Possibly an imposter?

Wonderful 

Your experience in life sounds just like mine, and you wrote this the way I probably would have if I hadn't got a diagnosis at a young age. The way you explain your compensations is the same way I'd explain things, too. I sympathise and resonate with everything you described there. Maybe stick around here for support - places like this are where we can really find a feeling of connection, even if it's with a different person every time lol :)
The Autism Reddit forum is the same for this. There are imposters for sure, they ruin all the support groups on Facebook lol, but you seem so similar to me I doubt you're wrong. For your reference, I have Aspergers and ADHD (and other less relevant things).

Sad reality of life; guilty, as charged. 

Hello Ian. That reads like my life experience, pre-diagnosis. Especially the bit about the family and animal relationships.

Actually, NO, all of it! 

As for retirement, simply replace work with "missions" or "projects", replace work colleagues with the people you meet along the road to getting your projects done, and it's practically the same, but YOU are the boss. 

Which is where it went wrong for me. It turns out I am lousy at ordering myself or other people to do stuff for me. 

We are all trained from birth to take direction, and follow someone else's plan, and we were not given the training in self discipline or leadership like previous generations were, so the first few years of retirement were really difficult for me as I tried to adjust. 

I've noticed that I'm not getting fitter, faster or stronger either, so that getting other people to do stuff, is a MAJOR useful trait as you get older. 

Also there's lots of change which forces us to break old habits and ways of thinking, and that can be quite a "Downer" especially as whilst previous generations would learn from the elders, current generations have been trained to prefer the T.V. set.. 

What a wonderfully worded post! This has been SO helpful for me. Thank you x

The longer that a person on the autistic spectrum is exposed to the neurotypical world unsupported, the longer we have to compensate, camouflage and mask our differences. 

Without a neurological timeline, it can be hard to draw a conclusion on whether a regression has caused autistic traits to develop, or whether one has had a neurological difference from birth. 

However it does not mean that you do not have autistic traits; you can complete and Autism Quotient Test (AQ), a Empathy Quotient Test (EQ), and a Systemising Quotient Test (SQ); online to figure out where you stand.  
I had an EQ of 28, an AQ of 32, and a slightly higher SQ (which I cannot remember); the result was that I was masterful at masking my decisively autistic behaviours, and it took until 28 to get a diagnosis.

As far as eye contact goes, I am passable at it, on examination a professional pointed out that, I break eye contact every time I reach ‘flow’ in my digressions. But as I have masked for so long, I have reached a level of faux-social competency, that my autistic traits are hard to detect. Also I tend to get along with well with the neurodivergent, in the old days a lot of these people would have been referred to a ‘remedial’ in education.

A lot of autistic individuals can have: pedantic speech, an all-or-nothing attitude, can be exploited a-lot, can take things literally, and learn better through exposure to our interests.
We can have a social impairment that makes social conversation very hard to navigate; small talk, jokes, laisse-faire instruction; we can have drastically less patience in situations were there are loud sensory influences.   
We can respond badly to change and to office politics. We can have a hard time in large groups. We can have alexithymia; a lack of ability to convey emotions we feel or see. We can buy the same items in bulk and wear the same clothing.

I’m trying to dump as much lore as possible, and this is all that come to mind at the moment, I hope this helps.

I had a diagnosis two weeks ago, and I have to say that I felt like an imposter too, it is hard to feel that you are neither-here-nor-there.
But the reality is that just because the neurological timeline was not complete for the screening, does not mean that you don’t have autistic traits.
All conditions are a compilation of symptoms, if you experience some of the difficulties I’ve/we’ve laid out, then you have a place here because we wrestle with these issues all the time.

Thanks!

Your post could be my post....literally WORD FOR WORD. I am 61 and retired 10 years ago. I had "dabbled" in animal welfare whilst working and decided that I would immerse myself in it totally, as I realised that as a very high functioning person, I needed to keep my brain working, solving problems and feeling that my life was worthwhile.

Now, I don't know how I had time to work! I deal with endless feral cats on farms, and only have to deal with people when the cats are booked in to be neutered which I can bear (although I've managed to Pee the staff off with my apparently rude manner...)

I know for a fact that some of the large animal charities, need people to sort the endless forms they have out an put them on the computer, and people to socialise frightened inmates There may even be a paid job doing it. Just a thought. I have just started telling people that I';m autistic, and most people have cut me a bit of slack which has been a revelation!

PLEASE don't be too despondent, there is a place for you out there!

Thanks, yes. I suppose I could get reassessed, but things are very complicated. Autism provides one possible explanation for how I am, but there are other perfectly plausible explanations. People will have different views. In the end I'm not that bothered about the labels.

Yes, voluntary work is starting to happen. Will also need to find something that pays...

Thanks for engaging!

Thanks for that. A lot of good advice and well intentioned. Some of that is on the cards already. I have done some volunteering. More on the cards possibly. I'm going to try volunteering as an user in a local theatre. In some ways that isn't an obvious fit for me, but I think I'll cope OK with the sort of interactions I'll be faced with there, I hope. Dog walking is also something I'd considered - got as far as getting the application form for a charity. Also planning on getting back in the gym which might help give a bit of structure to some days.

I'm really not bothered about the diagnosis really. Things are extremely complicated and in the end I just am who I am, regardless of labels people might attach to me (or not).

I feel similar. My wife (the only person I feel 100% comfortable being myself with) is encouraging me to mask less with others, but it's difficult.

Re: assessment, I was first assessed as not autistic. Fifteen years later, I managed to get a reassessment and was diagnosed autistic. It is possible!

Re: the work vacuum, have you considered voluntary work? I find it's like work without so much pressure.

Hello mirror....opps....I mean Ian.

You sound very dangerously like me.  Accordingly, I am hardly surprised that retirement is not proving the best arrangement for you.  I will never retire, but then again, I'm not really sure that you could call my work a job either - its just me being me.

I know that the following advice sounds ridiculously "standard", but in your case, I think it may be right on the money = get out of your house and do stuff.  Get a routine of activity going again.  Give yourself other things to think about and to talk about.

Dog walking.  It will fill your time and conceivably raise you a few quid into the bargain if you were to choose to do it commercially (not something I would necessarily suggest) - but volunteer dog walking  is a glorious thing to keep you busy in the company of sentience that will never burden you like bloody humans do.  Find your local dog shelter or pound and volunteer your services.

Simialrly, helping on a farm or at stables.....horses, cows, pigs (pigs are b**stards by the way)....is another rewarding way to keep yourself busy.  These days, such places are screaming out for all the help they can get.

I assume that neither of these suggested activities are akin to what your work was, but that is part of the beauty of retirement - you can reinvent yourself as something else - to keep yourself sane.

Animals are your key, chap.   They will save the day and save your bacon.  Don't languish and stare at your navel whilst loosing yourself in the deep mire of your own mind.  Keep active at all costs - both mentally and physically.  Wives and children can get you, until they don't....never take them nor your own mental health for granted.

Forgive this rather bullish response - not my usual modus operandi - but for some inexplicable reason, I believe it to be appropriate in this instance.  You really do sound a lot like me (you poor old soul.)   And for the avoidance of doubt, I do like pigs, but their similarity to humans make them one of my least favourite beasts.

From what you have written above, a diagnosis isn't really what you are longing for - but you fear being an "imposter" in this place.  Do not worry yourself over such matters.  You are very welcome here.  You sound perfectly autistic enough to me - based on your writings above - and who are we to judge anyway.  A very significant minority, if not majority of people on these pages, suffer from imposter syndrome, so you are in very good company here.

If I have entirely missed the mark above, I ask for your forgiveness.  I intend only good things to flow from the above and apologise if it is all a little "too much in your face."  I note below that you wrote to Shardovan that "I've not succeeded terribly well", but I must take issue with that.  You are 60, you have retired, you have survived - bravo.  Now just keep going !

Very best wishes from an uncharacteristically rambunctious, Number - and I hope you choose to stick around to see if we are "your type of people."  I think we will be.

I don't really have a problem with the verdict personally. I can accept that, at this remove, it may simply be impossible to make the diagnosis. They can't turn the clock back and observe me as a 4 year old, and I can't now give them the evidence of how I was then as I don't know that myself. There isn't an awful lot to go on and there are factors in my early development which may point to other causes (or not). I had problems early on, but there was no help in those days. Meltdowns were punished, so you have to work it out for yourself and eventually find your way in the world of others. I've not succeeded terribly well, but that's hardly surprising in the circumstances.

Some of the assessment stories I’ve heard on here have been appalling. Even very recent ones. ‘You can’t be autistic because you have a friend and you looked me in the eye there. Next!’  So you’re right to mistrust the inconclusive verdict.