Critical of self diagnosis - you shouldn't be

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Self-report can be both highly accurate and highly inaccurate, depending on the individual and the question.
But a person cannot observe themselves from outside, and that is what I see as the key missing part of self-diagnosis.
Also, I don't believe that self-report of childhood history, esp. early years before 3 years old, is accurate without corroboration from parent. My mother reported many things about me that I would never have known myself, and the additional value of parent report is that they come from outside my own mind.
Adding add these factors together is why I don't recognize self-diagnosis as valid, because there is too much missing from the diagnostic process.

What I find interesting, and I could be wrong about this, but when I read Tony Attwood's book, one of the things that I thought I read is that many Aspies have a remarkable ability to see themselves impartially as if they were outside of themselves looking at themselves as if looking at a character in a movie. I also think I read that they also have remarkable long term memories. I am not saying one way or the other but it might not be entirely impossible to imagine that maybe people could somehow do this.

People may think that they have the ability to see themselves from the outside, but I don't believe it when they tell me that they do.
People also make up false memories that never happened and no one else can remember, but they think they remember as something that really happened clearly.

I can't see myself from the outside, I can't get out of my own mind.
I am sure that I have many false memories of early childhood too, as well as not remembering many things that would be relevant for autism diagnosis, so it was critical that my mother did the parent report instead of me doing a self-report of my childhood behaviors.
But for professional diagnosis, the childhood history is sometimes unavailable because the parents are unavailable, so I see that as one part that is recommended but optional given specific circumstances.
The one part that is required in my opinion is outside observation by professional trained to recognize both autism and other disorders, so they can tell if observed traits are more likely attribute to autism, other disorder, or no disorder at all.

I remember very clearly things that I did as a child. I even remember what I was wearing and what my hair was like, what ribbons were in my hair. I remember conversations and what I said and what people said. I remember things like spending every day at recess sitting on a monkey bar staring at the dessert from the minute the bell rang until it rang again. I remember all kinds of things like that. I remember being in class and having trouble understanding what the teacher was asking or saying. I remember how I was sensitive to noises to the point where I spent much of my junior high school and high school days shut up locked in my room to try to get away. I remember the depressions, I remember the anxiety. I can revisit all of those moments now very clearly and actually see myself as if I were watching someone else. I don't think my memory is that flawed. I might not remember every little detail or conversation or moment accurately but the kinds of things that I do remember are very clear and very telling in an assessment for ASD. I am not saying that we will remember everything with 100% accuracy but to say that we can't remember enough to show evidence of ASD traits, we might as well say that no one can remember anything about childhood.

People can and have been diagnosed without childhood history beyond what they can report themselves.
People are regularly diagnosed without self-report, e.g. children.
The one thing that is critical and missing from self-diagnosis is clinical observation, and I dont' believe that any diagnosis missing this part is valid.

I retrieved the lost thread by manually copy-pasting from the old software. I'm sorry that in the process some posts have been lost since I had to manually assign each post to the poster and couldn't quote them.

I'm sorry again for all the posts that have been lost - last few pages which have been made on the new software are unfortunately irretrievable. it was my terrible mistake, hope that by doing this at least it has been amended to some extent.

Self or other diagnoses (no literalist critique about the semantics of words yet again please, it was intensely tiresome) both lead to better outcomes for most people in making sense of their past lives, making connections with support places like WP (it used to be somewhat more supportive than it seems to be here) and placing their challenges in a context, which can be a springboard to more fulfilling lives and better uses of talents and abilities.

If you want to dismiss half of those diagnoses as worthless because a clinician didn't rubber stamp them, despite the gains that accrued, then that says more to me about you than the merits of different ways of finding one's place on the spectrum.

This whole thread has been revealing in that sense.

How is any self-diagnoses 'not allowed' it is not a crime to self diagnose and no one can really stop anyone from doing it. People do self diagnose as having schizophrenia, and I can see why some of them wouldn't want to pursue an 'official' diagnoses due to the stigma...but of course it can be a hard thing since lots of people with that do need resources and help like the ones who cannot work because of it but you have to have official diagnoses for that sort of help.

Lol there are possibly lots of people with autism who aren't diagnosed? No there for sure are...considering all the people who go years and years not getting diagnosed till finally they are. Also how do you undertake proper diagnostic criteria? all they do is see if you have enough symptoms for the disorder, test some of your mental functioning, ask your perspective on your struggles/symptoms like how they are experiencing them and then forumlate a diagnoses.

Also psychology/psychaitry actually does not stick to the scientific method, using the tests that have been created through scientific method is not the same thing as applying scientific method to diagnosing. There is no experiment taking place when diagnosing.

I consider it wrong to say to other people that one has autism or is autistic, including with the qualifier "self-diagnosed", if one has not been diagnosed with autism by a professional. It is misrepresentation to say that one has a mental disorder without diagnosis of such. Saying that one suspects oneself of having autism is fine with me. Saying that one has many autistic traits is fine with me, and indeed I am surrounded by people who have many autistic traits, and sometimes they talk about their traits, and I talk about mine, just like a group of autistic people might talk about their autistic traits at a meetup. Thinking that one has autism without saying it is not wrong, as people are free to think whatever they want to think. It is only when they communicate their thoughts to others and represent themselves as having autism that others may disagree with and criticize their thoughts and behaviors, such as the behavior of self-diagnosing with autism and representing oneself as having autism without autism diagnosis. It is fine for me to think that I have schizophrenia, and I can become 100% sure that I have it, but it is wrong for me to say that I have it, and if I say that I have it, then I am open to criticism of my thoughts and behaviors related to my communicated claim, and I have no eggspectation that others will withhold this criticism or believe as I do that I have schizophrenia.

I don't allow others to marginalise me, even if that is their intention. (No-one can truly marginalise anyone without their consent). This discussion reminds me of religious infighting: eg "you can't get into heaven unless you have been formally baptised into the church" "christians are what they believe think and do, not a baptismal certificate". Typical of both the religious crap and this thread, opinions are being stated as if they were fact. Truth gets lost quite quickly in these and only prejudice is left standing.

Saying that one is self-diagnosed is a clear and obvious representation that one has not been diagnosed with autism by a professional.

I couldn't give: Three hoops, two shiny shites, one iota or even a single jot about who is self diagnosed and who is not.

I had aspergers before I got diagnosed and I've still got it now.

To summarize my deleted posts, I think that self-diagnosis:

*is invalid due to lack of clinical observation, which is critical to identify and diagnose autism
*is low quality due to lack of knowledge/understanding/analysis/context/eggsperience by amateurs
*is misleading when people self-diagnose with autism and represent themselves as having autism

In addition, I am not obligated to provide social-emotional support to people who self-diagnosed with autism on the topic of autism self-diagnosis. Instead, I criticize self-diagnosis as a bad process and am not supportive of a behavior that I think is wrong.

I don't see how being paid to conduct a diagnosis necessarily denotes higher quality

Criticizing someone on a support site where self-diagnosis is accepted is not really very supportive. You could encourage someone to get a professional diagnosis but discounting their experiences is not a great idea. Usually it's a precursor for a lot of adults who end up geting a professional diagnosis.




It's invalid to you. That's your personal opinion. You have the right to believe that. However, I could also have the personal opinion that autism is not a real disorder. Doesn't make it true though. In France, autism is regarded as a psychosis. Doesn't make that true either.

i've spoken to many psychologists and psychiatrists who do official diagnoses and they pretty much tell me that autism is incredibly obvious. They're able to accurately determine if someone has autism within a few minutes of speaking with that person. Obviously they will still conduct the ADOS test but 99.99% of the time that merely confirms what they already had determined within the first few minutes of interacting the the individual. So someone doesn't need a MD or PhD or PsyD to be able to determine if they have autism. Someone could not be logical about it and incorrectly diagnose themselves but depends on the individual. There are doctors who are really bad too!


There are plenty of doctors who don't have much knowledge of asperger's or autism and those doctors feel comfortable telling a patient " i don't think you have autism" which as far as a patient is concerned rules it out. (often times that patient actually does have autism but the professional isn't familiar). On the other hand an individual who researches it enough and comes into contact with enough people who have it, can easily determine that they're on the spectrum.

I'm not a doctor but I can definitely tell if someone is on the spectrum if I spend enough time interacting with them.


Not misleading if the diagnosis is correct. It would be misleading if a professional misdiagnosed that individual as well but in the case of a professional diagnosis, the individual actually is more certain about the diagnosis (even though it's wrong) because it came from a professional so it could actually be more misleading than a self-diagnosis in this case . . .

Self-diagnosis is invalid as a scientific process that is designed to reach a reasonably but not always 100% accurate conclusion, because it is missing a critical component.

Self-diagnosis is low quality, because the amateurs who self-diagnose lack knowledge/understanding/analysis/context/eggsperience of professionals who have been trained to diagnose others.

Self-diagnosis is misleading when someone who has not been diagnosed with a mental disorder says that they have the mental disorder.

Problems with professional diagnosis do not validate self-diagnosis as a process and do not validate misrepresentation of oneself as having autism.
I have no obligation to provide social-emotional support of anyone on wp, and note that I am criticizing the process and behavior while making no personal attacks.

A lot of the self-diagnosed group seem more certain about their autism, and are more vocal about it, than the professionally diagnosed.

All I can say is at the adult autism clinic I got my diagnosis from, I was told about half don't end up receiving a diagnosis of autism. If that is reflected on sites like WP, then approximately 50% of the self-diagnosed are wrong about their diagnosis and 50% are right.