing would be exhausting. No sympathy there, either. Most people cannot relate to being bullied at school. They think that to be bullied as bad as I was that you have to bring it upon yourself. No sympathy. Obsessive crushes? Same deal. Not thinking about others' needs because one's own emotional survival is in jeopardy? Forget it.

In other words, many neurotypicals lack empathy and sympathy for people with Asperger's because they cannot relate to what we go through. But because their neurotype is in the majority, our not relating to them looks like lack of empathy and sympathy whereas their inability to relate to us simply means our circumstances are too weird to be relatable.

And one more thing...

I'm going to, once again, plug a book by my favorite non-fiction writer, Richard Dawkins. The Selfish Gene. It is a great book with a misleading title, and the gist of the book is that natural selection works on the level of the gene rather than the organism. The genes are selfish (in a metaphorical sense), and this selfishness of genes gives rise to altruism. After all, family members share copies of these genes, and being altruistic towards them increases their chances of being passed on to another generation.

I once had a conversation with my mother about how people go through social rituals that are often phony: telling someone their baby (which they really think is ugly) is "perfect", insisting on paying for a meal even though they know damned well that the other person is going to cover them anyway, offering a Christmas guest leftovers to take home even though the host knows the guest probably doesn't want them... I told my mother that I think these rituals are really to stay in the good grace of others who might be able to reciprocate someday when the stakes are higher. My mother, missing the point that I was trying to offer an evolutionary explanation for these rituals, said, "No, it just makes them feel good." Okay, fair enough. But what does "feeling good" mean? There is a reward system in the brain that perpetuates behaviors that benefit oneself. If I remember correctly, oxytocin in the brain is the reward. So while the person might "feel good" from helping someone else, ultimately the individual (or their genes, if you want to get technical) are benefiting.

We are all out for ourselves in the end, and no amount of sympathy and empathy-- no matter how genuine-- changes that fact.

Asperger's Crushes: When the Brain Gets Hijacked by Neuro-terrorists

When I was just a few months away from my fourteenth birthday, I still hadn't yet experienced my first crush. Quite frankly, I didn't want to even though it was something everybody expected of me. My mother nagged me about it relentlessly. I watched as girls, some of whom used to be fun to hang out with, seemingly dedicated their lives to snaring Cute Boys; it truly bordered on obsession. I had a history of stepping well over the border of obsession in terms of movies and television shows. Given how perversely aware I was of my obsessive nature, I was certain that once I got my first crush it would not border on obsession but would fall well over the border.


I was right. 


I had no idea how right I was. I got my first crush the following summer on one of my counselors, Jonas (not his real name), at overnight camp. It was my first year at camp, and Jonas reached out to me when he saw that I was struggling. I had a history of being bullied, so naturally I was paranoid at camp. If not for Jonas, I doubt I would have returned the following summer, let alone looked back at my camp years as among the best of my life. Jonas knew I had a crush on him and, fortunately, he was very understanding and patient about it and remained my friend and mentor for many years.


After Jonas, I developed crushes on a total of 8 other people. I am not attracted to people easily, but when I am it's overwhelming. With the exception of one person, Hans (not his real name), a friend from Germany from whom I got my first kiss, nobody reciprocated. They were generally either taken, older, or both. Sometimes my relationships with these people started out as friendships or positive acquaintanceships only to end in disaster with the person shutting me out entirely. I always assumed the person in question was not interested so I did my best to hide my feelings. I could not do it. I tried my best to figure out how to keep a low profile while still remaining friends/positive acquaintances with these people.


Sure, and maybe while I was at it I could enjoy the smell of a bacon cheeseburger without trying to eat it. 


While I have conquered many aspects of Asperger's syndrome, this is one that I still struggle with, probably because I'm not attracted to people easily and thus haven't had much experience controlling it. Like many people with AS, I always became intense with the person on whom I had a crush without meaning to. Once, I was even accused of stalking. This accusation is apparently very common for people with AS.


Why do we get obsessive crushes? Why is it that people with strong feelings can generally keep theirs hidden and we can't? My guess is this: We tend to have tunnel vision. We get hyperfocused. Getting hyperfocused doesn't end with a hobby or favorite movie. It manifests itself with people we find attractive. I read that the same chemicals in the brain that are involved in drug addiction manifest in the beginning stages of a person experiencing an infatuation. This is true with a person with a neurotypical brain. What, then, does a brain scan reveal in an Aspie who has a crush? 


I don't know. I don't have answers or advice to other Aspies who have struggled with this as much as I have. As far as I'm concerned, my otherwise rational brain gets hijacked by neuro-terrorists. But I want you to know something that I didn't until very recently:


You are not alone. 

The Road to (Self-) Diagnosis

Growing up in a small, homogeneous town in Pennsylvania, it was excruciatingly clear that I was different. I knew long before I started experiencing chronic teasing in second grade (which continued through ninth grade), long before other kids nicknamed me "Space Cadet" and "Alien." I knew it long before I began to sense that my parents thought there was something wrong with me, long before teachers and parents began calling my parents with "concerns." 


By fifth grade, I knew that I had ideas, perceptions, an imagination, and a sense of humor that often significantly deviated from what much of society expected. I also got inordinately obsessed with certain movies and television shows and I knew it was weird to do so. Like many people, I, too, thought that there was something wrong with me. I struggled to figure out why I was so different. But it was the early 1990s and I had never heard of the concept of someone's brain being hardwired differently, or even mental illness. In the '80s and '90s-- when I was growing up-- few people had. 


My parents first brought me to a psychologist in the middle of my fifth grade year. Dr. Klein (not his real name) told my parents and me what amounted to, "I don't know what to tell you. I've never seen anything like this before." I stopped seeing him after three years because it was clear that he wasn't helping and, although I liked him as a person, was notorious for analyzing things that had no deep meaning. 


The summer of 1998-- three years after I had last seen Dr. Klein-- was a major turning point in my life. The concept of people's brains being literally wired differently began to dawn on me, and it drastically influenced the way I understood myself as well as other people. I strongly suspected that my childhood and early adolescent obsessions with movies and television shows -- not to mention the obsessive crushes I found myself beginning to get as of late-- indicated Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). 


Unfortunately, despite my epiphany about OCD, I struggled with emotional frustration and meltdowns as well as major setbacks in social interactions. My summer camp-- the only place I had ever felt like I truly could be myself-- was not going to hire me as a first-year counselor in the summer of '99. With no friends at school-- I just couldn't connect with anybody-- I had no one to turn to, no backup plan.


In the fall of 1998, for the first time in three years, I was back in a therapist's office. Dr. Fried (again, a pseudonym), was a much, much better therapist than Dr. Klein. After the first or second session, he spotted a common denominator in my personality. "You're a very intense person," he said. Indeed, I am! I experience life in general intensely: favorite movies, friendships, crushes, and worrying. Based primarily on the obsessive worrying, he agreed with my theory that I had OCD and diagnosed me with the condition.  I only saw Dr. Fried for about six months-- college was just around the corner and I would be moving to Brooklyn, NY-- but he helped immensely. I moved to Brooklyn in an optimistic state of mind. 


In my junior year of college, however, my problems began to resurface. I continued to have social problems, not so much with other students (I made some good friends), but with teachers. I was in art school and many of the teachers fit the stereotype of the temperamental, self-righteous, imbalanced, and just plain nasty artists. Despite the OCD label, which was initially empowering, I began to suspect that OCD didn't paint an entire picture. I knew, somehow, that it just wasn't quite it. There were so many things-- like my problems reading social cues-- that just didn't add up.


In 2002, towards the end of my junior year of college-- and one of the worst years of my life-- I came across an article in Time about autism. As far as I knew, autistic people were "those people who don't talk." But then I saw a short description of Asperger's syndrome (AS) in a side bar. Obsessive interests. Difficulty interpreting nonverbal social cues. Awkward motor skills. I ran some searches on the Internet for AS and found out more. Obsessive, obsessive, obsessive. Difficulty making and keeping friends. Experiences the world differently. Misinterprets situations. And so forth.


The pieces fell abruptly into place.


Over the next year, I bought a number of books on AS and essentially diagnosed myself; a psychiatrist confirmed my diagnosis in the spring of 2003. After years of poking around in the dark and only finding partial answers, a complete, coherent picture was finally formed. AS was added to the DSM in 1994, but the vast majority of professionals weren't aware of it until a little after the turn of the century. 


At long last, I had an answer. How did I feel then? How do I feel now? As I said, 2002 was one of the worst years of my life. 2003 was the absolute worst. Whereas the discovery would have come as a relief in high school, a time when I was more optimistic despite my insecurities, I felt embittered and frightened. How could I possibly hold a job after graduating if I had this problem? Would I have to live in a group home or on SSI? Looking at my turbulent childhood and what looked like was going to be a difficult adulthood, I felt that nature had played a sick joke on me. 


Things have changed since then, and I'm a happy, well-adjusted adult, am relieved to have the AS label, and I am able to interact socially as well as the next person. Most people are amazed when I tell them I have AS. And yes, I do have a job. I suppose part of me feels cheated because I suffered for much of my childhood and my early adulthood, just by the sheer accident of being born in 1980 instead of 1990. But I know I should look on the bright side-- at least I wasn't born in 1950. People didn't go to therapy in those days; many people thought it meant you were crazy and should be locked in a padded cell. Sometimes I wonder if that would have been my fate, with the emotional meltdowns that I had from experiencing a world that made little sense to me.


And while we're on that note, it's important for society to understand something important about AS-- it isn't a mental illness and there isn't necessarily anything psychologically wrong with the person who has it; his or her neurology is just different. What Aspies need is not to be cured anymore than a gay person needs to be turned straight. After all, if we cured AS, we would have no Albert Einsteins or Temple Grandins. Aspies-- like gays-- need understanding and support and to have their strengths nurtured, not their weaknesses emphasized. I feel privileged to at last be entering an era where this attitude is starting to become more prevalent.