Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi,
I have only been on the journey for 8 weeks. I was again in the burnout phase rapidly heading to meltdown (now that I know what it is!). I just so happened to listen to a book & the main character was Asperger’s. My thought was “why can’t everyone just be like him?”.
Ping, the light came on! I have to say that it has been a long time coming & if I had heard the little of ASD all together I would have switched it on sooner.
They think in pictures, doesn’t everyone? They like order, come to Auntie she can help with that & so the dance of masking continued.
I have been through the SARA (Shock, Anger, Rejection & Acceptance) model. My psychologist gave me my “certificate” yesterday & I could say that I am in the Acceptance stage.
“Ok I will see you in 6 month”. What????? I did the all the mostly ambiguous questionnaires & there are no answers (yes there are book recommendations, resources, etc.). I am glad that my husband was with me & he could confirm that, it wasn’t just a me, not getting something situation.
I have listened to:
Unmasking Autism
Spectrum Women
Looking after Your Autistic Self (just started)
It feels so good to belong at last! I figure I have come to the right place to ask does anyone have a recommendation for what helped in the early days?
I really like the autistic authors who write autobiographical books such as =
Odd Girl Out by Laura James
Strong Female Character by Fern Brady
Untypical by Pete Wharmby
How to Be Autistic by Charlotte Amelia Poe
NAS94605 said:what helped in the early days?
I'm not sure how you mean 'helped', but the books I found most interesting in the 4 months since diagnosis are the ones that had a lot about 'lived experience'. I enjoyed these, I kept saying 'yes' to things they were saying:
The other thing that helped is telling people my diagnosis and using my new-found knowledge of autism to educate their preconceived ideas. It reenforces what I have learned. Also the list of things I made notes on while reading the books have helped at work in terms of speaking up and asking people if they can do things a little different.
OMGoodyness, I have had 21 people view this discussion & I am trying really hard to accept that they might be off finding a response, as I 100% do that. There is no right or wrong answer to the question I asked. What worked for someone else may not work for me. I am 100% ok with exploring ideas of what meant something to someone.
I just find most resources are written by NT’s so make little sense to me.