Feeling Wrong/Broken Prior To Diagnosis

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OK, firstly I don't strictly speaking have my diagnosis yet but I have never related so well to something in my life so I see diagnosis as a formallity now.

I've been having difficulty investing myself in AS at an emotional level. I keep trying to talk myself out of it despite all the obvious evidence. This in itself confuses me as the ability to answer all these masses of questions far outweigh any possible stigma I may feel from an ASD. For the last 5 weeks or so I have been a wreck - emotions all over the place, anxiety and panic attacks, urge to start cutting again (have not been tempted for years), drinking vodka by meself well into the early hours to keep myself under som sembelence of control...things are not so good and I could not put my finger on exactly why. Why has waiting for this diagnosis having such an effect on me?

Imagine...
Ever since you can remember, you've been aware of having issues. In a million different ways they make life heartbreakingly difficult and you are acutely aware of them being unique to you. If you ever forget there are plenty of people to remind you how much of an outcast you really are. As a child you feel overwhelmed and try to make sense of it: Conclusion - you're fundamentally defective and ending it all might be for the best since these problems do not seem to be going away (my thinking from twelve to eighteen). For years, the most powerfull raw feelings of dispair you could possibly imagine burn these conclusions deep into your DNA - You are broken, you are worthless, you are essentially a bad person. Even the only way you find to combat these feelings - cutting yourself with a razor - solidifies your self-image as an outcast/monster. You become an adult and, emotionally exhausted, the feelings subdue a bit. You become largely numb compared to the intensity of emotion you're used to. Things others seem to become emotional about seem to just wash over you. You lack connections and feel like a creature inpersonating a human being. Regardless, you might as well just make the best of things, try to act like a reasonably good person and hope nobody realises that you're actually so ugly and broken inside, toxic, wrong. It becomes your underlying identity. You wear your mask and you try to do all the right things as best as you can but you are constantly reminded of the waus in which you are unlike normal humans. You are the probably crazy man who sits and rocks in his chair talking quietyly to himself - someone who who has serious defficiencies and should be ashamed of himself!

You might not always be thinking it at a concious level but you get on with your life. A life carefully stacked up on top of this ugly souless creature. You know this truth about yourself and always have.

...How can someone just casually discard this kind of darkness burried deep inside. It is not just part of my identity - it IS my identity at the foundation level. I dont really know how to think of myself other than this at a deep level and it is a bit scarry to poke a beast this big which has laid dormant for so long - it almost killed me a number of times and I have grown very causious of disturbing it

This is some dark carzyness I know but, there it is for the world to read. Please discuss...

I don't have to imagine it I wasn't diagnosed officially until 2 years ago when I was 42. I knew I was different than other people, had created work-arounds for years to 'deal with it', and was by most accounts successful in life. I'd stumbled upon descriptions of Aspergers syndrome and eventually took all the tests online and was pretty convinced I had it. It wasn't until a big blow up at work that I went to get an official diagnosis.

I'm glad I did; I also found out I have ADHD too. Does it change anything? Not really. I'm still building my mental models to understand 'normal people', I'm still pushing against all my limitations and fears constantly... but for some odd reason the second it was officially confirmed I felt LESS weird and more normal because there are way more people like me than I knew.

Go get your diagnosis, accept it but don't let it define you, and then start to embrace who you are instead of trying to be something else (if that's what you're doing)! A fish is not a defective frog. Yes they can do some things I can only do with great difficulty.. but the opposite is more true. Embrace your strengths and carve a niche out for a successful life.

You're more than a set of traits.. it's what you do with those traits that make you special and unique. Just because you're pre-disposed to certain things doesn't mean you can't for limited amounts of time be whoever you want. I've been in Toastmasters for 8 1/2 years now and I'm doing things I never would have imagined were possible. Yes I still have those socially awkward moments where I want to run and hide but not as much any more.