Post-diagnosis

Dear future historian,

There is a tiny numbness, after my diagnoses. But it is not caused by it. Quite the opposite. I feel like if the un-officiality of my self-diagnosis (not to mention the years of ignorance b4* that,) had deeply affected my understanding of myself and my needs.

Many people don’t understand the reason to seek a piece of paper to make it official. Others don’t even understand why someone would get to the trouble of research to self-diagnose. And all reactions are valid. I am only sharing my story, in the hope to help create, for you my dear future historian, a more inclusive world.

Even b4* my recent diagnosis, even after about 5 years of research and about 3 years of self-diagnosis, I still had my doubts. Reinforced by everyone I talked about it with. ‘We are all a little bit autistic.’ If I had a penny for every time I heard that.

Not even my 50-bullet-points list, of ‘why I think I am autistic,’ didn’t provide me with the mind-opening moment that my official diagnosis has. Because no matter how ‘convinced’ I was, there was still the doubt in everyone else that was obviously affecting me, no matter how much I tried not to let it.

I have been trying to write to you today 5 times. I know, sometimes I mention the hour too, sometimes I don’t. My lack of consistency, my struggle to concentrate, my anxiety and self-doubt, all that for some stupid reason.. I let them stop me from sharing and publishing. Yet for some, maybe equally stupid, reason -after my diagnosis- I suddenly feel free to be proud of myself, without hearing the whisperings in my head anymore of how autistic we all are. Its like a heavy weight was finally lifted.

And for some reason I heard now from a few ppl** that I am an inspiration. Don’t ask me why I should get an official diagnosis to be one.. Like if being dyslexic-immigrant-mother-of-two with anxiety wasn’t enough, like being human.. isn’t enough.

Everyone who gets up in the morning and fights with the dragons of Chaos and a degenerated Order is an inspiration. But ppl** don’t share their stories. There should be the focus. Not on what diagnosis someone has.

New mothers for example up until b4* the internet had little access to real information about postnatal sex. Because women didn’t talk about that stuff. Autism is equally taboo, unfortunately.

Oh, I was listening to Steven’s Fry Victorian Secrets.. a lot to talk about that, but for now just that he mentioned Victorian personal diaries, and how grateful historians are for them.. So, you know, I was thinking of you a lot today.

What was I saying? Oh, yes. Ppl,** by sharing stories, they help the next generations, and even their contemporaries, to avoid reinventing the wheel. They help in the creation of a meta-story, a story that in the next generations will improve lives.

Stories might look innocent, and even useless, in the short term, to change anything at all. Yet they have a power to echo through History and create ripples that shape the future reality.

Wouldn’t it be nice if at your time, my dear future historian, ppl** are supported, and their struggles and overcomings appreciated, weather they have a diagnosis or not? Having said that though, I have to mention that I think.. maybe we are not all autistic, but a diagnosis helps a lot to know how to self-care.

I for example have a bit of agoraphobia. Or at least I thought I had. I was trying to overcome it; unsuccessfully. Now I realise that it is mostly the sensory overstimulation that causes my frustration. And that will not improve by exposure. So, knowing yourself helps you to know how to take care of yourself.

Trying to sum up my mumblings, I would just say that I feel a relive after my diagnosis, but also a bit of regret for the years that past, that I was as autistic as now, but not only I didn’t know, but not knowing had me and others have expectations from myself that where unrealistic, and ended up in a spiral of self-doubt.

I need a cuppa again.

Stay safe and take care.  

 

P.S. We played UNO (Rick and Morty one,) with the rule that you can get rid of same numbers together, at once.. look what I got! :

 

*before

**people