Recently Diagnosed adults

Autism diagnosis throws everything into a different perspective

As well a writing the blog, I also attend online forums and even am administrator of an information sharing group and a moderator for a couple of social support groups.
Many of the recently diagnosed adults who report their diagnosis for the first time follow up with an emotional response. I am so angry I missed so much because nobody noticed, I am so sad for all the things I lost because I am autistic, I am furious with my parents, teachers, doctors, or others because they dismissed my struggles.

I am so sad, so angry, so frustrated, so relieved, so validated.

Getting a diagnosis of autism after a long life time of struggles in so many ways can be all of these things. Almost all of us go through whirlwinds of emotions as we begin to adjust to the vast and important life change our diagnosis means for us. We suddenly have answers for so many of our struggles, from social failures, problems on the job or in the home, difficulties with perception, balance and motion, problems understanding things that go on around us and have gone on all of our lives. Now with our new understanding that it has been our uneven neurological development that has played havoc with our lives all this time (and nobody knew!) we can forgive ourselves for our failing to live up to others’ expectations. Blame and shame surrounding our performance ( or non-performance) in almost all parts of our lives has led us to feeling guilty, believing we are somehow bad people and that we are failures due to lack of character, inner strength, willpower, laziness, ineptitude, stupidity or moral failure.

Finally, we can see how our unevenly developed neurology has given us struggles that “normal” (neurotypical ) people simply don’t have.

We can understand why we were blamed, punished, shamed, bullied, etc. Nobody knew!

We can finally forgive ourselves for all those struggles and years of disappointing results. It was not “all our fault” after all. Now we know WHY!!!!

Don’t be surprised if you feel completely at odds within yourself. It is going to take a while to look at just everything in your past and in everything around your every day life today and see how autism has had its workings in it all, even though we may never have suspected.

Its likely pretty normal to have these emotional responses. Our world has been turned completely upside down and now we suddenly have this new perspective that shows us things we may never have understood before. Of course it is unsettling!

Do your very best self care as you begin the journey to your new life with this new understanding.

You will have loads of questions, old memories seen in new ways, and you will begin learning new ways to live your life using new every day tools in thought processes, behavior, self accommodation and more.

I promise you things will start settling down as you find your way little by little and begin to experience those marvelous “aha” moments when something confusing, painful, frustrating, exciting suddenly makes sense.

You are definitely not alone.

More and more older adults are finding diagnosis and changing their lives for the better as they go forward after recent diagnosis of autism.