Autism camouflaging and late diagnosis

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People not from here would ignorantly describe it as a London commuter/satellite town, but there is actually a fair bit too it. It's the largest town in England with 250,000 people, has multiple thriving industries with the main one being IT (Microsoft, Version, Dell, HP and many other euro headquarters here), we have Reading festival which is one of the main music festivals in Europe, have some cracking local history thanks to William of Orange and William I, a large abbey in the middle of the town in which some royals are buried, some other rumoured to be.

My favourite thing is the countryside though. I am a country boy living on the outskirts of the town. Loads of woodland, farms and amazing areas to walk, canoe and cycle. I am going to cycle to one of my favourite places tomorrow - Calleva Roman Wall and amphitheatre. There is the remains of an amphitheatre out in the woods from the 1st century BC between Reading and the next town and is just kind of sitting there hardly looked after.

For me it's that, at the surface, everything could be explained by (extreme?) shyness. I was never disruptive or oppositional, my organisation was fine so I got all my homework done, I was fine academically so I could do the classwork, so I guess the teachers didn't consider there being more behind me just never talking. I don't make eye contact and I've never mimicked or imitated as far as I'm aware - I had no awareness I was any different. My autism was masked by it presenting as shyness, not a conscious effort from me. A lot of people are shy and aren't autistic though, you would get a lot of false positives if you were to think each shy person could be autistic so I guess it's just easy for that kind of thing to happen.

IME: the amount of energy it costs. For me (ASD) is exhausting. The rewards of social acceptance are way smaller than the price. I prefer authenticity over 'fitting in' and 'being normal'.
Maybe for NT's the rewards are bigger?

I'm 27 female and I am not official diagnosis with ASD but score high on all tests, I had not known of it before.
However, you say received many misdiagnosis and I question as what because I have about 4 diagnosis currently but wonder how inaccurate it is. If you would like can message me!

I had not left my house 2 years before, and would go out wearing my comforter (blanket) around me or holding a giant stuffed animal pillow to hide in which I realize now as pretty odd for my age. (still prefer keeping to myhouse/myself)
but now I go to college for computer science AND work there 11 hours, which is challanging/confusing a lot.
The best was DBT (dialectical behavioral therapy) they gave me for the diagnosis as BPD.
But DBT is extremely helpful in knowing how to act socially much better.
Whether my diagnosis are accurate or not and that DBT was helpful for BPD or ASD will be a question

Thanks, Biscuitman.

We have a Reading in the State of Pennsylvania. It's famous for having a pagoda.

To be honest, you can never be too old for animal pillows.
Anyways, I do the same thing aside from the "not leaving the house in two years" part. I'm not sure if it's because of AS or what.
I'd sure like to know, though.

Hehe thank you, and speaking of which, nice picture!
I do not do this anymore but I think it helped me feel more comfortable and safe
I had also sucked my thumb well into my teens
without these now I seem to substitute with fiddling with my hands, face and sleeves.
But it's probably of anxiety, not sure

(my big pikachu was my go to, and I like your rilakkuma )

Aww, thank you! And yeah I can relate to that, too. I still suck my thumb sometimes, but only if I'm extremely stressed. I usually "regress" more if I'm having an episode. I'm honestly still trying to make sense of some of the things I do.

I've become very good at this, and I do it so I'll be liked and accepted; after certain people discovered I had this, I was genuinely surprised at how nasty they became towards me, I mean talk about discrimination.

I know "the way" certain people on the spectrum act, and I do everything I can to avoid acting that way myself, and I tend to mirror the NTs instead. For example...

- Walking up to a random strangers (active/odd social communication style) and expressing their special interest in a lopsided way to them ("I like red cars, do you like red cars?") is a sure fire way to expose yourself as an autist, it's sad to see actually because that's how I was when I was younger. I know people say "just be yourself", but this is just bad advice to give to someone with autism, being themselves has never worked for anyone really...

- "Confusing social communications with personal irrelevancies"; basically people on the spectrum tend to bring up a lot about themselves during conversations, such as what they like, and what has been going on in their lives, but struggle to talk about normal chit-chat instead, and if they can it tends to be more-so about gaming and TV etc.

- Weird dress sense and general lack of social skills don't really help either.

Besides, except in cases where they really need support, I think a diagnosis is nothing but harmful and many here agree with this, better just hide in the closet for as long as possible lol. I don't think kids with this have the know-how to camouflage their autism anyway.

If support isn't required, the diagnostic criteria isn't met and the traits are subclinical.

I wish I was diagnosed earlier so I got the help I needed - there's stuff I probably would be able to do (poorly, but still) had I got help throughout my life and it's awful being the age I am and only now improving in these areas - I feel massively behind and embarrassed.

When I found out I was different, but before I was diagnosed, I blamed myself. So I disagree with you because I don't agree with knowingly putting kids through what I went through.

Of course I don't know how I'd have turned out if I got diagnosed as a toddler.

Oh gosh, no, I very much disagree. As someone who wasn't diagnosed until age 37, I grew up hating myself, unable to understand what was wrong with me. I've struggled through years of depression and anxiety and made many harmful choices which could have been avoided if I'd known I was autistic. I'm relieved to finally have my diagnosis but feel it's now too late for me, the damage is done.

There is no one answer. People and the people they have to deal with are so very different.

Two things take into consideration.

You are under no obligation to disclose your late diagnosis to anyone.

Camouflaging is often a catch 22. It does hide traits that others find objectionable and can build toughness. But fooling others into thinking you are typical means that others will judge your inevitable slipups as a charactor failures. Succesfully faking normal is often a 24/7 effort. Everybody has a limit on how much pain they can take. I use the pee anology. Most can fake not bieng uncomfortable for a time but the longer you have to 'hold it" the harder the effort to fake it. Some can fake not bieng uncomfortable then bieng in pain for a long time while others will start getting noticably jittery. Eventually if the pressure is not relieved an accident will occur and if it is in public the whole faking effort ends in catastrophic failure. With autism some people can fake it for decades leading to great success but there is a cost. Dammed if you do, dammed if you don't.

For me I got diagnosed at 55 so a lot of damage has already been done. But it has prevented further damage.

Why do you think these things?

For me facial expressions were always there, just extremely weird. I had funny smiles and all kinds of stuff but I was fairly loud and social, I Just didn't know how to do it.

I wasn't TOLD until recently but I think I was diagnosed since early on. My doctors told me they thought the label would change me for the worse, but once I learned about it I revolutionized my life for the better. My symptoms were never hidden, in fact that's what worries me. But I certainly think it might be more common for people with AS to have symptoms hidden, especially depending on the circumstances. It doesn't manifest itself as commonly as traditional Autism or even Schizophrenia or Anxiety Spectrum. (I know it's NOTHING like those but society puts us together so I might as well make the comparison, I don't want to offend anyone).

Personally this isn't something I want on my record.

What record? You think an autism diagnosis is harmful because of possible discrimination? Bit of a catch-22; get a diagnosis and get help versus get a diagnosis and get written off.
I do disagree with the suggestion that kids can't camouflage. Some can more than others I think; girls seem to be better at it than boys, maybe because of heightened female awareness.