Emotional Frailty #1 At-Risk

My emotions undermine me.  Intellectually, I can be a survivor.  Emotionally, I am often the first one “voted off the island.” I may present a flat affect most of the time, but that is only an attempt to keep control on the most erratic aspect of my personality.  I have learned that emotional control is prized by every teacher in every classroom–the cardinal sin of our school culture is to lose emotional control.  My inflexibility and insecurity mean I live in constant fear of catastrophic failure.  As Karen Williams observes, “Children with AS rarely seem relaxed and are easily overwhelmed when things are not as their rigid views dictate.”  Living with the constant fear of the next embarrassing failure can be incapacitating.  This is partly why the incidence of depression and suicide is elevated for individuals with Asperger’s.  Given the Hobson’s choice of keeping emotions unexpressed and succumbing to depression and self-injury, many Aspies accept the social stigma of losing composure and social status.  This is why so many of us with Asperger’s embody “fragile vulnerability and a pathetic childishness.” (Wing, 1981)  Because I am so vulnerable, I need you to assertively protect me from emotional assault, and the consequences of my own emotional frailty.