Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi there,
I am looking for some honest advice from others who are going/have been through the process of autism diagnosis in adulthood.
Some background: I am a female in my 30s. I have OCD (diagnosed in teens) and anxiety (recently diagnosed). I have always done well academically, gained 2 degrees and I work within the healthcare sector. However, throughout my life I have always felt ‘different’ to my peers - but put this down to my OCD. Over the years, several people have made flippant comments about me having ‘autistic traits’, which I never really paid attention to tbh
Over the past 6 months or so, I’ve looked more in depth at my OCD (as I was going through counselling). However, another recent comment from a colleague had me looking into undiagnosed autism and I now can’t get the thought of it out of my head. I have done several of the autism screening tests, all of which have returned high scores:
AQ-10 - 8
AQ-50 - 34
RAADS-R - 126
I’ve begun noting down some characteristics as I notice them:
*I like routine, and struggle with change to routine/plans
*I like to be in control of situations, and like to carefully plan ahead
*I feel the need to complete tasks perfectly/completely right, and I really dislike not completing a task before moving on
*I see everything in black & white
*I struggle to build/maintain relationships, outwith family I have 1 friend (I have work colleagues, but don’t socialise outside of work as this is something I really struggle with)
*I find social interactions difficult - making/maintaining eye contact, often struggle to interpret peoples thoughts/feelings, I very often worry I’ve upset or angered people after I’ve finished a conversation even if there’s no indication of this.
*Social events make me very anxious - since my teens, I can count on one hand the number of social events I have attended without a close fanimus member or my husband with me
*I will often talk very fast when anxious/in a group of people or if discussing something which heavily interests me
*I will point out small mistakes (even in conversations, much to my husbands annoyance!)
*As a child I was a very fussy eater, much of it was down to food textures in my mouth - certain foods would literally make me gag. I am still like this with textures, although I am less fussy
There may be others I haven’t noticed/listed as of yet. I am apprehensive about following this up, as I am worried I’m overthinking/worrying and would be wasting peoples time. There’s aspects of my life/characteristics that make me believe I am just worrying over nothing - for example, I am married with children, can deal well with loud noise (concerts/football crowds etc), I loved imaginative/role play as a child. I also worry that some of these could just be classic characteristics of OCD/GAD instead of autism traits
I guess I am worried I am referred for assessment, have a long wait and then waste peoples time to be told I don’t have autism. Have others been through similar and could offer me advice?
Oo are you me?
I was diagnosed with OCD and GAD as a young child and have been rediagnosed with these at various points in life.
I have the same questions as you. A decade ago, I thought I might be autistic and asked my then psychologist. She said no way. A couple of years ago another psychologist asked me without any suggestion from me if I could be autistic. I said no I’ve been told I’m not and she said don’t be so sure!
I wonder if the issue could be that OCD is popularly thought of as just “anxiety”, in reality for those of us who develop it young it is more accurately thought of as a neurodevelopmental condition, perhaps closely related to autism. Anxiety is just one of the symptoms in the constellation of neurodevelopmental difference that characterise it, but it’s the only one that’s really talked about!
But I don’t know if that’s right and I m also stuck on what to do about it all. I feel different and I’d love a name for it that made sense to me and others.