Imposter Syndrome

Hello NAS37554. I appreciate that I have butted in here long after this conversation has ended and possibly been forgotten. However, on the basis of "better late than never" I would like to offer some thoughts that came to mind whilst I was reading your post and which Imade me feel familiar with what you have experienced in life - albeit in a very different way.

I was diagnosed with ASD Level 1/Asperger's at the age of 59, after 40 years of "adult" working life struggling to cope with my differences from other people, and their frequent exasperation with me. I always seemd to have been a borderline misfit, eccentric even, socially. Despite being (told I was) perceived as unusually bright by most other people, I really struggled with doing simple and easy things - like a disconnect between understanding a task, and having the ability to do it. There were other ways in which I seemed to "get" certain types of thing like a flash, and found myself in a very natural state doing those things.

The contrast within myself between between being mystified at simple common things but quickly grasping a small number of fairly narrowly defined areas of activity didn't help me in the eyes of most of the people who were influential in my life, for example, at work (but with one or two very contrasting examples). Thus I can honestly say that I mostly suffered at the hands of many of these people, who treated me as wilfully making the wrong decisions and failing to be bothered doing the right things - as if I had a perverse, deliberate and concsious tendency to go against the flow of what worked or was right.

As I read your post, I felt that much of my experience feels similar to the inconsistent and misguided - culpably misguided, perhaps - way you have been treated. I just felt that I was always fated to fail, because I could never learn these rules of life that everyone else seemed to unerstand naturally. You must have felt absolute torture if I am anywhere near right.

For me, the diagnosis od ASD L1/Asperger's felt like a "Not Guilty!" verdict on how I had lived my life, but of course it didn't reverse all the setbacks I had endured. However, it did enable me to let go (well, mostly let go) of my feelings of anger and frustration that had accumulated. More importantly, it started me on parallel journeys of (a) re-aligning my self understanding and realizing that I'm not broken, but I AM different; and (b) not trying to fix or cure myself, but learning to live my life in a way that makes use of my strengths, and work around my deficiencies.

There is much more that I could - and want to - say, but before that I will see if you get to reading this and, if so, you would be interested.

Best wishes, Piers.

Hello NAS37554. I appreciate that I have butted in here long after this conversation has ended and possibly been forgotten. However, on the basis of "better late than never" I would like to offer some thoughts that came to mind whilst I was reading your post and which Imade me feel familiar with what you have experienced in life - albeit in a very different way.

I was diagnosed with ASD Level 1/Asperger's at the age of 59, after 40 years of "adult" working life struggling to cope with my differences from other people, and their frequent exasperation with me. I always seemd to have been a borderline misfit, eccentric even, socially. Despite being (told I was) perceived as unusually bright by most other people, I really struggled with doing simple and easy things - like a disconnect between understanding a task, and having the ability to do it. There were other ways in which I seemed to "get" certain types of thing like a flash, and found myself in a very natural state doing those things.

The contrast within myself between between being mystified at simple common things but quickly grasping a small number of fairly narrowly defined areas of activity didn't help me in the eyes of most of the people who were influential in my life, for example, at work (but with one or two very contrasting examples). Thus I can honestly say that I mostly suffered at the hands of many of these people, who treated me as wilfully making the wrong decisions and failing to be bothered doing the right things - as if I had a perverse, deliberate and concsious tendency to go against the flow of what worked or was right.

As I read your post, I felt that much of my experience feels similar to the inconsistent and misguided - culpably misguided, perhaps - way you have been treated. I just felt that I was always fated to fail, because I could never learn these rules of life that everyone else seemed to unerstand naturally. You must have felt absolute torture if I am anywhere near right.

For me, the diagnosis od ASD L1/Asperger's felt like a "Not Guilty!" verdict on how I had lived my life, but of course it didn't reverse all the setbacks I had endured. However, it did enable me to let go (well, mostly let go) of my feelings of anger and frustration that had accumulated. More importantly, it started me on parallel journeys of (a) re-aligning my self understanding and realizing that I'm not broken, but I AM different; and (b) not trying to fix or cure myself, but learning to live my life in a way that makes use of my strengths, and work around my deficiencies.

There is much more that I could - and want to - say, but before that I will see if you get to reading this and, if so, you would be interested.

Best wishes, Piers.