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Not Autisitic enough

Al 1

Hi Everyone

i have just been for an assessment at the Nhs centre in Sheffield. I comcluded a session of 2 hours of assessment mainly verbally asking me questions and at the end of it I was informed that had I been assessed as a child then I would of got an ADOs test. It was explained that whilst I have many Autistic traits then this is not enough to warrant an ADOS test, which feels a bit like telling someone with 1 leg that can't be provided with a wheelchair unless they have no legs.

i went because I had an idea after my son was diagnosed and I also think my dad has had it for years, given I now know quite a lot about the condition. I racked my brain back to my childhood and now present day and I am clearly Autistic, but clearly the view is that if you are not Autistic enough then basically you can't get the same support Which is very fustrating for me. I was further told that basically I had adapted through learnt behaviour and that I found strategies and routines in my life that suit my situation and by default I have indirectly protected myself in some ways. When I basically explainer at the end  of how I could be defined with Aufistic traits, yet effectively not be Autistic enough it was positioned with me that 'The reason I taken this literal view was based on my Austism'.

So basically, I am just sharing this with this network to look for other people's experience where they may feel let down by the process to gain an ADOS test and the relevant support.

Thanks for listening and appreciate any feedback.

Al

Parents

  • Atypical, I think you probably are an aspie but the problem here is that because of the disgraceful underfunding of the NHS in general and the lack of mental health provision in particular, mental health carers feel compelled to ration what resources are available to cases that are judged as urgent. In other words, if it seems you can function faily well you won't be judged as being within the parameters that have been laid down that effectively screen out people who would otherwise be classified as well within the definitions of the autistic spectrum. I can understand how frustrating this must be because it is only natural to want to obtain an official recognition of what you feel is your condition and be able to move on and the only course seems to go private if you really feel very strongly about it. This would be very expensive but, perhaps, it would be a good investment if it sorted out your life for the future. The alterntive is to continually live in doubt forever, something that wouldn't seem very helpful to me.

    When you think about it, the autistic spectrum covers a large number of individuals and the question over where the cut-off point occurs must be a vexed one because how can someone be classified as autistic if they score a few points one side of an arbritary point and not autistic a few points the other side of it? It is obviously not quite as simple as that and it has to be viewed as a relative condition based on how problematic an individual is experiencing it in relation to the remainder of the general population. It's kind of like saying somebody is 'slightly' pregnant; you either are or are not! It's all relative. This is probably why psychology is not considered as one of the 'hard' sciences (such as physics) but more of an art that uses scientific measuring techniques and you have to wonder how acurate such techniques really are.

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  • Atypical, I think you probably are an aspie but the problem here is that because of the disgraceful underfunding of the NHS in general and the lack of mental health provision in particular, mental health carers feel compelled to ration what resources are available to cases that are judged as urgent. In other words, if it seems you can function faily well you won't be judged as being within the parameters that have been laid down that effectively screen out people who would otherwise be classified as well within the definitions of the autistic spectrum. I can understand how frustrating this must be because it is only natural to want to obtain an official recognition of what you feel is your condition and be able to move on and the only course seems to go private if you really feel very strongly about it. This would be very expensive but, perhaps, it would be a good investment if it sorted out your life for the future. The alterntive is to continually live in doubt forever, something that wouldn't seem very helpful to me.

    When you think about it, the autistic spectrum covers a large number of individuals and the question over where the cut-off point occurs must be a vexed one because how can someone be classified as autistic if they score a few points one side of an arbritary point and not autistic a few points the other side of it? It is obviously not quite as simple as that and it has to be viewed as a relative condition based on how problematic an individual is experiencing it in relation to the remainder of the general population. It's kind of like saying somebody is 'slightly' pregnant; you either are or are not! It's all relative. This is probably why psychology is not considered as one of the 'hard' sciences (such as physics) but more of an art that uses scientific measuring techniques and you have to wonder how acurate such techniques really are.

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