So.....received my Aspergers diagnosis today

Hi Peachi,

I am back in the office after the Bank Holiday now (I was in two hours ago actually as find it easier to work through emails when nobody else is here)

You're right , my drive is lacking right now. I think that is probably more to do with constantly thinking about the diagnosis and no time or inclination being left for anything else.

I think the first thing I need to address is anger management. The way I react to the seemingly smallest events has to be addressed. There is always someone on hand to tell you "not to sweat the small stuff" but as you know it's not quite that easy. 

However, I'm confident that if I can address the mental side of things , it may allow me to put the physical effects (shortness of breath, brain fog) in check as these are often more damaging to my day.

I'm sorry to hear about your Sunday meltdown and I agree that over thinking can be as much an issue as not pausing to think at other times. I've been guilty of it myself since last week, suddenly over analysing every thing that I've done.

It's a winding road isn't it?

I totally understand the reason why your focus is missing, I was exactly the same post-diagnosis. For a few weeks after my diagnosis I lost all my drive, focus and energy; everything that once made sense just confused me and I couldn't get my head around anything. All my little coping mechanisms were failing and unfortunately I had to go through a particularly difficult time where I just had to let time to it's thing and pray that my brain reset itself. Luckily it did and now that fog around my mind has thankfully passed; I am largely back to my normal self...save the occasional meltdown when things become all too much again.

I think you will start to, or will eventually, find that having your diagnosis will be a blessing in disguise. It might start to explain (at least to yourself) why you are the way you are or why you see things the way you do. Some of that pressure you feel might be allievated as although you will still have a requirement to conform you will quietly be able to think "I now know that I am conforming and I now know why". I think you will find that once you are in a better place with your diagnosis you will find that you are much more at ease with yourself and that you will be a bit kinder to yourself too. You just need that time to re-adjust and accept. In some ways it's like a mourning process; you are currently mourning your old life (even though nothing has changed inherently) and you now have to come to accept this new life that has been thrust upon you. This may not make any sense to you but I hope it does as it might give you some light at the end of the tunnel.

I'm sorry you felt you had to 'run the gauntlet' but again I know what you mean. That situation would be tough for anyone with HFA, let alone someone who had just received a diagnosis they were yet to fully process. Post-diagnosis I was rageful and just felt this internal pressure building; I was just waiting for someone to push the wrong button and I think I might have comitted murder! That feeling has passed thankfully!!

I hope your weekend was a calm one and that having the BH gave you a little extra breathing space to think things over and understand a bit more. I was doing pretty good up until Sunday night when I had a catasthrophic meltdown around my ingrained belief that I am not a good human being...sometimes time to think can be a bad thing for me. I need to get a little chalkboard for my kitchen saying "Days Since Last Meltdown"

Hi Peachi,

My turn to apologise for taking so long to reply.

The email thing is one of those issues that I never realised took up so much of my time. Like you I keep pretty much everything and review them , sometimes years after writing them, depite knowing this is largely pointless.

To answer your question about how I feel being it at home, largely more relaxed than being forced into the work structure.

I'm hoping that the diagnosis will allow me to perhaps be myself a bit more than I ever have been. I've always put pressure on myself to conform and act in a way that everyone else expects, despite knowing that it will be difficult.

This obviously doesn't apply to work though and my focus has been missing since Wednesday, which I suppose is understandable. I find focusing quite difficult most of the time anyway but the latter part of this week has been a bit of a write off.

It's been interesting the last few days. I went to a very late showing of a film last night (there are never any people there so it suits me fine). The cinema is in town and I had to "run the gauntlet" of the nightclubs and pubs on my way back to the car. It was around 1.30am.

I was struck by just how fearful I was. Not a pleasant feeling. The only way I can explain it is that before, I had this type of hardened exterior which I'd put up and walking past all of those fairly drunk people would have been ok. Since Wednesday, I've allowed myself a little leeway but the downside is feeling like that.

I was just desperate for nobody to drunkenly say anything to me or posture aggressively, as is so often the case in town.

Don't think I'll go again on Friday night!

Hi Felix

Apologies for not responding sooner, work called. And it's been really good to talk to you as not only do we share the same diagnosis, but we also have similar roles in the professional sector. You understand/experience similar issues to myself in the office environment and that only is reassuring so thank you for chatting with me!

I must check each email I send no less than 10 times before I work up the courage to actually hit the send button. I usually rewrite what I have written to as rarely am I happy with my emails. I'm scrutinising every thing I've written trying to see whether the recipient will understand what I mean, think I'm stupid, agree with me etc etc. This alone is extremely destructive and time consuming, and I don't know about you but I will often save old emails and re-read them in order to analyse what has been said, is there an underlying meaning, what is the sender really trying to say. Similar to you also my natural writing style is very 'flowery' as you put it. What a regular person will say in 3 words I will say in 16, I just naturally have that long winded style of writing (evidenced by the epic posts on here!) 

I'm interested to know how you're feeling today outside of work? Now it's the Bank Holiday and you have a few days off do you feel a bit more positive or relaxed? Are you feeling in a better place outside of work? When I got my diagnosis the last place I wanted to be was work; I had just been given a life changing piece of information that I was yet to process and people just acted normally around me and had the same expectations of me. Of course at this point no one at work knew of my diagnosis so they're not to blame for the way they acted, however I just wanted to be at home on my 'safe space' to link my wounds, be around familiarity and try to understand what was going on in my head. I always looked forward to the weekend as it gave me valuable time to.process and to try adjust.

(Apologies for any spelling errors, I've had to send this from my phone and spell check usually throws up some interesting nuggets!)

Thanks for your kind comments, Felix1974.

I'm glad to hear you told your Department Deputy, and it's good she's so supportive - I'm sure that as time goes on, you might be able to tell others when the time is right. The only time many NTs come into contact with autism, is as both you and Peachi have pointed out, when it's in the media, and sometimes misrepresented.  As more people with a diagnosis become more open about it, NTs will find some people with autism are people they know, and will modify their views, and be more understanding.

One other thing both you and Peachi have touched on which I really have difficulties with at the moment, is that feeling of being fraudulent.  Obviously I'm in a different place to you and Peachi at the present time, as I haven't had a diagnosis yet, but I often have the same feelings that it can't be me, yet I read about the various descriptions of AS/HFA and find it's absolutely the story of my life!  It's the not knowing which is so frustrating for me at the moment.  Hopefully it won't be too long now. 

That sounds awful.

I don't blame you for declining the course. I desperately didn't want to go but at the time, I didn't actually have any valid reason not to go.

Thing is, if they asked me to attend another one, I'd probably go again and this is the trade off of not informing them. I did it once, I could do it again (badly but still do it.)

The "funniest" part was the day we did a number of detailed psychometric tests and the people holding the test couldn't understand why my results were so vastly different to the rest of the course. I had a reasonable idea but they just spent the whole day scratching their heads.

I have a question (and today for me has been particularly bad). How many times do you re-read a work email before actually sending it?

I spend an inordinate amount of time doing this.

I put it down to being aware that my prose is over complicated and "flowery" as a teacher once told me when I was 7.

I have to check and then check again and then re-check numerous times to ensure (although I'm never sure what they'll think upon receipt however many times I check) that what I have sent doesn't appear melodramatic or ridiculous, although this exercise has limited value as I can't always tell whether what I have sent is reasonable anyway.

Thank you for taking the time to talk to me today. I appreciate it.

That specific meltdown sounds particularly awful and it's sad that you got to that point. I suppose at that time however neither you nor you firm would have known what the underlying issue was so naturally, in their eyes, you needed to enhance your leadership skills. However as you rightly point out this was the wrong course of action and put you into a situation where it only made your issue that much worse. I couldn't think of a single thing I would hate more than a residential course where I had to interact with others. In fact I was nominated for a leadership course as part of my role and I declined it for the pure fact that I cannot handle the pressure and stress of integrating with new people. I have neither the desire nor interest to speak to new people because, quite plainly put, I find 99% people tediously dull.

The last major meltdown (and probably my worst) I had was at a family gathering for a birthday just after my diagnosis. I was practically mute for the entire party as I was not in a great place post-diagnosis. After a few drinks to try get myself in the mood to speak to people I ended up having the most catastrophic meltdown. I couldn't speak at all for a few days afterwards and it took me about two weeks to recover from; this one had stayed with me since...again stuck on that mental loop torturing myself.

It sounds bad , as you're describing something that causes you distress but I'm glad that I'm not alone in how I interpret these things.

I know (surely) that not all of the emails that appear to be personal attacks, are actually personal attacks but where I struggle to understand communication, I just can't see what are actually confrontational and what is just a normal email that someone neurotypical would dismiss quite comfortably.

Your point about continuing to torture yourself over issues long in the past does strike a chord. I do the same.

I don't know about you but I have an outstanding long term visual memory (and an equally appalling short term one) and I think that this whilst in some ways is a good thing to have, it does make  the bad things which the memory should dull, ever present.

I won't bore you but I can "see" conversations from decades ago which people who were there will deny ever happened and they don't understand why I'm so vehemently insisting that they did. It's not their fault, they truly can't remember them and this is probably a function of a healthy mind/CPU

Regarding meltdowns. Yes I have them, although they are reasonably rare and predictable. 

I have to do some presentation work in my current job, which as you can imagine is quite gruelling for people with diagnoses like ours. 

These are the areas in which I've suffered meltdowns.

The biggest one ever was a disciplinary that I had to give a senior member of staff in November 2014. It should have been very simple.

We agreed that his Managing Director would start the meeting by laying out the issue. I would then explain the regulatory position and the problems it had caused and the HR Director would close with the disciplinary part of the meeting.

Sadly, when it came to my turn to speak, without warning, I completely lost the ability to speak at all.

With the panic building, I sought to force myself but nothing but verbal diarrhoea came out. 

This incident I doubt will ever leave me and the company (well meaning but misguidedly) made me go on what was a very expensive leadership course to try to fix me without really considering where the problem lay.

This was just as bad to be honest and anyone who has ever been on a 5 day residential management course will know that they are intensely inwardly focused and all played out in a room full of strangers, which as you can imagine was about the worst thing in the world for me.

There have been other meltdowns but nothing as significant as this one.

I don't include, the daily mini meltdowns where people's behaviour moves me to irrational anger to the point where I can't breathe.

Your work and how you are expected to act, perform and behave sounds very similar to mine .

Felix1974 said:

Part of my problem, I've found, is that certain emails and meetings can be quite damaging to my thought process for long periods afterwards. Where a neuro typical person might accept or reject and move on, I find I can't and internalise it for days, weeks, months, years....

Felix I totally understand this as I do exactly the same thing; it's almost refreshing to know that someone else does the same thing as me.

There are so many things in work and in life that, as you say, NTs would accept/reject and then move from. But for me these things linger and stay with me for what can be a very very long time afterwards (I am still torturing myself over a specific and highly damaging incident from work that took place back in August 2015...I just cannot seem to get my head around it and move on). I internalise these situations/events and try to make sense of them; I deconstruct every single element, I replay every single conversation or word spoken, I assess every single variable to try and make sense of it in my mind. This can take as you mention days, weeks, months, even years...it is so incredibly destructive and sheer exhausting!

Do you have meltdowns? Is this something you experience? I know from my experience I certainly do and they're usually caused by my work. I can normally feel a meltdown coming on and can take steps to try circumvent it, however sometimes (case and point this week with my new project) something comes out of left field and knocks me sideways into a full scale meltdown. They're awful, it's like my brain is a computer that has frozen and can't work properly; I can't process anything, I can barely speak and need to take myself off to reset.

My firm is as it is sadly. They are one of the oldest firms in London and they act like it a lot of the time quite frankly. 

It's great that your organisation (or at least some of the individuals that matter) has taken a more enlightened view.

This morning has been quite brutal actually, we are being asked to do the impossible on a couple of projects and I'm just counting the hours until I am able to leave the building, although I need to try and focus a little before then.

Part of my problem, I've found, is that certain emails and meetings can be quite damaging to my thought process for long periods afterwards. Where a neuro typical person might accept or reject and move on, I find I can't and internalise it for days, months , years afterwards even when the issues they raise, have been resolved.

I tried to address this by creating a routine where I tell myself not to care but the upshot of that was that people started to comment that I didn't give a sh*t about things. Too far the other way.

I have had no luck in striking a balance, i just don't understand whether some emails are personal attacks or not and I find this even harder in Board meetings where the discussion is face to face.

The COO, who despite his less than progressive views on mental health, is a nice guy, actually asked me this morning if I was alright. He said you seem to be missing your list of things to do this morning and look a little rattled('d been dragged into an impromptu meeting (I wouldn't usually go anywhere without it otherwise). He's aware I've been back and forth to the hospital but assume they all think it relates to a physical ailment.

I so very nearly unburdened myself, such has been the sh*tstorm today but managed to restrain myself, which I still think is the right course of action.

That's funny (in the nicest possible way) about the Rainman comment you received. Just staggering that this film (now nearly 30 years old) is still most people's exposure to autism. Needs to change really.

What a shame you can't get time off as I think it would really help you. I know I would have certainly benefited from some time out just to process things and get my head around my new diagnosis.

And it's even more of a shame that your firm has that outdated view on mental illness, it's truly unacceptable in this day and age. You would never tell someone suffering with cancer to just "pull themselves together" so it really should be no different for a mental illness; just because you can't see it doesn't mean it isn't there and affecting people. Luckily my employer is very inclusive and supportive of all disabilities, including mental health and the support I have from them is second to none. I have still had a few comments from some colleagues that are maybe not where they should be..."well you don't act like Rain Man"....yeah go figure you f**king genius.

However I am glad your wife is supportive of you and is helping you, that's a tremendous relief. Has she done any reading on your condition? That may help her as I gave my husband some links to info on HFA for him to read and understand (I find it very difficult to articulate myself verbally when I am stressed/upset etc, so the internet helped put words to what I wanted to tell him). But I know what you mean as there is only so much help they can give you if they don't have the problem themselves. My husband is very supportive but there's a limit to his support purely because he doesn't have what I have. He is also a very practical man.... wife + crying = hug / wife + meltdown = take her for a walk to reset and so on. However this doesn't always work for me because I don't always need a practical answer to my problems as A) there isn't one, or B) I need to be left alone for a while. He doesn't get this sometimes and he gets frustrated as he can't help me.

Hi Peachi,

I had exactly the same thought. That I should perhaps take off a week or two to digest it all and come to terms with things and in an ideal world, I think that would be the best thing for me and all around me.

However, I work in a very traditional financial services firm in the City and my Department is truly under the cosh at the present time. As Head of that Department, to disappear without giving a real reason would sit badly with the rest of the Board and would also I accept be appalling leadership.

Most of me doesn't actually care about the effect on others (as you know) but I just can't drop out right now.

The acceptance of mental disorders or illness here is very much '1970's" in outlook. I have two staff off with depression. One is in a very bad way and our COO remarked to me that she should just pull herself together. And he's not the only one to harbour these views.

As you can imagine, those sort of attitudes are why I am not clamouring to tell them about my diagnosis.

To answer your question, these forums have been a big help so far.

My wife is tremendously supportive but she can't see it through the eyes of someone with Asperger's however hard she tries.

This place helps.

Oh yes I feel like a fraud all the time and wonder do I reallt have HFA?! There are people with ASD that suffer with far worse afflictions than I do, however you have to bear in mind that Autism covers a large spectrum of issues and that Aspergers/HFA is just one end of that spectrum. Certainly there are people affected in such ways by autism that they cannot function independently or they cannot speak as well as others. However people with our diagnosis have their own problems to deal with that, on the face of it, may seem insignificant in comparison with other problems, but that doesn't mean they're any less real or damaging...if you get my drift? That's how I try to look at it anyway and I find it helps for the most part.

Post-diagnosis I found work virtually impossible, I struggled horrifically so I understand your anguish. I would have taken a few weeks off sick to come to terms and deal with it on my own, but I was covering for another employee so had to stay in work which was torture. Trying to do my job plus the job of another whilst coming to terms with a new diagnosis was not easy, but I'm on the right side of it now thank god; I hope you find that right side too soon.

Are you finding chatting on these forums any help? I found them immeasurably helpful as I was chatting to like minded people who understood my problem and who I could be 100% open with.

Thanks for that reply Peachi and I don't see it as waffle. 

I have lost count of the number of times that I've been told here to shorten my written communication. I have never complied though, I'm not entirely sure how to do "concise"without leaving out large pieces of crucial data.

They are used to me now I suppose.

Your point relating to empathy is a good one and this is something I have wrestled with mentally my whole life. Unlike you, I haven't even reached the stage where I think I am a bad person for not empathising with people more substantively.

I think that I've probably just assumed that not being particularly interested in others activities or problems was how everyone felt. 

It's been more difficult since I became management, around 15 years ago. Having to deal with staff issues, both work and personal, I find totally baffling.

I don't know if you experienced this but I still feel slightly fraudulent? I think from discussing with my psychiatrist that I have Asperger's , almost without doubt but when I see and listen to others, I kind of think, wow they are far more affected than me. Maybe he got it wrong? 

However, I think this is because the way I've constructed my coping mechanisms , they're designed to allow me to interact in the world as "normally" as possible and it's easy to kid myself that they are based in intuition, when I know they are not deep down.

Funnily enough, yesterday at work was atrocious, I don't know if the previous day's events were just on my mind but it was like they were storing uncomfortbale things for me, which were all dumped on me simultaneously.

Feel a little more positive this morning though. Weekend nearly here.

Thanks for taking the time to come back to me

F.

Thanks Telstar.

God, that is a long wait to be seen but it does sound as if there may some light at the end of the tunnel for you.

I took the decision to tell my Department Deputy yesterday. She is the only person I  trust within the firm and has a younger brother who is autistic and she was glad I'd told her.

I wanted her to know because on the occasions where I don't behave in a typical manner, she bears the brunt of it mainly.

Having said that, I told her to make no allowances for me. The last thing I need having dealt with it well for decades, is to in some way start thinking of myself as disadvantaged.

I was keen to seek diagnosis so I can understand why I react to things the way I do, not to give myself a free pass.

I hope that you get the help you need soon  

F

Hi Felix

I'm glad some of what I said resonated with you, I'd hate to think I was just waffling!

Yes...I totally understand the Brave New World feeling and that's a fab way of describing it. For me it was almost like waking up the next day with a fresh pair of eyes; I was seeing things that I had seen for 31 years but in a whole new light and with a totally new mind-set. The numbness will pass, how long it will take for you I cannot say, but I assure you that as you process the diagnosis and adjust to it the numbness you feel now will pass. After my diagnosis I could not imagine it ever going away but it did and it will for you eventually.

In reference to your decision not to tell too many people, I personally think this is very wise. How can you hope to explain something to other people when you don’t fully understand it yourself? The only people I told when I was first diagnosed was my husband, my mum and my dad…that’s it. It’s an intensely personal piece of news to receive and until you have had to reconcile yourself to it I think it’s wise for you to keep it to yourself…more for your own benefit than anything else. I have eventually told a few more people; a couple of close friends know and I have told my manager at work who has been exceedingly supportive. Telling my employer was terrifying as I really wasn’t sure how they would take it, however I have found that telling them has been beneficial for me and has allowed my employer to put things in pace to support me (i.e.; I work from home two days a week to help with my sensitivity to the high noise levels in the office etc.) This may be something you wish to consider in the future, but not right now J

In reference to your coping mechanisms I will say to you what my psychiatrist said to me…”How can I break down anything you have in place now because what will I replace it with? What will be left of you and your walls if I tear them down? Utter chaos.” I think this is a very big thing to consider and it sounds like you’re acutely mindful of it already. I don’t know the full extent of your diagnosis so can only go on my experience so bear with me on this one…

Part of my HFA diagnosis saw my psychiatrist identify that over the years I have developed my own set of coping strategies for handling my ‘disability’ (I hate calling it that but for want of a better word…) I have my own little mechanisms for coping with the world, situations and people, and these work for me very very well. I have external coping mechanisms and I have internal coping mechanisms, and these have gotten me through life thus far with no major hiccups. HOWEVER, as my psychiatrist has said, she would be a very foolish person to come along and try to change these mechanisms because as she put it, what would she replace them with? What works as a coping strategy for an NT won’t work for me, and to try make it work for me would result in complete chaos, destructive behaviour and probably a mental breakdown! What she is doing instead is showing me new ways of looking at things and giving me a new perspective on the world. As a specific example; because I fail to empathise with people and can’t understand emotion for the last 31 years I have convinced myself that I am a bad/evil person…that there is something fundamentally wrong with me. I would describe myself as black inside, that I have no soul and I must be a terrible person because I can’t understand emotion in others. This has become very destructive for me and it has a profound effect on my mental state; I have convinced myself that I am truly evil and that I am wholly undeserving of the positive attentions of other people. To cope with this I have thrown myself into voluntary work and I donate some of my monthly wage to charity because, in my eyes, evil people don’t do that…only good people volunteer and donate money. However, my psychiatrist is now trying to change this way of thinking to get me to understand that just because I can’t empathise doesn’t mean I am an evil person, I am just different, I see things differently and have other strengths/actions that demonstrate that I am not evil. I won’t go into all the things she is doing for me as it’ll just bore you, but what I am trying to say here is that she isn’t touching my coping mechanisms, she is merely trying to alter my perspective of things so that I stop crucifying myself. I feel like maybe I have flown off on a tangent here but in a round about way I’m trying to say that the mechanisms you have in place now will most likely keep serving you until your last day, they’ve gotten you this far and I think you’re wise to not abandon them so lightly following your diagnosis. However, maybe a having a new perspective will give you further mechanisms that will enhance the ones you already have?

Wow, I am sorry Felix I have rattled on here, but I want you to know that everything you have said makes complete sense to me. Diagnosis was described to me like being born again…you’ve been warm and safe for all these years and then BAM…dropped into the world cold, screaming and naked…welcome to your new life, now deal with it. But I assure you that the numbness will pass, your brain will make sense of everything and you will return to being something like your old self but better in many respects. You’ll have a keener understanding of yourself, you will recognise your strengths/weaknesses faster and play to them for your benefit, you’ll feel different but you’ll be okay with it. Keep chatting on here, I found it really helps as most people here understand your issue and will offer some advice or their own side of things. Jxx

Hi again Felix1974,

Regarding the wait for my assessment, I was told at my referral last June that the waiting time for an assessment was around 18 months to 2 years, due to the team being a small unit, and an increase in referrals.  However, they contacted me again a few weeks ago to reassure me that they hadn't forgotten, and are trying to address the issue.  While it's quite a confusing time for me, they have kept in contact, so I will have to wait a little longer.

I can understand you not wanting to tell people at work, at least for now.  I'm not currently employed, so that issue doesn't affect me at the moment, but I think people have different experiences on this issue. Only close family and a few colleagues from my last place of work know I may be on the spectrum, and they've all been very supportive.

One area where it might pay to tell people you have an ASC is in interaction with people providing services.  Recently I was in hospital for a pre-med, and the nurse explained a procedure which I didn't comprehend at all (this is something I've had problems with throughout life).  I told her that I was possibly on the spectrum, and she then explained again, instructing me more slowly, almost acting out what was required, which I found a great help, and understood completely.

You'll definitely find lots of support on this forum, and people who have been through what you have, so you'll always have somewhere to come to ask advice or opinions, or even just to do a brain dump as you say.  Good luck and keep us up to date on how things go - I may in the same situation in a few months...

Hi both and thanks for your responses,

It's comforting to know that I'm not alone. My decision at the present time is to tell nobody and other than the people on here, my wife is the only person that knows.

For now that is how I intend to proceed. The psychiatrist I saw suggested that his experience of working with corporate boards is that the other members would use the condition as a stick to beat me with at every given opportunity.

Knowing the individuals involved, I don't doubt that he is right and work is hard enough already.

Telstar,

How is that you are still waiting for an assessment ? 11 months seems an awful long time to me. 

Peachi,

Thanks for your words. They make sense. This morning feels somewhat like a Brave New World and your describing of the feeling as numb, fits very well.

I hope that I adjust quickly. My thoughts are that I shouldn't change anything just yet and take some time instead to grow into it, if those are the right words?

The way I see it, I've coped and developed what must be effective strategies for 41 years and to throw them all in the bin because I suddenly feel I should be behaving a certain way would be wrong and quite self destructive.

To be honest, I don't know if any of what I am saying makes sense to me or anyone else , it's more a brain dump after yesterday's news.

Thanks for listening. I'll no doubt be on here more in the coming months.

F.

Hi Felix74,

I'm very similar to you...only maybe a few months further down the line. I received my diagnosis of High Functioning Autism around 3 months ago and although it didn't come as a surprise to me it has taken some time to adjust to this new information.

Straight after the diagnosis (the immediate 24 hours after I mean) I felt kinda' numb...like my brain was in hibernate mode, or like it was protecting itself (if that makes any sense?) After this initial period I started to process the information; I talked to my family about it, I spent days and days researching HFA, devouring any little blog, article or mention that I could find. I stayed like this for a week or so seeming pretty much okay with my diagnosis.

BUT THEN...for me it all came crashing down. I can't say what caused this monumental trip up, but it was like I couldn't cope with the weight of the diagnosis and what it meant for me going forward. "Where do I fit in? What does life mean for me now? How do I carry on like before? Am I a good human? Do I deserve to be here?" A gamut of probably very stupid questions seemed to bother me constantly. During this period it was like my brain had gone into total shutdown and refused to work; I couldn't make sense of things that had previously been clear, my coping mechanisms that had been in place for years weren't working any more, my emotions were all over the place and I was as low as I have been for a long long time. I struggled with looking at any positives of my diagnosis, focusing only on the negatives; in particular the distance that I feel it puts between me and other NT (neuro-typicals).

However...I'm now around 3 months post-diagnosis and I can honestly say that I am on the right side of it now. I am 85% reconciled with my diagnosis, I have mostly accepted it and almost embraced it. Don't get me wrong I still have my moments of doubt, anger, grief, being generally pissed off...but for the moest part I have 'stabilised' myself. HFA is not some illness that must be weeded out or frowned up, it's a fundamental part of who I am and it shapes my life, it makes me the person that I am. I am learning to see the positives of HFA and how these make me successful in my career and my life in general.

I hope this isn't all just waffle, I suppose what I am trying to say is....yes, there is an adjustment period. For you it may be short or it may be long, it may be smooth or it may be rough. But whatever path it leads you down you will come out the other end and hopefully with a better understanding of yourself and how you fit into the world with this news you have received. xx

Hi Felix74.

Glad to hear that you're relieved.  You say the diagnosis should help you in all areas of your life -  and the relief of knowing, and everything in your life suddenly making sense post-diagnosis should really help.

I'm awaiting an assessment (since last June) but know that if a diagnosis of Aspergers is made in my case, I would feel exactly the same.

I've heard others say too that it sometimes takes a while to process the diagnosis, but no doubt everything will fall into place.