Slowing down!

i know what you mean but mine was the result of a breakdown, for want of any 'proper' word. I lost all my emotions, interests, life lost its point and meaning and since then it's been five years of nothing. I know other people say that when people with autism go through acute stress the autism gets permanently worse, for instance i became learning-disabled and lost all my longterm memories from the past, i can barely concentrate now etc - it's a controversial view. I would say deal with the anxiety like get tablets or whatever, "autism" is just a name stuck on an unalterable fact with no ideas about what to do about it, whereas anxiety depression ocd there are help books, forums etc; this is the view i am coming to

Thank you to everyone who has taken the time and effort to respond to my original message. I was beginning to think it was such a lonely path this overwhelming anxiety,depression and exhaustion. It's comforting to know that others understand..I was beginning to get so low, frustrated and I was wondering why despite regular medication. Thanks again.

HI,thanks for your reply.This is the same for me,I work part-time as the anxiety totally drains me and I just can't do a full time job.Sometimes I just flake out and go to bed but some days the anxiety is so bad that I am awake all night.Work is just something I have always done,always full time and just a time-filler for me as well to be honest,since 2010 I have had to take on part-time because I just can't do full-time anymore,I just havent't got the energy.Of course,depression,an eating disorder and OCD do not help but I know exactly what you mean.Everyday I have so many things to do that I almost go to pieces because I can't cope with the list of things,these things take moments each but it feels like it will take hours to do and I get so overwhelmed and exhausted.The anxiety is sometimes more than I can bear,

Regards

kt1son

Hi Andrew

I'm 50 and diagnosed over a year ago, I am struggling with anxiety and life in general. I don't really have any motivation, I still have my job, but that often just feels like a time filler.

I think modern life is getting so much harder in general, especially when living on my own. I do find my anxiety does build up very high and the only thing that stops it is simply burning out of emotional energy. I don't feel like getting up in the Morning (could that be more down to depression), Recently when I wake the real world suddenly comes in to view and I get in to a highly anxious state.

Random

Hi Andrewj,since my diagnosis of Asperger's 2 weeks ago I have had time to think about having lived with this condition for 47 years and over the last few days I have come to exactly the same conclusion.Far from having the experience to have got used to it I am finding that it is getting increasingly harder to live with,things are getting worse,obsessions,anxiety(that's really tough to deal with),my routines which are becoming even more rigorous than ever and I guess it is because of the condition spiralling over the last 8 years that it has led me to where I am today in terms of dignosis,had things stayed where they were I would have just lived my life thinking I was just a bit awkward and set in my ways but it has gone way beyond that and experience is doing nothing to help me cope.Tha anxiety,which is awful is something I am seriously tiring of and would love a day without it,actually,if I had a day without it I'd be anxious as to why I'm not anxious.I also find that interests which I have had all my life becoming boring,and there weren't many of them due to my attention span which has always been nearly non-existent,now it's nill and I am constantly distracted which is really difficult to deal with and hugely frustrating as I am always thinking of the next thing before I have barely dealt with the current thought so I totally agree with you.

I'm 56 and in the last few years particularly I've struggled to maintain interest in hobbies that have absorbed me all my life.  As these mostly involve collecting, maybe I've just reached saturation point and own everything that I really want.  Also I have even less interest in going anywhere than I used to - sometimes I don't go outside the small town where I live for months.  I was only diagnosed with Asperger's last September, so it's not a reaction to the diagnosis.

In my case it's hard to be sure of the cause as I've suffered from chronic insomnia for 16 years and increasing levels of depression.  Both of these have a noticeable effect on my energy and interest levels.  I'm less anxious than I used to be but that's because I avoid as many of the trigger situations as possible.  But there's certainly an element of anxiety in the insomnia - usually it's anxiety about insomnia, which becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, rather than external worries.

I know that in middle-age one should have regular physical check-ups to rule out other causes.  Due to medical phobias, I haven't done that as thoroughly as I should but my blood pressure is normal and I'm only slightly overweight.  I exercise for 30-40 minutes every day. 

I haven't worked for years and only ever had a full-time job in my twenties.  Even then I found it so exhausting I had to lie down as soon as I got home!  In recent years, whenever I do go out for a few hours, say shopping in a city, I find it wipes me out for the rest of the day.

For what ever its worth I'm an Aspy as well, anxiosu to the point of exaustion like you, I'm only 36, so its not your age. Its your being bright enough to see the world has gone mad.

Thank you

I dont think its because you are getting older.

I think its because we are all apparently living in the Pre-credit crawl of a post apocaliptic moovie setting the scene of how the mistily rememberd 'old world' fell by gradually moving from news paper headlines into cave paintings.