Unsure where /who to go to

Our daughter Sarah age 27 has struggled throughout her life.  Her milestones were late and speech was slow, she went through mainstream school with SEN assistance.  Even at an early age when dyspraxia was mentioned our doctor told us not to have her statemented as this would label her for life.  Which looking back on it in our opinion was a serious mistake because she now falls below everybody’s radar.

After school she then went onto college, studied for an Ntec in catering and passed.   Up to this point there was no mention of autism.

After this point any assistance we had ceased.

Sarah has managed to obtain and maintain work since leaving college, holding down two jobs - working for National Trust *** for one day a week and then *** in the catering dept doing a 4 day on/off shift.

It took her a long time but Sarah has managed to learn to drive so is mobile which has helped her maintain her independence and travelling to work.

Sarah has also been living independently in her own home (with a lot of help from us her parents) for the past twelve months.

Where Sarah struggles is with social norms and interaction with people.  She has few friends (if any) that she can call on to go out with and it is the loneliness that she is really struggling with.  Having said that she does (where shifts allow) help out with the local guiding movement and also attends various groups..  Whilst these do help they don’t provide her with the “friends” that she craves.  She has told us that if she is invited to works do’s that she inevitably sits on her own with little interaction with her colleagues.  She also informed that none of her work colleagues contact her out of hours.  She was asked however not to contact them as she “was making a nuisance of herself and didn’t know when to end contact”.

After watching the Christine McGuinness programme on TV we as parents and Sarah independently had a lightbulb moment and she said ‘that’s me’.  Sarah has been to the doctors and has been referred for an autism assessment/diagnosis but has been told that this could take a further 2-3 years (we are now about 10 months in).

I would imagine that this waiting time is not helping with her mental health and we as parents did not know where to go.

What we need to know is if a private assessment was to be done would it open up more doors for her and earlier?

Any help would be appreciated. 

[edited by moderator]