How Diagnosis Is Life-Changing for Autistic women

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A personal perspective.

Diagnosis at age 68 came as a huge relief! My life has changed forever and for the good.

Validation is transformative. Finally, after very late diagnosis, I found my tribe, I knew them and they recognised and acknowledged me as belonging to it. Belonging+validation facilitates self acceptance, freeing us to gather up the strands of experience within the new awareness of what made our lives so hard, and the process of integrating new knowledge with past experiences was life changing for me too. It is sad that unaware AS women are still misdiagnosed and marginalised, confused and internalising harmful NT judgment and exclusion. I hope they find their way here as I did, when I wasn't even looking.

Thank you for sharing.

I relate to the not-knowing I was highly anxious - it's the water may of us swim in.

Interesting that she was/is the scary type. I was/am the sweet but glimpse of scary type.

I was diagnosed at 31 but I basically un-diagnosed myself for 14 years between 2008-2022, between a combination of an ex-partner who didn't believe I was autistic (just selfish/immature/etc) and later clinicians that disagreed with the previous clinicians who *did* believe I was autistic (though I'm 100% convinced that if I hadn't quit the last therapist, she would have come around to something because I was shutting down/going mute in session.)

What followed were 14 years of hell wherein I had lost the entire map to my life, including two burnouts and several years out of the workforce.

Diagnosed: A month before I turned 50.

It was 49 years of having no idea what was "wrong" with me.
Then about five months waiting for my assessment.

It wasn't so much the yes / no that was important to me.
It was all the details of the individual tests.
It really helped me frame the background to my PTSD.

I mean it helped me understand I had a neurological difference, and my sensory issues were/are real, even if other people didn't understand them.

It's few month ago I got the diagnosis of Asperger and now I can say, it changes everything for the better. Because of my knowledge about who I am, finally I am self-confident enough to recognize, what the NT's doing to me AND that they are not right, when they criticize my behavior in every way, because they doesn't want to understand.

I was never officially diagnosed but I am pretty sure I have some form of autism. All my life I have been very awkward and bullied almost everywhere I go. I was extremely suicidal for a while years ago because I just didn’t get what was “wrong” with me. I’ve had long term relationships that always end up emotionally abusive. My ex I am in the process of leaving now constantly called me the r- word and told me one time he was only with me because he felt sorry for me. I have almost no friends and feel safer isolating myself. I’m very lonely but am afraid to connect to people because I feel like they will always eventually turn on me. I try to take one day at a time sometimes

Welcome Rita687…. Yes recognize lots of what you wrote about myself . But my relationships are usually pretty good when I find good people . Many many years before that ever happened .
Totally get the one day at a time thing . Hope you have found good ways to get through possible meltdowns.

I'm not sure which thread this goes with but I thought of a metaphor or something to explain how I've been feeling and wanted to share. Let me know your thoughts

Everyone has a machine in their head. For most people, when a certain input goes in, the output is 2. For me, the output for that input is 12. My machine isn't broken or wrong; it just produces something different than the normal output. I've learned that my output isn't the same as others so I developed a calculation to convert my output to theirs. Doing this calculation is tiring and takes a lot of work. Sometimes I make a mistake with my calculation and report 3 or 5 instead of 2. This is especially likely when I'm tired. Or the calculation just didn't work for reasons I don't understand. Sometimes I report 12. Maybe I forgot to do the calculation. Maybe I wanted to save my energy for later. Maybe I was completely out of energy. Maybe I just didn't want to do it and wanted to stick with my answer, not caring that it's different. If I don't report 2, this can lead to people being confused, judging me, or being annoyed that I didn't report the same answer as them.

blueraspberry, I relate. I am having a chuckle thinking about announcing at my workplace, "I know you expect a '2' aaaaaaand..."

All the times I provided a deliverable and the initial response was WTH and then later I got an "ah-ha!" (and if I didn't, it wasn't the place for me). Even when I ask beforehand, or do reviews, the NTs are so used to getting their "2" they can't describe it. It's "just 2, obvs".

My allistic sister expects a 2, I came out with a 12 and she translates it as a 4,523. Who's doing what math?

12, 12, 12, 12....