Oh absolutely avoid it! I certainly wasn't suggesting it! I was just highlighting that the medical system is broken for such things. Unfortunately generally if there's physical evidence of mental health issues, they should have been treated long ago.
All I can really suggest is just try your best to keep plugging along. Thinking about it, something I did a few years ago was as at my surgery which doctor specialised the most in mental health matters and made damn sure I was seen by him, that sort of requires there to be a choice of doctors in your surgery so I don't know if that's an option but just in case it is, it might be a route for you.
Yeah, I've found this to be a great supportive environment, it helps that things are anonymous here because it's easier to be honest, lots of the people here helped me realise it was ok to call myself autistic even though I didn't have a piece of paper.
I'm with you there, I am my own harshest critic by far but I am getting better. One of the reasons I started that massive document of evidence, to begin with, was because the first person I had to convince was me. I still backpedal a bit I had a horrid night over the weekend when I decided I was deluding myself and everyone around me, the next morning I re-read my document and sure enough, I was back on track, I couldn't refute it.
If I can be a little blunt, in my experience with previous mental health diagnoses those people who won't believe you now, won't when you have a piece of paper. They may have to act on it once it's official but usually, in my experience, those people still think it's all make-believe, and they're usually the people who haven't had mental health issues, its ableist BS but unfortunately reality.
If you think you need more than those few days off, make an appointment with your GP and ask for a sick note, give yourself room to breathe, if you have someone who you can take with you to support and advocate for you all the better.
See, this I tried to avoid doing since I haven't harmed myself in almost 10 years now. But it seems if there is no physical evidence for doctors, it can't exist. And how everything is going atm, I'm really struggling not to start again.
I'm grateful for every suggestion. Something like here is the first time for me to actually share anything regarding things like this with like minded people. I never fully trusted anyone to really open up an it's so nice to see that there is actually support for each other.
And you are so spot on with this. I always doubt myself and don't want to take myself too important. Even if I have ths feeling I'm right I have to question it over and over. If I wouldn't struggle even more with other people, I'd say I'm my own worst enemy.
I think for me the issue is, that people won't believe me and understand if I can't say "here, it's official". Even my boss at work was like "well, just take a few days off and it'll be fine again".
Yeah, it took me a serious self-harming incident for them to take me seriously the first time too.
I didn't until a few months ago, there are also often service directories for health and living stuff run by your local councils and CCG's. This is the one in my area https://www.thelivewelldirectory.com/ if you can find a local one for you, you should be able to look up services and charities to speak to.
honestly, you seem like you're where I was a few months ago from what you're saying. If you've done 3 months of research and you are yourself convinced when I suspect you might be falling prey to imposter syndrome and not letting yourself internalise it. I just said screw it and took on the label and its made things way easier.
Yeah, it took me ages to get an assessment for the depression and my gp was treating me as if I overreact. It took a break down at work to get heard.
I didn't knew there were mental health charities. Thank you for pointing this out. That's definitely worth to check out.
I know what you mean. On the one hand I want to believe it is autism since it would explain so much. But on the other hand I'm afraid I make myself too much hope and could get let down and have to start from the beginning. It already took me like 3 months of research to get here. If it's not this, I wouldn't know what is wrong with me. This would be really hard to take.
Yeah, it is I agree. Though I have had to fight for just about every diagnosis I've had. it was hard to begin with but I've been shown to be right several times now. It's getting easier, once you get things embarrassingly right 3 or 4 times they tend to believe you.
If you can afford to play it then it might be a good option, I know I can't so I'm settling in for the long wait.
Also regarding therapy, have you tried checking in with a local mental health charity? I did recently when I got told the only option on the NHS in my area is CBT which didn't work on me last time, and I was put in touch with a local group that do therapy privately but funded by charity. the waiting list is only 3 weeks and is costing me £5 a session because that's all I can afford.
But if I'm right and I really should have autism
I don't know your mind obviously, but I found it liberating to leave this thought behind and just admit to myself I'm Autistic, and once I accepted it myself I found things to get easier, self diagnosis is really accepted, one of the major reasons being how long it takes to get diagnosed. Self diagnosis might not give you official support but it may help explain things to others and yourself. Feel free to discard this advise if it doesn't fit you, I just recognized something I did at the beginning of my discovery.
It's kinda sad that one has to basically prepare a court defense to be taken serious. In still waiting to get therapy for my depression and anxiety. But if I'm right and I really should have autism, it would make it so much easier to cope until the therapy will happen.
I'm even tempted to pay for it myself if the way ting list is too long. Atm I'm hardly holding it together and something has to happen, the one or other way.
I have just had my confirmation for my referral and the doctor seemed a little bowled over by the amount of evidence I produced. What I did was since I found out I started keeping notes of things I thought were Autistic traits I have just in a big list and I've been moving it over to a larger document laying out evidence such as developmental stuff family told me and stories from my past.
This document is around 20 pages now. I am doing this so when it comes time to go for my assessment in a couple of years I have tons of information built up. When it came to talking to the GP, he's already had a report from elsewhere but I pulled out the most stereotypical evidence the doctor is likely to be clued in about and just did a bullet point page, a full sheet of A4 with things I could just list to him.
As it happened I saw him in person rather than on the phone so I showed it to him, I had already done the AQ10 that the local authority needs to process a referral so I gave that to him too and I just briefly talked about how it has been affecting my life.
Like I mentioned I did have a psychiatrist for the ADHD assessment suggest a referral for ASD so I had a leg up there and my history reads like a stereotype for misdiagnosed ASD with Anxiety and depression disorders and Bipolar etc so it is somewhat going to depend on your history and also your doctor. I would bear in mind that you don't have to take no for an answer though, you can seek other opinions if you think your doctor is unfair or if your lucky enough to be in a self-referral area you can bypass the GP altogether if you want.
Thank you, that really helped. The questionnaires are a great idea.
include blood relatives in your family who are autistic or adhd or called weird/different
and a list of occasions when u have been called weird, autistic, different
Hi there,
Personally I'm getting as much anecdotal information together as I can. I'm making copious notes of how I meet the criteria (which traits I have and how they affect me etc, now and in childhood). I've also filled in the AQ10 (and the AQ50 and the RAAD) questionnaire, which I scored very high on, to take with me when I see my GP. I've annotated the questionnaires because some of the questions aren't black or white (prefer the museum to the theatre? That depends on which museum and which show, also, how I'm feeling on the day, the size of the theatre, etc). I'm a quick thinker but I struggle to translate my thoughts into words, so I either go mute or talk absolute rubbish. So I'm writing a little script to take with me to refer to, to keep me on track. Apart from that, it's just trying to be firm and not be fobbed off, which is easier said than done, I know.
Apart from all that, I can't think of anything else, so if anyone else has any tips, I'd love to hear them...
