Regressing After Diagnosis/Self-Diagnosis?

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Gosh, I replaced "think" with "believe" in the meantime...

Measuring what is "best" for us is a long quest, and it involves both people around us and ourselves. The point is, the latter is more important in the long run.

I've noticed myself doing a lot more "stimmy" things since I started suspecting an ASD - rubbing the top of my leg when I drive, chewing the inside of my cheeks, hand wringing, etc. - though I can't say for sure if I'm doing it more, or if I'm simply more cognizant of it. I'm also less reserved about wanting to maintain certain routines. One thing is certain though, I feel a lot less stressed out just letting me be myself instead of trying to be "normal."

Since self-diagnosing about 4 months back and joining this site, I think I've been more "aware" of my Aspie traits. I've become slightly obsessed with gathering information on the disorder (as Aspies do, it seems), and I started to worry that I had begun to believe that I might have "convinced" myself that these are more pronounced, but it's just as likely, maybe moreso, that it's just the enhanced awareness.

Seeking official diagnosis ASAP, and hoping that will alleviate some of my obsession with fact-gathering.

Definitely - after I put the puzzle pieces together & realised what was the cause for so much grief.

No. I bet if I do, my mother might say I am trying to be Asperger's and my husband might think so too. Besides having it doesn't mean you are to have it more. I once had that misconception too so I did it in my teens and mom didn't like it and she said I was trying to be Asperger's than myself and using it as an excuse.

That's about it.

When I realized I likely have AS, I felt less of a "mandate" to act normal like everyone else.

I can't say it's been a good thing...I've gotten sloppy with how I let myself behave around others, but it was nice to realize that they way I felt and responded was "normal" for me.

Yes, I have found that what I've been experiencing since self-diagnosis of Aspergers is arguably regressive behavior.

First there was the period of feeling 'broken', which left me wondering what the heck was the right thing to do, and then came the 'regressive' stage. As others here have stated they've done, I experienced more identification of symptoms, such that I now actually notice them and accept them as natural, with subsequently less willingness to suppress what I used to barely acknowledge (stims, difficulty with eye contact, pedantic behavior, strange postures, 'stuck-ness', very limited visual thinking, etc.).

I am seeking diagnosis and hope to succeed within the next six months. Part of the goal after dx is to rebuild some behavior patterns from the ground up, as I've found several adaptions I'd assumed over the years have been wrong guesses. I'm not sure I like the idea of someone telling me how to act but I do know I need guidance because I've been terribly unsuccessful in some areas.

Shortly after I enquired about the possibility of me having an ASD to my parents (they agreed) my mum said that I seemed to show more traits after I told them than before, such as obsessiveness (although this has always been very prominent throughout my life) and temper as well as various "stimmy" type stuff, she thought maybe I was "putting it on" a little bit. But my dad said it's probably because they themselves are more aware of my behaviours now and know what to look for more, so they end up finding more. I don't mean this to come out like we look too far into it and blow it out of proportion because we do not. I don't know if it's a coincidence or not that so soon after I let others know about my possible ASD, I became much more prone to meltdowns, and I've had several really bad ones (as if there is any such thing as a good one ) in the last few months which have resulted in me making a visit to a psychiatrist. Although personally I believe that these meltdowns are more due to the fact that I am not coping well with the transition into adulthood. (Job, driving, money, expectations etc etc.) and I am getting stressed out at it all and it's unfairness.

I also think that maybe I seem perhaps more autistic as I am allowed to show my true self now, instead of bottling it all up and crumbling inside.

People are always telling me not to bottle up my emotions and my true self.

I appear much less aspie now I know about it.

10 years ago in the mother and toddler groups I used to rock, flap and play lining up the toys and making mandalas out of toy cars with my toddler. Funnily enough no one ever commented on my odd behaviour. I even worked with a charity which helped people with autism and they must have known but they never said a thing, I mean I used to rock and flap loads and line everything up which could be.

However as soon as I found out about aspergers and its symptoms I make a concerted effort not to rock or flap or line things up. Ive really isolated myself as Im so self conscious around my social skills. Ive gone on a couple of courses and showed myself up by correcting the teacher, monologuing and interrupting, I worked really hard not to but still did, so I wont be doing courses any more.

I would be much more happy if I could embrace my 'difference' but I feel very silly about it, I dont want to have something 'wrong' with me. I was more happy with myself when I thought it was normal to line things up and flap, I dont know why people didnt comment, they must have just been very polite. When I was in school people commented that I was odd and often asked me if I was on drugs and would call me crazy, but they never mentioned lining up or flapping or anything. Before people just thought I was difficult and a bit crazy, I actually think thats probably a more positive label than aspergers or autism.

Makes me feel so separate and unhuman, I didnt know everyone else could read expressions and body language, I thought they were all like me, it made me sad to know I had got things so wrong. I dont know why I didnt realise, i even did a degree in psychology and argued in my essays that people didnt use body language and the researchers were making to much of it, I just didnt know.

So now Im 'worse' in that before I knew, I did lots of things and tried to have friends where as now Im very isolated but I probably appear much less aspie as now i know what the 'symptoms' are I can hide them more effectively.

I can see where your motivation toward said skills can be sapped a bit, particularly when you both know that not only will it nevery truly change but that there's a community of similar people out there. Really it tends to be a shift from "I need to do this in order to survive" to "Wait a minute, I might have been overdoing it a little"

I'm sure you'll work it out in the middle eventually but yeah, I understand that it can be quite uncomfortable at first to feel like you're letting your guard down - especially when you're used to seeing the consequences of that roll in like clockwork. Seems there's only a certain amount of effort that you can maintain day to day in the long run though, typically the way it ends up is you'll just end up trimming the excess off of you're coping skills, worrying less about the parts that don't matter and having more energy to make it sustainable.

Since self diagnosing I'm still putting on the front I always have although now I am much more aware of exactly how big of a front it is and that other people don't do the same thing as a general rule. I always knew I saw things differently than other people but I never realized how much of an issue that was for other people. I just keep finding out, more and more, that the world doesn't work the way I thought it did. While, on one hand it's a huge relief to know that life has been so difficult for a reason, I'm approaching a massive meltdown because the things I got 'wrong' just seem to be never ending. It's a Matrix-like change of perspective and I may be approaching the brain exploding point.

For many of us older types, only exaggerated Kanner-type autism was identified when we were children, so most of us stumbled through life knowing we were obviously different but not having the first clue why. To survive, we learned to hide it, to some degree, most of the time. Over the years, that gets unbelievably exhausting. By the time we approach 40, most of us have already begun to experience the consequences of the fatigue from what amounts to constantly pretending to be someone else. By the time many of us get to the point of considering a diagnostic evaluation, we have generally "regressed" (meaning "trended toward appearing more different from the hypothetical norm") a substantial amount, although we are generally not aware at the time just how far we have strayed. A not-inconsequential part of what appears to be "post-diagnotic regression" is actually the result of unintentially comparing our autism-aware post-diagnostic state to our blissful memory of our best years of fake performances, rather than our actual state at the time of diagnosis – much of the "regression" actually happened before diagnosis.

Still, it is common that at some level of consciousness we make a post-diagnostic re-evaluation of just who we want to be, so to speak. Generally, up to a point, the more severe your symptoms are in your "natural state", the more noticeable your adjustment away from fake-normal is likely to be, Beyond a certain severity, or for certain personaliy types, attempts to fit in (if ever they were made) were abandoned long ago, so a formal diagnosis doesn't really change anything.

I thought I was just putting it on a bit because I had been reading about it so much, and maybe I was a bit, but part of it is because I feel less like the need to fix what is wrong with me because I now know it's a natural way for me to think and do things - that was after the "I'll never be normal!! Waaaaaaaaaaaah!" stage.

I feel like I've reset all the mixed theories I had on what I should do in this or that situation, why I'm odd etc. and now I'm starting from scratch. I'm also exploring how to strike a balance in public, so I'm more comfortable being myself but not detrimentally so. At home I'm as weird as I ever was .

I wouldn't say regressing so much as accepting and gaining some confidence to be myself.

Well put.

I think another thing to consider - when we find out we have it, or for those diagnosed too young to understand - when we find out what it actually means, our theories about ourselves have to change. In a pre-awareness reality you have a certain outlook that you can become whatever you feel you need to be and you push yourself toward that. Knowing you have AS though is knowing that you're spinning you're wheels to try too hard to dismantle and rebuild yourself as NT.

I think in general, at least for those of us with deep enough thought to consciously know we want better lives (pretty much any of us who'd sit here and blabber about identity included), it seems to go with the territory that we need to be genuine not only to be happy but to interact with people and not give them the sense that we're trying to pull one over on them. In both senses it seems like the better we can hone our coping skills to who we find ourselves to ultimately be, the better it all seems to work out. That's probably the biggest challenge though - peeling the onion to figure out what we are and aren't, who we are and aren't, what's our own individual character vs. AS or other things, etc. etc.

Yeah now I am rethinking everything I thought I knew about myself. I see how much I was trying to distance myself from the way I really am, recreating myself as a different person and using all my energy to maintain that persona. Suddenly I feel like I need to hide out at home more than ever because I am not sure anymore how to act in public, how to act around other people.

I am not just questioning the things I do and the way I present myself, but the things I thought I wanted out of life, lots of hazy ideals and goals I've been hanging on to for all these years thinking one day they might manifest but never knowing how it would happen. Now I don't even know what I want anymore, or what is realistic for me to want.

I think the better word is 'accepting' it rather than 'regressing.'
You'll know when you regress.