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I think I'm autistic

ginger_gnome

Hi, I'm not sure if this is the right place to post or not.

I've got three sons, two of whom have been diagnosed as autistic (one with ADHD as well).  It's around five years since we got the first diagnosis and since then my husband and I have thrown ourselves into learning and providing the best environment for our boys to grow up in ... they're (all three) amazing young lads and I'm immensely proud of them.

However, the more I learn and the more meetings we go to the more I'm convinced that I have autism myself.  My husband agrees with me ... I show so many autistic traits and have so many similar struggles to my children.  I'm not sure what to do.  I'm in my mid-40s and don't feel that I need a diagnosis other than to help me understand myself (if that makes sense). 

I think I'd struggle to get a diagnosis as I hide my traits well (I think) ... I struggle with eye-contact but have trained myself to cope with it.  I struggle in social situations but have taught myself so many coping mechanisms over the years that often folks don't realise I'm struggling.  I have meltdowns but restrict them to when I'm on my own or with my hubby ... my husband and sons are the only people who truly see the real me.  I'm not sure if I should pursue a diagnosis and, if so, how to go about it?  Thanks :-)

  • I'm 60, and first did an online test five years ago. Since then I've had some other clues that I may be on the spectrum. Then it was spotted by a mental health nurse, and I was put on the waiting list. 15 months in, I have my second appointment with the psychologist next week, and should get the results in a couple of months. Something I've realised is that with hindsight it's been having a growing effect on me as I've got older. The thing that really messed things up was what I thought was just my "mid life crisis" ten years ago. I thought that the support I got then meant I was well on the way to being "cured" of whatever had been troubling me all my life. So I went off and did new things, confident that I could now do them, only to get in the biggest mess I've ever been in, and too overwhelmed by it to resolve the situation. So now I'm stuck. I've been making decisions, and acting, all my life, based on what appears to be inaccurate information about myself. This is why it's so important to me to know what the problem really is. I needed to know decades ago, when I may have been able to avoid getting into the situation I'm in now. So to anyone younger than me, I'd say that whatever your views on getting a diagnosis are at the moment, you may regret not getting one later in life. I'm finding that where I'm able to start doing things in a way that assumes I have Aspergers does seem to work, so even without a diagnosis it's worth trying to change the way you do things to a way that works for someone with ASD, and see if it helps.

  • Hi Ginger. I'm s 55 yr old female and I recently started to suspect I had aspergers, after seeing a documentary about it. I did an online search and came across the AQ screening test developed by professor Baron-cohen: this indicates likelihood of being on the Autistic spectrum if your score is 32 or more and my score was 41 (highest you can score is 50). After recently being off work with mild depression due to anxiety and not coping well with some recent stressful situations, I saw a GP at my surgery who previously worked in a local mental health team and is familiar with Autism spectrum screening. I enquired about assessment and he asked if I thought it would help, to which I replied that I felt it would help me understand myself better, so he told me to send him a copy of my AQ test answers and he is going to review these and then ring me to arrange an appointment to discuss it with me, as getting an appointment with a specialist can take ages. 

    It's your decision whether to pursue a diagnosis. The first step to formal assessment is to see a GP, but you might want to do the online AQ test first to give an indication of whether you are likely to be on the spectrum and take the results with you (Google AQ test - it's on several websites)

    As someone else on this forum said, you're still the same person whether you get a diagnosis or not. But I feel that learning more about myself and being part of a community with others who are on the spectrum is really helpful.