Initial Assessment ... what next?

So happy to hear that you feel much better now :-)

Thanks re: my icon, it's kinda fun and has some energy which appealed to me. 

yea I feel much better now - actually my diagnosis was spot on and explained everything in my past. It also means I  know what I am dealing with.

thanks DD

ps I love your daisy duck icon it just looks so cool

Hi Aidie, well if your expectations were different then it's natural you'd have a stronger response to it. Have you made friends with the identification now? 

Lol at the "I told you so" T-shirt, sadly I expect that they will not even acknowledge it.  I am not good around little kids and my sisters are also half-sisters - I expect that the ASD gene comes from my dad's side so won't affect them. But yes, I will mention it if I see signs that something might not be quite NT. Thanks for the suggestion.

i couldn't think straight for a week when I received my ASD diagnosis. But then i thought I was not on the spectrum and they where going to confirm I wasn't !!!!

Now you can tell your sisters,,, make sure you are wearing your "I told you so T-Shirt" 

Keep an eye on nephews and nieces, your knowledge / awareness can be useful in early diagnosis if one of them happens to also have some Autistic related genes.

No. I think the psychiatrist expected more of a response and said "I'll just let you absorb that for a minute". I said "It's only confirming what I already expected to be true, I don't have any emotion about it".  It was 24 hours ago and I still don't really have any particular thoughts or mood about it. I first suspected I was autistic about a year and a half ago, it was very unsettling then but I've come to terms with it, various friends know etc.  I hope it might improve relationships with my sisters who up until now I think they've thought I was just making it up to excuse what they see as 'poor behaviour' - we're not close...

Thank you. I hope so too!

Congratulations on getting your answers Hope the new information helps when it comes to getting back into the workplace.

did it shock u to have it confrimed even though u sorta knew all along ?

Hello

I had my assessment yesterday, I paid to go privately as NHS waiting list is longer than my saving will last!

It was a structured interview with two psychiatrists. First 45 minutes they asked my mum a load of questions about what I was like as a child in terms of development, social interactions and special interests. Then a further 1 hour and 45 minutes talking to me on my own asking loads more questions.  It was pretty exhausting and I was 'overcooked' by the end and losing my train of thought a fair bit!  After a short period of time to confer (the psychiatrists left the room then returned) they let me know there and then that there were enough indicators for them to confirm that I do have Asperger Syndrome, although also explaining that term was not in use since the terminology change but it's what most people still use for high functioning autism.  They are going to take a couple of weeks to write up a full report and send it to me, and they'll also send a 1-page letter suitable for employers that confirms the identification and what steps might support me returning to the workplace. 

Now all I have to do is find a disability-confident employer who also needs my awesome skill set!  I imagine that is going to be a whole lot harder than it sounds... but for now I'll keep positive and see what shows up.

It was an exhausting afternoon but it was efficient and that has been helpful because my mum travelled a long way to come to the assessment and she also got some 'closure' by finding out the result quickly too.

Hope that's helpful in some way to share. Happy to answer any questions if you have some.

Daisy

Good luck with your assessment tomorrow! Please let us all know how it goes?

Thank you for sharing your experience. I am about to do my assessment tomorrow so it's useful to know not to expect an outcome right away. As others have said, it's out of your hands now so it's just trying to wait patiently - I'm saying this as much to myself as to you!

Definitely! Never too old to play! Only a couple of weeks ago I just had to play on a rope swing that myself and one of my friends discovered whilst out for a walk in the woods :-) 

nothing better than climbing trees. I think it should be prescribed by doctors. 

I did same test and am on the spectrum.

Yes as kitsun just said they are watching ur behaviour. The test you had is the recognised test. It is a good test actually.  Yes u are in a limbo but u are not lost. They will call you in for the results in about 4-6 weeks (thats what happened to me ).  They have to follow the process. I wouldnt worry about your mum too much. They will be asking what u where like when u where young and I bet they will find ASD traits. The lego & mechano are classical solitary activities (Just like me).  Try to not think about the test, dont replay it over an over, you have done everything correctly.  

Let us know what happens.

I used to love Lego, in fact on last months meet up for the local Autistic women's group that I run we had a Lego evening :-) it was good fun, playing with Lego and chatting among ourselves!

I used to spend hours sorting my mum's buttons box into different categories according to colour/shape/size. I used to play with my barbie doll sometimes too, I would tell my mum that I was that they were having a party. I would dress them ll up for the party but never actually pretended that they were at a party as such, I never did 'get' the whole pretend play thing! Mostly as I got older, I was out climbing trees, playing football and building dens with the boy next door and his friends.

That’s one thing I seem to have cracked! She was telling me about how I’d only play with things like Lego, Knex or Mecanno which I could do on my own, and would fight with other kids when they didn’t do what I wanted

Autism is a spectrum condition and if you've met one person with Autism, you've only met one person with Autism. Your mum knew how the Autism of the girl in her class affected that girl. But that will be different to how anyone else's Autism affects them. Are you able to try a different approach with your mum, such as asking her about your social skills etc when you were young?

She worked as a primary school teacher with a very low functioning asd girl in her class, and I think that’s her understanding of autism now. I’ve teied to explain to her about low/high functioning etc but she seems to be closed to listening

Hi,

Different assessment centres use different methods of assessments, sadly there does not appear to be a uniform approach. I had all of my assessments and received a verbal diagnosis on the same day. It doe seem as though they did quite a thorough assessment though!

There is no right or wrong answer to the questions, they are simply intended to initiate interaction so that they can observe your social and communication skills. So being able to answer a lot of their questions will have no bearing on whether or not you get diagnosed.

Do you know why your mum doesn't think that you are Autistic?