Coming out as someone with autism

The first thing my mum said when we were told I had Aspergers was 'I'm so sorry'.

She felt guilty because all of the problems I'd been facing up till that point (anxiety, pressure, a growing fear of people, falling apart from my dads side of the family, constant fear of doing something wrong, even a mental breakdown from being hounded by my accelerated maths teacher) she dismissed as an ongoing effect from her divorce with my dad when I was ten.

Being diagnosed at 17 is weird, people don't know where to put you. Proffessionals are trained to deal with small children, not teens, and all my relatives other than my mum are reacting to the news in different ways. Some try to ignore it, like my dads side of the family, and they don't bring it up or discuss it since I told them. My mums side of the family pretty much said 'Well we always knew she was weird' and haven't had any contact with me since.

I always hated girls clothes, prefering mens clothes with dragons or skulls on it. Often my elder cousin would be found playing with my Barbies while I played with his plastic dinosaurs that he'd have brought over.

The problem now is this, I have spent all my life seeing things differently to others, do I try to see things from their perspective, or stick with mine? Its hard to know that all the actions I did when I was scared, nervous or anxious weren't recognised for what they were, pleas for help. I thought I was being blatantly obvious and that people simply didn't care how I felt, I didn't realise that they geuninely didn't know.

To some extent, I'm glad, because I feel more confident in my actions, if I do something that seems selfish or rude due to an emotional build up I can now identify that I was acting out of fear, not anger.

But overall, the best reaction was definately from my school. I don't socialise outside of school, I go home, and do all my homework. I mean, all. Doesn't matter if its due three weeks later I would do it all in one night. And my high school didn't care, they just wanted me to hand over more A's or A*'s and kept piling on the pressure. When I told my headteacher, his response was to try and downplay it as though it wasn't a big deal, but when my other teachers were informed, all but one (who I got on with and helped refer me for OCD to CAHMs) had the infinate reaction of 'oh sh*t'. They were all treading on eggshells with me, my homework is broken down each day so I'm not overworked, I'm allowed to draw during my lessons and they try to encourage me to join in to class banter.

But, even though the main areas of my life are changing for the better, I still feel a certain level of fear and anxiety, one, because its change, which to me is bad, and two, because theres always so many things that ca go wrong. Did I speak to that person in the right tone? Have I got all my homework despite checking three times before I left? What if someone I don't know talks to me? What if I trip up and get laughed at?

I mean, I've only just noticed I've developed a nervous twitch in my right arm, whenever anyone praises my work then says 'but', my arm twitches. I've noticed it does it whenever I begin to feel inadequate, like I'm not 'worthy', as though no matter what I do it isn't good enough for others. Luckily I can talk most of this over with my mum or a psychologist but it still makes me scared that I might feel this way forever. :(

Katie

The first thing my mum said when we were told I had Aspergers was 'I'm so sorry'.

She felt guilty because all of the problems I'd been facing up till that point (anxiety, pressure, a growing fear of people, falling apart from my dads side of the family, constant fear of doing something wrong, even a mental breakdown from being hounded by my accelerated maths teacher) she dismissed as an ongoing effect from her divorce with my dad when I was ten.

Being diagnosed at 17 is weird, people don't know where to put you. Proffessionals are trained to deal with small children, not teens, and all my relatives other than my mum are reacting to the news in different ways. Some try to ignore it, like my dads side of the family, and they don't bring it up or discuss it since I told them. My mums side of the family pretty much said 'Well we always knew she was weird' and haven't had any contact with me since.

I always hated girls clothes, prefering mens clothes with dragons or skulls on it. Often my elder cousin would be found playing with my Barbies while I played with his plastic dinosaurs that he'd have brought over.

The problem now is this, I have spent all my life seeing things differently to others, do I try to see things from their perspective, or stick with mine? Its hard to know that all the actions I did when I was scared, nervous or anxious weren't recognised for what they were, pleas for help. I thought I was being blatantly obvious and that people simply didn't care how I felt, I didn't realise that they geuninely didn't know.

To some extent, I'm glad, because I feel more confident in my actions, if I do something that seems selfish or rude due to an emotional build up I can now identify that I was acting out of fear, not anger.

But overall, the best reaction was definately from my school. I don't socialise outside of school, I go home, and do all my homework. I mean, all. Doesn't matter if its due three weeks later I would do it all in one night. And my high school didn't care, they just wanted me to hand over more A's or A*'s and kept piling on the pressure. When I told my headteacher, his response was to try and downplay it as though it wasn't a big deal, but when my other teachers were informed, all but one (who I got on with and helped refer me for OCD to CAHMs) had the infinate reaction of 'oh sh*t'. They were all treading on eggshells with me, my homework is broken down each day so I'm not overworked, I'm allowed to draw during my lessons and they try to encourage me to join in to class banter.

But, even though the main areas of my life are changing for the better, I still feel a certain level of fear and anxiety, one, because its change, which to me is bad, and two, because theres always so many things that ca go wrong. Did I speak to that person in the right tone? Have I got all my homework despite checking three times before I left? What if someone I don't know talks to me? What if I trip up and get laughed at?

I mean, I've only just noticed I've developed a nervous twitch in my right arm, whenever anyone praises my work then says 'but', my arm twitches. I've noticed it does it whenever I begin to feel inadequate, like I'm not 'worthy', as though no matter what I do it isn't good enough for others. Luckily I can talk most of this over with my mum or a psychologist but it still makes me scared that I might feel this way forever. :(

Katie