How did you feel when you were first diagnosed?

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This is my story:

My original diagnosis is High Fuctioning Autism.I was originally diagnosed with this at age 10. However,I did not find out about this until April 17,2003:a week before I turned 13.

My mom told me that I had a condition known as Autism,but it was extremely high-fuctioning and I could act like everyone else.

I was VERY upset at first,but after a while I felt relieved that I had a name for my problem and knew how to control it to a certain extent.


-SpaceCase

Yeah I felled pretty much the same.

I was 19. I was at the mental hospital. Doctor told me that I have very high IQ. I didn't feel anything about that. Then he told me some info about Aspergers. I thought: THAT'S ME. I got over excited.

I'm fifty, found out about six months ago. Relieved to know I'm not alone...

I know I got diagnosed at age 11, and I know when, and where, sorta. I just don't remember being told about it or my reaction, but I remember knowing that I had it when I was in my freshman year of high, that was the earliest I remember thinking about the diagnosis.

I'm 17 now.

Relieved, because it was the first diagnosis that actually fit perfectly.

I always had sorta like an ego problem.


I used to deny that I had anything wrong with me.

I can't remember the specifics, but I do remember that I had no reaction to it until much later, because I didn't think it was that much of a problem. I was diagnosed at the age of about 10 or 11, after my first Epilliptic fit (my nurse suggested to my mum a book on it (probably by Tony Attwood!) and I got diagnosed soon after. My reaction came six years later, about three or four months ago, just before I signed up on WP. My mum had mentioned it again because it may come up as a factor for extended time due to slow thinking processes. It also had a different name from what I thought it was, 'Efburgeson's'. Anyway, I looked it up on Wikipedia and as I read it, I was actually met with a sense of awe mixed with 'hey, this is cool!' as I related to many of the things there. I had always thought I was normal, and that nothing interesting was involved with me, and yet here there was something that was with me the whole time.

It's also how I came to WP. I joined about a week later (what? I was nervous!).

I was mad because they called me an autist. I thought "what the f**k! I am not a drooling ret*d!". Then I found out what autism means and it doesn't mean drooling ret*d. And then I found out that I was high-functioning. I sorta like my eccentric self that AS is causing. It puts me aside from the flock of NT sheep

Hated it hated it hated it. I found out I was really different and thought "I want to be normal, I will over come it" so I tried to do my school work on my own with out getting any extra help and no matter how hard I tried, I still couldn't find answers in text books to fill in the blanks on my page, answer questions, etc. That's because everything was starting to get abstract and I'm a concrete thinker. Back then I thought that's what AS was. Troubles doing your school work so you can't do it on your own so therefore you need extra help with it to find answers to questions, filling in the blanks etc, help with math. I assumed it because my mother always mentioned AS to me whenever I was doing my homework and struggling with it. She say "You know what that's called? Aspergers." She never explained it except give out examples to me I did like "remember the time "Stop that teasing" and you stop and do another tease when I meant quit teasing. That's aspergers." I just didn't get it because I always thought she miss spoke and it was a misunderstanding and anyone would think she meant stop THAT teasing. My brothers didn't get it either and they're NT. They were in elementary school then when it happened to me. I had just finished 5th grade then. I didn't get it until I was 15 when my mother kept telling my brothers "Stop that teasing means stop teasing." I kept interrupting it as "Stop THAT teasing" and then I realized it was just a figure of speech. But some people tell me it can also mean stop THAT teasing. Now I don't know the difference when I heard people say it but luckily I don't ever hear anyone say it. Instead I'm always hearing "quit teasing," "Stop teasing," "no more teasing." My mother told me my mind tunes out to the word "that" so therefore I don't ever hear "stop that 'this'" "stop that 'that'."

I was 14 when I started asking what it really is because my mother kept telling me I only had very little and I wouldn't believe her because if mine was so mild, then I wouldn't have so many problems with my school work. After keeping on asking her questions and talking about it, she must have had enough because she went downstairs to the filing cabinet and pulled out a bunch of printed off pages from the internet and handed them to me and they were all about aspergers and autism. She had a very few pages on ADD and one page on NLD. After looking thru it and reading it I saw it was more than just school work. It was also about troubles making friends and being bullied and obsessions and that all explained me and why I couldn't keep my friends and why I had troubles with them in elementary school. When I was little it was easy because we had the same interest and they played with my stuff when they were at my house and when we play on the playground, we do the same things I liked but then when 4th grade came, it was starting to get hard because my friends didn't wanna play on the equipment anymore, they wanted to just hang out in the field and talk and sometimes they still do jump rope and play games on the playground I liked but then it got harder and harder as I got older. In fifth grade, it was harder except for when we were playing dodge ball and it was such a fun game I joined in but in sixth grade, they didn't want to do anything but hang out in the field and none of them wanted me around. It was boring stuff anyway. I got left behind as we grew up.

After reading more about it, it also helped explained a lot about me and why I'm the way I am and why I had some unique gifts lot of others didn't have such as good memory and outside interests, dates memorization, etc. I don't think I have very little aspergers, if I didn't wouldn't I be in relationships and be able to understand people better and not have such a concrete mind. I wouldn't be so mind blinded either. I don't have that many friends, I only have online ones and my ex bf but I don't see him much for some reason. I just don't have an interest in coming and seeing him on my days off, I don't want to go up there and pick him up and bring him back down to my house and then bring him home again and come back to my house, that be four trips and more gas mileage and putting gas in my car more often.

I was diagnosed but my parents never told me until I became homeschooled.

I'll tell you in a fortnight.... if I get diagnosed.

Didn't care; I always knew/know i'm 'weird'.

nice to read about similar people, though

I haven't been "diagnosed" at least not yet. I imagine it would be like it was when I first found I fit the profile. I would feel like most of you. HAPPY! You HATE being alone! You tell people how you feel about something, and they act like you;re NUTS! It's nice to find thatothers have felt the SAME things!

I am a little upset because I found that it wasn't just shyness, etc... Oh well, that was starting to seem like the case anyway.

Steve

I was relieved that I finally knew why I was different, and also not alone. I was only diagnosed about 3 years ago, in my late 20's. Growing up, people didn't realize that autism was a spectrum, as only low-functioning types were really known. Hans Asperger's work wasn't really known in the US until the late 90's at the earliest. I didn't have enough autistic traits growing up, which is why I didn't get the diagnosis until adulthood.

I was around 3. I can't remember what I felt like.