Hi, my name is Stephanie and today I want to talk to you about how I felt
when I first found out that I was autistic.
Now, I was actually diagnosed late at age 23, which was actually just about a
year ago. Like many late diagnosed autistics, I had to advocate for my own
care and diagnosis. I had lived a lot of my life knowing that there was something
wrong with me. I felt like I was a normal person but somehow I was like kind of
broken and any day I would just somehow snap out of it or grow up out of it, but
that just didn't happen. So, I had both the luxury and disadvantage of being
fairly self aware. The reason I am sharing this today is not just to relate
to other people who have been late diagnosed, but also those who are late
informed of their diagnosis. A lot of parents opted to not tell their children
that they were autistic because they didn't want them to, like, live by a label. Now,
some of these people knew, like me, that there was something wrong and they were
searching for the answer. But there are also people who were blissfully ignorant
and not very self-aware that maybe some of the things they were doing might be
kind of off-putting or strange. I believe that though our experiences
are not the same, there are some similarities that might be helpful for
the autistic and for their loved ones. Though I had been searching for a reason
for my brokenness, autism was actually suggested to me by someone else. I've
mentioned before on this channel the stigma around autism and my own
ignorance concerning it. In fact, I was so far removed from the idea that I could
possibly be autistic that I completely brushed that idea off. Someone had
actually ended up hugging me and saying, "it's okay; I'm autistic, too," and I was
like, what are you talking about? You know, like, nicely, I just went, "Heh," awkwardly smiled, and
then walked away, thinking, like, but I'm not autistic, but okay. It was
suggested to me as Asperger's, of course, that form that's one step away from that
scary word "autism." And I'd actually dabbled in the thought of Asperger's before
when those times came out of desperation and I was
googling online, like, what is wrong with me? I had seen Asperger's pop up before
but I was always like, that is certainly not me. But now that someone was
suggesting that I might just ever so slightly have Asperger's, I was willing
to go ahead and take another look. At that point, I think I was just ready to
find the answers to why I felt the way I did and why I experienced the world the
way I did and stop kind of shoving it underneath my bed, hoping that it would
go away. At this point, Asperger's had already been absorbed
into autism spectrum disorder because of the dsm-5. However, this information, for
some reason, is like really slow to leak to informative articles and such not
online, so I got a lot of strange conflicting answers when it came
specifically to the differences between Asperger's and autism. However, to my
dismay, I was seeing myself in Asperger's and specifically in autism in females.
This slow, sinking feeling came about where I realized that this was the
answer and it was written in my language. But that meant that I was weird. That
meant that I would never be normal. That the person I imagined myself to become
someday wasn't who I would be and it wasn't a matter of just waking up
tomorrow and finally being what I thought I would be in my head. People
probably didn't like talking to me. Maybe they just talked to me out of charity.
Though things fit and I finally found some peace in knowing why I experienced
the world the way I did and the struggles that I experienced, it was like
the entire world readjusted. It was like everything I had ever known was
different and especially people were different. I think that it was just that
understanding where I had constantly convinced myself that I really knew the
true, true people, their true selves or whatever. I thought, like, oh, of course, no
one could actually do these bad things. No one actually had bad intentions. Like,
everyone was just so wonderful and I somehow knew them even though I would
hear these things come back in confidence that didn't line up with the
image I had in my head of people. And I would reject that because I couldn't
accept it. And then I started to realize, like, I really don't know these people
and I really have been really gullible and naive concerning people and my
relationships and understanding the world. And it was terrifying. It was like
everything I had convinced myself I knew was wrong, and it was like, it was like I
had convinced myself so that I could cope with being here. And suddenly it was
taken away. And then I started to wonder, how do people perceive me? Am I like the
weirdo that they don't really want to deal with or talk to? Am I such a
freak? No one's told me and they're all secretly just pitying me and they don't
want to deal with me? And it was just this horrifying thing at the same time
of being an answer. So, while I tell you guys a lot about the awesome part of
getting those answers and finally feeling understood, there definitely was
a time where, honestly, I kind of started getting angry. Not only did I feel like I
lost my sense of connection with people, not only, you know, it was, it was a fake
sense of connection, to be completely honest, but I had convinced myself of
things so that I would feel better about it. And it was like everyone was so
different and it really was that people thought differently than I did. And that
concept is still difficult for me to grasp. That people don't think the way I
do and they they do have the intentions that have been shown by their actions.
And it was just really hard to accept that the dark side of people exists, too, just
like, I'm sure, it exists for me, but it was just something I couldn't, couldn't
accept from people. And then I just, I was, I was angry. Like, why didn't anybody tell
me? Why didn't anybody tell me that I was a weirdo? Why didn't anybody tell me,
like, this is why no one wanted to be my friend? Why didn't anybody tell me that I
was such a weirdo and such a freak? And then
I mourned the loss of who I imagined that I'd be. I thought that I would someday
grow into this person who gracefully maneuvered about all the social
situations and knew what to do and knew what to say
and that it would just come with time and I would just click and be someone
else. And for some reason I always thought myself, like, I'd be a good business woman,
even though I'm really not suited to that kind of thing. And I don't know. I
just had this image of someone who would somehow be so great and confident and
good with people and that's just not who I am. And I look weird and I do weird
stuff and it doesn't just age out like I thought it might. So that sucked. I also
realized a few things about people, also, that I didn't think before. For example,
with a lot of stimming, I legitimately thought that people did those things. I
thought they spun around in circles and did things with their hands and all
sorts of things and just pretended they didn't or hid it in public because they
were being more reserved than me. And I thought they were just being
uncomfortable around me and didn't want to show anybody that. And then I found
out that people don't do that. They're not just hiding it. The reason I haven't
seen them do it is because they, they don't do that. So, that was fun. And on
this channel, I've also talked a little bit about my mental health issues and
this realization definitely affected those sorts of things in both positive
and negative ways, and kind of, like, in waves. It was definitely, like, the example
of delayed processing in autistics. It was, it was a lot of things to process. It
was almost like my entire identity was revealed to me, but at the same time was
not what I had perceived myself as. Of course, something unique to those
who are late diagnosed instead of just late informed is that that time period
where you start to realize, like, this is who I am,
and this is the why's to all the questions in the back of my mind, but you
can't share that information. I've lamented about this particular
issue plenty on this channel already; we'll skip beyond that point. After my
diagnosis, I felt a little out of sorts, but I had learned a lot about autism,
especially in my search for answers and to understand more about me and to
understand if this was me in the first place. And I began to be able to say the
word "autism" without feeling like I had just said a bad word in public or
something. I feel like I was starting to drop my feeling of stigma toward it. I
learned that a lot of the beautiful and wonderful things about myself that I hid
were worth letting out. This is not an easy process. I think it's actually more
difficult for those who are late informed, especially, who are not self
aware and, you know, looking for those answers, because there's no personal
drive in the person to understand what's going on with them and for everything to
suddenly change is difficult, and it's less welcomed when you're not already
aware that something isn't quite right. I know that it's hard to believe, but the
feeling that the entire world has just changed is simply only your perception
of the world that has just changed. People who love you loved you and saw
your awkwardness and they saw your weird things. They already knew all that about
you, and they still loved you. You are just as wonderful and worth being
here as the day before you knew. I know a lot of people still see autism as a
disadvantage and it's okay for you to feel that way. However, I feel like the
idea that we are so disadvantaged that the whole thing is just terrible and
horrible is kind of misguided. I think that everyone experiences disadvantages
and advantages in their life and while, yes, we experience things that a lot of
other people don't, we also are capable of a lot of things
that other people aren't. Whether you choose to live your life seeing those as
bad things or good things is up to you, but you can be upset with who you are or
you can embrace who you are. And I can almost guarantee you most people who are
late diagnosed or late informed have probably worked on hiding very
special things about themselves in their life because they knew it stood out; it
made them different, and it kind of scared them. And if you learn to let
those things out, those are special things about you, even if they're weird
or awkward to other people, that are unique to you and it's important to be
able to be the person that you were made to be. Autism is not a death sentence. It
does not mean that you are less or stupid or worthless or any those sorts
of things. For me, finding out about autism helped me understand who I am and
really start to really understand my identity as a person. I could choose to
live the rest of my life hating that I have disadvantages that other people
don't or I can just accept the fact that this is who I am this is how I work and
embrace that and be okay with it. And for me, I've actually become quite a lot more
comfortable with who I am, despite looking and seeing the differences a
little more than I used to. But I can also share information with people and
hopefully help other people discover who they are a little more and hopefully be
okay with that. Thank you so much for watching today. I hope that you enjoyed
it. If you did, go ahead and give it a thumbs up and let me know your thoughts
about this in the comments below. Are you a late informed or late
diagnosed autistic or have you known about your autism all of your, like,
childhood, teenage years, etc.? Also, I want to mention something I keep forgetting. I
do have a Patreon, so if you're interested in that, I will link it in the
description below and it'll also be on my end screen, but just a quick shout out
also to my current Patrons, like, you guys are super amazing. I can't believe how
awesome you are. Thank you so much for supporting me and being part of my
journey and thank you guys just as viewers for being here. It really means a
lot to me. Also, side note, if you hate my hair, I'm sorry. I'm really here for it
right now. ... The beanie has made a comeback but
also with a wig and I feel like this is, this is just, this is just my best life. [laughs]
Anyway, I hope that you're having a wonderful week. I hope that this video
helped you in some way at least a little bit,
and see me in my next video. Bye!