Published on 12, July, 2020
Hello, I'm a 21-year-old man. You can call me my username, Armada. I wanted to ask for some advice from people who may have gone through the struggles I'm currently facing or are going through the same thing as me. I apologize as this may get long-winded and hard to read, as I like to ramble on in these types of posts.
For a long time now, I've been struggling with some fairly 'basic' signs of autism. Overstimulation, being anti-social/socially anxious, struggling with 'meltdowns' and masking are some things that I deal with the majority of the time. Though, most of these things are swept under the rug by doctors and family because I'm not presenting as a "stereotypical autistic person".
But, the main thing I really want to know is that is it really worth it for me to go through the time, effort and money to get formally tested by a professional? Now that I'm 21, I'm almost done with schooling (at least for right now, I'm not sure if I'll be getting my bachelor's degree). I won't need the services that my college may offer to their students who are on the spectrum. I don't think a workplace, especially where I'm located, would offer any accommodations to an employee. In my mind, the diagnosis would just be proof to shove in my family's faces to say "Hey. I was right. I was right all along. Suck it". But I'm not sure that spending over $1,000 is worth it in the long run.
I would love some insight and wisdom. Thank you!
If anyone is curious about what other things I may be dealing with, feel free to ask. I'm very willing to be open.
My advice would be to take some online autism tests. AQ10 and AQ50 (sometimes called just 'AQ') are the most commonly used by clinicians in this country, but the RAADS-R is the most definitive. They can be found here: https://embrace-autism.com/autism-tests/
If you score in the autism range it will give you more certainty about following up on a diagnosis.
You are awesome for this! I wanted to take some tests online but I was unsure if they were accurate. Thanks for the link!