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Well, I don't think that this question in itself makes much sense, given the fact that Asperger's is not a uniform condition, and that it would be similar to asking somebody what it is like to be poor, educated or imprisoned. Every person will respond differently, and the examples above have very diverse circumstances, opinions and individual perspectives.That being said, I find that most people are so naive when it comes to the topic of Asperger syndrome that your life actually becomes WORSE after you get diagnosed. For instance, in my earlier years, long before I was diagnosed, I was able to go to the washroom at school and do everything else that people were doing. Nobody acted as though I was somehow disadvantaged in that sense.In fact, I even seem to recall that my life was fairly typical until a couple of years after I started school, when suddenly, I had some bad experiences, both in school and elsewhere that caused me to get excluded from my other peers. (The circumstances behind this are a bit complicated and will be saved for another answer some other time.)Anyways, as a result of being more or less made an outcast (something that became even more entrenched in later years) I ended up having to find ways to entertain myself. I ultimately ended up dabbling in creative writing, and that eventually became a serious hobby for me. Later on, studying history, natural science, geography mathematics etc. also became subjects of interest.By the time I was in middle school, I became independent enough that I was able to create my own activities, and I rarely interacted with the others unless forced to for school-related reasons. (The feeling was mutual.) It was also during middle school (February 2004) that I was diagnosed after being put through a series of tests and surveys, and at the time I had no idea what these tests were for.In regards to my Asperger's, nothing seemed to be much amiss at school after receiving the diagnosis, other than that I was getting suspended/receiving detentions far less often than before (something else that I am not going to discuss in this answer). However, a year and a half later, when I found myself going to high school, is when I noticed that things began to change drastically, and not usually for the better.When I first went to high school, I was entering the system as just a normal student attending a normal schooling schedule. Admittedly, I did have trouble paying attention in classes, though I feel as though it had far more to do with the fact that I don't like school and have always found it boring and dreadful, as opposed to any disorder that psychiatrists may have assumed that I had.For the first two months I was attending this high school. My grades were roughly average (passable, though nothing great) and I was more or less content, as I cannot say that my teachers were great, teaching-wise, so I studied my own subjects at home and treated school as something of an afterthought.Then, on Halloween weekend, I received a call on Sunday evening informing me that I was to be transferred to a new school starting tomorrow morning and that a van would be picking me up. I was admittedly quite perplexed, especially considering the fact that I had assignments from my other school that I was in the midst of completing, as well as having library books that I had signed out that were going to be overdue unless I found a way to return them.Being changed from one school to another also meant that any work that I had done for the first two months went to waste. To top it off, it also meant that I was effectively losing an entire semester, since it would be kind of hard to catch up in a whole set of new courses two months in at a different location.When I first arrived at the new school, I was told that I would get to take two classes for the first semester. The first credit would be to take a private “social studies" class dealing with Asperger syndrome. The second, would be that I would get to take a music course, something that I was already doing at my other high school (I was also a band member at the other high school).However, the music class ended up ultimately being a waste of time, grade-wise. At my other high school, our teacher had us do the trumpet first (other students practiced with other instruments) with piano classes coming in the second half of the semester. In this high school, however, it ended up being a reversal, where pianos were taught first and personal instruments would be taught last.When I got to the classroom in early November, I was unaware of this, and I just assumed that the schedule was the same. I played the trumpet for a few months until exam time in January. There, I ended up nearly flunking the entire exam, alongside the course, because at the time I had little experience playing the piano, and I had no idea which notes did which (written on paper).I called the teacher over and asked her what this was all about. It was then that I found out that in her class, piano had been taught at a time I was attending a different high school. I then had to explain to her my situation, and it was then that she once again proved herself to be a real piece of work when she effectively threw up her arms in the air and sarcastically asked me what I wanted her to do about it.Of course, I did not take that sort of reaction very lightly, and I gave her a nice earful in front of the rest of the classroom. She then got all uptight and ran off to my EA teacher and whined about how I “yelled” at her. I was so disgruntled by her as a person that I ended up never joining the high school band, which she ran (not that I wanted to by that point, anyway) and I also only merely passed that course, thanks to getting a fairly high mark when it came to my knowledge in playing the trumpet.Being switched halfway into a semester also meant that I lost two additional credits altogether. I also noticed that at this point, I had even less rights in regards to what I could do in school than before. Now that I was in a “special” programme, I was suddenly not allowed to go to the washroom unless I was being supervised by an adult assigned to me. Some of those adults were extra humiliating, as they insisted I hold their hand going to and from class, to the washroom, or to my locker.Of course, being treated this way got me looked at by literally every person in the school. Even something as simple as writing the date down on a sheet of paper was not possible to do without some EA instantly hovering over my shoulder and telling me what to do as if I had not already been doing that for a decade beforehand.I did not deal with physical and verbal assaults as much in high school, as my negative experiences there were still limited to exclusion and being gossiped about (not being able to do the simplest thing without being watched over by an adult most certainly did not help), yet I still ultimately regarded high school to be just as much of a joke as primary and middle school, thus I limited my school life as much as possible and rarely interacted with either the students or the staff.Some people would say that this attitude of mine was a result of Asperger's, and such people would erroneously claim that as proof that having Asperger's means being antisocial. I do not see it that way at all. To be quite frank, my reasons for not interacting with people in high school had far less to do with being antisocial and far more to do with the fact that I simply did not share much common interests with people at my school or elsewhere during this period in my life.For several years before high school I had become quite acute in learning to develop my own character independently from others. While other people were playing video games (something that I myself admittedly did as well at the time), or going to the theatres with their friends or partying, I was busy writing, reading, studying and researching world events, and learning to debate with other people, both online and offline.By the time I was in my sophomore year, I was becoming increasingly interested in politics and social causes (interests which only grew in the years to come) and so I had little time to be dealing with small talk or doing social gatherings that I did not feel would benefit me in the long-term. Had I found other students or adults that seemed to have similar interests and were willing to share their interests with me, I would undoubtedly have wanted to spend more time with them as well.However, since these types of subjects are not exactly things which an ordinary teenager would want to spend their time discussing and devoting their time to, I had to learn to either enjoy such interests on my own, or to find people online with similar interests.Due to the type of programme I was in, it took me an additional year to complete high school (losing two credits in my first semester of high school did not help), though I was able to graduate with two credits more than I needed to graduate when I decided to take a volunteer coop course, rather than taking the afternoons off like other students did.Prior to going into coop, I had been looking for work elsewhere. One of the first jobs I tried to do was becoming a babysitter in elementary school. I took a six week long course that came with a test at the end (for which I passed) in order to build my credentials. Needless to say, the only babysitting jobs I received were from people that I knew, asking me to do it for free (which I did).In middle school, I applied to several different jobs, but I never got a response. In high school, one of the jobs I tried to get into was the reserves. At the time, I was quite confident I would get in, since I had been in Scouts and Cadets, and the reserves at the time was in desperate need of recruits (due to the War in Afghanistan).The first time I applied to the reserves was in 2008, when I was seventeen. After a couple of interviews, I was requested to come back in a year when I would be eighteen and be nearing the completion of my high school education. So, a year later I returned and after a couple more interviews, I was asked to get some recommendations. I had to find three different people, and one of them included asking a volunteer at my old local church (where I had been an altar server) to send a reference for me.The reserves seemed to be satisfied, so they allowed me to go to the next level, which was taking the aptitude test. The aptitude test had everything from multiplication, grammar rules, vocabulary quizzes and problem solving questions. When I came back later to see my results, I was told that I scored very high, particularly in the mathematics category. I was then told to affirm that I wanted to be either in the artillery or the infantry.I came back for another interview later on that would have allowed me to take the physical test, and that's where things got interesting. When I was growing up, I always grew in bursts. I would get very chubby just before I would suddenly find myself growing a good half-inch within a couple of weeks and then becoming normal weight or even thin again.Unfortunately, the physical examiner was examining my waist at a time when my body was getting ready to burst again, so my waistline at the time was bigger than normal, and it undoubtedly impacted my results. In addition, the recruiters by this time had found out that I had been in the Asperger programme at my school. All of a sudden, they were becoming reluctant to take me in altogether.They decided that before I could even go through the physical training, that I would need to go see an approved speech therapist and psychologist, and that I would have to pay it out of my own pocket (in 2009, such appointments ran at between $600–1000) and I was also specifically informed that even then, it was no longer a guarantee that I would be approved.So, do I spend $1,000 (money which at the time I did not have) and hope it pays off and I get in, or do I accept my fate and give up on the application altogether? After a few days of pondering, I ultimately opted for the latter. To add insult to injury, the reserves, in their arrogance, actually sent me a letter a few weeks later, saying something along the lines of “we are sorry to hear that you do not seem to be interested in joining the reserves, and that your application will now be closed.”Realising that I was probably never going to get into the reserves or the army, thanks to my diagnosis, I decided to just take some additional coop credits in hopes of getting my foot through a door. The first coop I ended up working in was Blockbuster (a store that I had applied to in middle school, yet never received a response from). I worked there for several months and was able to get some good grades and a letter of recommendation for future employment elsewhere. Of course, as fate would have it, Blockbuster went bankrupt about a year and a half later, making any recommendations from an employer that was now obsolete completely meaningless in the eyes of a current employer.At that time, I had already decided to return to high school (after having already graduated) to take a volunteer job at another place. I won't bother mentioning the name of the place, but the employer at this particular location ended up being a nasty, conniving and vicious person that even had the audacity to tell me that I was doing such a terrific job and that she wanted me to work an extra two weeks longer during the after-Christmas holidays.Being who I was, I agreed to do just that without hesitation. Believing that I would get a good letter of recommendation, I found out a few weeks after my term there had ended, that not only was I being effectively used the entire time, but that she had declined to give me any letter of recommendation at all, claiming that she had “nothing good” to say about me.I was distressed for a few days over receiving such a reply, but at the time I decided not to completely let such remarks get the best of me, and I decided to keep on looking for employment. Still not being able to find any paid work, I went about volunteering at several different charity events, and even participated in some of their athletic fundraising competitions.Shortly after high school I had taken some courses in foreign languages (French, Russian, Dutch etc.) but I did not enjoy college, so I did not complete any diplomas. I did eventually go to university for a year and was able to pass my courses, but I stopped attending for a mixture of several reasons (finances, personal circumstances as well as interests being a combination of factors).One thing that I did end up noticing, is that people that were not volunteering at all were actually finding paid work faster than those that actually volunteered. There is a bunch of hogwash online claiming that volunteering is going to make you stand out on a resume. It is a pure lie, as volunteering and working for free at such employments actually devalues your application, since employers will assume that you must be an abysmal applicant if all you are doing is unpaid work.The young are paying for the privilege of unpaid work - and it's further entrenching inequalityWhy Your Unpaid Internship Makes You Less EmployableMy recommendation for anybody, whether they have Asperger's or not, is to NOT go out volunteering if you want a salary, since most people will not actually appreciate it. In fact, volunteering actually gets you looked down on. Not only does finding paid work become harder after you had been doing unpaid work, but you will still effectively be without sufficient income, and very few people will show any sympathy towards you, regardless of the reasons why.To add further to the above paragraph, becoming long-term unemployed also means that getting a job will become even more difficult, since employers will assume that your long-term unemployment gap either means you are not motivated to work, or that other employers know you are a bad worker, and therefore you should not be hired at all. In fact, studies have shown that even high school students that have just graduated are more likely to get a certain job, compared to an older person with experience in the same or similar industry, but who has been unemployed for more than six months.Long-Term Unemployment: A Destructive and Persistent Social IssueThe unemployment situation above is not limited to just people with Asperger syndrome, but with anybody that has the mishap of becoming unemployed for even a short period of time. Many employers will only hire those that were already employed at the time of their job interview. In the USA, several states, such as Connecticut, had to even make laws that prohibited employers from discriminating against the unemployed as a way to stave off long-term unemployment.unemployment discrimination | Connecticut Employment Law BlogAs a result of not receiving stable employment, I have concluded that it is better to just self-educate yourself and possibly find a way to create your own income, than it is to bother wasting your time writing resumes and cover letters to ungrateful employers that are probably going to throw it in the trash bin before they ever even open it.I therefore don't think it is a matter that people with Asperger's are not capable of working, as much as it is a case that our current system causes anybody that has slipped through the cracks and become unemployed for even a short amount of time (the Great Recession being a main culprit) to have a very arduous task in regaining any meaningful profession.Even in cases where people with Asperger's eventually find employment, their work positions tend to be limited to shelving or sometimes doing cash register work, due to the disdain that most people have against those on the spectrum.Most employers will not hire people with Asperger's, especially if it is a job that requires any form of concentration or people skills (healthcare, teaching, military etc.) because most people either naively or malevolently assume that people with Asperger's are effectively incompetent idiots that are not capable of socialising or interacting with their peers, customers or other individuals whom they may end up interacting with.In the rare cases where some people recognise that people with Asperger's are capable of doing a lot more than doing the most menial type of work, they will assume that people with Asperger's are similar to Rain Man and are only interested in numbers and math.I myself happen to be somebody with Asperger's that also happens to be very gifted when it comes to doing arithmetic or calendars in my head without the need of a paper or pencil. Nonetheless, I know that I am speaking as a minority among people diagnosed, and that not everybody with Asperger's is interested in only working with numbers, myself included.In regards to the state of Asperger's itself, there is a myth that seems to be largely believed even by those that are either diagnosed or self-diagnosed, that Asperger's is merely a social or neurological condition. In fact, Asperger's has also been somewhat proven (the extent of this is debatable) to also be a physical condition, as gastrointestinal issues, as well as certain allergies are also known to be conditions of this disorder.Autism and GI DisordersFarting unexpectedly (especially when younger) on a regular basis, or constantly sweating and smelling as a result (especially prevalent among those in adolescence and adulthood) is a common occurrence for those that are diagnosed. Certain allergies, particularly of products related to wheat, dairy and gluten have also been attributed to Asperger syndrome.It was not surprising that this was used against me as well, for I have always been prone to sweating (since I am heat-sensitive) and I used to have a lot of difficulty controlling my farts. Interestingly, however, despite being so sensitive to the heat, the opposite is true when it comes to the cold. I could be out in weather that is minus 10 or 15 degrees with my t-shirt on and not feel burdened at all. The only time such weather bothers me is when it gets windy, and only because my ear tips and nose become sensitive at that point. Otherwise, I am unfazed by Canada's winter climate, and in many ways, I even prefer the winter far more than the summer.In trying not to take up too much additional time: I do not think that having Asperger's is a disadvantage at all. I think that people in general have turned it into one, whether it was with good intentions or not.I never needed help going to the washroom before I was diagnosed (yet staff for some reason felt it necessary to do afterwards), nor was I ever antisocial. If anything, it was everybody else that was being antisocial when they decided to exclude me from their groups and I had to find a way to get around on my own (something that many other people with similar experiences can attest to).I also find it quite amusing that I hear the stereotype that “people with Asperger's have a narrow set of interests" when I would say that the average person with Asperger's, in my experience, have a far wider breadth of interests than the normal neurotypical person does.Most people are busy discussing their jobs, family, friends, the weather, sports and every other boring topic and creating a rut where it seems to be the only thing they are interested in talking about. Meanwhile, more academically gifted people (and this includes those without Asperger's) tend to be more likely to discuss things such as history, science, arts, geography, politics, economics etc. and bring far more value to the discussion table.Whenever I do have to converse with people, I can tolerate small talk for a while, especially if they are strangers or people that I have not seen in a while. However, such shallow conversations can only keep me interested for so long before I try to change the course of our conversations to something more educational and academic.Needless to say, most people do not find such talk welcoming, but I digress regardless in a vain attempt to persuade people to talk about something more interesting and valuable. It is normally the other group of people that decide they want nothing to do with me afterwards, as opposed to this being something done on my part.If their reason for not wanting to interact with me any longer is because I am not going to continuously keep talking about what THEY want to talk about (usually just them talking about their day or family) at the expense of myself not getting any joy out of the experience, then that is their fault and not my own.Most people with Asperger's have far better social skills than people give them credit for. Many people with Asperger's take rejection harshly on themselves and assume that it is their fault, when it is often times the fault of the other people. Nobody is under any obligation to pretend they are somebody that they are not, just for the convenience of somebody else; and yet that is exactly what some people are expecting from us when they act as though people with Asperger's should be blending in more by engaging primarily in small talk, rather than in deeper and more intellectual conversations.Empathy is also a strong trait that exists in most people on the spectrum, yet is treated as limited to nonexistent by the vast majority of the neurotypical population. People with Asperger's have empathy levels that are so high that it has been known to often times physically damage their brain and cause a variety of additional symptoms ranging from anxiety, depression and even PTSD.Theory finds that individuals with Asperger’s Syndrome don’t lack empathy – in fact if anything they empathize too muchMost humans are only concerned with their own well-being. Even most people working in “social” positions (nurses, teachers, doctors, police etc.) are only doing their job for their paycheque. While I am not saying that every person with Asperger's is sympathetic, or that every neurotypical is apathetic: I do believe that one of the traits with having Asperger's (strong, emotional feelings) will create a far larger percentage of sympathy among the Asperger population than the neurotypical population.In some ways, being only mildly knowledgeable in what Asperger's and autism is, is even worse than if the condition was unknown altogether. At least in the latter case, there would be no labeling, and it is unlikely that employers would be writing people off with such a diagnosis at the interview level. Using the word autism as an insult has also become commonplace.While I personally don't really care in the end if people want to use it, I do care that it is being used in a way that is incorrect, as it will give people a false impression as to what Asperger's is; one of the false claims being that Asperger's is an intellectual disability (something which somebody on the spectrum cannot have).A cure for Asperger's/autism is also completely unnecessary. Having the condition has given a multitude of other advantages that come with having your social skills sacrificed in the same way that blind people reportedly hear better, or deaf people see better etc.. What does need some curing, however, is for other people to stop treating Asperger's in the same way one would treat cancer and act as though we are incapable of even using a roll of toilet paper.Perhaps if having such a diagnosis did not automatically get one rejected from most of their peers and employers, the topic of Asperger's as a “disability” would become quite moot.BONUS:For further reading, here is a list of only some historical figures that were believed to have had Asperger's. Those that were diagnosed are not included, as are those individuals that would only be known to those knowledgeable in a particular niche topic. Also excluded are those where the diagnosis is not so clear cut, since that would create a list far longer than I wish to write down.Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519)Known for his many inventions as well as artworks, most notably the Mona Lisa; Leonardo Da Vinci is also reputed to be among the smartest men ever lived, as well as one of the most high-profile individuals believed to have had Asperger's.Reputed as a lifelong vegan (he used to even buy poultry, just so that he could free them) as well as being a professional athlete and apprentice (later, teacher) Leonardo also made very few friends and lived a lifestyle that was quite humble, even for his time.He never gained any stable employment, and in fact he had to survive by apprenticing students of his own in return that they pay him room and board (which came with food).While Leonardo did make acquaintances with other notable contemporary figures, particularly Francis I of France, he was nonetheless incapable of sustaining any long-term meaningful friendships. He never found a romantic partner (leading to later rumours, likely untrue, that he was a homosexual) and he reportedly became so distraught at never being able to father children that he went on to make one of the first robots in history, and that robot was reportedly an imitation of a child. (And some say this is also where the inspiration for Pinocchio originated.)Some of the earliest drafts ranging from parachutes, scuba diving equipment (first thought of in response to a naval invasion), tanks and helicopters are attributed to this famed Renaissance artist, inventor and polymath.Isaac Newton (1642–1727)Isaac Newton's academic career initially started off as a law student. In fact, Isaac Newton showed little to no interest in mathematics until well into adulthood. His first true exposure to the field of physics and mathematics came at a time when his scholarship was running dry and he could ill-afford to complete his law degree.He went to a fair one day and found a man selling a book on mathematics. Realising that he was catching on quickly to the subject and had some potential in the field, he returned to university and found that there were scholarships available for those aspiring to join the mathematics department. Without thinking twice, Newton took the opportunity, and his most defining years occurred in the immediate years afterwards, including the later Newton-Leibniz controversy.By the time he entered his middle ages, his interests in physics and mathematics had shifted over to religion, particularly in deciphering religious codes or predicting when doomsday (Armageddon) was to transpire. During this time, he also tried to create his own new language, which he had hoped would replace Latin (at that time the most common academic language) as a language that everybody in the world, educated and illiterate alike, would speak. Suffice it to say, his idea did not gain much momentum, so it was eventually abandoned, and the works he did create in that language are currently lost.Albert Einstein (1879–1955)Albert Einstein was a German-born American scientist known for his works in relativity, as well as some of his contributions in war-related research experiments, such as the Manhattan Project (something which he later regretted participating in).Einstein reportedly did not speak until he was nearly four years old, and he did not having strong social connections with other people, particularly in his younger years. (He once allegedly scared his piano teacher away in a fit of rage.)Despite being primarily known today as a scientist, Einstein was also offered the opportunity to become the first president of Israel; an offer which he declined for unknown reasons.Nikola Tesla (1856–1943)Nikola Tesla was a Croatian-born (also Serbian) American inventor. He had worked for Thomas Edison in his earlier years, and later built an intense rivalry against his former employer, who has also been widely reported to have been on the spectrum.Having been credited with possibly inventing the first ray gun (a weapon which he then allegedly dismantled, because he did not believe that humans were yet ready for such a weapon), Nikola Tesla also tried to find ways that would make electricity free for the entire world. Later conspiracies would claim that his aspirations were halted by people attempting to stifle his success, because they wanted to keep the population in a state of destitute.CONCLUSION:Archimedes, William Shakespeare, Socrates, Thomas Edison, Graham Bell, Thomas Jefferson, Beethoven, Abraham Lincoln, Benjamin Franklin and possibly even Bill Gates himself are among the thousands of other people that were widely believed to have had Asperger's. In some cases, the individuals noted above (Thomas Jefferson’s name being especially relevant) have cases against them that are so strong that entire books have been written with the intention of proving that a certain individual from history would have met the requirements needed for a diagnosis.One thing these people do have in common, however is that they were able to live out their lives without the stigma of having Asperger's attached to their name. While most of the individuals noted above still ended up living fairly shallow social lives (usually not a choice that they themselves made personally), the conditions for people living in the modern ages with the same diagnosis are not typically faring any better in that regard, and now we also have to deal with the label and being rejected from employment as a result of it.These people were admired for being intellectually gifted, and that is why people from their time allowed them to get into the sorts of professions that made them who they were. If the same attitude could be shown today, Asperger's as a “neurological” condition could be finally put to rest.