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All my life I thought I was just "sensitive" and "didn't like change". So whenever I started a new grade in school, or a new job, or a new position within a job, or a new relationship, I would just cry off and on for days or weeks. Sometimes more, sometimes less, but I never met a transition that didn't cause me to completely fall apart. It's this strange feeling deep in my gut that no one on earth understands what I'm feeling.

So I am assuming this is because of AS, and that others have experienced this? My 3 year old son has started preschool recently and he is not handling it well, and I am actually handling it worse than him. I have 2 children and I can't believe I'm going to go through this all over again with their changes. I need some coping strategies. I started some anti-anxiety meds but I feel like they're making me less anxious but more depressed?

L2K

I remember starting school at 5, and think I cried by the end of the day.
I don't take change well too.
You should try breathing exercises rather than anti-anxiety meds. I never took any, because my psych is anti-medication.

first day of pre-school - I cried for 5 hours straight because my parents left, then climber under table. Second day, played with another two kids for five minutes - rest sat alone. Third day, was taken out of pre-school - dam! My parents should have kept me in pre-school, being at home made me miss my developmental milestones even more!

It sounds like an aspie-trail and heard this often. I must say I don't experience this. Two reasons:

1) I avoid transitions and only start to change things if they so bad and unbearable that everything else seems better than the current situation and therefore I am relative happy regarding the change.

2) I can distract myself from myself and act like "my own lawyer". It is not like classic schizophrenia, I am one person, but I do not see the things which may happen to me or what surrounds me as something which really matter - even on physical level: I can ignore pain, hunger, being tiered or freezing. I know it is me, I do something to change this, but in some respect I am just observer of myself. Therefore a change in my environment is something which does not touch anyway. Perhaps I developed this as a protection mechanism, perhaps it deeper rooted. Anyway: This is way I am functioning.

No, change is evil. It is also unavoidable.

I have some security blankets, a few constants through a flow of unconnected events.

One is the self question, I see they have not killed you yet? Then I smile.

Breathing, walking long distances helps, it is me, the machine in motion, only connected to the ground by gravity.

The more of an unchanging self, the less the disorder affects me.

Everything has a center.

Change overstimulates me to the point of becoming pacey, unable to settle, maybe unable to sleep.

Our church routine has changed because its Easter week and its been exhausting even though I have enjoyed the evening services very much indeed.

Just going to the GPs or hospital can turn me into a bit of a idiot; I can become a bit over talkative and very stressed. I don't settle for hours sometimes after something like that.

One thing I have learned is to try to have any appointments or social gatherings earlier in the day so that I have time to pace or fidget and get it all out of my system for a few hours before bedtime.