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New but "Old" and Confused

manofkent
over 2 years ago

So, I'm a new member so I figured that I should introduce myself.

I was diagnosed ASD (Asperger's) two years ago, just a couple of weeks before my 50th birthday.  In some ways it has been a relief to finally understand some of my past behaviours and issues - the ones that made me feel anxious but appeared to others as just being awkward.  Some of the lifetime's worth of guilt lifted, I understand why I like being alone, get obsessed with topics, have to read up on subjects just so that I *know*...

Covid has been amazing for me.  Social distancing was something I had been practicing for my entire life.  Work From Home... bring it on.  Anxiety levels plummeted.  yet now, everyone is expecting normal again - although WFH is still happening for 4 days per week.

However, there's a flip and it's partly why I'm here.  Who am I? Really, who?  My entire identity feels like it's been stripped away.  I no longer know how I'm supposed to act etc (although I also understand that's not really a question).  I'm not shy about telling people I'm autistic - I work in the NHS so it's easy to be open in that sense. But my neuro-divergent brain needs to understand how neuro-divergent people are supposed to behave... I now worry that I'm coming across as playing on it, justifying bad behaviour or attitude as my autism when in reality it's not and perhaps others still think I'm taking the piss or something...

So anyway, "Hi" to anyone who reads this.

PS Yeah, oversharing and overanalysing. I know ;)

Parents
  • over 2 years ago

    Maybe its helpful to stop thinking of the ‘supposed’ as something you can consciously steer when in the company of others. As I understand it (and Im only recently diagnosed late in life too) ‘masking’ is less performative than it is reflexive.  So the public ‘you’ that has been the learned compromise will not, cannot, vanish overnight, maybe ever - a realisation as comforting as it is frustrating! For it to do so, 95% of society  would have to become neurodivergent overnight, and it wont. Give it many centuries before that might happen

Reply
  • over 2 years ago

    Maybe its helpful to stop thinking of the ‘supposed’ as something you can consciously steer when in the company of others. As I understand it (and Im only recently diagnosed late in life too) ‘masking’ is less performative than it is reflexive.  So the public ‘you’ that has been the learned compromise will not, cannot, vanish overnight, maybe ever - a realisation as comforting as it is frustrating! For it to do so, 95% of society  would have to become neurodivergent overnight, and it wont. Give it many centuries before that might happen

Children
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