Better late than never!
Hello everyone, I’m delighted to have come across this site and just wanted to share with you my story.
I’m 47 and have just been diagnosed from the University of Vienna, Austria, as high functioning autistic thanks to my wife and 2 year old son! My wife had long suspected all was not as it should be with our son and to cut a very long story short he was recently diagnosed as mildly autistic. A few months prior, following a huge amount of research she made on the subject, she basically put two and two together and realised that I shared many (indeed many more!) of the same issues as my son and suggested I was autistic. After much denial and scepticism I realised maybe she was indeed correct and that would explain so many issues and behaviours in my life. The diagnosis confirmed her belief and finally gave me the real explanation for so much that had happened in my life and came as enormous relief. Like so many others though, it came with so much regret that it hadn't happened much earlier in my life as I've no doubt if so, it would have taken an altogether different and better path. However, hopefully better late than never and I can chart a better course into the future with a full explanation of who I am and the implications of my condition when making decisions and seeking happiness.
I thought it may be helpful to briefly illustrate, certainly in my experience, why it's so important to have an early diagnosis. My mother completely failed to identify my condition throughout my life and still does despite the diagnosis. In her misplaced wisdom she forced me to join with her and my father a 'church' for which I participated during my whole childhood until my late teens. Given my already strong sense of being ‘different’ this merely reinforced it a hundred fold. I was the only kid in a school of over 2000 who dreaded every single day being outed as a religious freak and no doubt have the mental bullying I constantly received being upgraded to physical. I survived through those long and miserable years and kept my secret intact but I have no idea how.
After leaving school at 16 I had no idea what I wanted to do as a career. I tried 6 months at college but as I hated school and just wasn’t suited to studying I dropped out. I then managed one job for a year, hated every minute and finally (after getting married at 18 just to escape) gave it up to start my own business.
A succession of ventures followed culminating in the sale of a business I started 6 years earlier (looking back, despite my condition and seemingly against all the odds!) for a 7 figure sum! That should have been it, I'd achieved my ultimate goal, I was free, no need to work again at 36.
However, subconsciously I knew I would lose it all and felt powerless to stop it. The harder I tried not to, the more I lost (wasted, squandered, badly invested etc)! My wife and I were divorced, which reduced the funds even more until eventually I had a very little left. Whilst trying to get a new business off the ground I met my future wife and she still has a pre first date email from me that says “I’m different from others, not better, not worse, just different”. How right was I!
However, she presumably found me attractive enough to accept my proposal and seemingly overlooked my differences. Several years of marriage to my very neurotypical wife and the behaviours displayed in our son opened our eyes to the possibility I may share the same condition as he and how right she was! Given I'm a Brit and she's Bulgarian in the first few years she'd just took many of my traits as quaint and typically English (even the actress Emma Thomson recently suggested we're a nation of autistics at heart). We are now taking steps to obtain suitable therapy for both my son and I to establish how best to overcome the inevitable challenges that lie ahead. I feel blessed that at least my son can rely on me to fully understand what he faces and work with him to deal with it and have the tremendous advantage that was denied me simply by knowing.
We’ve already taken steps. We moved to live in the Austrian Alps where we operate an internet business and the only small talk I have to make with the locals is “Morning, beautiful day” and a big smile, which is just perfect for me! Obviously we’are still very concerned about our son as he is not yet talking but being the affectionate and babbling child he is, together with the superb care in Austria, we’re very hopeful.
The frustration at not understanding why you are so different and don't 'fit in' and the commensurate effort in developing coping mechanisms over so many years without knowing why you're doing it is overwhelming beyond measure! I feel a desparate need to take tme out to really 'recover' and to gather the energy to ensure what remains of my life is not wasted in the same way I feel the previous chapters were.
In summary, I honestly believe had I known why I was so different to others, the long standing lack of self esteem, my self destructive behaviour and prolonged bouts of depression as a result could have been understood and managed and would have given me a chance of avoiding self sabotaging much of my life to this point. I'm not blaming autism directly for making the wrong decisions in my life, that would be a nonsense but I feel it's a primary cause of feeling different to everyone else (mostly in a negative way - social awkwardness for example) and being the primary reason but I accept not sole reason, leading to such negative behaviours.
Thanks ironically to my son and my wife at least now there is a chance for both of us. As I say, better later than never.
I agree with you, Maverick, "Better late than never". I was diagnosed at 65 (I'm 68 now), and whatever is left of my life will be better, so I'm glad of it. Of course, when I was a child, there was no possibility of my being diagnosed with Asperger's, and I wasn't such a weird kid that anybody dragged me to a psychologist anyway. But I'm glad that I know now what went wrong.
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