Do You Still Second-Guess Your Diagnosis?

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saimand
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03 Dec 2014, 12:39 pm

I'M always second guessing everything...it's part of my OCD lol...there was time when I really doubted it was the right DX...then the 'F' spectrum dx's became my special interest and I came to the terms where I accept all of my DX's including AS...I doubted my glaucoma DX too so I guess I should be called second doubter lol...I have to have proofs for anything not just sb's opinion based on assumptions...


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League_Girl
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03 Dec 2014, 1:38 pm

Not being treated badly, the fact I have actually learned to be flexible, can control my stims (gee maybe those are not stims after all), learned social skills, not finding myself exhausted using them, I wonder if I am truly on the spectrum. But every time I try and bring it up to any doctor when I get the chance, I get told things like "You've adapted" "I read girls are affected differently than boys" "I think as you get older, you learn so it's not like it went away" "You're learned how." I am not really there to undiagnose myself because they are not my doctor and not there to counsel me so I don't go on and on about it and not turn the session into about me.

it truly feels like I have rewired my brain. What if I was just a brat growing up. What if I was just a messed up child due to my early history so I mimicked the symptoms and I was just slow in learning and I just developed slowly than others. I don't see anything exhausting about saying hi back to people when they say hi to me or saying please and thank you or not asking a question or making a comment I know is inappropriate and I see nothing exhausting about remembering to use a different word than the word "cheap." I still slip but I don't feel so exhausted for using the word Frugal or inexpensive because I had remembered to use those terms instead of saying cheap.

Or am I just an exceptional aspie? I also outgrew having sensory issues and dyspraxia because of therapy I was given and I keep reading aspies can't improve their social skills or can improve very little and I feel mine have improved a lot and I know someone here mentioned how much she improved hers in a few years after learning them and she got diagnosed in her early 40's and hers sounded good as an NT unless tired but said that happens to everyone. So that makes me think "Mmm maybe my diagnoses was correct after all." I also read The Lemonade War series and a character in it was aspie and it made me think "Mmm I was just like Jessie when I was a child minus the being good at math an everything subjects and skipping a grade" so maybe I really do have it. Hey she has a friend too and can get along with kids and with her brother just as long as kids are nice to her and accept her." The author also had another ASD character in one of her books and Jessie was more normal compared to him and she got annoyed with his rocking because it distracted her and and had to tell him social things she knew like what others had to tell her about and it irritated her too when she had to do that to her new friend. It was like payback. Also I thought she handled change well too despite not liking them. No meltdowns or freak outs or getting upset. I also figured she was a mild aspie or borderline AS while Maxwell was more autistic. I didn't have meltdowns either as a kid over a change, I can remember crying sometimes as a kid and feeling uncomfortable usually with a change and not liking it but in school I never flipped out about it but yet it said on my report cards I had a hard time with change in a classroom setting but I am not sure what that means.

I know I have something. I often think I probably have a condition that hasn't even yet been discovered so it doesn't have a name yet. I am just League Girl. But if you keep comparing yourself to others with it, you might think 'gee maybe I don't have it because I am not like that.'

But....

I can do the same with anxiety and ADD and OCD and pregnancy (back when I was pregnant) and depression, and still deny those conditions so how is Asperger's any different? I can remmeber years back someone telling me online comparing myself to other aspies is like an NT comparing themselves to other NTs and thinking "I must not be an NT because I am not like the other NTs."

And I have questioned my ADD diagnoses I got as a kid because I read it was overdiagnosed in the 90's and I suspect doctors were quick to jump to it than looking at what is causing the symptoms. Now I feel they are doing the same with autism, instead of looking at why the person has the symptoms, they just jump to the autism label. The treatment I got for ADD as a kid wasn't working so my mom knew it was something else. I talk to my husband about my AS and he has never doubted it and thinks I show symptoms all the time and I don't act normal. To him normal is going to peoples houses and chatting and visiting or having friends or being able to touch me anytime he wants without me "freaking out" or not getting too upset or having anxiety over "little stuff" and he thinks my computer is my special interest and then he said my new game was my obsession. I of course compared it to other people being hooked on their phones so how is a 3DS any different and he said those are real people they are chatting with, the people in my game are not real.

I also have another aspie friend who doesn't let his interests consume his life but he still has a time for them but he doesn't let them take over his life like he used to so that makes me think "mmm maybe my label is correct."
I am also someone who doesn't want to be glued to her interests all the time and neglect anything else like housework or going out and doing stuff and I am not missing my computer or my stories, it always feels nice to be away from it. I do believe you want to be in control of your interests, not have them control you. Jesse didn't seem to be controlled either by her interests and even as a kid I have always did other stuff than the same thing all the time like I would keep reading about typical aspies. But how do you tell the difference between a addiction and an interest, especially with computers. My husband thinks it's an aspie interest and thinks it's different than a computer addiction. I know plenty of people are hooked on their computer and don't even have an ASD and for some it has taken over and has controlled them instead of them controlling it.


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League_Girl
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03 Dec 2014, 1:52 pm

NiceCupOfTea wrote:

Do you find it difficult to switch between activities as well? Once I get started on one thing, I find it really, really hard to stop what I'm doing and move onto something else - hence spending 8 hours arguing on WP :p Apparently that's called "resistance to change" and is common in autistic people.


It often takes me longer to stop what I am doing to move onto something else and my husband often has to redirect me and give me a push (not a literal push) an it's hard to listen to what someone is saying when I am doing something else. It's like I can't shift from my activity onto listening so I am anxious for it to get over with. Also if I have to go to the store for something, I just want to do it now and get it out of the way and be back ASAP so I can get back to what I am doing. I don't want to bother with getting my kids ready so I leave them at home with my husband and I get upset if he tries to even suggest to bring any of them with because it means taking longer to leave and longer to get back to what I am doing. I have to do this everyday because I have kids now so it feels like I am fighting myself on a daily basis now.

I even remember back when I was a kid and teen, when I would get interrupted, I would start screaming because I didn't like the interruption rather it was homework or doing something else. I just thought I was just being disrespectful and getting away with it. I also remember saying "hold on" just like my mom always did when she was in the middle of something important like paying bills or on the phone or with cooking. I would also scream "okay" when anyone got impatient with me because I was taking too long to stop what I am doing to come. This brings back memories.


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Son: Diagnosed w/anxiety and ADHD. Also academic delayed and ASD lv 1.

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Nick22
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03 Dec 2014, 5:45 pm

Yes - I can relate to this. It's about a year and a half since I had my diagnosis. I think I've been lucky and learned to adapt down the years (I'm in my forties) to the extent that I find myself wondering whether I am making more of it than is there. At my end of the spectrum, I think that there is no real clear cut answer, even though that is what a lot of us (myself included) want to get. There is no denying that I find new social situations tiring, but I alternate between accepting it as an ASD thing, or just a more general lack of sociability.