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Late in life discovery of possible diagnosis, and effect on social anxiety?

Shadweller

Anyone else with social anxiety, diagnosed with Autism later in life / well into adulthood? What effect has the diagnosis had on your social anxiety?

I am 50 years old, and am currently on a waiting list for an official diagnosis. Since self-diagnosing a few months ago, I kind of feel liberated in some ways. Maybe it's because my difficulties suddenly make sense at long last. I can finally explain myself to myself. This is definitely helping my self-confidence.

Unfortunately I have long since developed a deeply ingrained social anxiety, but I think that I can feel that it is beginning to fall away, in some settings at least. It seems to me that due to my new understanding, my confidence is growing when out and about running errands etc, and my crippling self-consciousness is reducing. However, I am still in a bit of a bind, as I seem to be the sort of person that by nature, does care about the opinion of others. If I could just shrug everything off, like water off a ducks back, then life would be so much easier.

I have begun to process things in terms of "those people that are judging me negatively, just do not understand the causes of why I do the things that I do, in the way that I do them" and can feel that working through these sorts of scenarios is going to help. To what extent this will continue to help in the future, I don't yet know.

I was hoping to be able to access some kind of therapeutic support, presuming I do get a positive diagnosis, but from what I've heard so far, specialist provision for post diagnosis adults seems to be non-existent.

The standard advice which I have encountered so far, regarding what to do to help yourself overcome difficulties seems to be the exact opposite for Autism as it is for CBT for social anxiety. For example, I have seen Autism advice along the lines of 'avoid situations which you know you will find difficult and challenging', whereas for CBT for social anxiety, the advice seems to be to 'gradually expose yourself to the anxiety provoking situations, and the anxiety will eventually subside' (providing you have become aware of your safety behaviours and have successfully dropped them - so the theory seems to go)

Is there anyone out there who can relate to any of this?

Parents

  • I am awaiting full assessment, but have self-diagnosed ASC/ADHD and as an allied health professional (AHP) working in mental health (MH) often with people with ASC (diagnosed or undiagnosed), I think I'm most likely right in my self-diagnosis. I came to the realisation after being diagnosed with a personality disorder, which was shocking and from watching my children struggle with being neurodivergent too. I'm assigned female at birth but gender non-conforming.

    I have always struggled with self-consciousness and to a greater or lesser degree social anxiety, but at times I have been able to facilitate groups and do public speaking. When I was younger I knew I was different, but had a "zero fucks given" attitude and didn't realise I was neurodivergent, but this was before neurodivergence was a widely known term.

    I spent much of my earlier life rejecting mainstream society and consciously living on the margins. However, when I decided to train as an AHP in my 40s I began to experience terrible social anxiety. All of a sudden it really mattered that I couldn't successfully and seamlessly do all the social stuff that others do in professional life and trying to do it was unbelievably tiring.

    For me, I think because I can be very outspoken about what I believe to be right, though I have learned all the social rules about tact and being mindful of others, once I have the diagnosis I think I will be telling people I am autistic at the outset. I think that will reduce my social anxiety, though I'm aware that stigma still exists and others won't neccessarily be more tolerant or understanding just because I have declared my identity. I spend so much time these days ruminating about my faux pas and berating myself for it, when many of them are very minor, that I'm really hoping that the declaration of my identity will liberate me from that a bit and get me back to the "zero fucks given" person I used to be at least a bit.

Reply

  • I am awaiting full assessment, but have self-diagnosed ASC/ADHD and as an allied health professional (AHP) working in mental health (MH) often with people with ASC (diagnosed or undiagnosed), I think I'm most likely right in my self-diagnosis. I came to the realisation after being diagnosed with a personality disorder, which was shocking and from watching my children struggle with being neurodivergent too. I'm assigned female at birth but gender non-conforming.

    I have always struggled with self-consciousness and to a greater or lesser degree social anxiety, but at times I have been able to facilitate groups and do public speaking. When I was younger I knew I was different, but had a "zero fucks given" attitude and didn't realise I was neurodivergent, but this was before neurodivergence was a widely known term.

    I spent much of my earlier life rejecting mainstream society and consciously living on the margins. However, when I decided to train as an AHP in my 40s I began to experience terrible social anxiety. All of a sudden it really mattered that I couldn't successfully and seamlessly do all the social stuff that others do in professional life and trying to do it was unbelievably tiring.

    For me, I think because I can be very outspoken about what I believe to be right, though I have learned all the social rules about tact and being mindful of others, once I have the diagnosis I think I will be telling people I am autistic at the outset. I think that will reduce my social anxiety, though I'm aware that stigma still exists and others won't neccessarily be more tolerant or understanding just because I have declared my identity. I spend so much time these days ruminating about my faux pas and berating myself for it, when many of them are very minor, that I'm really hoping that the declaration of my identity will liberate me from that a bit and get me back to the "zero fucks given" person I used to be at least a bit.

Children
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