I am posting what i wrote up on the second meeting that just happened last Saturdayand i'd like yr feedback on it please so i can improve it  I don't know how to ddescribe the atmosphere there I'm afraid

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Women and Girls with Asperger’s Syndrome Meeting

(Facebook group: Au_Some Women and Girls)

By Nora Watts who runs the Toowoomba Adults with Asperger’s Syndrome support group

There are not too many times when I wake up at 5am excited to get up and get going like a kid  on Christmas morning.  Saturday January 29th was such a day. By 7am I met Lori and pip at Lori’s house and we left for the second ever Women and Girls with Asperger’s Syndrome Meeting at the West End Community House in South Brisbane.

Dr Tony Attwood, a man at the very leading edge of the understanding of Asperger’s Syndrome, lead a discussion group along with the facilitators Camilla Connolly and Rachael Harris. Both women also have Asperger’s.  We were perhaps 40 women, most with Asperger’s diagnosis, many were parents or carers of girls with Asperger’s Syndrome, a few were teachers or therapists. 

Subjects that we discussed included:

·         People assuming we have no affection for them because we don’t show it in the usual ways.  lack of affect)

·         Medications and their effects on us; many of us need to take less medication than most people or we end up “stoned” or like zombies.

·         Medical misunderstandings; when an intense fantasy life is misinterpreted as psychosis

·         Expectations of ourselves and expectation of other, especially other woman of us; we don’t always behave like a neurotypical person.  (Neurotypical or NT for short means what the majority of human beings are. Asperger’s and neeurotypicals are “wired differently so Asperger’s and other Autistic Spectrum Disorder people often behave differently than neurotypical) 

·         Monologue-ing: Going on and on about a subject of interest.

·         Vulnerably to being taken advantage of by unscrupulous people.

·         Being rejected by other girls and women because of our peculiarities.  We are often more comfortable in the company of men than woman.

·         Having interests different than other women.  We may be interested in science rather than in fashion or movie stars.

 After lunch Camilla talked about nutrition, exercise and meditation and the current brain research that makes these things even more important for us than for NTs.

To finish Rachael lead a ten minute mediation using a mantra to demonstrate how to do that.

Now I have to wait another 8 weeks for the next meeting. 

I've noticed the same thing about being very sensitive to medications. Is there any research on that?