I don't know what to do

Yes, I myself provided them with more source- the book, its in German because we are living in Germany and I speak tge language.  Its "Autismus verstehen" Tom Harrendorf and Melanie Matzies-Kühler a certified psychologist. In English the title is "To understand Autism".

Hello, don't worry about it. They will take from your story what they want to. They will have more than one source of information and can form their own ideas. You are not responsible. You have done what you can. They won't have understood it all, but that is to be expected.

You probably gave them more information than they can remember or absorb. So although it might have been oversharing it is probably ok.

Thank you all for your responses.

I spoke to the lady, I shared with her my story. She thanked me and said I'm helping her. But now it's kind of uncomfortable for me... I just realised I made a huge overshare to a stranger. And I gave her some examples of my social awkwardness,  once she giggled a bit... yeah for an NT to hear such thing must be a total shock. I skipped all tge awful traumas from my childhood and adulthood but concentrated on school bullying and my huge lack of social skills, I structured it as causes, event - what happened and possible coping strategy that I found (I told her I can't say if it's best one, but it was best one fir me at that time). I lent her a book about Autism, there is one man's biography and comments from a psychologist to it. This man's biography is not same as mine, but his experience is so similar, that it made me cry and I couldn't read it more.

The lady asked me, why I as a child preferred talking to adults. I told her I could find more interesting topics with them, find out something new and scientific or share my intrest with them without a risk of being bullied. I also liked listening to them because they don't do mess as terrible as kids and don't bully a child. If I listen to a story, I see it like a movie. I shared with her a lot of what I analysed and I hope it will help her understand and support her son. Unfortunately tge waiting times are long and tge child may not get diagnosed before going to school. 

I'm kind of worried about that child as if he was mine... I would like to do everything to save him the stress and trauma that I experienced but I'm aldo worried that his mom didn't understand me well and it will go wrong. She is in touch with psychologist though. 

First of all I am not wanting to cause any confusion here and you don’t at all have to follow my advice. But according to my mum, when I was little I had numerous tests for autism and they all came back negative but had suspected I could be on the spectrum. This went on for years but I didn’t have enough “evidence” to prove I was autistic until my diagnosis months back. But I had got bullied in all the nurseries and schools I went to and didn’t have any friends and I often think could this have been from autism? Or it could have been because I just don’t fit in with the typical Gen Z people. I often wonder would things have been better if I got diagnosed sooner? But if I did and I had the requirements, then would I have got bullied all the more for being even more different? 

Skip to my recent years when I just had the courage to work, I explained all my issues and in return I ended up getting bullied to an extent that I cried and so the manager had the excuse to hug and kiss me, then before I quit I actually got locked upstairs and had to have my phone locked in a locker downstairs so I couldn’t contact anyone and well got the hugging, kissing and was even shown content I found disturbing, especially with that manager as he scared me and creeped me out. Now I am suffering CPTSD, EUPD and BDD but I often wonder if I wasn’t autistic then would I have the other diagnosis? 

I guess my point is you may want to keep a check on your daughter. Have any of the assessors said she could possibly be on the spectrum? Sometimes autism doesn’t seem to show until later on in life. I’m not saying your daughter is autistic at all, but I would advise you maybe keep a check. We can’t get rid of autism but my advice is to be careful and not to get taken advantage of. Best to prevent anything bad if possible.

I think meeting with this family might be a good idea, I mean it’s entirely up to you but it might be helpful to talk about it, see if anything relates. Guess it’s kind of like being on here but it’s face to face. My mum would have been grateful for this opportunity when I was your daughter’s age. But it’s entirely up to you. Sorry if this isn’t really related to what you wanted to hear xx 

Yes, how it felt I will skip, but giving some specific situations and reasons why ut happened may be helpful

This is where I would put your focus in the things you tell them. They don't need the details of the bullying, how bad or hard it was, even though that's totally valid for you, it may be upsetting for them. But advice on the signs they can look out for and support they can give their child to try to avoid them going through that could be really helpful to them.

Some Details of my bullying story might be relevant for them - my total lack of assertiveness led to me being abused and laughed at at school. It's important for them to pay attention to this aspect of development.  Being bullied may have various reasons- it may be different appearance, in this case its about specific behaviour, my appearance alone would not be a reason for bullying.

Absolutely and I will tell them it's just one experience of one person. Their might be quite different. 

Everyone is different. So, like you, I wonder how applicable your experience will be for them.

I think it's dependent on whether you feel comfortable with it. If you did decide to do it then you should sit down first and decide what you are and aren't comfortable with - it's your story, you only have to share what you want. If/when you start the conversation, I would start by saying that some of your story is very negative and give them the option as to whether they want to hear that. I don't think you need to go into great depth about the negatives. You can just say that being socially different led to a lot of bullying. You don't need to go into detail about that bullying. If there is anything that would have helped you with the negatives, this would be useful to tell them. That gives them something they can do for their child. If you have positives in your story then I would share these too. This very much comes down to how you feel about it though. The other family have requested it. It's not on you if they don't like what they hear. But if it's going to have a negative effect on you then I'd avoid doing it.

I wouldn't say it's fully lived... but could be much worse. I will concentrate on the fact that early recognition and support give better results and help young ND people better function in the society. I know from the teacher, that the child already receives support.

I think you would be an example to them that being ND dosen't mean a life half lived, but one thats fully lived, even though there are hardships that maybe particular to ND's. But then everyone has their own hardships and battles to overcome.

Alien0n3arth said:

They say they wanna hear it and the teacher says, I would help. I'm not sure.

I think you should share only what you are comfortable with, as once information is disclosed, it can’t be undisclosed. You have a right for some things in your life to remain private. 

If you are comfortable with sharing information, consider disclosing in stages, over several meetings, so that you remain in control of the quantity of facts and details disclosed. 

It's finally a success but the way to it was very hard. I think I would aldo warn them of some dangers that can occur. 

I think that they should see you as a success story, as you are married, have a child and a job - I believe many parents of autistic children worry that their child will never be able to do that.

I think that your plan of how to tell them is good.

Yes, I will tell them every person is different and every autistic person is different.  I would show the good like often some special abilities (great memory for example or rich inner world) snd difficulties (impairment in communication and interaction) and of course I would tell them, I experienced it hard way because I was undiagnosed and unsupported,  but their child gonna be diagnosed and supported and its much higher chance of success in their life. 

Thank you, your answer is very helpful. I have pictures that I use to explain things to my therapist.  They are also in form of schemes and kind of comics (pictures with dialogues) so I don't really need any list of bullet points,  I would go with these pictures. If they don't understand,  I would provide more explanation and details.

Alien0n3arth said:

The family wants to meet and hear my story. I'm fine with showing them pictures, old photos and telling them how it was for me, but I'm not sure if I should.

If they are asking for your experiences then try to work out what these actually are. Write them down - maybe make categories or headlines that group them and make it easier to focus your thoughts. These should all be based around your ND traits.

Write down what it was about, how you felt about it (keep this bit very brief), how you worked outt how to deal with it and how it affects you now.

By having these pointers to reflect back on it will help you through what can be a difficult conversation to have.

Personally I would keep the focus on how you adapted, how you coped better and steer away from the misery it caused. People want to hear about hope and success so while you may feel you need to be validated for what you went through, it won't help the people and that is the reason you are there.

Tell them the resources you use, the techniques that have given good results and how you have come to be well enough to offer advice to others.

This would be my take - you have a lot to offer them and by not dwelling on the darkness can give them more hope for their own childs situation.

I don't know if you should or not, maybe you should set clear boundaries that there are areas of your life that are painful and that you don't want to open old wounds that may not be relevant. Maybe you could start by saying that as you were undiagnosed your experience won't be the same as that of thier child, who will be diagnosed and supported. But you could give them a general inside line on how autistic thinking varies from that of NT's, of course that depends on the child having the same sort of brain set up as yours and they may well not as we're not a cohesive thing, but a spectrum.