New here and Very Confused!

[ebichu64]

Hallo

This is my first post so I'd better make it a good one.

 

All my life I've never felt completely "normal", never quite fitted in and I always put it down to my being a bit more eccentric than everyone else.

 

When I visited my mum last year she made a commnent about how worried she was about me as a child because she knew when I was upset but I'd never talk about it. I clammed up. I was always really quiet and usually playing alone. I didn't have many friends and I was bullied all through school, from infants until I started college. I'd always put that down to my Grandmother drumming it into my head when I was little that "good little girls are seen and not heard". She was a horrible woman and bullied my mum through most of her life. Neither she or I have the ability to scream because that would be making a fuss and a noise and being a problem. (I dread to think what would happen if I was ever attacked and couldn't shout for help)

 

This time it really struck a chord because I am having similar problems at work. Something happens in the office that is unreasonable or unfair but when I try to talk to about it to my manager she explains it logically, makes excuses that I have answers to but simply can't get out. I end up either babbling, going off on tangents about all the other things that upset me whether they are to do with work or not, or agreeing with her even when I don't. So nothing gets solved and I carry on feeling frustrated and miserable. I'm on the verge of quitting, even though my partner and I can't afford me to, just to avoid any more frightening confrontations. I've suffered with anxiety and depression in the past and I can feel myself spiralling towards another breakdown.

 

Anyway, I started to look into my inability to speak when I get upset or stressed and why I can't connect with people. Or I can until I forget myself and start behaving normally, and then I get the blank stares instead. It's as if I've turned into a goblin or alien or something equally bizarre.

 

I thought I might have Aspergers and I went to my GP. Before that I did an online test and I came out borderline. My GP gave me another test, about 8 questions on one side of A4. Again, I came out borderline and he told me he couldn't refer me and I'd just have to learn to cope with the "stupid people" on my own.

 

I went away thinking, okay, it's what I expected, I can handle this, but a few weeks in I'm finding I really can't. I know these online tests aren't conclusive and I think they may be geared towards men anyway.

 

For example, I have no fascination with numbers. I quite like maths but I'm useless at it. I can do meet and greet and chat with people at events because I've learned how to and because it's an act for everyone. I get uncomfortable if people I meet in that environment try to get closer and more personal.

I like to be hugged but only by people I trust. I hate those "professional" hugs people give each other. I don't like kissing, I never have. My partner just came upstairs while I was writing this and I had to put my face in my hands and tell him to go away again because he was behind me and I could "feel" him watching even though he wasn't even in the room.

 

I've written my GP another letter and attached some information about Female Aspergers and how men and women have different symptoms, but of course he won't read it until tomorrow. I tried to speak to a local counselling service yesterday but they are shut at weekend too, as are many of the helplines. The 24 hour ones I found were specific to areas of the country and I'm in Manchester.

 

I'm beginning to feel really desperate, cut off and isolated. My partner's worried and trying to help but I can't explain what's going on inside my head except I feel like a motor that's not attached to anything, a flywheel that keeps spinning and spinning.

 

I know I have to be patient but the only time I have to try do anything about this is at weekends. I'm working so hard to be normal and acceptable at work that I'm too exhausted when I get home to do anything other than sit on the sofa and watch dvds. I need someone who knows what's going on to help me make sense of it.

 

There are lots of other little clues but it's so hard to put them into order or make sense of them. It might help if people asked me direct questions to help focus me. I'm such a mess.

 

Thanks for reading.

[matzoball]

Welcome to the forum.

 

What you are saying is very familiar to quite a few of us! You are doing the absolutely the right thing with the GP - it's often a fight to be taken seriously when you are an adult female with suspected AS. What might also be useful is perhaps a diary over the course of a week that details the issues you are having on a day to day basis. It's always more helpful if you have something that shows how your AS affects you.

 

There are a lot of women here with an ASD, so I hope you will feel you can talk about it here!

 

 

[ebichu64]

Thanks matzoball.

 

I'll try starting a diary tomorrow. Does anyone mind if I share it here as well?

 

I started reading Aspergirls by Rudy Simone. I know that Tony Attwood is highly thought of, but I wanted to read something from the perspective of a woman that has been diagnosed with it.

A few pages in I spotted something that was "me" and highlighted it.

Then I started highlighting everything that was "me".

And then I stopped again because the highlighting was getting out of hand!

 

Thanks again. I'd better go. It's nearly dinner time and I'm on gravy duty.

[Lyndalou]

As Matzo says, you will find many adult women out there in similar circumstances to yourself on this and other forums. I myself am one of them so I can completely empathise with your position. I have no formal diagnosis but over the last 2 years I have educated myself about what Aspergers is (and ASD in general) and I have over time become more at ease with finding out that this is what has made me into the person I now am.

 

The author of 'Aspergirls' only received her formal diagnosis around 5 months ago. I believe that initially she found no-one within 500 miles of where she lived who took what she was saying seriously and so she went out and wrote books and went on the 'circuit' raising awareness about female Aspergers instead! It's a difficulat position to be in; knowing you have ASD but not being able to 'prove' it....

 

I think that the main thing you need to remind yourself is that you are the same person you have always been with all your strengths and weaknesses, problems and talents. Educate yourself as much as you can. If you can find out why you act and react in certain ways in order to make improvements in your life then 'knowing' can be put to constructive use, whether or not ultimatley you can gain a diagnosis or not. Personally speaking, understanding that I have a real problem with certain sounds and types of touch has been very helpful for me. I've obviously known for years that it's better if I sleep with earplugs in and that I need to avoid getting my feet wet and more recently I discovered that I see the saturation of colour in HD TV in a strange 'velvety' fashion (I know...weird!!). However, for example, it only 'clicked' that crying and moaning noises make me stressed and irritable when my second child was around 6 months old. It suddenly made sense that when my eldest wouldn't stop crying when he was a baby that after a period of time I flew into huge rages because I couldn't stand the noise and the unpredictability. Sensory issues can be a very big deal in ASD's.

 

It might be worth your while reading other Rudy Simone books. I've read '22 Things a Woman with Aspergers wants her Partner to know' and I've not read 'Aspergers on the Job' but it might be helpful in your current situation. I've found some very good bloggers like Samantha Craft at www.aspergersgirls.wordpress.com and although she is not blogging anymore Rachel Cohen-Rottenberg who wrote Journeys with Autism. There are others I think that are not so good although their viewpoints are valid. I've found Tony Attwood to have a good understanding of female Aspergers although I feel he can still come over as a bit 'them and us'.

 

I wonder too if you would benefit from looking into Assertiveness training. It might be something you could source independently. I've been in situations where my boss turned things all around on me and it is a very confusing and upsetting place to be; kind of stuck between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea so again, I can empathise truly. Counselling may also be an option? (I've just reread your post and saw you are going down this avenue...) There is a woman who works locally in my area who specialises in working with people on the spectrum and although you are undiagnosed (or seeking diagnosis), this avenue could help you to come to terms with your situation. I suppose it's actually more psychotherapy. This is private and it may not be an option for you at all but it could be a short-term solution while you seek referral; what I've been told is that the (possibly only) session could even be so informal as to meet in a quiet coffee shop. (I'll have a look and pm you the email - she might have contacts in your area, you never know!!) I got referral on the NHS myself in 2011 through the mental health team for OT outpatient therapy which did help me a great deal but this was only after I had a near-total mental breakdown.

 

All the best to you and know that you are not alone <' />

Edited February 3, 2013 by Lyndalou

[ebichu64]

Thanks Lyndalou

I'll have a look at those books.

 

I'm not so sure about the training course. The idea sort of frightens me. Maybe it's too much like school!

 

I have done classes in the past but it's always hard work; the last one was BSL which I was really keen on and grew to hate. My teacher was arrogant and sometimes forgot me in the group, and I failed by 1 mark. They lied to me to try and cheat me out of more money, broke data protection and in the end I gave up. But it put me right off working with the deaf community which is really sad. Maybe I'll get over it in time.

 

But anyway, I'd prefer something 1 to 1 rather than get lost in a group.

[ebichu64]

Sorry, the message appeared twice again. Not sure why. Never had this problem before on forums.

Edited February 4, 2013 by ebichu64

[Lyndalou]

Can't see 2 posts! However, sometimes posting is a bit slow and if you press twice thinking it's not worked then you'll get 2 identical posts

[Shnoing]

Welcome here.

There's "Woman from another planet" which I found very informative.

 

Btw "borderline Aspergers" might lead to confusion whether you write about borderline (BPD) or even bipolar (manic-depressive) which it seems to be a "code"word for.

[ebichu64]

Thanks for the tip. I'll make sure I say "borderline aspergers". And I'll put the book on my "to buy" list. It does look interesting from the reviews.

[Lyndalou]

TBH, I wouldn't go down that road in terms of talking about 'degrees' of Aspergers. Tests, especially conducted by professionals not trained in diagnosing AS are simply a guide to decide about further exploration/assessment. Bear in mind that the current tests are firstly more tailored towards males and secondly often towards a 'younger' expression of the condition. I can look back and see exactly where I went 'wrong' when requesting an assessment when I presented myself to the GP. Much further down the road and after the benefit of much self-analysis, I would have gone about it in a completely different way; ie. I wouldn't have given my principal reason for requesting an assessment that I wanted a satisfying job - I am so used to having difficulties in relationships, sensory problems and the rest that it didn't even cross my mind that it wasn't 'normal'.

 

The simple fact is that you believe that you have AS. Any request for assessment should detail the difficulties you have in day-to-day living and the 'differences' you see(or perceive) between yourself and others.

[ebichu64]

Hi again Lyndalou

Thanks again, but how do I put the difficulties and differences into words? I mean without giving long examples (like I'm about to!).

 

I know that there are aspects of my current job that drive me mad, and that I have had trouble at work before, but I was in the Civil Service for 17 years and I mostly enjoyed my last job. I was made redundant from that... but there were a couple of hiccups there too.

 

I frequently remember other people doing things that upset me and when I tried to complain to my manager I was told to develop a thick skin or "not to let them get to me".

 

The question I always wanted to ask and could never quite get there was:- Why is it my fault that I'm upset when they are the ones who've behaved badly to me? Shouldn't you be telling them off instead of me? Or is it easier to have a go at me instead of defending me?

 

I had a breakdown in 2000. I had just left the civil service and gone to work for a civil engineering company. I successfully got them through their end-of-year finance without understanding what I was doing and they rewarded me by seconding me to the local council. They "desperately needed" an admin but there was no-one there to train me, so I tried to find jobs to do like sorting out their total filing mess, but mostly I sat around bored. I was supposed to come back to the company every 4th week, and on the third week I went on a training course for Microsoft Access.

 

The next week I went back to my old office to find my desk had been given to someone else and I was hot-desking. The same afternoon my manager told me to do a lot of complicated amendments on an important database used to calculate everyone's pay - after all, I'd just done 3 days learning Access! The guy who created it was working offsite and I wasn't about to mess around with it before asking him. It was the last straw in a miserable month anyway.

 

I locked myself in the ladies, cried and didn't come out until it was time to leave. I got sympathy from the other women in the office but that was as far as it went. Next day I went to my GP and he signed me off with stress and anxiety. i was ultimately sacked. Even then my crooked boss tried to claim he hadn't signed off my probation so the company could avoid paying me SSP. He was having an affair with the office temp and fiddling the accounts. He made no secret of the first but I discovered a discrepancy in the invoices while he was on holiday, and being honest and not sure what to do I took it to the Director (he was a nice man). I suspect a lot more discrepancies showed up and this was probably why my manager pushed me out and then piled the pressure on until I snapped.

 

I've been doing the diary for the last two days and it has shown me how things build up until they overwhelm me - background noise like the radio, people complaining at each other and talking across me when I'm trying to concentrate on a difficult task, the frustration when people ask me the same questions over again and I have to repeat work because they can't be bothered to read my emails. I'm focussed on doing a good job and getting results and the people I depend on are slacking off, forcing me to do half their jobs for them just so I can do mine, and slowing me down. Yet they still expect and demand results!

 

I want to avoid the term meltdown for now so I'll say it came to a head this afternoon and I threw a "tantrum" at my GP's receptionist over the phone, and then had a "panic attack with crying" in the middle of busy station concourse. I can't sleep now but my partner is going to phone me in sick tomorrow and try and get me a doctor's appointment. I don't feel relieved. I feel frightened, ashamed and as though I'm being a nuisance.

Edited February 6, 2013 by ebichu64

[matzoball]

You are not being a nuisance. You have to remember that.

 

A lot of people have found that when they have a breakdown, during that time of getting better, that their traits begin to manifest more than they had previously. It's because your coping mechanisms have shut down. The reason a lot of women find it hard to get diagnosed is because they mask it better - there is a train of thought that it is down to being viewed as 'emotional' because you are female when in fact it could be because of the ASD. This isn't true of everyone don't get me wrong, but that's what I encountered along my DX journey.

 

You have developed all these strategies and ways to cope over the years, and put down what you see as odd behaviour, as just you.

 

What's good about all of this is now you can take the time to build yourself back up again. You can ask your doctor about Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (a lot of us here swear by it), which could help you build up your coping strategies again, or even occupational therapy might be an option.

 

The very fact that you are identifiying noise, and external stimuli as triggering your anxiety and stress is very telling. You should put the encounter over the phone, and the panic attack down in your diary - try and explain how you felt - what was getting to you - everything you can recall. It is all useful.

 

The doctors will not see you as a nuisance, they will just be concerned and will want to help. So perhaps apologize for your outburst(i've done it a lot so don't worry), and explain to your doctor why you reacted the way you did and then give them the diary. Believe me it will all help, and they will want to help you.

 

Chin up kiddo x

[Lyndalou]

I second what Matzo has said and wish there was some easy solution but unfortunately there isn't.

 

If you are feeling very overwhelmed and emotional at the moment, being signed off sick will give you some head space so I think that's a sensible course of action.

 

What you describe in your previous job is likely to have had quite a negative impact on you and being bullied like this can knock your self-confidence very badly; even though you know that it is not your 'fault', it is like any kind of abuse or bullying when the abuser tries to convince the person they are abusing that it is their own fault. You know that your boss probably had it in for you in your previous job and because you didn't know how to 'play the game' and had integrity he was lacking you unwittingly left yourself wide open for being treated this way. I would warrant a guess that someone without ASD would be just as traumatised by bullying in the workplace as you have been but it is more likely they would know how to avoid getting into this type of situation by not being so 'truthful' etc in the first place - they have more idea of how to 'play the game'. Again, I can empathise with you as I have gone through something similar and I remember the hell it was.

 

Outbursts are embarrassing (and sometimes far reaching) but they are not the same as just having a 'tantrum'. It is when things just get too much for you to handle - emotional and/or sensory overload - and it is an outward sign of inward distress. The day I screamed abuse through my neighbour's letterbox will be a bit of gossip that will likely follow my around for years!

 

Give yourself a break, figuratively speaking and practically speaking

Edited February 6, 2013 by Lyndalou