Diagnosed when older? The process of accepting the dx?

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Like the OP I was overjoyed when I finally found out what was wrong, this changed to mild depression as the realisation of the effect this disorder has had upon my life, I am now fairly at ease with it. The big risk I face is allowing the DX to become an excuse and use it to refrain from sociallising

AMAZING some of the stories here ... up until a couple of years ago, thinking I'm the only one who goes through anything like that!

In short; I was watching a PBS special on something or other that had a short bit about a 10 year old boy with AS. I watched with my jaw hitting the floor, thinking that A) this kid is a mirror image of me at his age and B) what do you that isn't normal? I thought this was stuff everyone struggled with and I just really, really sucked at it?

I got online and started learning all I could about AS and Autism, largely trying to disprove my emerging self-diagnosis. In no small part because I'm highly skeptical of most people who self-diagnose off WebMD (I do think we are largely a nation of hypochondriacs). But the more I learned, the more little online quizzes I took, the more the dx fit. A month or two later, a shrink unofficially confirmed it.

Like so many here, I felt huge relief; like I was suddenly seeing myself and the world around me through brand new eyes, or for the first time, or both.

I did later go through the helplessness/frustration stage but I don't think it had anything to do with the dx. More a loss of resources (namely, poor people's health insurance) to start figuring it all out. Back to DIY psychotherapy.

Yeah, there are downsides. Like finding out that my parents were told something was 'wrong' but withheld that dx from me and never pursued it, continuing on their chosen why-don't-you-just-try-harder/shaming-me-into-behaving-better road. I was really mad about that for a while, but also realized, "What am I going to do? Both parents are in their 80's, one with Alzheimer's, it's not like I can make us go back and re-do childhood family therapy." They did what they could with the resources they had at the time. Nearly all of my NT family doesn't believe it or doesn't want to believe it, still in the try-harder mindset.

I also spent a lot of time wondering how much easier my life had been if I hadn't spent so much of it trying to force my square-peg self into the round holes of society.

But again; what's past is past. Since the dx, it's been extremely helpful in choosing the next job, in relating to friends and family and coworkers. Even gave me the courage to tell my sisters; "I need to communicate with you guys via email and not verbally for a while ... for my health."

Of course, I could go on forever about this, but that's the center of the meat. Good luck to all of us as we figure out this strange planet we live on. Especially since 'help' is nearly always directed at children with AS, not adults.

- Jo

It's amazing how many people have responded to this thread about accepting a Dx who won't have one for themselves for one reason or another.

I agree with Millie but just thought it was odd so many with no diagnosis would have any idea at all what it would be like having had one made and to live with it.

Up to a point I agree but what about telling your wife or husband that you have a 'condition'? How about telling your boss that you may have some issues your psychiatrist mentioned you should talk about. How about telling your parents or your friends that you have been diagnoses with such and such of a condition, not just AS, perhaps something more serious. What about arguing with the DMV that even though you're autistic you still have a right to get a drivers license.
Having a diagnosis changes a lot of stuff that just imagining doesn't.

To QrisJ and Morgana:

I used to refer to it as my personal invisibility cloak - later shocked to find that it's common with us Aspies to wonder if people around us even see us at all! Case in point, a conversation I had while working on the tech crew at a film festival last Spring:

Boss: I think all this mini-DV player needs is to be cleaned out. Too bad we don't have any canned air.

Me: I have some in my RV parked out back. I'll go get it...

John: (seeming to notice everyone in the room but me) I can go to Walgreens and buy some.

Me: I'm parked closer, it's really no trouble for me to go get mine...

Nicole: (seeming to notice everyone in the room but me) I think I have some at home. I can go check but it will take about an hour.

Me: Really, I do have canned air in my tool box, it will only take a sec...

Boss: (seeming to notice everyone in the room but me) Man! I wish we had some closer on hand!



To garywww and Millie:

Only 2 years into my dx, I've been experimenting with the approach that I'm not going to solicit it, but I'm not going to hide it either. At work, I'll try to bring it up only in ways which simultaneously show that I'm striving to work through it to do better at work. For instance:

I had one of those classic moments recently where (metaphorically speaking) I'm asking a coworker about apples and she's angrily answering all about oranges.

I took a moment to write my question concisely on a piece of paper with a multiple choice answer:
__Yes.
__No.
__Depends.

Before showing it to her I explained: "This is me, not you, but I'm Autistic, giving me a bit of a language barrier and it's sometimes easier for me to be understood through written word than verbally. Here: (Showing her the note).

It worked like a charm! She was too in shock/not knowing what to say about someone declaring so bluntly "I'm (hot media buzzword that most people treat as a way bigger deal than I'm treating it)," so simply read the note and answered the question.

- Jo

I was diagnosed a week ago. I have been feeling depressed about it but I've also got PMDD. When I'm not having those major depressive episodes during PMDD I feel ok about it, even relieved that I finally know why I am so different.
Sometimes it is tough, especially when I've never had a job and when I think of people my age that live on their own and are independent.
This year will be my toughest yet, but I will finally be able to work because I will hopefully get some assistance.

OMG i so could have written that myself. In fact I was so taken aback that I had to re read to compute if I was reading a post I never knew i posted .. hahahhhhaa

I had weeks of being so excited as if I had found the super hero in me. excuse my language here but i took on the moto.. No more f***s to give.. I could just be me, I understood myself and it felt like I was meeting myself for the first time.

Well 6 months later I was diagnosed at 41.. the first few days I felt relieved as if I could really just settle into being me.. But then I started feeling.. who the ding dong am i? I felt like I could not find the 'me' entangled in the masking.. What was me and waht was the masking.. omg then I went into an insane melt down.. a solid 8 days of almost hyperventilating with small bocks of hours where I could gather myself and go out for a bit and then back to crying and staying in bed all day..
I got stuck in a loop of ' Iv been trying to fix this for 23 years now.. actively, obsessively.. constantly ... and the realisation was just oo much for me that all that work would have been helpful but the finality of the fact that I could not fix this brought me to my knees.. I felt i could not go on.. I had not energy .. I could not see how I could go on in life..
I have been in a very depressive and complicated feeling state for the last 4 weeks ..
To day is my first day our of the vortex rabbit hole of hell..
I feel totally different.. Today i wrote a piece from the information that I have been patching together in my mind.. If you want to read it I have posted it in another post.. I think you can look at my other posts..

I had to re register as something happened to my profile but I did post in the time I was falling down the rabbit hole but it is not there.. sorry If im not all rainbows and ice creams but im just saying that you are not alone.. I nearly died of that feeling of aloneness and loneliness over the last 4 weeks but I did not and I feel fine again and have started to built strategies to co exist in this alien world around me..

I hope you find your way soon!