Did getting diagnosed change you life in anyway?

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My parents assume that I am an aspie, and have talked alittle bit about getting me diagnosed. I told my closest friend this and so she asked me, "Is getting diagnosed going to change your life?" and the only response was No. So, I want to know about what others have experienced...

It really hasn't changed my life much. When I realized exactly what I had (I diagnosed myself after a long time of thinking about it), it made me feel as if I should live my life to fit the condition. That is something that I tried my best not to do and didn't really do it, but you can't help but think it sometimes. But when I found WrongPlanet, being an aspie changed to being just a way to find other people who were like me. So it really hasn't changed me much, but it allowed me to find others that I can communicate with and as a way to pick out news stories that apply to me. The biggest thing it did do was to change my preception that all aspies are scientific and logical. I just realized that there was a similar spectrum in personalities between aspies and NTs, but that the way they think is very different.

I was diagnosed at Junior Kindergarten. My parents told me when I was in Grade 8 that I had AS, but I wasn't really interested in it and I lived my days without even thinking once about it, as if I never even heard the word.

I am now in Grade 9 and after gaining interest in it and researching some of it, it explained why I was so different in some ways. However, it didn't change my life. I have always been aware that I was different, even before being told I had AS.

Yes. It has made my intellect even more amazing.

Not really. All it did was make my family accept it properley.

Yes it did, I was diagnosed as autistic when I was 8 and it was kept quiet from me for 45 years. Now just recently I was diagnosed with Aspergers.
It certainly explained my chronic social phobia and those head banging tantrums I had when I was a pre-schooler ripping pailings of the next door neighbour's fence.
People used to send me funny internet videos of kids having tantrums like that classic one in the supermarket of that kid screaming for bon bons.

I just reply back, "they are very tame compared to ones I had"

Yes it has.. in both good and bad ways. Though my thinking is slightly biased at the moment.

Range of factors here

What country you were diagnosed in
What age you are
Family situation
education corcumstances
Social circumstances

i am 21, and since i was about 5 i knew i was 'different ' from the other kids at school. but as my mum was a teacher at my school the others didnt bully me.
when i was 11 at started secondary school the bullying started big time.
i found a couple of friends at break time (or 'recess') in the support room (special ed room) who were my firneds basically all the way up school more or less
one was called andrew and he was diagnosed with autism
he did have a one track mind but i took an interest in the subject he always talked about and did... - drawing cartoons in an anime magna style (same animation and drawing style used in Pokemon)
he was a very good drawer. but the other kids picked on me 4 hangin round with me. and when we were seen going into the cinema to watch Pokemon the movie - mew vs mewtwo i was picked on 4 a long time after that as it spread round school
my other friend was called daniel, and he was NT but spent his life in a wheel chair because he had muscular dystrophy. Sadly he died 4 years ago at the age of 15
but he was a great person always laughing and joking about. kids picked on him because of his wheelchair and double joined thumbs which he enjoyed bending the wrong way on purpose... LOL!

anyway
when i got a computer i started researching more into autism to see if there wasa way to help andrew and stepped upon an article about aspergers syndrome, which i read and thought... oh my god that sounds just like me
so i researched more and the more i researched the more i was convinced. so i went along to my fgp and asked if i could be referred to a psychologist. and a year later here i am. Diagnosed. it hasnt CHANGED my life. it has brought it into perspective and i realise the problems i have are down to the syndrome and not because of something i didnt learn

No. It was interesting, though, to see how many things I had in common with the diagnosis. It was like... "that's me!" in so many ways. Perhaps it changed me a little, because I notice sometimes the way my mind works, and I can attribute those things to having AS. Or, perhaps not "having AS" but rather, symptoms and what comes along with the minor mind modifications.

Thanks to all of you for sharing you're experience.

Well, I was diagnosed at an early age, (Around 5-3, I don't know myself). I never knew what I was diagnosed with until about 7th grade, when my mother mentioned Autism. Then, I started to educate myself about Asperger's and in about 10th grade. A little late perhaps, but my parents rarely spoke of my AS, and it wasn't until I looked up Autism itself that I learned about it. I always knew that I was a little different, but it really feels so much better when you learn what makes you different. It truly helps, and aids me in understanding myself as well.

You're welcome!

I was diagnosed at 19.
It did make my family understand me alot more.
Before it i was always arguing with my brothers.
They didn't really understand how i was different.
But when there was finnaly a clear reason i got along with them fine ever since.

Wel my older brother still trys to turn me into a player at times lol.
But that isn't ever gonna happen tbh.

At that time though i had dropped out of school and had serious sleeping problems.
So it did take me a while to get my life back on track.
It kind of saved me.

Laz, excellent post.
Im 51
Here in the US, AS wasn't recognized till 1994!
I had a lot of frustration trying to make myself understtod to councilers.First went to a shrink in third grade, (age 9)who decide there was nothing wrong with me-despite what would be considered "red Flags" today.
Got My first (mis) diagnoses about 5 years ago.(ADD.Inattentive)
Got my Aspergers dx two years ago.

So first, I got abit depressed, went through a lot of retrospection.
then decided to get help.
also had a big (unresolved) philosophical crisis (self improvement vs, self acceptance,
am I human etc,
Decide to take another shot at college, with abetter understanding of my problems.
that semed to go pretty well until this semester, good help being harder to get than you think here.