I’m Terrified I’ll Meltdown at School

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I’m an undiagnosed female in high school. I’ve never had a meltdown during school hours, but I come close a lot. And it scares me that one day I’m going to snap and meltdown, because I don’t have a diagnosis to say that I’m autistic. I would be suspended, expelled, or maybe even arrested for aggressive behavior. And my family doesn’t believe I’m autistic, so I wouldn’t get any help from them.

The only two people who know I’m autistic are teachers. I’ve been contemplating telling them about my fear, but it i don’t know if it would be worth it...

You have to be 18 to get a diagnosis

Get a diagnosis

Disclose to school

Get accommodation

If your parents won't send you to get diagnosed, talk to a teacher about it

See if you can get the teacher to recommend you to get assessed and diagnosed . A letter.

"Failure to attend to special education need" is a Child Protective services violation

It is very difficult for girls to receive a diagnosis or to be recognized as autistic.

You need to get a diagnosis, especially since you speculate that you might be autistic... I did not think I was autistic until I found a psychologist who I believe to specialize in sexual trauma; however, she also specialized in autism and I spent our entire first session talking about Sylvia and that is when she asked me if I was on the spectrum and that led to my eventual diagnosis; however, I was almost twenty one at this time! I had just always thought that I was a psychotic, yet passionate introvert who had trouble relating to the rest of the world...

Often when I would have meltdowns in high school at school-- though most of my meltdowns were in the morning, almost every morning-- I would often run away, hide in the bathroom or hide in my favorite teachers room or skip class and hide under the tables in the cafeteria and after an initial trauma, I was allowed to go to the counselor's office. Have you tried going to the school counselor or maybe when you feel the rumbling phase, you can excuse yourself from the classroom and find somewhere to hide...

And yes, I would say that not having a diagnosis does put you at risk for ill treatment; be careful around police until you get your diagnosis... I am not going to tell you my experience with the police so you will not freak out; however, just try to get a diagnosis. Also, if you need to talk about anything, Private Message me... I too was an undiagnosed seventeen year old girl, so I understand...

I learned this simple line:

Exceuse me, I need to go to the bathroom... right now!

and I used it every time I felt seriously overwhelmed, including in the middle of a lecture.
So if the meltdown happened, I was alone in a bathroom.

Thank you guys for the suggestions. I've been trying to get diagnosed for almost 2 years at this point. Since no one was helping me find a professional, I finally asked my sports coach to help me out yesterday, who is an LLD instructor and has an autism specialist as a roommate. So hopefully that'll help me get to a trustworthy place to be evaluated.

As for excusing myself before meltdowns, that is extremely hard. I go nonverbal before my meltdowns without fail, so I wouldn't be able to ask to be excused. I have a text to speech app, but we're no allowed to use phones in school.

And besides, I usually come close to meltdown because of the noise in the cafes at lunch or when being confronted by a principal, not my actual classes. We're not allowed to leave the lunch room without a pass, which I would have to talk to the main principal to get (who I've suffered a lot of trauma with and don't want to talk to.) It would be hard to get all the way to one of my favorite teachers' rooms (cafe is on the first floor, and the classrooms are on floors 2 and 3) without literally being chased.

How about noise cancelling headphones?
They help me deal with noisy places and they are more socially "normal" than earplugs. Morover, people are likely to assume you are listening to music and not talk to you. Would you be allowed to have them?

I have earplugs, but my school pair got eaten by the dryer, so now I only have my pair i keep for church. I could start using them, but I don't want my parents to be mad at me if I lose them too. And no, we aren't allowed to wear headphones. As it is I get yelled at by the principle whenever he sees me with ear plugs in because he assumes theyre earbuds.

The earplugs I wear cost less than a dollar for a pair...
Well, for that strict environment, you most likely do need some mental health professional involved, so you have some official paper that you need some accommodations.

I had a few methods of dealing with anxiety while in high school. Sometimes they worked, sometimes not as well. What I did was some simple "meditations" to take my mind off whatever circumstance was giving me anxiety. One method was breathing in and out and imagining a ball in my chest. When I inhaled, I would imagine the ball rising, and conversely it would fall to the bottom of my chest while exhaling.

if you can, being some sort of headphones or earbuds to school. That has been a tremendous help for me. Or, bring a comfort item or something to stim with (like a glittery pen or rubber band or an actual stim toy). Chewing gum also helps relieve some tension. I don't know if teachers care whether or not you chew gum at your school, but if they don't it can be helpful, even if it's just a little bit.

I can relate as I am an undiagnosed female as well, but I'm being evaluated monday. I come close to meltdowns at school but they never really peak until I get home and it's horrible to think that one day I just might lose it in that moment, so I can very much understand your frustrations.