Asperger’s, Women and Perfectionism

Perfectionism

One of the main characteristics of young women living with Asperger syndrome is that they have a great deal of anxiety. One of the main triggers of anxiety is that they set themselves impossibly high standards for any work they do. Any imperfection may result in them starting a piece again or screwing it up. As this mother of an aspie teenager recalled her own issues: “As a teenager, I loved to write. The problem was I was never satisfied with what I wrote and my work would often end up in the bin. Similar difficulties existed at school. I hated getting things wrong. I hated messing up my book with errors and blobs of ink from those leaky fountain pens. I hated the crossings out and comments by teachers and above all I hated getting bad grades. Often I would give up as it was easier not to do something than to risk getting it wrong and face criticism.” From a web blog “Aspieinthefamily.com” A failure to perform at the required standard can trigger anxiety, low self-esteem leading to a whole range of problems including sleep disturbance, meltdowns etc.… Failure in the eyes of an Aspie is not necessarily the same as what a neurotypical person would call failure – not getting a distinction in a music exam for example or less than an A* grade. I remember going with my daughter to collect her GCSE results. She got the best overall results in her year group with 10 A grades and one B. She was disappointed in herself though, because she didn't manage to get an A*. She felt she had let herself down. I can't remember a single time when her achievements in education have made her happy. She has always seen herself as not quite good enough” Carol Young women with Asperger's often find school a disheartening place because although teacher's mean to give feedback which is helpful and constructive, even the best of them can make them cringe with embarrassment. Criticism is almost invariably taken personally and it hurts them. Sometime bringing tears even when the person is quite grown up which is a source of embarrassment to them and the person giving the feedback. These cases of female Asperger perfectionism have been well documented. An unwelcome sign of perfectionism for some women may be the development of anorexia nervosa. The Asperger girl fits the profile of the typical anorexic - high achieving, middle class articulate parents, perfectionist tendency with a degree of social immaturity, ticks all the boxes. No whilst many Asperger girls don't become anorexic, many do. “There are striking similarities in the cognitive profiles,” says Kate Cantura, researcher from King's College London She and a colleague Janet Terasure have explored the idea that anorexia might be a manifestation of Asperger's. Tchanturua argues that: Both people with autism and those with anorexia tend to be rigid, detail-oriented and distressed by change. Their 2015 meta-analysis suggests that about 23% of female anorexics are likely to have Asperger's. They suggest that some of the “missing” girls on the spectrum may be misdiagnosed as anorexic. Jenifer O'Toole author writing on Asperger families (her whole family including three children) remembers her teenage struggles with anorexia which she linked to perfectionism the course of which eventually saw her hospitalized: “I used to have a spreadsheet of how many calories, how many grams of this, that and the other thing [I could eat],” she says. The resulting anorexia became so severe that she had to be hospitalized when she was 25.” Whilst there are many positive characteristics of women with Asperger's which make them interesting, successful and charming. The perfectionist trait and the anxiety it leads too ae no doubt the flip side of the coin for them and their families. If indeed it is true that many people with anorexia are so because of Asperger's then this is a real problem, since the mental illness with the highest death rate of any is indeed anorexia. 671 words