Female Aspies= Borderline personality disorder??

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This suggests that BPD may be quite the opposite of Asperger's...

http://evmedreview.com/?p=535

I'm pretty sure that bipolar is supposed to develop over time (say, by mid-teens), not be around all of one's life. That's part of the reason for assessing someone for AS based on what their parents say about their early life. Were they also sensitive to noises as a kid? How did they get along with people when they were younger? (Apparently some clinicians in the US say there is such a possibility as childhood BPD, too, but still there is controversy.)

Another distinguishing factor between BPD and aspergers/autism meltdown/shutdown situations is that I'm pretty sure BPD isn't supposed to be triggered by sensory issues, unlike AS. Like with BPD, one is supposed to end up waking up one day feeling totally depressed, or another day, feeling full of energy and manic. Or, more importantly, with BPD, one hour they might be yelling and angry at someone and then suddenly an hour later they might turn manic and happy toward the person and want to treat them to dinner, even with no intervening emotional input. Whereas with AS, one would not be expected to have these odd sorts of mood swings, but possibly get more anxious and irritable in response to stimulus like loud noise or anxiety and then have a meltdown/shutdown, and then the symptoms just gradually go away as the stimuli are removed. That's what I have concluded from my readings and observations, anyway.

I was almost diagnosed with BPD because the psychiatrist thought a girl my age can't have autism (or ADD). She insisted I had symptoms I had not and she insisted that I wasn't telling the truth when I told her about my symptoms, my difficulties, my feelings and my (sensory) perception.

The diagnosis was later ruled out entirely during an assessment that literally found no evidence for BPD.

Poke, you are male. You may not realize that there is a gender bias that is very real.

The fact is diagnostic standards are normalized for males. All too often females are diagnosed with some "female" disorder because the diagnostician can't look beyond the male normalization to see that women present differently. Or that women/girls could have a "male" disorder at all. This happens frequently. Women have different symptoms for heart attacks than do men and have died because their symptoms were ignored.

I think that the autism diagnosis has expanded to include both less and more impaired individuals since the descriptions of Kanner and Asperger. All the children described by Kanner and Asperger seem to fit what would today be called "HFA" or "AS".

I'm a guy but I was diagnosed with Borderline & about 10 other things when I was officially tested for AS. What happened was I had my 1st relationship when I was 20 & I had a mental breakdown after it ended. Most all the psychs, docs & other experts I've saw seemed to think AS & autism were like less sever form of mental retardation. They thought I communicated too well verbally & seemed too intelligent to have anything on the autism spectrum. The quacks diagnosed me with borderline to explain some of my Aspie & my emotional issues I was having at the time. Aspies can be very emotionally immature compared to people their own age. I would NOT of been diagnosed with borderline if I would of been a 13-year old who had a breakdown like that over my 1st relationship but Sense I was almost 21 & the quacks didn't believe I had AS; I got borderline to explain that. I doubt I would get dingdonged with borderline now because some of those issues have gotten a lot better after I quit seeing psychs & taking meds

For all the gender bias regarding ADHD I was diagnosed with it at age 18 without a hitch, but maybe only because I went in to be tested specifically for that. I had already self-diagnosed, and had been prescribed Ritalin by a GP. My college said I needed an official diagnosis to get accomodations. My parents' insurance didn't cover testing so I went through the local vocational rehab dept because they covered it if you were having trouble in school. They sent me to a psychologist who specialized in ADHD.

If I had been going to a therapist not knowing what I needed to be tested for, and hoping they would figure it out, who knows what they might have come up with. No one prior to that had ever suspected I had ADHD.

Poke, i find it interesting that any time Verdandi posts about her misdiagnosis, you're in there like a dirty shirt trying to cast doubt on her statements. i think it says a great deal about you that you seem to have taken that approach. that level of vindictive manipulation and targeted attention-seeking seems highly unusual for a person diagnosed with AS. it's very curious.

How come a practiser can easily claim that an autistic person's autism is actually BPD?

Well this is what happened to me and I see how this can happen to other autistic females who don't have a co-morbid BPD too:

Frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment.

I explained that I usually do not understand other people's reactions. I raised the concern that other people's emotional reactions and changes of opinions are unpredictable and that this is a huge issue because a lot of people seem to dislike and avoid me. I also said that time and time again I get intro trouble at school and in clubs and that the children and adults there bully me.

What it apparently meant to the psych (just what she said): my perception is skewed and my subconscious pretends it doesn't know why and when other people react the way they do. Bullying is also a phenomenon I might simply imagine or dramatize. Alternatively (she wasn't sure but learnt to this), I might be lying about not knowing why and when other people react the way they do to appear innocent and make sure I'm not abandoned.

As far as reality goes: I'm a failure at picking up on facial expressions/body language which is one things that made people really unpredictable at the the time that I told the psych that.

A pattern of unstable and intense interpersonal relationships characterized by alternating between extremes of idealization and devaluation.

I explained that I didn't have many friends. I also mentioned that usually, a great number of people take interest in me and treat me very nicely but that they then suddenly turn on me or lose interest in me. I actually made no mention of idealisation or devaluation... but that doesn't matter.

What it definitely meant to the psych: other people do not notice me for being abnormal/atypical because I'm normal. And that because there seems to be a pattern, I was responsible for why people didn't want to associate with me. I treated them rudely and ignored them intentionally.

Reality: well, I'm autistic... I can be pretty aloof sometimes, I guess. Or was it passive?

Identity disturbance: markedly and persistently unstable self-image or sense of self.

I explained that other often claim I can do things that I can not but that they also claim that no person can be good at some things that I am good at. The other issue that apparently was of interest in that aspect was that I said that most people think or thought that I might be mentally ret*d, that I am extremely insecure and that I am emotionally unstable and mis-behaved. (meltdowns, ignoring people, unable to access skills, loss of speech, social impairment, can't tolerate changes)

What the psych said later: that others are right and my perception of myself is wrong.

Reality: not having eye-contact and being (temporarily) unable to talk to someone doesn't have anything to do "insecurity" in my case. Most people don't get why I can do one thing but not another because they don't know autism or know it but fail to understand what it is.

Impulsivity in at least two areas that are potentially self-damaging (e.g., promiscuous sex, eating disorders, binge eating, substance abuse, reckless driving). Note: Do not include suicidal or self-injuring behavior covered in Criterion 5

I don't remember about this, sorry. I think I mentioned that I am impulsive but that's it. At times like these I wonder whether I have a "special interest" after all because I really want to start the game I just received and my memory isn't as cooperative about remembering all details to help write this post as it usually is.

Recurrent suicidal behavior, gestures, threats or self-injuring behavior such as cutting, interfering with the healing of scars (excoriation) or picking at oneself.

I had to fill out a form that asked for self-injurious behaviours. I admitted to head-banging at that time.

What it meant to the psych: I don't know, she never mentioned anything about this.

Affective instability due to a marked reactivity of mood (e.g., intense episodic dysphoria, irritability or anxiety usually lasting a few hours and only rarely more than a few days).

I told of several incidences that probably were taken to be like that:

- I often cried and felt overwhelmed as a child because of crowds, noise, being touched
- one time in school I was prompted to change seats. I resisted, got yelled at, covered my ears with my hands, cried, were touched/yanked and yelled at some more and screamed back... my parents were called to fetch me.

I reported that I get upset if plans get cancelled, if my food isn't exactly as it should be, if people touch me, show up on my doorstep or do things that they don't usually do... so on. I also said that other people often accuse me of being unpredictable, emotionally unstable and insane.

The psych: That was taken to mean I lash out and get upset for no reason. I know that is what it meant to the psychiatrist because she explicitly told me that what I claim bothers me cannot bother anyone.

Note: my mood's pretty stable and in the past, people took freezing up, being stressed about sensory overload and meltdowns to mean that I am unpredictable, emotionally unstable and insane, not realising that I simply reacted to my environment.

Chronic feelings of emptiness

No idea on that one. I don't see how anything I said could be connected to it even in a remotely sane way. It wasn't mentioned unless I misunderstood something.

Inappropriate anger or difficulty controlling anger (e.g., frequent displays of temper, constant anger, recurrent physical fights).

I already talked about meltdowns above.

According to the psych: check, I had that symptoms badly.

Transient, stress-related paranoid ideation, delusions or severe dissociative symptoms

According to the psych: somehow, loss of speech and skills, inability to read body language, inability to "put myself in other people's shoes" were "dissociative" though she doubted that me experiencing these things was all real.


Now onto playing DMC, yay.

Nope. Teachers thought I had behavior problems and I was diagnosed with other things; ADD, dyspraxia, sensory processing disorder, cluttering, language processing disorder, and they said I had poor social skills and were suspecting OCD. But I was 12 when diagnosed so I was too young for the BPD label.