Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi,
I'm in my late 50s - have just had a diagnosis of autism confirmed.
Certainly, as an adult I'm very structured and have fixed routines (prefer to do the same thing each day, eat the same thing for days on end, really struggle with social anxiety which I think manage with 'scripting' but a lot of this has become second nature, I have a couple of artistic interests which I get very focused on to the exclusion of other things). I think I might be alexithymic in that I have a very poor sense of what my own emotional state is, but I'm pretty good at reading other people's states.
While the diagnosis has led me to a few "oh of course" moments, it's also been really confusing since as a child I don't think I exhibited any of the signs that are associated with autism. Similarly, I can make eye contact with people and feel as though I'm pretty empathetic and know what to do in social situations.
All of this has got me doubting my diagnosis and wondering if I'm autistic at all? In fact, rather than giving me answers I feel a bit like my identity up to now has been taken away?
Any advice in dealing with this would be really appreciated.
I’ve struggled with imposter syndrome a lot, and I’m coming to realise there are other comorbidites that hide my autistic traits. Taking the RAADS-R test (and other similar tests) has been reassuring for me (available on the “embrace autism” website), especially given it’s slightly more biased towards a false negative than a false positive (IIRC). It’s also important to remember that a lot of the diagnostic criteria is structured around traumatised and stressed autistic people- if you lived in a neurodiversity affirming or more suitable environment as a child, it’s not necessarily surprising other non-traumatised traits may be missed. The part I’m working on now is accepting that I can be deserving of help and validation even if I’m not ‘struggling the most’.
Both re being autistic and with being intelligent - I struggle with imposter syndrome. I expect at any moment to be revealed as a 'fake', a 'wannabe'. Even with using https://en.commtap.org/mcprobcalc I tend to think I just got lucky on a high range IQ test, or that almost anyone could've done well on it. A lot of the problem re being 'autistic' is that I don't fit in with the 'high achievers' or at the opposite end of the spectrum.