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How is everyone ! I'm Bridget... I recently have figured out that the problems I've always had are shared by others.
I've dealt with depression due to social awkwardness. I've been very anxious all my life as well, especially with loud noises or new people / social situations.
Though, A lot of good has happened from my problems as well... I've always noticed patterns, been passionate about topics.. it's nice really. but it really stops me from leading a social life.
therefore, i'm asking my psychiatrist to refer me to a practice that would evaluate me for Asperger's.

I'm really happy i found this forum (my friend recommended it to me..)
(:

Anyways so yeah. I was also saying hi to everyone, but wondering how I would go about being correctly evaluated? Because I am 18 years old, I feel this will be difficult

I mean, I've been diagnosed with Depression, Anxiety disorder, OCD, and Psychosis NOS.
Though I know I'm not psychotic, because the hallucinations were flashbacks of traumatic events from when I was a child.
I think it is just post traumatic stress.
but anyways... I've been hospitalized before because I had horrible OCD that drove me to the point of suicide. I wanted to end it.
I was 13.

Any insight on how I would start a conversation with my doctor about being "referred"? Because he tend to think I don't have Asperger's. However, I know myself better than him - and I think he has that "stereotype" in his head that 18 year olds with the disorder are social basketcases

I actually had to quit my fast food job because I had horrible social interactions with customers. my coworkers, and bosses. people would always make fun of me for working "too slow" when it was because I had to get everything "just right"....
I also couldn't stand being made fun of, so I would have severe anxiety/depression because of this job =/


Should I tell the doctor all that?
And how should I talk to the evaluation doctor?


Anyways...
Thanks in advance,
Bridget

To WrongPlanet!! !

Welcome Bridgete.

You have a lovely name.

I hope you enjoy it here on Wrong Planet!

I wish I know the answer about telling a doctor or not but I hope you pull through this.

Welcome greetings to the Wrong Planet neighborhood, bridgete2010.

Welcome to Wrong Planet!

Greetings and welcome to WP! Hope you find this a useful and good place to be.

Welcome! Great people here!

18 years old... my oldest was finally diagnosed *official* through tests with a child autism specialist, at age 18. You're lucky, because I think the cut-off date is somewhere around age 21.



Not sure about that. I was diagnosed with PTSD back in 1995, from a lifetime of sustained abuse (it was dragged out my entire life) and culminated in an extremely abusive marriage, and well... I couldn't take anymore. I was working as an Administrative Assistant, and had my life in order for the most part -- I was coping the best I could (undiagnosed Aspergers though), but my hubby wouldn't stop terrorizing me... which lead to nightmares of the worst kind, he sent some things thru the postal service that were examined by SBI/FBI... when that broke in the news, I had a nervous breakdown. I was prescribed Trazadone to inhibit nightmares, but I continued to try to work, despite the media attention, and despite my life being turned upside down by his terrorism.

But hallucinations? No.

What your problems may result from is very real, "suppressed memories" and "intrusive thoughts". Something trying to surface and you need to confront those things, with help of a counselor. I have had acquaintances who were raised in foster care, and confided the level of sustained abuse in those environments, resulted in suppressed memories. The same thing for victims of childhood sexual trauma, often ends up suppressed in memory. Sometimes it can only re-surface through therapy like Hypnosis (personally I believe it would be impossible for anyone to hypnotize me as well and I've never passed out/blacked out in my life either. Believe it or not.) Yeah.. it sounds like suppressed memories (you even said they're something from real and not imaginary trauma in the past).... that's what police told me about statutory rape, is kids will sometimes not even remember things for years, and have flashbacks... or the memory begins surfacing late in life. You really really need to discuss that (what you see), because it doesn't sound like "hallucinations" you're describing.

Here's an article which sums up what PTSD is like, and it really, really hits home...

Oddly, in some ways, it almost sounds like Aspergers. Which may have helped mask Aspergers through the decade of pointless, ineffective counseling I endured. Not one professional recognized the underlying Autism...



That describes how I felt for about 10 years of my life. I locked myself away in isolation. I didn't have trust in people anymore. I'd wonder why God had cursed me, put me on this earth to be alone forever, and dwell in perpetual isolation... without love, without purpose, without anything truly meaningful to look back to, except abuse, betrayal, lies, being used and trust trampled, something tangible and good to hold on to...for a clue what direction my life should go forward on. All I had was a blank... people exploiting me.

...the symptoms sounds a lot like Aspergers Syndrome... and can be mistaken... and a person who's A.S., simply "slip through the cracks" in spite of spending 10 years in and out of counseling and seeing professionals... slip slip thru the cracks... nobody notices, nobody cares. The story of my life.
When the diagnosis for A.S. came through, it was the first lisence I had to reclaim my identity, my life... everything began making sense.

People in my life knew I was different, odd... and had done everything in their power to discourage friendships (the OPPOSITE of what an A.S. person needs done to them), socializing (except their circle.. their church... their friends) ... telling me how to live my life. Ummm, I resigned behind four walls into a world of isolation for about a decade. They were still on the outside, manipulating and condemning me to hell. Their mouths are still on auto-pilot, full-steam ahead, condemning... and so am I, arranging resources for my kids to get the help they need to accomodate their Aspergers Syndrome.
The doctor told me today, if necessary, she would issue authorization for one of my children to receive "Homebound" education and not be required to attend public school. Yeah, my daughter has it that bad... coping skills dealing with Autism.

They didn't and couldn't see Aspergers in the background which lead up to me making that horrible choice to marry a man who would terrorize me and my family. I didn't see the true danger or nature in him... I wasn't aware of the subtle cues and danger signals, that perhaps normal people would've.
I thank God I am alive today, because, yes, he tried to make attempts at either physically harming me, and death threats. He was finally arrested, and charged for the deaths of several people.
People were so busy judging and condemning me for my "bad decisions" and just didn't see Aspergers had kept me cut off from socializing my entire youth... to have ever had the social skills, that perhaps, I'd been more aware of dangers in people. Their solution was "stay in the little prison world we want you in" --- you're different and odd... we want to ostracize you -- you don't deserve the same rights as others to be happy.
And when you come out of that box people put you in -- it's like "Swim or Drown".

But hallucinations? Nah, I don't see things that aren't there, or hear things that aren't there. That's another problem. Perhaps suppressed memories / trauma trying to surface. When you get in touch with what your own sub-conscience is trying to tell you through dreams / day-visions like that, you'll address the "underlying issues". It's so important that your doctor knows from you that these things are not "imaginary hallucinations" but actual things in a very real, abusive past. Otherwise they'll dismiss your concerns to be marked off and simply explained in some other psychosis (like schizophrenia), but not PTSD.
I'm grounded in reality, but real life things ... sometimes, I'm sooooo afraid "the past will repeat itself" in real life... and avoid situations that can lead to the past (possibly) happening twice.

In recent years, I began spreading my wings again, and attempted dating. I would have nightmares, of my "husband coming home". He never actually reached me, or harmed me in the dream... it was my sub-conscience speaking of the man I was thinking of dating (and making comparisons)....and my fear of repeating the same mistake again, I'd end up breaking off the date all over again.
Family coming around (scoffing atttitude) "I don't know this man, so I don't think she needs to be dating him" (vicious traumatizing attempts to live my life for me).



One PhD / Psychiatry told me once, that OCD is infact induced by traumatic experiences. A person's world seems so out of control, the brain produces a "trick of the imagination" (like an addiction) "if you just do this or that compulsion ... you'll have a temporary sense of being in control of your out of control environment." In other words, cracked and brittle nerves.

But I do not have OCD, though I'm familiar with what it is.



Symptoms can overlap. It is very good idea for you to be referred to a child Autism specialist, because, they will do a thorough examination / testing that will leave little question what your true conditions are. They will rule out what you do not have, and if you are Aspergers, you will leave with an affirmative "Yes" or "No".



You can't work like that.

If you have employment, you're going to need a career where you don't have a boss breathing down your back and at the disposal of small-minded bullies to prey on you. They will do it in a place like you described working.

You need to focus on college and getting a degree and employment, which does not involve a lot of interaction with other people.

BTW, Welcome to WP

You probably _DO INDEED_ have PTSD with all you're describing.

But PTSD does not explain hallucinations / flashbacks.

It sounds like police describe of "suppressed memories" in children of violent crimes -- something trying to surface, and my guess is "mental health" is spoonfeeding you lots of pills for a band-aid to your problems. Are they addressing these flashbacks with more than just dismissing as "hallucinations"??? Did they have you sit down and thoroughly examine these traumatic events... instead of abruptly dismissing them? You need to discuss them, because your subconscience is pushing them forward... there's something there you need to know, instead of suppressing those things.
I was in and out of useless counseling sessions for 10 years... and not once.. NOT ONCE, BUT NEVER did any counselor ever think to ask me, "Did you receive rape counseling when you were a child?" My answer would have been a big resounding "NO I DID NOT".

Seriously, they'll throw pills at you and leave you to fix it yourself.

20 some years after the crime, was the first counseling I ever received.
When I finally addressed that underlying issue... it gave me freedom, power over the memories, and I began to put the past behind me and moving forward with my life. I began to develop self-esteem I never had in my life... I began to see I was not the evil predator who "raped those poor defenseless helpless" men. (Funny how everything got turned around over the years, and the crime was blamed on the victim.) Oh... the first counseling in 20 years... and that man picked apart all the pieces from a legal perspective, and sorting out who was the victimizer and who was the victim. The so called "witnesses" that I had fallen prey to believe over the years.
He pointed out "They weren't witnesses." 'They weren't even in the same area of the house." "They don't remember anything." "Their memories (from a criminal investigation p.o.v.) were memories that were fostered by what ADULTS were saying through the years." Above all, they were four year old children at the time... and incapable of "witnessing" anything.

When I came out of that last counseling session, I was a new woman, with a new perspective on life...

I hope your counselors begin taking you more seriously, and stop dismissing important things like traumatic memories as "mere hallucinations".

Here's something I hope will help to better understand what PTSD is like.

There's no "hallucinations" with it.
You don't see things that aren't there.
You don't hear things that aren't there.
Sometimes, I have wanted to escape into a fantasy (a good one) and forget the nightmares that were real life.

When I hear a deer walking in the brush... sometimes still, I wonder if it is the attacker coming up to my side in the shadows.
When I see a moth land on the window... and scares me, taking me off guard, I expect I will see a face of some intruder.

They are only harmless things... yes, but the fear is there, and very real "The past is happening again." It deeply affects your social life.

It's even traumatizing to discuss these things, and I prefer to forget them. I'm sharing this so I hope it can help you to understand, if you suffer with PTSD and it sounds to me, like you may.

This video shows something of PTSD in a Viet Nam Vet's life. He sees a cow... fence... barbed wire... but something is triggered and remembers constantly of the traumatizing things he saw. When he's hunting, he remembers carrying a gun in Viet Nam. There are no hallucinations. Everything in your present life, can take you back to the past that haunts you.

***Warning the video does have some graphic depictions of war***
Hope the mods don't reprimand me for posting this, for sole purpose of the educational nature of the video

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAE6Il6OTcs[/youtube]

Rooster - SongMeanings
By: Alice in Chains. Lyrics. Ain't found a way to kill me yet ... this "rooster" home with them in the form of what is now considered P.T.S.D. ..
The Rooster is a very deep philosophical concept. When the song begins, the soldier thinks that the enemy is the "rooster", and he is right in a sense; in the first verse, the "rooster" represents the communist enemy, but as the song progresses, it becomes clear that the rooster is a deeper concept, namely man's propensity for war. It is still an "enemy", but not a tangible one. The soldier brings the "rooster" home with him - it "roosts" in his soul as a kind of xenophobic tribalism driven by the comfortable numbness or desensitization necessary for combat, but detrimental to civilian social life.
The song is about the self-destructive nature of war and our inability to keep it in check - no matter how hard we try, the rooster "aint gonna die". It serves as both a warning to those considering joining the forces and a tribute to those who fought for us, knowing at least in part that they would have to harden their hearts for battle. Doing so makes a place for the "rooster".
Soldiers have to face the challenge of making themselves the kind of person who can kill other humans without remorse in order to do their job, and they bring this "rooster" home with them in the form of what is now considered P.T.S.D.
The "rooster" is the ultimate price paid by survivors of the Vietnam conflict, second only (and arguably first before) the giving of one's life for the cause; it may be better to die than to live with the "rooster" in your soul. The rooster drives out the ability to fully love other humans by devaluing human life in general; it is not clear to me that life without the ability to truly love is better than no life at all.
blroepk
http://www.songmeanings.net/m/song/11812/

Welcome to WrongPlanet, and welcome to my time warp.

Hello Bridget, welcome,

Good luck going for evaluation!

Enjoy your stay on the Wrong Planet!

I failed to mention it too... even psychologists make the error of mistaking the repetititive behaviors sometimes associated with Autism, as OCD when those two conditions are _not_ related. My oldest daughter does _NOT_ have OCD (pointless compulsions) -- certainly not. But the first doctor who suggested it (based on that my son had received conclusive diagnosis for A.S. by specialist), but she was not a qualified specialist... she wrote in her analysis aside of suspected Aspergers syndrome "exhibited several obsessive-compulsive-like-behaviors" That's not OCD. What she was making a reference to was my daughter's obsessive Aspergers-interest in cartooning... my daughter was born with "Mickey Mouse" on her brain... I think the first words my daughter spoke were "Mickey Mouse" and when my daughter was speaking to that psychologist over a course of several months, every time she visited she would repetitively illustrate a cartoon character called "Gorgonzola".

That's not OCD... nor is it "OCD-like behaviors".

My daughter's career interest is in animation and cartooning.

Sadly, you (Bridgete) may have been given a wrong diagnosis. On paper, OCD and Aspergers repetitive behaviors can sound the same (just as some symptoms of PTSD like isolation sound like Aspergers on paper), but they're very different, like night and day. It takes a trained expert to discern the difference.

Every symptom you described

~ Depression (from the trauma which is normal with PTSD... normal for anybody to be "saddened" who suffers trauma)
~ Anxiety disorder (naturally with PTSD after trauma you are filled with anxieties)
~ OCD (can be easily explained after traumatic incident and/or often misdiagnosed in Aspies because they have repetitive behaviors)
~ Psychosis NOS (Misdiagnosis, as you said, those were not really hallucinations but real events in your life).

Sorry to be so repetitive, but I don't want to see anyone misdiagnosed in mental health and a victim of malpractice, instead of receiving "help" the medical establishment inflicts harm on the person.
All of those symptoms could be brought on in a normal Aspergers person, (and Aspies are often preyed on, bullying and the victims of predatorial crimes), who then develops PTSD...leading to (naturally) depression, anxiety (naturally), either traumatic explanation for onset of OCD (or simply the OCD mistaken in place of repetitive Aspergers behaviors, and as you state there were not really hallucinations. It sounds so much like suppressed memories (and you said they're flashbacks). Why is your doctor so careless with your medical care and not taking your concerns seriously??
Many people on WP have dealt with Quacks... get a second opinion. Don't allow the new doctor access to your old records either. Insist the doctor make a fresh start from scratch, on your diagnosis.

and... btw, when my daughter finally saw an actual specialist who dealt only with child autism... he did a thorough examination and assessment and in his final report, she was _negative_ for OCD. The first psychologist, was unqualified to make that assessment. That's precisely why she was sent to an Autism Specialist.

You need to see a new evaluator and definately an Autism specialist.

My suspicion would naturally be, you have been misdiagnosed, and suffer only with
1. Aspergers Syndrome (first which lead up to ptsd...)
2. PTSD
3. Recurring / Suppressed memories.

Depression and Anxiety are side effects of the 1 and 2. The "OCD" is debatable. Either onset from trauma, or it is A.S. mistaken as "OCD". (If it is OCD, you can take control of it without medication... by self-will, determination and refusing to cave in to the compulsion. When the compulsion strikes, tell yourself, "I refuse to do this. This is silly. No lightning will strike... no curses will fall from the sky. This is superstition." The OCD should go away, like the bad addiction it is.)

If you have a diagnosis of PTSD, enough that it is interfering with your ability to function in life... preventing you from having stable employment (you sound like you do not have stable employment and are reacting in an extremely traumatized manner around people), you can apply for disability through Social Security. They will require that diagnosis from a qualified evaluator. Unfortunately, you describe not being old enough to qualify for Social Security, but they do have a program called SSI that can help people. There are also other programs (I do not receive them) like Food Stamps, HUD (which helps on costs of housing/rent) and possibly other programs that are available.

That would be my advise, and also seek out vocational rehab. You need to concentrate your time and energy on an Associates degree. (Beware the education frauds / loan scams like online colleges.. I know from experience. ) To protect yourself from educational fraud: Go to your local community college (which is valid accreditation) and apply for FAFSA. They will pay for the full cost of your tuition, books, and additional funds that are necessary to help you through schooling, and you will receive a valid Associates degree in your career of choice.
From there, you can take your valid Associates degree and obtain a better line of employment which doesn't require that level of interaction with the public. Also your degree will transfer to a legitimate State university like (e.g., University of Texas) and obtain a Bachelor Degree in your career of choice (without a price tag that equates to the tuition of Harvard University = online diploma mills charge around $25,000 per year which is financially ruining young people's lives... you don't need that, on top of all the other exploitation you've had done to you).
A valid Bachelor of Science in your career will hopefully lead to good employment -- away from the public hysteria... I never made it that far... but at least, I got it figured out in time for sake of my Aspergers children.

My daughter is receiving her High School Diploma this year. The very next thing she is going to do with her life, is begin Community College for an Associates degree related to the things she enjoys. The last thing she needs is to be cast out to the wolves to "swim or drown" and work in a type of job like "fast food" where they drive you like a machine and uneducated bullies having their "fun" with vulnerable, sensitive, intelligent co-workers... its a "dog eat dog" world in those kind of places.

Don't be ashamed to ask for help. Afterall, you tried to work... you try... and since those co-workers refuse to allow you to work in peace, and earn an honest living and want to prey on you and exploit you -- and refuse to leave you alone in peace. When you're holding a degree and working in a successful career... most of the knuckledraggers you're describing in fast food, will still be working in fast food, or some other blue collar employment, because hey, they didn't have the best socialization skills either. Bullying is "not" a good team leadership skill, necessary for management positions. They'll make a career change to digging ditches, changing diapers, sweeping floors, cooking... they lack the intelligence to go far in life. Don't allow them and the hostile work environment they create, to deprive you of reaching your full Aspie potential.

Last edited by AspieForty on 08 May 2010, 1:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Welcome to WP!

Welcome to WP!!