Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi, I am undiagnosed but score nearly autistic on a couple of tests and have significant scores in all areas of the masking questionnaire. My primary problem is struggling with social interactions and cues. It has quiet a significant impact on my life. In fact I had basically a melt down at the end of some intensive online training this week. I'm pretty sure the trainer thinks I'm crazy. A diagnosis would help that. But I am worried about the stigma I may encounter from health professionals and really other people in general if I go for a diagnosis. Other women who got diagnosed as adults did you notice a change in how people and health professionals interacted with you afterwards?
(I mention health professionals as currently everything I go to the Dr about is attributed.to the menopause I don't want to give them another 'easy to fob off' ready diagnosis)
It's hard to suggest if diagnosis would help you because it's so personal. I got diagnosed privately 2 years ago as an adult woman. I would say so far that it's not been worth the cost. Professionals don't really seem to give a damn. Having adjustments not implemented at work despite a diagnosis is a new level of frustration. On the other hand, I am learning stuff about myself that I wouldn't have if I didn't know I was autistic. My advice would be to experiment by treating yourself as if you have a diagnosis and see how that feels. For example, you could ask for adjustments at work without saying you need them for autism reasons, just say that you need them (all human beings are allowed to ask for adjustments, we need to normalise this!). You can also try treating yourself as if you are diagnosed autistic. Give yourself permission to be who you are without blame or judgement, because even if you aren't autistic, you still deserve to give yourself what you need and treat yourself with kindness
I really like your answer! Yes, we all need to be more compassionate to ourselves and others. I also have some thoughts about many mental health professionals being against self diagnosis. Is it for practical purposes, to protect the diagnosed people from confusion or harassment or abuse of the condition (to get away with bad behavior not having anything to do with the condition)? Or maybe it’s to prove to the world that only they are the specialists allowed to assess wether someone has the condition or not, which in ideal should be this way but the sad truth is that there are many misdiagnoses in the mental health conditions and many people struggle going undiagnosed and not being properly helped, just gaslit instead. Now we have access to knowledge and we can compare ourselves to others and the description. Only thing may be missing here is some objectivity but we can get it from some feedback. It’s a broad topic.