Before you knew you had AS...

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I got diagnosed at 26. I was very very belittling toward myself and hid a lot of what I now know are stims. I'm more likely to stim in public now and I understand I'm not just stupid, lazy, difficult, being a baby, etc. and I feel better about who I am (sometimes... It's a long process to change a lifetime of negative self thought.)

I'm glad I got the diagnosis and it explains my ENTIRE life.

I felt like I was racing in the snow with a blindfold on. While everyone was sliding on top of the snow, I was sinking, blind to the world. Everyone would tell me, "Try harder! You're not working hard enough!" But the more I tried, the more I sank within the snow. I couldn't explain it. It was in every way emotional torture. I'd rather be waterboarded than to go back.

When I finally figured it out, it felt like a great deal of weight disappeared off of my back and the blindfold came off. It was like for the first time in my short life I could finally see. It was liberating.

I feel about the same. Nothing really changes. It is just that I am more comforted to know the reasons why.

I think getting a diagnosis benefitted me in the long run. It didnt benefit me immediately but it help to shape my growth, give me access to resources, and help me grow into my own person. My parents rejected the diagnosis at first and I just mindlessly believed them. Its helped so much in the long run, I dont know what would have happened if I wasnt diagnosed?

I felt relieved in a way as it meant there was a reason for me not being good socially but in another way it wasn't good as I saw myself as different from the norm and hence not a part of the mainstream any more and just disengaged myself from most of NT culture. I no longer saw the point in reading magazines or buying nice clothes as I wasn't 'normal' so what was the point in trying to fit in with the 'normals' any more. I could see that people had been treating me differently and it wasn't my imagination/exaggeration and this made me angry. I had a good job pre diagnosis and have never earned as much post diagnosis and stopped working full stop 2 years ago and said I'd never go back into the workplace but I am just about to start a new job tomorrow as I'm bored of sitting at home. I'm not overly bothered if the job works out well or not as it's only for a year to cover maternity leave so that takes pressure off me. I just want to see if I can actually hold down a job again and do something interesting/useful again as I'm no good at self-motivation and end up just sitting online all day without a job.

I did meet my friend who lives with me on an AS forum and we get on very well so that has been the most positive thing to come out of the diagnosis.

I just assumed I was normal and a bad kid. I just thought I had to try harder and needed more practice so I be better at sports and with my balance. I also thought kids dealt with things better than me such as with jeans and tight clothing. I also thought everyone thought like me and I would find it weird when my friend hated books and Polly Pockets and I couldn't understand how she can hate them so I thought she had to like them because they are fun to play. I also couldn't understand how people didn't like the same movies I liked so I assumed they liked them. I also thought everyone did a better job at controlling their behavior and hyperactivity. I was not aware of my problems then. I was still a happy kid.

I think my life got better after the diagnoses and after I learned what it was. It also took me a while to figure out my past and I realize how many misunderstandings I had and how I missed social cues and didn't know the social rules. I have always copied people and always watched people with my eyes because that was how I figured stuff out but I would read them wrong. I also realize when mom would get mad at me for how I was acting because something was uncomfortable like when she be brushing my hair or making me shower and I complained the water was too cold or too hot, it may have been sensory issues and she thought I was being a wuss so she slap me. Back then I was feeling like I was getting abused and mom didn't love me nor care and then the next thing I knew I was back to thinking she did love me and cared for me and then I would think she didn't care when those situations would come up. I also realize my school may have been trying to teach me to follow the rules by punishing me but all I saw was I was being treated different and other kids were allowed to do it and I wasn't so I rebelled by fighting for my rights by acting like the other kids more and doing what they do so I be treated like everyone else. I fought tooth and nail for it for two years. I still feel relief when I find out some things I do is common in other people with ASD so that means I am not stupid or that there is nothing wrong with me. I've been hard on myself before. Sometimes I am still hard on myself like I feel lazy or feel I am not trying hard enough. It took me until I was 15 to feel normal. I used to be upset about having AS and thinking every single thing I did was due to it so I was blaming everything on it. I realized I was happy and had better self esteem about myself before I knew I had AS so I went back that way again.

Yes, except for the short life.

Before I knew I had AS...

...I just thought I was a bad person. And weird. And simply not like everyone else... in a bad way.

And I was diagnosed just this year, at 33.

Knowing has made it easier being around people -- because I understand now why I don't "get it" the way they do. I used to have to "try so hard" and it would stress me out, and then feel bad that I didn't understand right away (or ever). I also have that problem where I can't isolate one conversation in a crowded room. It completely bewildered me that most people could do that.

Being diagnosed also made me very angry with major situations I had been placed in in the past. I probably have to go to therapy to deal with those issues.

Alrighty, you posted in my thread, so I'll post in yours.

Before I knew about my diagnosis, I spent too much time daydreaming of a different life due to struggling so much to make my voice heard.

After finding out about my diagnosis, I've met and gotten to know many people from different walks of life who have ASD. Knowing them has taught me tons about life and my identity. I have also since been able to get the necessary supports at school, and am now finally achieving to my full potential. I've also become much more mature and independent as a result of this journey. I am now working, living with my partner, and doing university full time. I never knew I could get this far.

Still awaiting a formal dx ( though I believe an early dx of Childhood Schizophrenia was made by my pediatrician & suppressed by my family!). Of course, AS was not even a dx when I was a kid & what the heck was High Functioning Autism? Everyone ( including me knew autists just got worse & ended up in institutions forgotten by everyone).
How was my childhood? I still have nightmares.. Oh, btw, I was threatened with being one of those locked away & forgotten about by my parents. There was NO tolerance for anything even slightly odd/off or person who was different in the 60s & 70s. Bullying? You stood up or got beaten down, because that was how it had always been. All those memories, where could I even begin?
I know a lot of people in the aspie pride crowd probably think I am being overly dramatic, but they truly have no understanding at what went on before there was an Autistic Spectrum, AS/HFA etc.

Sincerely,
Matthew

I'm glad that I know now, because it helps me find coping strategies that work well for me (things that I found really help me to do amazingly better)! I don't think I like others knowing though, because people are too judgmental and negative, two things I'd like to avoid if at all possible. Thanks to a natural disaster, all records of my psyc evals over the years have been destroyed, so I like to pretend that I'm completely NT now (not sure if that's legal! lol!).

Mostly, I don't want accommodation. I want people's high expectations of me. I've gotten pretty far in life not in spite of my differences, but because of them. I want to see how far I can go. I am the first non NT person in my family, and with any luck I'll be the first one to have "Dr." preceding my name.

You're awesome.........you're going to be so successful!

I became a little less anxious and more comfortable in my own skin about 5 years ago when I accepted and tried to learn about the diagnosis that I got when I was 14 ..............I'm a little slow.

Last edited by daydreamer84 on 20 Sep 2012, 6:43 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Before I was diagnosed, I had an awful time with just about everything, just didn't know why.
Afterward, I at least knew why and could find ways to try to manage everything. So I think I'm better off now because I know the cause.

I suppose my son's generation will be the first who will know pretty much from the start and I wonder how/if that will change things - I haven't told him, there is no way he can grasp something of this magnitude but I have said that we go to social skills group to help him learn how to be a good friend. I worry a little because kids hate 'being different'

I feel very much the same. For a few years before I knew more about AS, I ocasionally used to say that i was 'a little bit Aspergers' in a joking sort of way just like someone might call themselves a little bit OCD without seriously meaning it. What has shocked me is not just how well I fit to the definition but, as you say, how it seems to explain EVERYTHING about me. I have yet to get a formal diagnosis but given the way I see myself in so much I read of peoples childhoods and adulthoods with AS, i would now be astonished if I was not diagnosed on the spectrum somewhere.

I went through hell at various times of my life trying to make sense of these issues. Childhood was painfull and confusing and even in adulthood I would go to networking type events at work and think to myself 'If I just attend a few more of these I will get the hang of it like everyone else seems to be doing'.

At the minute I cant honestly say I am happy knowing what I now know but, deep down, I think it has to be better having that knowledge than not.