Just been diognosed heard all negitive not positive

I do it watching tutorials on youtube double speed with subtitles

So wish I could do that. Autism plus Dyslexia adds up to slow reading.

So agree. Ilove my hyper focus. Can't imagine how I'd manage in life without it

Indeed!

First and foremost: Congratulations on your diagnosis :-)

And Hell yes! There are positives about being autistic!

Don't get me wrong, mine has also brought me a shed load of problems to over come in life, and weirdly medical phobias that almost killed me. So each of us in our own way has more than our fair share of s**t.  But you know, the sweetest thing that any one said to me on this forum when I got my diagnosis recently was: "You know you have superpowers, don't you?". Lol.

This is going to take a while to process. You are going to have a thousand little 'ahhhahh' moments over the innocuous but odd stuff about your life, a thousand tears for the pain it brought, (mostly because you live in an NT world that doesn't get it), but also I promise, there are things about you that are different in a good way that are so positive and you have them BECAUSE you are autistic. And they are your gift to the world. There will be pain. There will be compensations. 

You are brilliant. You are you. Own it. It ain't all bad, I promise.

I thought I would add another comment as I think this graphic is very good. Being autistic is very different to how professionals describe it, it’s a very personal experience. I think this graphic perfectly illustrates why being autistic is cool.

https://www.instagram.com/b_alexa_autism/p/CV8Bu5rsZpc/?utm_medium=share_sheet

Personally I love the fact that I can hyper focus on anything I am interested in.

I think that the problem lies with the diagnostic process and the (very limitied and out of date?) diagnostic criteria from the ever-expanding DSM.  All very pathologising and very little on our strengths.  It threw me for a bit because the focus was definitely on the negatives but I believe the reality is rather different and I'm coming to a more settled view with the help of groups and websites that are autistic-led (Ausome Training, Kristy Forbes, The Autistic Advocate, Aucademy and more).   

These days I'm wondering whether it would have been healthier for me to simply self identify and bypass the medicalised deficit model of diagnosis.

unless you are autistic+ADHD, then your subconcious mind is playing pranks on you bouncing you around LOL

but you can read double speed

Insane focus is a good positive. My daughter is like a laser, nothing disturbs her til she's finished.

The autistic brain is amazing. Professionals only  use negative language instead because they refer to the medical model and restrictive diagnostic criteria. You can embrace being autistic by spending more time connecting with the autistic community and relating to lived experience.

Hi Pop! 

I think one of the big benefits to getting an official diagnosis is so that you can get support when or if it's ever needed, or maybe accommodations in the workplace.  So whoever wrote the diagnosis report might be working on that assumption as well - in which case, they probably only felt the need to highlight the negatives.  Awesome for anyone's self esteem...not!

In reality, you're a complete human being with just as many strengths.  We just need to work those out for ourselves, because we're all so different from each other.

I hope you're able to see what your strengths are once you've had a bit of time to process what's in the report.

theres no negative nor positives, you are who you are and you remain who you was. only you can tell us the positives and negative of being you.

don't forget about reality snapshot

most of us impose sort of block on oneself that is preventing full development, we feel like imposters until both self-diagnosis and official diagnosis happen, at least grown ups, I don't know how it is for kids, with loving parents that helped them to get diagnosed and get familiar with being autistic.

Hmm I have just said hello and asked whether it is worth getting a formal diagnosis.  This kind of implies it doesn't add anything. 

However all I have read so far about autism is largely positive as long as you deal with it in the right way.

It really depends in your assessment process, and how you are informed. You should be told your strengths and weaknesses really.

I‘m not diagnosed yet, but my daughter is. There are plenty of good things. Some people excel in a particular field, we may be creative or musical, some have good memory, we think out of the box, we can cut out the time wasting stuff, we know a huge amount of facts on our special subjects, we are honest, we don’t lie.

How about the fact we don’t judge people? Or we have an affinity with animals? Hate injustice?

Just some things to throw out there….

it is all good, if look at it at a different angle, and ignore what they tell you, they interpret it all wrong