VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY.

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Ok, I am on the list to be assessed, so I can only guess what the possible results will be as I write, though I do know without doubt that I have a few traits. However, the point of my writing this post was to share how life changing things have been in the last half a year. I have gone from knowing nothing but having no idea what's been going on in my life, to lightbulb after lightbulb moment to discover not only what has been going on, but to understand myself more...
I write to share what a shock it has been and what a journey... Wow... If you told me a year ago where I would be now I would not have believed it. To know what is going on in my life. To know what has een causing all the difficulties. Wow!
So even if I am not on the spectrum, I have found the "Keys" of understanding myself and how to control and understand the cause of shutdowns... (Prior to joining this site I never knew what they were called and only had vague ideas as to what was triggering them. (I know for some this is hard to comprehend but it is true as I had been sidetracked for years in altering my diet as I assumed it was allergy related)).
So there have been giant leaps forward in my life and masses of relief as well.

I really feel for anyone who has been through things like this. The feeling of struggling through life not knowing why things are such a struggle. The being accused of laziness, where I could do more but have to be careful as if I try too much I risk another burnout which will likely be serious...
But at least now I know and understand.

So regardless of if I am on the spectrum or not, I was wondering if anyone else has had the same type of discovery? I mean... Those huge lightbulb moments... The time when everything makes sense and becomes clear?

Anyway. Over to you guys and gals.

YESSSSS! I agree wholeheartedly!! It feels amazing to feel validated and not told that you are just being lazy or behaving inappropriately. I have always felt like such a weird person and like no one could get me. I wear my heart on my sleeve and am unfortunately very naive and can't read people or situations well AT ALL. I have been been bullied physically and emotionally, sexually abused, and psychologically manipulated, and couldn't figure out why I was such an easy target. Even when I dated someone who was in school for psychology and was working with a child with severe autism, he would tell me to stop flapping in public, to stop giggling and jumping, to stop scratching and tapping, to stop hitting my head, to not say or do certain things because it would make me look like a fool, and most hurtfully, that autism is more extreme and I just don't have good coping mechanisms. I didn't know much about autism until recently despite all of that. I just trusted that he know what he was talking about and I just need to learn how to cope better. Well, anytime I put myself in extremely stressful circumstances, I just shut down. I try so hard not to, but I do EVERY TIME. I have melt downs and feel so helpless when they happen at work. The only reason I have a job is because I am on medication for depression and anxiety and don't have to interact as part of my job. It feels SO liberating to know that I'm not alone and others are struggling with the same issues. So yes, everyone, PLEASE share your experiences! These are the types of conversations that can help us to better understand each other and ourselves.

Until I knew I did not need anybody else to tell my failures were the result of my being weak and lazy I just knew or thought I did. Now I know better.

I spent most of a month laughing and crying at the same time when I first figured it out.
For a while I was having almost daily epiphanies from things I found on this site.
It all really helped.

One thing I was rather surprized and taken aback about, was that when I joined this site, I found it full of what I describe as normal people who love having proper conversations, as to me, I seem a "One off" type of person and I found it difficult to bond with people unless in some way they were mildly eccentric. It was wierd in that people my age when I was in school, who were roughly my intelligence level hard to connect with but a few who either seemed to lack intelligence, or were younger then I was but somehow stood out as being "Different" themselves, somehow I could connect with. I could never figure out why. I now believe it was because if I am autistic and they were autistic that I could relate to them?
As from an early age I soon had to quickly learn how to mask in more ways then one... Mask by hiding stims which I never knew were stims, and mask to fit in, if I met someone on the spectrum (Or rather, who was like me as I don't know if I am actually on the spectrum) but they did not mask so their stims and ways were more obvious, I could relate to them but I did not fully understand them until recently, even though I stim myself. It was through this site that I learnt more and how my hidden stims which I did not know were stims were no different to someone elses more visible stims... It was then when I realized how much masking I had been doing and for so many years.
Hitting burnout after burnout sent me into a rather fragile stage where I could no longer mask... I was somehow glitching between the masked me and the unmasked me... And I found I felt like a young child when I was unmasked, and yet when masked I was an adult.
This puzzled me until I realized that the days before I started masking, I was a young child, and it occured to me that metally, to unmask I was going back to the time before I started masking. Oh gosh! I felt soo vunerable. I felt like the unmasked me was like walking through a public place naked. So many people were looking at me. I was acting soo wierd... Well. They may not have been actually looking, but I felt like they were! Some were though.
And it also came to me why security guards in shops follow me around. I act differently and they assume I am a threat because I act differently. I am banned from one large store even though I have never stolen, and I am stopped or followed and wztched by security at a few other stores.
Some stores I can't go in because I panic or they are stores that set my sensory issue off. I can't do crowded stores, and panic a bit going through stores with narrow isles.

Anyway... What I mean by normal people in here. People I can identify with. Ok, I may not understand everyone, as lets say I am on the spectrum, there are those on the opposite side who are more extroverted... I naturally am an introvert but if I feel comfortable, I then open up and if I start talking about a subject that interests me, try to stop me! I don't say I am an ultra introvert, but I certainly am not an extrovert if that makes sense? I need my alone "Me time" to recharge. I need my space if that makes sense?