I’m interested in hearing from other women who were very early readers/talkers but struggled immensely with social communication and understanding what was expected of them. Please share your experiences!
Thank you for sharing this! Your experience has a lot of similarities to mine, I was in school in the 90s/ early 2000s, so I was identified as having social issues by teachers and the SEN team but they couldn’t immediately identify what was going on. Got labelled both gifted and SEN at the same time, was bullied terribly and constantly labelled a weirdo. It’s a very strange experience to be constantly told that you’re so smart and capable and so strange and incapable at the same time.
I suspect I had hyperlexia. My reading level was fairly advanced as I was reading before school age, at least well enough that at 3 years old I got bored if someone else read me a story! I had to read the words myself. I spoke a bit but not fluently until I was 4 years old. I think I did OK academically when I started school but I would get frustrated a lot and destroy my work if it wasn’t perfect. I also hid from my teacher and had a lot of anxiety. This was the late 90s so I was just considered a “weird” kid rather than neurodivergent. I was lucky that I did well academically as the other neurodivergent kids were treated poorly by teachers and I could keep a low profile. I would say I was often angry and outspoken in the first few years of school, then when I was bullied more I withdrew and eventually had selective mutism (and bullied for that too - a no win situation!).
According to my mom, I was speaking in full sentences by 18 months and having full adult conversations by the time was 2.5y. I think I started reading on time, around age 4-5y, but my reading comprehension was beyond crazy. I remember they made us take this test regularly that told us where our reading comprehension was. In 4th grade (around age 9y), I hit the maximum allowed by the system, which was 12.9+ - above the level of 12th grade in the 9th month. So basically at age 9y, I was reading at a college level. I have always struggled with social cues and making friends/maintaining friendships. I honestly don't know how I wasn't diagnosed as a kid.
I think I did but I lucked out because I had built in friends - 3 girls whose parents were close with my parents. They all shared similar interests and love of reading and were sensitive. So I was really lucky. It sounds very very lonely - I’m glad you found this community
Edited to add: I went to school in the '70s and '80s, so autism/ADHD were not even on the radar. Autism was the kid in special ed who banged his head on the wall all the time and was non-verbal. ADHD was something only little boys had and was blamed on too much sugar and bad parenting. Somehow, no one ever really questioned why a little girl with extremely high scores on every standardized test had so much trouble completing homework assignments; so I was always told I was "bright but lazy" and an "underachiever".
According to my mom, I taught myself to read at age 3. I was a proficient reader before I started school, which caused some problems. They kept trying to teach me the alphabet - and I was like "I already KNOW this, I am reading chapter books!" To make matters worse, I was emotionally/socially very young for my age and had a hard time with emotional regulation, social skills, etc. So, instead of going into first grade, I was put in a "transition" class. It was awful, because all my friends were now a grade ahead of me, and the kids in the transition class were for the most part the slower/dumber ones so it was even more frustrating academically.
School was terrible for me, because it was much to easy academically, plus it was boring (I was eventually diagnosed with ADHD at the age of 36) and the social aspect was very difficult. I had very few friends. Most of the other kids thought I was weird and didn't like me. This didn't really bother me because I preferred to play alone anyway. However, around 4th or 5th grade, I guess I realized that I was supposed to want to have friends, and that no one liked me because I was weird. This realization gave me some intense social anxiety. I was terrified to go out of my house for a year or two; I now realized other kids were making fun of me. I became such a recluse that many of the kids in my neighborhood thought I moved away.
In junior high, I made a concerted effort to act normal and blend in better. All the other girls loved Duran Duran, so I said I loved Duran Duran also. I tried to wear the same clothes that other people had, and tried to do the same stuff they did. It kind of worked, and I made some friends - but it was exhausting.
In ninth grade, I had a revelation that perhaps I should stop caring about other people liking me, and just worry about whether I liked them. I started listening to music I liked vs. what was popular, wearing what I liked regardless of whether it was "approved" by the cool kids, etc..
I went to a very large high school, which was a blessing and a curse. It was great because I met other kids who were also misfits, and for the first time in my life had close friends. I could be as weird as I wanted - there was freedom in the anonymity. The downside was that I went from all A's to C's and D's, because I skipped class a lot and smoked a lot of weed. My new friends were not very academic, so neither was I. Being such a large school, it was easy to fall through the cracks.
I still had some trouble with social skills. I tended to get myself in awkward situations, because I wasn't good at reading other people. For example, I would meet a guy who seemed cool and fun, and I'd want to hang out with him because it was fun - but I usually failed to realize he was romantically interested in me and then it would result in awkward situations with a lot of miscommunication. Also, I ended up dating people I didn't really like because I felt like I was supposed to have a boyfriend, but I wasn't good at figuring out whether I liked a person or not.
I did not go to college after high school; partly because I didn't understand how to pay for it (I knew I only had a couple hundred dollars, and college cost thousands and thousands of dollars, but I didn't realize loans were possible), and partly because I had enough of being in school. My father was dying of cancer at the time, so my parents were preoccupied with that and no one noticed that I never took my SATS or applied to college or anything.
I started working and after a couple false starts found a great job and did well in it. However, it would have been much easier in life if I had gone to college; I got passed over for promotions a few times because the position required a bachelor's degree.
Eventually, in my 20's, my social skills improved. But I'm still kind of bad at female friendships, because I think I still come across as weird and stand-offish. But, I do have a few close female friends, and a lot of male friends, and a great husband who puts up with my weirdness.