Newly diagnosed. How do you process it all and move forward?

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Hi all. I'm not new to this site, however I've never posted anything until now. I suspected for some time I was on the spectrum. I got wrongly diagnosed (as BPD) a few years ago which shortly lead to the end of a serious relationship...because after that diagnosis, everything I did or said got blamed on me being boarderline. It was awful, because I was being called something I was not but if I got upset and reacted I only reinforced the perception that I was BPD. I read up on it after the diagnosis and just couldn't relate to anything, except for my behavior when I'm having a meltdown.

Fast-forward to a week ago, I was diagnosed with Aspergers (I'm 36, FYI). Not sure where to begin to process it all. I'm trying my best not to obsessively reflect on my life and alllll the ways it might've looked/played out...had I been diagnosed much younger. I've already read one book twice (highlighting and tabbing different sections for my parent to read) and pulled out the 5 other books on AS I bought back before the BPD diagnosis, but never read. I couldn't handle how much I related to the first few pages in Aspergirls... So I put the books away and found some distraction to get absorbed in until enough time passed that I forgot about it. That's been my coping strategy for almost all the unwanted thoughts or feelings in my life. Ironically it's what lead me back to a professional for help with my anxiety and OCD recently (which have been off the charts for lately).

The person I was referred to for the anxiety diagnosed me with Aspergers. Don't get me wrong, I'm grateful to at least know - for sure- why I've always struggled so much, and in ways I didn't see others struggling...why I've had to work so hard to fit in and how I got so good at being whatever each person wanted vs just being me! It explains why I've felt so disconnected from my peers and from a world that makes very little sense to me. And why I feel so nervous allllllllllllll the time.

It's nice to finally take a breath.
But I'm almost afraid to exhale for fear of being propelled straight into space by the force of years of pent up confusion and nerves being released all at once... Seems about as safe as being shot out of a canon...

And yet I'm happy to have a place to go to chat with like-wired folks...a place to rant and rave about it all. It's daunting and scary and really really upsetting when I think about my younger self and how lost I felt. I can't put into words how much I want to go back and tell that little girl she wasn't broken, just different. Hell, maybe even special. It's like grieving, in a sense, the childhood I could've had.

Does this make sense? Can anyone (particularly females) relate and if so, how long did it take for your feelings to catch up to your logic upon diagnosis? One of my assets (I'm sure many here can relate) has always been my ability to see the bright side or the "pro's" in a situation. But it's infuriating when my emotions don't immediately get on board. I know I have to go through the stages of anger and grief to get to the acceptance and growth on the other side. But is there any way to speed up that process? Thanks. And apologies for the novel, aka rant:/

I was diagnosed a few months ago, I'm only 19 but it feels like I've wasted so much time not understanding myself. But I agree with you, dwelling is useless, depressing and detrimental to the time you DO have to move forward.

I read Aspergirls too! There were some things I found frustrating, but most things were very relatable.

I'm sorry you were misdiagnosed. I often worried/assumed that I had bipolar disorder or a personality disorder because I didn't realise that ASD presented itself so differently in girls.

I suppose I can't help with speeding up the process - I am still going through it myself! - but I assume it'll come in time.

I would be interested in knowing what your life looked like (university, jobs, etc.) because I am struggling a bit with it myself, but obviously that's a bit personal so don't feel required to answer. Did / how did moving out happen for you? What was that experience like? How is your relationship with your family? Do you have pets / how did you get your pet/s? Sorry for being nosy. I am finding the future quite murky at the moment.

I can completely relate! It is only in the last couple of years that my social skills are catching up to my abilities in other areas. I am a university-educated woman who has worked with the English language in some capacity (teaching, editing, proofreading, writing and library work) for a little over 20 years all told, but only got my driver's license at age 48. It has helped me immensely.

I have been trying to remember something that my favorite inspirational tennis player, Denis Istomin, said in an interview,, "Never look back-only forward." It's tough to do all the time, but I'm working on it.

Welcome to Wrong Planet

You have probably been burying your true autistic self. It is described as “masking” or “pretending to be normal”. She has been dying to get out for decades now. It is going to take time, it will be messy sometimes, there probably will be weird, confusing, strange and powerful feelings during this process. There will be a strong desire to manage and clamp down on these feelings as you have been doing your whole life. Fight that urge. Let your AUTISTIC BRAIN do what it needs to do to process all of this.

I was diagnosed late as well-- just about 2 years ago. The first two weeks for me were horrific as I remembered episode after episode of unexplained unpleasantness from the first forty-odd years of my life that I remember. Once I got past the memory was a relief but having all those memories pop up at once was like being pummeled.

It's like the worst thing in an aspie's mind is an unsolved puzzle or problem: Why did this happen? Why did that go that way? Why did I say xyz? So I had all these unexplained events in my head-- many of which I thought I had forgotten-- and then when I got the dx it was as if all these alarm bells announcing a solution had been found wen off simultaneously. I entered a deep depression for about two weeks-- and I mean that in the clinical sense, not the colloquial sense of "oh I'm so depressed." I mean lack of appetite, sleeping constantly, loss of interest in things, etc.

Gradually I came out of it, but there are still times when I'm reminded of some random even from my past-- sometimes recent past-- that suddenly makes sense. But being reminded of it is generally an unpleasant experience as I get to relive the embarrassment (or realize for the first time how embarrassing it really was) whenever this happens.

Still in all it makes sense of things and my life seems less like a haphazard series of unexplainable events and more like someone who grew up long before the term Asperger's Syndrome was ever coined.

Keep on keeping on. It gets better, as they say, though it may take a long time to unpack, in the end it's worth it, IMHO.

I was diagnosed less than a year ago, after getting a misdiagnosis about 12 years previously. The immense relief I felt when I started to research into AS, and to a lesser extend when I was diagnosed, was unparalleled. I've done a bit more reading on AS, and am still finding out things about myself that I never realised. I'm struggling to find the balance with my family, but really nothing has changed for me. I'm trying to make more allowances for myself at home, but find it difficult to "be myself" at work. I can't help but think how my life would have been different (better?) if I had been diagnosed earlier...