Just got my official report in the mail

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Perfect description.

This is one of those moments where the word choice is so good that I know the person who chose those words experienced something almost identical to what I did.

Congratulations, Skibum! That must be a relief to have that closure of sorts.

I think the more tests the better; there are lots of things to rule out as an adult. The more tests done the less room there is for doubt afterwards so that there will hopefully be less to pick apart and doubt and analyze ad nauseam. I'd rather have the other things ruled out for good than to have to constantly wonder and worry about accuracy and lack of being thorough.

Yay, skibum!

I had a four hour test a few years ago, and a twelve hour test a few years before that. Getting the diagnosis can give you a lot of relief. Like you, I thought something was amiss about myself and pretty much knew I had nonverbal difficulties. You might find yourself seeing new strategies and new possibilities now. You also get someone else's perspective. I had the RAADS-R and thinking out loud, 'jealousy's no problem for me to know about. People will just tell me if they are jealous.' To not know that that was an issue! also, the psychologist thought my voice was atypical. It sounds like you are seeing yourself in a new light, and this is good.

Thank you so much all of you for your encouraging responses. It really is a relief to know. It is really amazing to learn about myself and gain new insight. It feels weird because it's humbling to have a final stamp and to see that in many ways I am actually more impaired than I had realized. But it also gives me a kind of feeling of security in a sense because some people in my family had argued with me that I could be Autistic and now I have actual quantitative information and actual values to show them and an explanation written out in layman's terms.

Since my diagnosis my parents have taken it upon themselves to learn about Autism Spectrum Disorders and to try to make things more comfortable for me when I am with them. I am so incredibly grateful for that and I really admire them for it. They spent my whole life treating me as if I were a misbehaving kid because they had no idea so now they are trying to really understand what this is all about. I am so grateful to have them as parents. And I am so encouraged by all of you and all the help that you have given me in this journey as well.

Jen, I will look over the report again and see if I can answer your post where you asked what all the tests were. If I look at the report it will help me to answer you correctly without relying on trying to remember everything. It was 13 tests administered in almost 8 hours all in one day so I could easily get confused trying to remember.

But it is a good feeling.

And about the Hubble pictures, funny thing is I don't live too far from a Hubble Telescope. They do take magnificent pictures.

Pretty comprehensive: 8 hours of testing!

It really was. They were originally going to do more tests than that as well but they decided to skip a few because they felt that they were not necessary. So if they had done them it might have been ten hours or so. I am glad they felt like they could skip some!

But I am really glad that it was as comprehensive as it was. I was pretty sure going into it, 99% sure that the outcome would be ASD but now there is no room for doubt at all and as Quiverswhiskers mentioned in a post above, that really is a great feeling.

"cascade of AHAs" That is great. I love that Jensen!

If you can't be honest on an autism forum, then where can you be honest?

Even on Wrong Planet, I feel like I'm on the wrong planet. You lot seem to act like NTs and I seem to act like some.... utter pissed-off weirdo.

The number of tests some people have seems to be ridiculous. There are only a relatively few autism tests for adults; the majority are designed for children.

What's most important in diagnosing autism is clinical observation of your behaviour. There's no need to have 10 similar tests, all with much the same questions. All the tests in the world won't make up for a clinician's inexpertise or inexperience.

#pissedoffweirdoatwork

One's stims aren't visible on the internet--unless you post them on YouTube.

I do lots of autistic things here--I post my own crap which sometimes is irrelevant to the topic, for example.

Er, I'm not talking about stims, not even remotely.

I couldn't give a rat's arse if you fidget, stim, or whatever, 'til the cows come home. I'm talking about, I dunno what the f to call it. TOM? Dunno. Whatever, you lot seem to act just like NTs to me. I can't tell the difference in text. I feel different to NTs. I feel different to you lot.

It's easier for autistic people to experience TOM when they're not actually in the presence of another person.

I think you fit in quite well, actually--even amid your abrasiveness. You fit in because you don't fit in. That's the essence of it.

Internet writing is the great equalizer, it seems to me.

There are people who are raging autistics "in real life" who are great rationalists when they write on the internet.

You are a personality in the Forum--even if you irritate me at times.

The only real way to tell if someone has a learning disability or not is to perform an IQ test. You can't make the assumption that they do or don't have one by looking at academic work alone. Also, autistics frequently have very split IQ profiles, with significant gaps between their verbal and nonverbal IQs that neurotypicals do not have; an IQ test with such a split score would further indicate the presence of autism, or some other learning difference.

BirdinFlight and NiceCupofTea, I am simply sharing about my experience and how it affected me. You are welcome to think of it however you like. I can't help it if I might appear NT or not. And I certainly did not create the diagnostic testing procedure nor choose the tests they had me take. And I also know from reading the report that the tests test different things. And I did not make the conclusion of where I stand on the Spectrum nor was I only observed for those 8 hours.

And BirdinFlight, I am also the same person I was before my diagnosis. I have learned some things about myself and gotten some new understandings on certain things which have broadened my perspective and understanding about what happens in a clinical process and I have shared what I have learned. That does not make me self righteous neither does it make me a jerk. If you spent any time getting to know me at all rather than just throwing these mean and hurtful accusations at me and projecting your own insecurities, you would realize that I am neither of the things you have mentioned.

I probably irritate everyone.

I almost just want to get banned, tbh, so I can be done with massively winding myself up with so many people's posts. It's not like I'm popular or I'll be missed if I disappear. Just as in the NT world, the most popular people on this forum seem to be the sweet, huggy-wuggy ones. I don't do "sweet", "nice", or, above all, "huggy wuggy". I'm just a c***.