Adjusting to change?

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Is this a problem any of you have? You are used to doing things a certain way and find it hard when circumstances mean you can't . For me it makes me quite anxious and I find it quite hard to adapt , to working out how to do it differently.

I really struggle adjusting to change. I always thought it was just a constant anxiety issue I had, but I have now realised it is almost all because of change.

I can cope with change in a way, but I will plan my day often well in advance. Not to the hour or anything, but everything will be in an order and I will almost assign energy to it and prepare myself. If anyone changes those plans, like I forget a meeting everything gets horribly stressful. If I forget my tobacco one day it feels like everything has gone wrong.

Anyway I may not have many solutions but I defs have the same problem. I think life takes more energy out of autistic people so even small changes to plans can be a hugely stressful event to us.

I feel like I use a kind of "auto-pilot" to be able to get many things done. When anything changes, I can quickly get lost and anxious through procrastinating and imagining the worst of how I'll perform. One slight upside that I have noticed, and which I always try and remind myself of, is that I tend to adapt far quicker than I imagined I would - a new "auto pilot" establishes itself quite quickly once I've had the chance to familiarise myself. Until I'm comfortable with the change, it is always a time of high anxiety and exhaustion, though.

Yes, I struggle massively with change and always have.

It also really throws me off. We recently had some major work done to our house and I am still recovering. It's been about two months and I'm still a mess.

I've always had this problem but I've gradually gotten better. Being on anxiety & OCD medication helps & being forced to handle changes helped me become better adaptable to em.