Was it better to be unaware of your own autism?

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I dont think it made much of a difference. I was a freak before, and im a freak now. Ive never fitted in, not even with other aspies. I guess its good, because I get disability allowance. Its not good, because my parents forced me to take a lot of nasty antipsychotics and treated me like i was broken, when they really should have taken a look at themselves.

I was diagnosed when I was 5, so I can't really remember how life was before that to be able to make a clear comparison.

Diagnosed at 46 and much better off for it. For a couple of years it felt like a big deal but not so much any more.

Maybe, but currently reading a book about autism, from Christopher Gillber(2002),
a guide to Asperger syndrome - ... and its scary accurate account of certain realities in my life.

Unfortunately I spend a good deal of my life thinking something is not right with me, at times, I had a tendency to mask my natural instincts and behaviors.

I had many situations where I may or did cause lots of unintended consequences.
Sometimes due to watching and repeating behaviors without full comprehension what they are.

I have spend most of my life looking at people wondering how they do it.

My interactions were often horrible and not very fun.

Some interaction may have been fun for me, but not always acceptable.

So yeah my ability to learn about autism has some properties and qualities that I may use to work on my self in regards to people relations, optimize my approach to people and learn to be OK with certain things without being hindered by people who function differently.

I intend to take notes and see a psychologist as soon as possible and see what type of framework I can use to work on this.
Not sure what can be done or what I will do with the information yet.
Then again if its going to end up better I prefer that.

I prefer to know. After all truth is truth whether someone likes it or not.

It was shocking and then illuminating. I am delighted to have learned I have autism. It makes my life make sense. It is the only thing that explains all the weirdness in my life.

i'd defiantly have liked to known back in my in my teens, because then I may have understood better why I didn't understand other people, and developed coping strategies earlier.

It may have also led me to select different paths as I went through life, rather than picking what a Normie should have done and then finding things more difficult than they needed to be, and possibly helped people to understand me better.
I am in here, thinking away, you just need to create the right environment for me to come out and contribute.

I was diagnosed with ASD in my early 30s, after I was misdiagnosed with schizophrenia. My mental health was all crap but it was completely misunderstood by professionals. I don't wish this misunderstanding and mismedication to anyone.

Awarness of ASD gave me terms to describe my experiences. It gave me understanding that I have special needs and need to adress them to prevent getting insane again. It was the missing piece that made my lifetime of memories make sense. Without it, I wasn't able to distinguish which of my "abnormalities" were mental health problems and which of them was just me not being "normal" (typical).

I needed this understanding to heal.

definitely better off after diagnosis. a shame it didn't happen earlier in my life, but it could have also happened even later than it did. made a lot of things make waaaaaaaaaayyyyyy more sense.

slightly old thread brought back alive by a new member...

To answer the title question, no, definitely not. My adult diagnosis explained so much and validated my difficulties. I feel I'm justified by my diagnosis. My formal diagnosis actually helps in practical ways, too. I think my life has improved since I became aware of my autism though I still have a long way to realize my full potential. Becoming aware of my autism has made me motivated to improve my life.

Yes, I wish I was. I was diagnosed at 8 (very rare for an articulate female with only a mild case) and it was revealed to me straight away, probably because my parents got this advice: "it is best for the child if she knows about the diagnosis". So as soon as my parents pulled the assessment results out from the envelope they were like "you have Asperger's syndrome" and was described as "it means you can't talk to people properly", then within a day the whole family plus family friends and their dog knew. I had no control over it at all.
I was happier within myself BEFORE I knew I had the curse. I was so embarrassed after I knew, and I hated people knowing. I still feel the same to this day. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it.

No.

I don't like being unaware of anything about myself.

kraftiekortie I am so sorry you had to go through that with the stairs
One day I hope "they" realise that rough handling like that (presumably going all the way back to neonatal) can cause ASDs

I just wish that I'm more rational about all of this.

Regardless of my age, whether or not I know about it, I simply wish that more emotionally mature or at least just more rational about any knowledge or lack of thereof.

Than this explosive 'stubborn' mess with impractical ideas and fancies over her head.


This is not 'me', this is the 'human' vehicle who's basically the bags of hormones and nerves, whiny, needy and generating crap.
And "I'm" not 'mature' enough to handle this 'responsibility'.

And I don't like her. I might as well just say I hate myself -- in a rational and more objective sense, but that just doesn't reasonate -- in which I'm sure is either a form of overrationalization by claiming my inner self hates my outerself, or something just as bad as irrationality induced belief and denial.

My knowledge and awareness are at odds with my emotional maturity and everything else.
It's more than just watching people play a part while I don't have a script of whatever role I'm supposed to play.

It's an imbalance I've felt since around kinder. And the gap just grows in years.
Each time the gap grows, usually is grows gradually too fast, my mental health just dwindles -- because I'm either emotionally not ready and able to process or simply just being irrational all around, knowledge or not.

It's the reason why I feel helpless and trapped in this body, instead of thinking of ways of taking advantage of the knowledge.

Maybe this is the reason why I'm not an optimist.
Maybe this is why knowing autism in my case shouldn't be too soon or too late.

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No, it was terrible to not know why I seemed to be on the wrong planet. Self diagnosing in 1978 was a small relief, since I had no idea how many others there were like me. I did know that science and engineering were popular careers for us, so at least I would be around some others as an engineer. Noticeable ones were always there and plenty of others who were more accepting of us. Once my widowed mother had met an MD at a singles event and told me he seemed a lot like me. I thought "wow some of us become doctors", I never would have guessed that. My mother was probably autistic too, but died soon after 1994. I wasn't until the last few years that I discovered the autistic community and opened up about my self diagnosis. I don't know how many others suspected and did not say anything. Two people had said they thought I was, but both did it in such an awkward way that I didn't confirm that I knew in either case.