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Hello

Mumof2Scotland

My son was diagnosed with autism last week. We got his report today and it’s overwhelming reading it. It’s helping me understand him so much more but it’s also making me scared as I don’t know what the future will hold for him.

  • hello everyone,
    i am a 53-year-old bloke born in 1972. i was recently diagnosed with audhd (autism and adhd), along with severe ocd, generalised anxiety disorder (gad), and sensory hypersensitivity to noise. like a lot of us gen x generations, i spent my whole life knowing i was different at school but had no knowledge or map for my own brain. i ended up at a grammar school and masked my way through 31 years of hard work, basically copying and pasting other people just to fit in.
    i am joining this forum to connect with people who understand what it is like to survive a lifetime of masking and late burnout.
    my main difficulties:
    • the masking and people-pleasing trap: i worked for 31 years in construction as a chain man setting out, and later in manufacturing. because i was a "yes man" who found it hard to say no and always felt i had to prove my worth, i was heavily used and gaslit. i would do the job of three people, skip my breaks, and do out-of-hours airport runs for free just to be liked. it was a full-time job just pretending to be normal.
    • people anxiety and the terror of silence: people give me major anxiety because they are unpredictable. conversations feel like high-stakes work using stored scripts. strangely, i find sitting in silence with someone much harder than having to speak. when a conversation goes dead, my brain panics because there are no clear rules, and my mind starts racing, checking what they are thinking. i hate being on the phone or speaking in online playstation parties.
    • executive dysfunction and transition blocks: i get bad transition blocks when changing from one game to another or trying to do something unfamiliar. if i have to drive a route i don't know, i panic without a sat-nav and have to take someone with me.
    • adhd time blindness and object permanence: when i get into a good game, i hyperfocus for up to 13 hours, losing track of time, missing meals, and going to the toilet last minute. i also get caught in the "postal chase" on ebay, where buying something gives me a dopamine rush, but the second it arrives, the thrill goes. if a game or object is out of my direct sight, my brain completely forgets it exists.
    • addiction and my lightbulb moment: because doctors only diagnosed anxiety and depression all my life, i used alcohol through my teens and twenties to numb the social anxiety and fit in. it led to addiction and i spent all my savings—£25,500 in total—going in and out of private residential rehabs in blackpool. i did a long stint of sobriety from 2004 to 2019 using aa and na meetings, doing a lot of driving for my boss to keep me sober, but i never felt i fit in there because i couldn't find the underlying issue everyone else had. i relapsed in 2019 after a massive wave of grief where i carried 6 coffins in a short space of time, including my sister from cancer and my brother-in-law through suicide. after rehab in 2019, i watched a documentary about adhd and autism and had my lightbulb moment. i finally put a finger on it. knowing why i used alcohol made all the difference, and i've been sober ever since with zero desire to drink.
    • sleep issues and hyper-hearing: my brain never switches off and i don't sleep well. i usually get about 4 hours, then wake up with a recurring word or lyrics swirling round in my head like a broken record. i live in a renovated old mill apartment and have hyper-hearing—late at night when it's quiet, any tiny creak in the building makes me jump.
    • physical injuries and chronic pain: work demands completely broke my health. i have multiple spinal fractures, chronic osteopenia, and a fused ankle with zero movement in the joint. i can't walk up stairs or hills, use a walking stick for balance, and live with a lot of stabbing pains and burning sensations. i am frightened to death of spinal surgery, so i have to be incredibly careful not to fall.
    my strengths, collections, and safe sanctuaries:
    even though my life has been incredibly hard, my high intelligence is my shield. i use my love for structure and symmetry to turn my flat into a perfect visual museum to calm my anxiety:
    • my immaculate sorting systems: my flat is spotless and everything is set out in a uniform arrangement. i collect things from my past to heal childhood missing pieces and create order. i have 80-100 pairs of vintage designer masking jeans (armani, versace, gucci) neatly stacked, 80 lacoste djokovic polos in nearly every colourway, a rail of pristine deadstock 80s fila bj tracksuits, and rows of brand new dewalt tools stacked perfectly in tstak boxes that i will never use.
    • diecast cars and currency: under my tv, i have a row of all-red bburago ferrari cars in a perfect line, and more set out in a uniform diagonal arrangement on a two-tier glass table. i also collect bank notes and coins; i have historic christopher wren £50 notes, crisp euro notes, and a vast wad of used bank notes from all the world travel i did (new zealand, vietnam, brazil, rio for new year's eve 3 times). back when i could work, i was a serious athlete—i could do a 10,000m row in 43 minutes and swim a mile breaststroke (64 lengths) in a perfect, unbroken flow. i also donated 97 counts of platelets (triple donations) for alder hey children's hospital because i loved sitting in the chair for 90 minutes with nobody bothering me.
    • my high-tech safe zone: i have an elite solo gaming setup. i have nearly 7,000 trophies and 41 platinums on the ps5 (including the massive grinds of getting platinum on death stranding 1 and 2). i am currently hyperfocused cleaning up the planets on star wars outlaws. i love premium, clean electronics and run a cordless apple ecosystem with a macbook air on a stand, imacs from the newest right back to the original silver screens, an apple watch ultra, and a 65" samsung 4k qled tv.
    • sensory regulation: i regulate my nervous system by wearing oversized, heavyweight fleece jogging suits made by the brand comfrt (which i found through a youtuber called mom on the spectrum). i use weighted silk cushions to run my fingers over, and when the weather is nice and hot, i love going out for hours on my tga breeze s4 mobility scooter. i park up by a high playing field near my mum's, enjoy the breeze, and listen to joe rogan podcasts all afternoon in a 100% mask-free bubble.
    i am currently going to a tribunal with an advocate from the healthy minds charity to get my motability car back, after a telephone assessment unfairly stripped my mobility points because i gave a literal answer to a route question. i don't work anymore, i don't deal with other people's problems, and my mum helps me manage my money on a strict direct-debit system so my finances are totally safe from my ebay impulses.
    i am looking forward to looking through this forum and chatting with people who see the world the same way i do.
    thanks for reading.