Published on 12, July, 2020
Hello, everyone. I am new to this community. I have been on the waiting list for an ASD assessment for a year and a half and it is finally set for Tuesday morning. Despite my mother insisting I am on the spectrum for a number of years, so far I have been in the mental health system and have a diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder. This appears to be fairly common in females. I like to be prepared for things like this and to know what I'm up against. However, I haven't seen two stories of an assessment that are the same! My experience in applying for PIP where I was accused of lying about literally everything and awarded 0 points has scared me. The assessment is to be held at my home and last for three hours. Supposedly it will be conducted by a consultant psychiatrist. Does this align with anyone else's experience? What happened? What should I expect? How will the meeting be structured? If anyone could give me any information or links at all about their assessment appointment, I would be most grateful. Thank you so much,
I think it depends who is doing the assessment but mine was in two parts. The first half was an interview which was quite general and covered things like school, interests, friendships etc. For this part it can be helpful to have a parent / guardian with you to share some of those experiences. The second half was the ADOS assessment where I was given an number of activities to complete, like reading a story or completing a puzzle. The tasks weren't difficult and I don't think the psychiatrist was interested in how well I did in the activity, more how I responded to different prompts in that time.
I understand that it can be a very anxious time because of not knowing what to expect. It might be worth e-mailing your assessor to ask for a timetable to help you to prepare, or you can take things with you to help you feel calm, I took a colouring book and my headphones and even though they stayed in my bag the whole time, I felt better knowing they were there.
I hope it goes well for you, try to remember that the difference here is that the consultant psychiatrist will actually have some understanding of ASD, whereas the PIP assessor is not a specialist in this area. Here is a link to some ADOS information if it's relevant https://research.agre.org/program/aboutados.cfm
Thank you very much for your response, Patch! Particularly for the link you sent me. That's very helpful reading. I had heard some of the assessment was task-based but hadn't heard any details about it. You also have a good point about the assessor. Did you receive a diagnosis on the day or was there a waiting period?
That's no problem. I got my diagnosis on the day but had to wait a couple of weeks for the full report. What surprised me the most about the whole day were the amount of ASD traits the assessor picked up on that I hadn't even noticed, so they definitely know what to look for!
Re PIP, I've heard from a few people that it's really common for an application to be rejected and then the outcome is much better after an appeal. It sounds like a horrible process, but the outcome of the assessment on Tuesday might help.