Hi a newbie here I've recently been told I have ASD

Hello Spankie
My son who is 30 has just been assessed and diagnosed with ASD. He had an online assessment lasting about 4 hours with two different ladies (2 hours with each and a break in between) I was present. They then asked to see him face to face for a further assessment which was about an hour. Two weeks later he received the outcome. We are waiting for the full details of the assessment to arrive in the form of a written report. My son has always been ‘different’ he is intelligent and just appears very quiet and shy. I think because he is intelligent and well spoken his diagnose has come quite late in his life. He was very worried about the ASD outcome but has come to realise that it makes sense of a lot of things that have happened in his life. How he has struggled and the difficulties he has had with a lot of things. School work for one and then later on employment as well as relationships with people. He is one of the most caring and considerate people you could every meet. He is frequently misunderstood as he misinterprets other people’s body language and facial expressions. He is often totally overwhelmed by things going on around him. We are both now learning the best way of helping him. I wish you all the very best as you learn about yourself and ASD. 

Hi @spankie76 and welcome to the community.

Something to remember is once you have met someone with Aspergers that is what you have done, met one person. It is a wide spectrum and as with everything else people are very different from each other. Another is that it does not change who you are, it can help you to understand yourself better, and put a new perspective on things that may have happened in your life.

My daughter and her cousins from my side of the family have all been diagnosed with Aspergers and they are each very different with their own personalities. When I was learning about it after being told that would likely be her diagnosis what struck me was a lot of things I was reading seemed to relate more to my own experiences than my daughter. But as I continued learning about it I found out that girls present differently, probably the reason why it is often not picked up so quickly. 

Things are very stressful at work at the moment and to be honest without understanding why I feel the way I do I think I would have walked out in the last couple of weeks, although the option for redundancy by the end of June was an option. Instead I've applied for a couple of roles within the company and take it one day at a time. Fortunately I have a fantastic boss who totally understands me, and colleagues who are supporting me when I need it. Fortunately we are working from home still, as one of my habits is to scratch my scalp when I'm anxious or stressed out, so it is only my wife and daughter who mention the scratch marks. Sorry this is not sounding as positive as I meant it to be. Point being once things have been sorted out I will settle down and things will return to some form of normality, where as in the past I would have just moved on and dealt with the consequences.