Published on 12, July, 2020
Hello all im new here and would like to introduce myself my name is Steve and i work on the railway doing maintenance work. Ive worked there for about 12 years now i dont like it but the money is good and im excited to buy my first house at the end of the year. Well the main reason i decided to join this community is that i am in a bit of a predicament and was wondering if there is anybody out there that can give me their honest opinion? What it is i recently watched a lot of bbcs documentarys about autism and suddenly realised that most of those chilrens "habbits"? Was like looking at me when i was a child and still now as an adult in most ways anyway i decided to do an aq test out of curiosity expecting maybe a 18 or 20 score but i got a 36 and then with the eq and sq i got 14 and 15 i know they arent proper diagnosis but i feel i cant get a formal diagnosis as my work is classed as safety critical communication and i worry that i will fail my medical if i am diagnosed has anyone got any ideas? And sorry for the rambling i never know what im supposed to say
If you're not ready to get a diagnosis, why not ignore the label, and just use the information available as a source of self help to problems that you've recognised. There's nothing very weird about most of it. I'd already read similar ideas to much of it from other sources, and the only difference with some of it is that it suggests applying similar solutions in a way that can work for people on the spectrum. If someone thinks you are doing something in an odd way, just tell them that you've found it works for you. It might work for them too, even if they're NT!
A really useful book is "Living Well on the Spectrum" by Valerie Gauss. The first part has a series of worksheets to help identify your problem areas, and the second part has worksheets to help resolve different types of problem. It's also worth reading books like "Complete Guide to Aspergers Syndrome" by Tony Attwood, which has some useful suggestions.
If I'd known this stuff decades ago, even without the autism label, I might have been able to adapt before my life got in a mess, and getting a diagnosis now wouldn't be so important.