Hello folks.
I am a 30 year old guy living in the Northeast. I have always known that there was some undelying cause for the many issues I had as a child but it was only a few weeks ago when reading Born on A Blue Day, that I pieced together the full picture...as uncomfortable as it made me to see it for the first time.
Growing up, the problems making friends, subconcious head-rocking, the dyslexia, dyspraxia, the bullying and feeling an outsider, my odd reactions to social situations or overstimulation, the uncontrolable tantrums....I had written off all that as something that was unfortunate but which I had completely overcome and certainly not something that I should waste my time analysing in terms of who I am now.
And as a teenager, that continued awkwardness, the (eventual) ability to get girlfriends only to be dumped after a couple of weeks once they realised I had no clue what I was doing, that intense depression and feeling of isolation and lack of control that led to the self-injury and overdose...The rare times I thought back to that I labeled it extreme teenage angst and quickly brought my thoughts to something less upsetting.
As I read this book and then researched AS more online, I started to realise that all of my odd little personality quirks I have as an adult actually fit the AS pattern pretty well too. I had never made a link between these three stages in my life before for some reason and I started to think long and honestly about myself. I started to realise that behaviour I thought was pretty normal isnt and that I did things I chose to ignore untill faced with the truth of it all now.
I have spoken to my GP who has agreed to reffer me for diagnosis as I feel that I need to get a professional opinion despite already being pretty convinced by this point. To be honest, the picture of AS fits me so well that being told I did not have AS would raise a lot more questions than a positive diagnoses. In the few weeks since my discovery I have swung dramatically from fascinated to depressed to angry to grieving to numb to worried to experiencing a terryfying panic attack where I could not stop shaking or hyperventelating. It is probably safe to say that I am having difficulty coming to terms with the realisation and understanding what it means to me but I have found that talking to others who have gone through this has helped so this is why I decided to join your forum.
Thanks
Si
