Yes, I think I'm somewhat afraid of it. I'm quite high functioning in many ways, or should I say, I'm thought to be as one, because I live fairly independently, and not much emphasis has been placed on the absence of my private life / own family / romantic relationships.
drex wrote:
(...)
Unfortunately, due to my obsessiveness, I am very hung up on nomenclature or names. I like something to have a name. Now "they" are telling us that Asperger's will be no more. Will I still fit into the spectrum as I do now? I like the culture of Asperger's and proudly identify myself an aspie.
I feel the same, although in a slightly different context. I was given a most unfortunate dx in this respect, the PDD-NOS, which placed me out of the Aspie culture altogether theoretically, and left me with only a couple of assimilated people with the same dx. I've even met someone here who didn't know he is on the spectrum who had a PDD-NOS dx.
1000Knives wrote:
I'm not at all, but I'm diagnosed NVLD, and because I was late diagnosed, under earlier criteria, I'd probably have been more likely to get a PDD-NOS, but now under the new criteria I'll probably be ASD. I do wish NVLD itself was recognized officially, but it's not, so meh.
It's interesting that AS and NVLD are often associated as having similar characteristics and it's the opposite of what you write here. The main reason why they diagnosed me with PDD-NOS was that I have relatively weaker verbal skills. The differentiation criteria for AS vs. HFA (or PDD-NOS) is inconsistent, to say the least, imho. (or simply BS)
After some research on the net and summing up my experiences I came to the conclusion that the merging of the trhee major PDDs are welcome, while not forming subcategories (like in ADHD) with similar labels at the same time is somewhat misguided. They could preserve Asperger's as a sub dx of ASD and make a similar category for HFA, for example, while removing the ugly and nameless NOS dx. Since they are subtypes, they could all be part of the autism spectrum under the same major diagnostic label.
So, I've made the provision asking the psychs to include in my dx that I have a form of high functioning autism, to make things clear. I don't want to slip into SCD from an ASD.
Reading the criteria of the proposed ASD in the DSM-V suggests it's more strict than either AS or autism since it requires more symptoms to match, and inventing SCD also suggests a future narrower interpretation of ASD. Due to this, it would be all up to the diagnosticians' subjectivity. The proposed severity levels are highly subjective matters too. I hope there would be consistent and more concrete guidelines / interpretations / case studies introduced along with the changes to help professionals out of possible confusion.
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Another non-English speaking - DX'd at age 38
"Aut viam inveniam aut faciam." (Hannibal) - Latin for "I'll either find a way or make one."
10 Feb 2012, 4:25 am
