Did anyone have a lightbulb moment?

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I was definitely not carefree as a child. I hated being a child. I wanted to be an adult.

I felt stuck as a child...always.

I've probably gotten less cynical as I got older because I was more in control of my life. I see people as they are; most people aren't the monsters that cynics paint them to be.

I'm very much a kid at heart, too. As for my mind: sometimes, it's adult when it's required--but, basically, I'm a kid in mind as well.

I wasn't forced to be an adult when I was younger. I just didn't like being a kid in status. That's it. I was a kid in status when I was younger. Now, I'm an adult in status, but a kid in mind and heart

Yeah...there are pressures to being an adult.

Ufortunately, the job part is essential to me. I feel a loss of control when I don't have money. You go through all kinds of crap when you work; but you go through similar crap when you don't work.

I'm married, but never had kids. I sort of regret getting married, and I sort of regret not having kids.

I don't feel pressure to be neurotypical. I think people should treat each other decently, though. I only learned to treat people decently (in some ways) relatively recently. Previously, I made social mistakes which hurt people--and I never wanted to hurt anybody. This was behind my pressure to get better socially--not the desire to fit into a neurotypical world.

I do understand your viewpoint on this, though.

I once heard a story about a man who had a lightbulb moment.

He had to have it removed in the A+E department.

I definitely had a light bulb moment. An old friend reconnected with me on Facebook after 10 years. In the mean time, she had two daughters. One has Asperger's. She would mention some thing that her daughter said or did, and I would chuckle to myself, "Ha! I used to do that when I was her age," never thinking that there was a reason that we were similar!

Then one day my friend posted a checklist for signs of Asperger's in girls, by the author of AspienGirls, Tania Marshall. She wasn't directing it at me, just posting it for all the parents she knew. I read the list out of curiosity. I think I thought it was one of those silly Facebook quizzes, like "How OCD are you?" or "What Disney princess would you be?" I read through the list, and by the time I said yes to about 24 out of 30, I was thinking, "What the heck???"

I went to the AspienGirls site and started reading, with growing astonishment. I was having a bit of trouble taking the site seriously with all the purple and glitter, so I read some other sites. It really was a WOW moment. I felt like I had found the Rosetta Stone--something to translate all the mysteries of my life that 30 years of cognitive based therapy had failed to do.

I talked to my psychiatrist and started learning how many mental health professionals don't even have an elementary knowledge of ASD. I fired her, and talked the next psych into referring me to a clinical psychologist for testing. After several months of waiting, I got the diagnosis of ASD and ADHD.

Instead of a "light bulb moment" I had what I call a "door hinge moment." (More kenithsetic (sp?) than visual in my kind of thinking.)

What's a door hinge moment? If you've ever lined up door hinges you know the point where all the little metal tabs and holes are almost lined up? But not lined up because they ALL have to line up perfectly in order to put in a hinge pin? And then, when everything is lined up in the only way possible to make it work, suddenly everything lines up and the hinge pin slips in slick as can be?

This was how I experienced my moment of understanding as my new understanding of Asperger Syndrome helped me "line up" all those crazy unexplained incidents in my life, growing up and in adult life, I'd had no answer for.

Knowing about my AS makes me feel my life is more complete.