Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi all,
Been to 6 sessions with a counsellor/psychologist because I was struggling with health anxiety among other things affecting my general life. At the last session she advised she thought I was on the Autism Spectrum. I was not expecting this at all. I am really messed up now and unsure what to do.
I've done a number of online tests and they all show that I am close but not in the range of having ASD. I don't see the point of putting myself through trying to get a diagnosis if the chances are I will not pass the basic preliminary questionnaires. Is this all they judge you on?
Since seeing the counsellor and her telling me what she did I keep noticing my behaviour and things that upset me and make me feel awkward a lot more and part of me wonders if she is right. It's really messed with my feelings as she made out like if I do have ASD then that's the reason I might be struggling with everything but she didn't really give me any help or guidance. I have been advised that if I do have it, continuing with normal counselling that isn't specific to the condition may do more harm than good.
From the research I've done so far I can't see me getting diagnosed very easily as I am good at a lot of the general symptoms and behaviours that show up the condition, whether I've learnt to be or I actually am good I don't know.
Any advice or ideas what to do next? Am wondering whether to try and pay (already spent loads on the first counsellor) for another counsellor to get a second opinion and maybe not mentioning what the first one said to see if they find the same conclusion?
I phoned the GP to discuss options but twice now I've been told they can't speak to me unless its an emergency.
Hi, it went a bit in a similar way for me, so feeling messed up sounds very familiar. She may be right or not, guess the line they draw is very artificial and there is a fairly wide band where the same person could get a diagnosis or not, depending on the people doing the assessment, on the very short-term circumstances on the day, on longer-term circumstances...
Well, if you go for it it's not going to be quick... Guess if you answer the AQ10 questions honestly and you don't score high enough there then it will be very difficult to convince your GP to refer you for an assessment, otherwise it may happen sooner or later, but it's not going to be soon enough to help you with deciding about the counselling.
Somehow it's shocking that they say if you have it and you continue with counselling if may do more harm than good. I mean, they are not putting you in a box, close it, flick a switch and check after a while if you are still alive. Counselling is pretty much a dialogue and they should be able to react to your reaction to whatever they do, especially if they keep in mind that you may be mildly autistic. But they don't do that, I have no idea why. Most probably not all of them, but many, it seems they are a lot more inflexible that any Aspie could possibly be... They seem to follow a scheme they have memorised and are unable to divert from it and your answers also have to fit that scheme. Like a counsellor asked me constantly how various things made me feel. I told her, and as far as I could tell my answers matched how these things made me feel but she wasn't happy with it and kept suggesting other words which didn't describe my feelings at all. Maybe she thought I just don't know the right word since English isn't my first language, but somehow you think that will become clear after the second or third time.
Maybe try to follow your own advice regarding the counselling. If it feels o.k. there is no reason why you should stop it, if you are unsure maybe give it a few more times, if you are afraid of seeing her then you may want to stop it or at least ask if it's intended that you feel that way (maybe this sounds stupid but I was really afraid of going there but was convinced that this must be part of the game because I assumed that they could see this and that they would change something if it wasn't intended, but it turned out I was wrong there).