Introduction, newly diagnosed

Thank you. I'm glad I know, and I've been thinking back a lot about how I was growing up and if school would've been easier if I had a diagnosis. But I didn't so hopefully I can figure out what works best for me now instead. I appreciate these articles and books, I've been looking for more information but I didn't know where to start, so I will definitely check them out! I've recently started therapy as well so we'll see how that goes. I agree with you about it being the start of your journey, I feel the same way, that's why I've come on here to hopefully find out more and talk to likeminded people.

Congratulations on your diagnosis and welcome to the community!

Following a diagnosis, it can be common for us to experience a lot of emotional dysregulation, so please don't worry if you experience this - it's normal!  Besides perhaps feeling some relief about now having an explanation for our past difficulties, this can also include working through a phase where we experience confusion, uncertainty, so-called "imposter syndrome", and/or (backward-focused) anger, frustration, grieving, and more. 

As for many others here, my own diagnosis turned out to be much more of the start of a new journey, rather than a conclusion full of instant solutions for my difficulties.

The NAS has a great set of articles focused on "after diagnosis", including one covering how you might feel during the subsequent days / weeks / months. You might find them of interest and/or helpful:

NAS - How you might feel after a diagnosis - includes perspectives from other autistics

NAS - Other advice covering post-diagnosis including:

• Talking about and disclosing your autism diagnosis
• Emotional support for family members after a diagnosis
• Formal support following an autism diagnosis
• What can I do if formal support is not offered or is not enough

Therapy (or counselling) is often recommended after a diagnosis, as a follow up action for your GP to arrange. If you prefer, depending on where you are in the UK, you may instead be able to self refer for talking therapy on the NHS.

Before arranging it, you might find it helpful to borrow or buy this book, which includes discussion of various types of therapy and counselling, together with advice on choosing the right therapist or counsellor - all from an autistic person's viewpoint. Several of us here have found it very helpful:

The Autistic Survival Guide to Therapy

Finally, I'll just mention a couple of books that I and others have found helpful early on in our post-diagnosis journeys:

Self-Care for Autistic People: 100+ Ways to Recharge, De-Stress, and Unmask!

How to Be Autistic (free download currently available via this page)

Anxiety is mostly a fear of not being in control or knowing what to expect, so new places you don't know trigger this, as well as things you can't predict. It's a nervous system response which triggers the thinking an worry.

Lowering your shoulders in particular, and a few deep breaths help. But mostly it is exposure that makes it easier. You do the thing and it gets easier because your nervous system learns nothing bad happens. You break it into smaller pieces and make each piece manageable. It is why visiting a place before an event, or looking up pictures or plans, or getting  good instructions helps. Talking is probably not going to help much because it is not a cognitive problem.

You can perhaps moderate the worry. Instead of thinking what will go wrong you can think about what will go right.

Burnout is avoided by reducing stress and making sure you properly relax sometimes. Improving sleep quality is the number 1 thing here. Masking less is a big reduction in mental load, but this means different things to different people. Allowing time to recover a rest and not feeling guilty will help. It is as a much a mindset change as anything. You need to activate you sympathetic nervous system, rest and digest, to overcome the pressure. Another way is to burn the cortisol and adrenaline off, by exercise, a walk, gym session, etc. I have a rowing machine and if I use this for 30 mins plus I feel a lot calmer and can think straight. I only just fully realised what it is doing. 

Therapy is probably going to struggle to address this, unless you have old things on your mind that are stopping you relaxing. You can talk these through.

Be aware that in burnout you thought cab be a bit awry. You feel logical, but you have distortions and logic errors, plus priorities go a bit wrong. 

Communication is a tougher one as it is personal. For me it was overthinking, not being relaxed, and masking that made it hard. If you have a glass of wine is talking easier? If yes, then you can talk, it is just too much self monitoring and worry about saying the wrong thing (masking) and over sensitivity to responses.

Therapy can help you with this. But you may find it you are relaxed with the therapist you can talk ok after you get to know them. It is a question if being relaxed, confident and not afraid of saying the wrong thing 

If you do want to get into detailed stuff about your history, not that they may get confused. Therapy is often for emotional people trying to get their emotions under control. For autistic people it is often trying to understand things, which makes the confusion, looping and worrying go. This requires going into detail, which conventional therapy tends to hold back from to avoid the emotional flooding. This is why therapy can be ineffective.

You may also want to visit the same topic multiple times. It is how the mind tidies things up and makes sure it understands before filing things away. It takes time. People can get frustrated with going over the same thing multiple times.

Hope this helps a bit. This just from my perspective, you may think differently.

Thank you. I read something "autistic brains often process a significantly higher volume of information, slowing down is a necessary strategy" I hope it helps because it helped me when I thought I wasn't doing enough and being tired after seemingly small things. But I don't think you need to worry about writing after everyone else, because we all have different opinions and your words might mean more to someone than they do to someone else. I'm glad you're having a good experience on here, I've only been on here a day and I already feel a lot better and I have a better understanding. I have a lot of hobbies, but my main ones are photography, watching films, reading and cooking. Thank you for taking the time to say something.  

Hi, welcome to the community! Being an outsider is my whole life experience,  often here too. I mean not that I'm treated bad in this community,  I like it and it's very important for me, but I often stay away from discussions because it's too much for Mr to process or I lack my own opinion or need more time to form one and by this time it's kinda too late or everything has been already said (written actually). I love this place and it's tge only place where I found like minded people and wish you that too. What's your hobby? I love aliens and space. 

Hello!

Hello Larissa 

Thank you, I was being too hard on myself so I appreciate this. We all need to be a little kinder to ourselves. I hope being on here benefits you as well!

Welcome, Larissa and thanks for your post. I am also recently diagnosed and I appreciate your enthusiasm for finding out more about this newly confirmed aspect of your identity. You will find lots of insight and solidarity here. Hopefully you will also be heartened by learning about strengths which autism can bring. Most of all, be good to yourself and enjoy the journey.

I relate to a lot of these, but I'd say I struggle the most with communication, burnout and anxiety. I've started going to therapy to try and cope with these (mainly anxiety) but so far I can't find much that works for me. I guess it will be trial and error until I do! If you have any tips on how to handle these I'd love to know and try them out.

It varies by person. You also need to separate out autism issues, from trauma, relationship issues, childhood issues, general life problems everyone has.

If you are just after autism issues then there are:

• Sensory challenges, sound, light, strong smells, touch/clothing, temperature, these are made worse when stressed as in threat mode you amplify your senses,
• Movement issues, I am unusually graceful, but many are the opposite,
• Communication issues, either blunt, too wordy explaining your reasoning, too literal. Sensitivity to tone, expression, and taking things too seriously,
• Challenges in relationships, past or present,
• Overwhelm issues, short term problems in response to a certain stnulus,
• Burnout issues, long term response to a long term pressure, chronic stress overloading the nervous system,
• Sleep issues,
• Eating issues,
• Attention problems, hard to start then hard to stop,
• Anxiety, which is a nervous system mediated issue, also anticipatory anxiety,
• Executive function problems, ties to burnout and overload,
• Cognitive distortions, of which I do most at times and mode dependent thinking caused by stress and threat responses,
• Employment issues linked to all the above.
• Masking challenges, identify what it is, or is not, what you want to change. Age plays a big part in this. Masking can be stronger at work or at home.

It is then coping and mitigation strategies so that you still.live the life you would like to.

Note that ASD can make you prove to other problems, such as depression, abuse, alcohol use, and possible childhood neglect problems which causes all sorts of adult issues.

This will do off the top of my head. 

If you recognise some you can say what you are struggling with the most.

Hi and welcome to the community.

I see from your profile that you like photography, watching films, reading, cooking. I tried doing a weekly film club thread on here but it didn't get much interest and I haven't been able to find any films I like since Christmas. I have also started a book club thread, so you could contribute to that if you want:

A book club - with a difference.

A part of me saw it coming, I was on the waiting list for a few years so I had a lot of time to think about it and if I wasn't diagnosed, I don't know how I'd feel, because I've always felt like there's something different about me.

I'm mostly just wondering what other people have struggled with and how they've overcome those struggles as I don't know anyone with autism and I'm hoping I'll have people to relate to.

Thanks, this was helpful. 

Hello.

I'm pleased you feel glad. It is common to have whole mix of emotions.

What would you like to know? 

Mostly it comes down to knowing and accepting yourself and past, and figuring out how to make things easier in the future.

Just knowing can reduce the pressure you put on yourself, which can make things easier without changing anything externally. 

Hi 

Welcome to the forum 

Joined this forum after a few tricky experiences with postal pen friends. 

Was looking for a female pen pal, with similar interests like reading, photography, art, crafts, jigsaw puzzles, and puzzle books. Prefer digital letters (email, social media, or forum)

Hi Larissa, you’ve come to the right place. Everyone is welcoming and any q’s you have, there will be plenty of us to try and help answer them and share many relatable experiences. 

Welcome Larissa!
It's a good place to ask others about their experiences, there are people here who are right at the start of their learning journey, to those who have known themselves for years.  Feel free to join in anywhere and start your own topics, it's all really helpful! We also love to talk about our special interests, so it doesn't have to be serious.

Enjoy!