What led you to discover...?

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My daughter told me about her friend who has AS. I went online to find out what it was. What I read, was pretty much describing me.

After a very sudden and severe depression almost a year ago I went to the the doctor and he gave me oxazepam and sent me to a psychologist for cognitive behavioral therapy. The questions and assignments in therapy didn't make sense to me and were very difficult to answer. Needless to say, we didn't make progress so he advised me to get a diagnostic inquiry at a specific centre for that.
The main reason for being diagnosed ASD is the way i performed the TAT test. In TAT you have to describe a series of very ambiguous (old fashioned) images and that took me a long time and a lot of words. I still have my reservations becouse real life to me is less ambigious than the pictures of TAT. Furthermore I'm very sensitive to sound but i thout thats HSP instead of ASD.

I've always known I was different, but at the same time I assumed everybody would feel that way. In a western individual society difference is often encouraged, Think different is even an advertising slogan. I never thought there would be a systematic difference. I interpreted my own whish for solitude as Introversion and my slightly odd hobbies and interests as nerdy or geeky.

In the past I have been a good liar (the best lie is embedded in the truth) a skilfull thief (years ago ), I ve not been bullied or harassed, I did social work , I understand word jokes and i can read mind and body. I mean those are not typical ASD traits/experiences/activities, right?
BTW, I can feel remorse and I do care about other peaple and animals, otherwise i'd be on a different forum right now.

I had just started college and one day I was with my OT in a cafe and I was telling her how difficult I was finding it because there were so many people making noise all at the same time. I couldn't explain why it made me upset. She asked if I'd ever been tested for autism, and I said no. She said that for a while she had been noticing things about me (poor eye contact, odd gait, intolerance to change etc) and perhaps I should read about it. We went to the library to find a book and I nearly cried because it was like reading a textbook about my life and that was the first time I'd ever felt understood, that somebody "got" what I was trying to say.

Had an embarrassing moment happen where someone referred to me as "socially awkward."

Realizing this was an ongoing trend, I inquired online and someone said my situation sounded like AS. Did some research on what AS was, and that let me to realize I very likely have it.

When the psychiatrist who dxd my son mentioned I probably have it.

Well my parents first discovered something was wrong on my first day at school when I was 4. Apparently I was frightened, and I mis-behaved badly, like hid under the tables, tried to physically hurt the teacher, kicked the other children, wouldn't play with anyone in the playground, wouldn't sit still in assembly and at storytime, and even tried to escape from the school by crawling under the hedge. The teachers were worried, my parents were surprised because I acted like I was traumatized. But I did calm down after the first week, but the teachers realised I needed extra help with my reading, writing and counting because I was lacking behind the rest of the kids.

The teachers and doctors suspected moderate learning difficulties, then ADHD. But finally, by the age of 8, they discovered mild AS.

Like most others in this thread, I always sensed something was different about me but could not put my finger on it. Tried many times over the years to tell shrinks what was going on with me but could never put a comprehensive explanation together, could only piece out individual experiences. I had read about Aspergers before but it didn't resonate with me. It seemed like something with extreme symptoms/indicators involved. Like many others who are uneducated about AS/Aut the picture I had in my head were the hand flapping screamers bouncing their heads off the back of the chair. Then one day last year I was reading an article about it which explained that you didn't have to have extreme symptoms and that many people go their whole lives feeling like I do and not being diagnosed because their symptoms are minor, but existent nonetheless. It also went on to explain the different areas where you would have issues and I then read more on the internet, finding this place in the process. It was like the sky opened up and the universe imparted the wisdom upon me I had been seeking my whole life.

I was on-line and looking for explanations for my daughter's behaviour. I must have googled the right combination of words that triggered a whole load of sites on Aspergers. After reading a little, I had a eureka moment (mainly about my daughter, but a little about myself). I'd heard of Aspergers before, but I didn't really know what it was, to be honest, I thought I did but I didn't. Like many people, I didn't understand anything about the range of traits and had a stereotype image in my mind (I'm ashamed to admit), which my daughter especially is nothing like. Furthermore, I had no idea about the connection to sensory issues. That really got me intrigued, as this has been a major issue all my life. It also explains most of the problems we had with our daughter, when she was a baby, as well as the 'way ahead of the others' thing she had going. Then I bought 'Aspergirls' to try to understand my daughter and felt I was reading my own autobiography. I've never had my daughter's behaviour problems, so I didn't realise our issues could have the same roots. Everything just fell into place, after 38 years of knowing I was different and not knowing why. So here I am. I still don't know if I do have it or not or if I have ADHD. My daughter is waiting to be assessed for autism, but the school accept that she probably is on the spectrum.

I thought for a long time, I guess since I was a teenager, that I had some autistic traits but back then I thought autism meant you had to be completely non-functional. Then I got my ADHD diagnosis, which seemed to explain everything but as time went on, it didn't.

In about the last year or so, autism kept coming up in conversations with people and it got me thinking about it again. And after I started watching House, there was one episode about an autistic child and Wilson talks about how House might have Asperger's. So finally I decided to do some serious reading up on it, and here I am.

I did not what Aspergers was until just about 1 year ago. I normally do not watch the show The Doctors. It just happens the day I watch it, it was the day they discussed the autism spectrum disorders. When they described Aspergers it sounded like they were describing me. They also mentioned some children with Aspergers in the 70's and 80's were misdiagnosed with ADHD. I was diagnosed with ADHD but really did not seemed learning disabled so I figured I must have Aspergers. Another good thing about the show is they mentioned WrongPlanet. I was diagnosed with Aspergers in 2010

There have been times in my life when I embraced oddity, but back in the eighties I set out on a personal development odyssey. Well, to me it felt like the odyssey started in the sixties but this was real, measurable work. By the start of this century I was close to standing on my own two feet, but still troubled by failures to perform in social contexts. Autism came up as a last resort and it stuck.

My mom always thought there was something up with me. I vehemently denied it but a while after my diagnosis I came to acceptance and that acceptance is what has helped me become better