To all who have been, or are in the process of, being diagnosed as an adult.

It seems to me from what I read on this forum that your story is the normal experience of the nhs for ASD sufferers.

The mental health people in my area may be better organised but there is still a shortage of treatment time/manpower. I don't think CBT will be offered very easily or quickly even here.

Aspergers is a "new" diagnosis that many doctors (trained over the last 40 years) will not have been trained in. By new I mean that many doctors were trained before it was widely recognised beyond some more obvious cases in children.

GPs are able to dole out meds without any very specific psychiatric expertese. Their experience will be that a great number of people are made happy with this service so they do not look too closely at how suitable it is in many cases. I observed that this did not do much good for my father (also probably ASD) and this is one the reasons I have avoided meds.

ASD sufferers are, by definition, poor at communicating so we present with confusing and garbled accounts. This is compounded, as you say, by presenting to the doctor at times of great distress. How on earth a GP can make sense of such a patient presenting in that state is beyond me.

Following advice from this forum, I wrote down a list of reasons and detailed incidents in support of my request for a diagnosis. Thinking things out and writing them down, before you go, does seem to help. I also presented in a state of obvious distress, which probably helped convey the urgency.

I haven't received any CBT yet. Although CBT is supposed to be the greatest thing, I suspect that many patients are very sceptical, or resistant, which means that in many cases it simply won't work. A GP is, therefore, likely to have difficulty in believing that it is going to work in any particular case and therefore may be reluctant to spend budget. I would be interested to know how often it works in practice and how successful it is in ASD patients in particular.

Personally, I am trying to follow a self treatment by CBT approach. Debating, challenging and being challenged here on the forum seems like a good place to start as it allows us to clarify our thoughts and work out what is reasonable to each of us. Sometimes it is like looking in the mirror but it is sometimes easier to see things in other people's reactions than in our own actions and behaviour.

It seems to me from what I read on this forum that your story is the normal experience of the nhs for ASD sufferers.

The mental health people in my area may be better organised but there is still a shortage of treatment time/manpower. I don't think CBT will be offered very easily or quickly even here.

Aspergers is a "new" diagnosis that many doctors (trained over the last 40 years) will not have been trained in. By new I mean that many doctors were trained before it was widely recognised beyond some more obvious cases in children.

GPs are able to dole out meds without any very specific psychiatric expertese. Their experience will be that a great number of people are made happy with this service so they do not look too closely at how suitable it is in many cases. I observed that this did not do much good for my father (also probably ASD) and this is one the reasons I have avoided meds.

ASD sufferers are, by definition, poor at communicating so we present with confusing and garbled accounts. This is compounded, as you say, by presenting to the doctor at times of great distress. How on earth a GP can make sense of such a patient presenting in that state is beyond me.

Following advice from this forum, I wrote down a list of reasons and detailed incidents in support of my request for a diagnosis. Thinking things out and writing them down, before you go, does seem to help. I also presented in a state of obvious distress, which probably helped convey the urgency.

I haven't received any CBT yet. Although CBT is supposed to be the greatest thing, I suspect that many patients are very sceptical, or resistant, which means that in many cases it simply won't work. A GP is, therefore, likely to have difficulty in believing that it is going to work in any particular case and therefore may be reluctant to spend budget. I would be interested to know how often it works in practice and how successful it is in ASD patients in particular.

Personally, I am trying to follow a self treatment by CBT approach. Debating, challenging and being challenged here on the forum seems like a good place to start as it allows us to clarify our thoughts and work out what is reasonable to each of us. Sometimes it is like looking in the mirror but it is sometimes easier to see things in other people's reactions than in our own actions and behaviour.