Distraught and confused, please help?

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I hope someone can help, maybe from first hand experience...I'm 28, received a diagnosis of AS 4 years a go so relatively late. I have had the associated problems/challenges etc that go hand in hand with AS all my life, and the problems have become harder and harder to mask and cope with as the years go by and the expectations on me become greater i.e. career, earning an income, paying bills etc. I finished uni in 2005 and since then I hopped from one job to another hoping each time would be different and putting pressure on myself to be like everyone else, as back then i didn't understand the cause of my difficulties. After a severe case of depression and anxiety which left me jobless and living back with parents for 8 months, a diagnosis of AS, and an overdose of pills (for which the doctors said there was no one available to help with someone with my needs), I managed to get myself back on track.

6 months a go myself and my partner moved in together and now pay a mortgage/rent (shared ownership scheme), and bills etc. However I am fast spiralling in to the same old problems, as I foolishly think I can cope working full time etc. As a result I am trying my best to work out my limitations in order to remain healthy and in control of the condition, so i have reduced my hours at work to 4 day's a week. this is very hard financially as myself and my partner earn little more than the minimum wage. Although he has prospects in the future to earn more I can not see much hope for me as frustrating as it is and as capable as I am my intelligence and capability just does not translate in the real world of work and so I find myself underpaid and under employed doing manual work stocking shelves etc.

I am currently going through a severe depression again, and just can not function, as my disability is severely effecting my mental health and my ability to function. I am signed off work for 2 weeks at the moment and am looking in to possibility of going down to 16hrs per week work so I can better manage my condition, but I have come back from the Citizens Advice Bureaux which was just awful and highly embarrassing. The lady said point blank i'm not entitled to anything and my disability doesn't really count. She just spent the hour firing mathematical questions at me which I was ill prepared for as I was not told to take this information with me and I really struggle with processing anything verbal, and struggle with discalculia.

Going there and seeking help with benefits was my last resort. I am not happy or comfortable with asking for such help, but I have to come to terms with my limitations and keep healthy for mine and my families sake. I left so upset and I'm distraught, I don't know what to do and can't see any way out of this mess apart from just giving up on life completely. I can't go through with this though because i love my boyfriend so much and he would be devastated, he has been nothing but my guardian angel through everything. I don't want to be this person anymore or put him through seeing me like this anymore. I just wanted help to enable me to continue working a limited week so I can survive and live with my condition...

I'm sorry this is so long but I don't know where to turn

Thank you x

sorry, i can only hope that you live in a big city where there are universities which may have studies you could enroll in, pertaining to depression treatment.

Similar circumstances here except I'm 55, AS iagnosed at 45, living alone, can do anything with numbers except type them, currently marginally and tenuously employed in part-time clerical job that doesn't allow me to do anything with numbers except type them (which is why I'm about to be fired).

Despite auntblabby's well-intentioned platitudes (sorry AB, but your advice to me to "just hold on as best you can until you reach 62 at which point you can get SS, at which point it will be a bit easier to keep a roof over your head" was even more uninspiring and discouraging than it was useless) you "don't know where to turn" for the same reason I "don't know where to turn" and that's because at this moment there is nothing we can do except the one thing we can't ever do: give up.

Unfortunate for both us and the world that our unique potential remains untapped while we struggle in jobs anyone else can do except us; nobody can appreciate what we could do if given the chance because they literally couldn't appreciate it even if we were doing it now.

The ability to recognize unique potential is a rare talent in and of itself. Berry Gordy spotted something nobody else saw in a skinny little girl from the Brewster Projects who sang through her nose, and fifty years later those who scoffed at Berry and his teen-age protege then known as Diane Ross are still working in the Detroit office of the Citizens Advice Bureau.

Hang in there and wait to be discovered. Got anything else to do in the meantime?