Problem that is making me feel fear for the future

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I would love help. The obvious doesn’t cross my mind.
I don't know how to describe this problem and can only do so by giving examples, which is long winded.
When I look back over my life at the way I have dealt with things, it makes me feel vulnerable and I don’t trust myself. I am highly intelligent but obvious things don’t occur to me.
This post is not about getting support, it’s about the reason for the things listed below, I hope it’s autism.
When I see doctors, tradesmen or anyone with a problem, I write a list of things, but I miss the most important things off, I could give loads of examples. This causes hassle.
When I bought my home, despite it being the third property I had bought, it did not occur to me that the reason the advert was because the place was not selling and I have had loads of problems with it.
When I bought my first property, it was old and needed a lot doing to it. My mum convinced me not to get a survey as she said they always find something wrong, she has lived in old houses all her life, and she knew a work colleague who lost money on four house surveys as they were all bad. I did not realise she was trying to create problems for me.
I had abusive parents and my mother put me off moving out, on loads of occasions, but it is only in hindsight I realised my mothers intentions to keep me there to abuse.
I had a recent asbestos inspection and made a list of things, yet, as I missed the most important thing off the list, I had to get another professional to test that.
There’s loads of things, I am 56 years of age, and do not trust myself to have relationships as I will miss the obvious. I feel really despondent.

Are you newly diagnosed with autism, or do you suspect autism but don't have the diagnosis formally at this point? I found a lot of things cleared up in my mind when I learned about being autistic at age 65, and diagnosis at 68. It explained so many of the things I struggle with, and answered (after some emotional homework) a lot of those "whys" from my past. It sounds like you are coming to some understanding about things from your life and past too. Treat yourself kindly, get rest and do self care as you sort through it all. The older we are, the more stuff we have to sort! You are definitely not alone. Seems to me like you are making progress.

I was formally diagnosed in 2020
I first noticed this problem in school.
I wish I could describe it without using examples.
In school 2 girls who hung out as a twosome wanted me to hang with them, looking back, to use me.
I was hanging with 2 other girls. One girl from the first twosome said "Two's company three's a crowd" in the context of me hanging with the other twosome.
I never thought of the obvious response "You're a twosome"
There's loads more examples.

Ooh, you were diagnosed late, l thought mine was late at 54.
I just don't want to use autism as an excuse for genuine faults yet, I appreciate autism does have social, practical, and emotional effects.

To be honest, while I am highly intelligent and easy to talk to, I feel like I have failed as an adult.
I bought a property, normally an achievement, but I fear this will be a liability and a mess I leave to make others lives a misery when I die.
It was a silly mistake, I make loads of those. It would help if I could get ADHD formally diagnosed, I nearly did but I was poly drugging at the time, not to get high, but to get through the day. I was invited back to the ADHD clinic to see the ADHD specialist, but I couldn't face going there sober, so I tried to reschedule. Then, for that clinic, the NHS funding was cut. There is now a four year waiting list and only people who want medication will be seen.

I want to point out that you seem to be expecting to know as much as a professional and have an ability to write a list to cover all the bases upfront.

I have some other thoughts but I thought I would just throw that out first.

You know if you live to be a 100 you will still be learning things about houses.I imagine that isn’t very helpful.

My go to advice for something like this is usually given very little credence. I like to wax on about dealing with uncertainty. It is actually a topic of interest for some people, or at least for me. I figure if people write about it, there is an audience of more than one.

I made this post because, an indescribable problem has blighted my life, made me feel I cannot cope as an adult, vulnerable.
I was hoping autism was the reason, and came on here to see if others shared this misfortune, as I feel quite alone and it's hard not to mentally beat myself up, as it has put me in some unnecessarily bad positions.
I don't have any desire other than self awareness.
I like to minimise uncertainty, I like stability. Some stress in life is needed, otherwise we would just not move, but the amount caused by this is bad, stress causes disease.

I can relate to this. Sometimes, I get caught up in something and regret things. This is a bit unrelated but houses can be a bit tricky and risky. I guess you could turn right around and try to sell it. Personally, after fifty I am selling not buying. But, that shouldn’t stop anyone. Col. Sanders started KFC after fifty.

I find dealing with trades people a little frustrating sometimes. They aren’t usually in the business of teaching anybody anything. It is like part of their job is dealing with the ignorance of people and maintaining it. I am usually trying to learn something and they aren’t having it.

I bet the farm on a stock once and it went terribly the wrong way. I was writing in a journal to tell myself never to do something like that again. Something like that is really painful and lonely. I am not suggesting writing in a journal but I know the pain is real. A journal is kinda a last ditch effort. I hope that does not sound Blaise.

It does sound like your difficulties could be due to autism.

It seems that you have two problems that you are dealing with: one is difficulty in keeping track of what things are important to pay attention to, and then slipping up, leading you to miss something important, which causes practical problems and stress, and the other is feeling that you are inadequate and likely to make mistakes, and then beating yourself up over it. The first one is a practical problem, the second one is an emotional problem. I think you can deal with each one separately.

I'm not sure how to improve the practical problem. You said you already write down lists, which is something I would suggest, but that hasn't worked for you. Is there anyone who can help you look over your lists to see if you missed something? The other thing I would do is try to minimize being involved in situations that will require you to be able to pay attention to all the details. That's easier said than done. But if there are things that might be a challenge and you don't absolutely have to do them, can you just not do them?

But the main thing that seems to be troubling you is how you feel about making mistakes and missing important things. I don't know if seeing a therapist is an option for you, but there are strategies for that. We all need to learn to accept ourselves as we are, without feeling that we should be different somehow. We all have flaws and inadequacies. We have to learn to live with them and realize that it's okay. It's okay not to be good at some things or to have difficulties that other people don't generally seem to have. I know you're worried that you might make mistakes that will later cause bigger problems. That's a real concern. But not beating yourself up over it is doable.

I don't know if this helps. I wish you the best.

I'm worried about the saleability of my property, and I do feel concerned about myself with missing so many obvious things.

I have no problem with journals.
It's missing things off lists for practical matters that puts me in a dodgy situation.

I really hope my difficulties are due to autism.
I don't always have anyone to look over lists to see if I have missed something.
I feel really alone with this problem.
I guess my problem affects things we cannot avoid.

I feel really bad about missing important things because of the trouble it gets me into.
I see someone who used to work as a psychotherapist, she gives me her time.
I agree beating myself up is bad but I get scared that I do not feel adequate enough to be an adult.

I have similar problems and anxieties. For most of my life, I lived with family, roommates, or partners, so there was a safety net to make sure my executive functioning difficulties didn't cause serious problems. But for the last 6 years, I've been a single parent. Without another adult around, far too many things escape me. Almost having utilities disconnected because I forget to pay is a regular occurrence.

it is a lot to sort! And it seems as if you are having a lot of anxiety. I felt incomplete and incompetent all my life because everybody expected things of me that my autism did not allow me to perform. Once I learned of my autism, I was able to begin to sort my strengths and weaknesses and figure out new ways to do things to make my life easier. I stopped trying to meet other people's expectations and stopped trying to fulfill whatever might be their needs and wants. (I was raised to be a "people pleaser") When I learned I could stop doing that and begin to take care of myself, I have been able to do better self care, and although I doubt it will ever go away, the anxiety today is less. Give yourself plenty of time to do self care and learn all you can about both yourself, and your autism. It took us a long time to develop survival techniques not knowing about our autism and it is going to take some time to unravel and learn how to live our best lives now we know. You are among others who really do understand. For me that was one of the biggest gifts I got with diagnosis. I learned I was not the "only one" and that everything was not all my fault. That has been healing! If you have questions about your property, there are experts you can consult, and good info to get on line before you make any major decisions. With owning property, there are always always things that have to be attended to, and that is another "learning thing" to work at. Please do your best self care as you move forward. No point beating yourself up over the past. My best lessons in life have been learning by experience "what not to do". Forgive yourself and move on. ( I think a lot of my self hatred was because of all the punishment and shaming I got most of my life, I truly believed I was bad and unworthy because everybody told me so for the biggest part of my life, maybe you are in the habit of self hate for similar reasons?) We are here listening and willing to offer support. Hang in there!

It sounds a little bit like loneliness. I don’t have anyway of knowing. I have read that loneliness can make people worry and be a little paranoid.

If it were loneliness, you might have a better way to address it. It sounds a little like you are reporting on your feelings in a stream of consciousness. I don’t think anyone (or few people) have the ability to escape the effects of loneliness when confronted with it. It can be something that happens with age.

Maybe loneliness is giving you anxiety and making you paranoid. I throw that out there because not everyone knows that it does that to people. I obviously don’t know your situation.

If you were able to pinpoint that as an issue, there would be ways to address it or at least understand it. It would be more addressable than autism IMHO.

This is just an interesting side note … but I watched a video that said if you are lonely you should not be put under anesthesia because you might wake up in a terror attack. I just bring it up to point out that it is a real physiological thing. Anesthesiologists can not ethically put you under if you are lonely. Supposedly, it causes the operating room staff some issues to have operations postponed due to loneliness. It’s on YouTube if someone wanted to research it. I might be exaggerating the point but it is interesting.

p.s. I’m feeling pretty good about this post being remotely helpful. My other ones fell short of the mark I am afraid.

Similar here, though I've begun to do better in relationships.

I've bought several houses and didn't find it that hard (though there's a lot to do) because the estate agents and my solicitor were helpful. I've only sold one, and that was a done deal with the neighbour so it didn't take much effort. I dread the thought of trying to sell the one I'm living in, so I hope it'll never happen. I can't imagine moving all my stuff to a new place.

There does seem to be something about me that attracts trouble whenever I try to do anything that involves the co-operation of other people, especially service providers. So when the goal is very important and has a deadline, I worry a lot, and put an enormous amount of work into trying to pre-empt trouble so that I won't have to solve problems on the hoof, but snags still come up and I always think that one of these days it's going to be fatal to the mission. Wouldn't be so bad if the world stopped changing how it did things all the time. I'm not great at communicating to people what I need, and I'm not great at understanding their replies. Not that it's always my fault. The world isn't a particularly caring, patient place, and it screws up a lot.

You are not alone, i also think i was not meant to be an adult sometimes. I feel like a child most of the time. I don't know how much property is supposed to cost, i feel like i would be an easy target for scammers and i am scared of it. I wish there was a common sense or street smarts class when i was a child bc i struggle with a lot of what you mentioned too.