cyberscan wrote:
I really don't understand the need for adults to have an "official" diagnosis. Unless there is a specific physical benefit from such a diagnosis such as funding or to explain things to someone you depend upon, I recommend against it. Having an official diagnosis means that you will not be eligible for private insurance, to serve in the military, or work in some jobs. If you are an adult and also have been able to hold onto a job for more than a few months, it means that you will not be considered disabled and therefore you will be ineligible for government benefits.
Many of the online tests are accurate in making a diagnosis, and having an unoffical diagnosis should be good enough to explain many things.
In my case I'm hoping my (UK) employer will understand me better and stop trying to wean me onto stuff I just can't do - like making sense of unclear instructions, working in crowds, jumping from the detail to the big picture all the time, being expected to cope with interruptions without delay to the job in hand, having others involved with tasks I'm doing instead of just giving me the work and letting me get on with it, etc.
It's early days to say whether the DX will make any difference at all, but at least psychologically I expect to feel a little more confident when others assume I'm neurotypical and start getting all exasperated and looking at me as if I'm being awkward or lazy, when it's just the AS that's doing it. The law on discriminating against AS is rather unclear, but stuff like proper rest breaks are more likely to require respecting. A lot of employers do this crafty trick of coercing employees out of their breaks and holiday rights, somehow saddling the employee with the misconception that the work they are given is entirely their responsibility to complete on time, whatever it takes, which of course is completely unfair. But anybody with an official disability is on stronger ground if they fail to comply with that kind of bullying.
It's easier than just fighting them back on the grounds of general workers' rights, they'll just put you down as a Commie or something if you do that. For some reason militancy in the workplace doesn't go down very well, even among the most exploited parts of the workforce. Trade unions seem to have lost most of their teeth - I haven't even bothered to tell my union about my disability.
See ny point? I'd find it almost impossible to lay into the management and tell them they were being unfair or expecting too much of me as a neurotypical. But it's not as difficult to just explain in a friendly way to them that unfortunately I have a disability which makes it practically impossible for me to comply with all their demands. I don't have to give criticism in order to inform them of the unrealistic nature of their expectations. They in turn will (hopefully) feel less inclined to take their customary liberties because they don't know for sure that I won't leave and go for constructive dismissal with a discrimination case, and if I do happen to screw up while attempting to do their Aspie-unfriendly bidding, they'd be taking quite a risk if they tried disciplinary action. Some employers are reluctant to risk litigation, and I've met people in my workplace who seem quite scared of being seen to discriminate. They've even been known to use it as an excuse - like when they wouldn't allow somebody to go and pick up their kids from school in work time because that would look like discrimination against workers who had no children (I doubt they were correct, but it gives some measure of how much the spectre of discrimination sways their thinking).
Actually the scariest stage for me was when I'd diagnosed myself with the online tests and could see how work expectations were harming me, but didn't feel I could explain effectively because I had no official DX. Now at least they daren't pretend I've made it all up just to get out of my responsibilities.
Maybe I'm unusual, but I find the prospect of not being eligible for military service as a good thing. I'm probably too old to be drafted and sent to kill or be killed fighting in a war I don't agree with, but it's nice to have that bit of extra protection, just in case the gov does something really stupid. You only have to look back at WWI to see how cavalier the generals can be with other people's lives once they've got them in uniform.
I'm not trying to knock your opinion though. UK benefits are a little more robust than the American ones, which perhaps puts a different complexion on these matters for UK citizens. Over here, as long as you fulfil the numerous requirements, you get benefits for as long as you don't have a job - they're not great but at least it's some kind of income. Even in my case, even while I'm employed, there's some possibility of getting part of the Disability Living Allowance, on the grounds that I can't cook.......I presume that would let me buy cooked food or hire a cook occasionally. But I haven't applied for it so far. Contrary to popular belief, you don't die from lack of cooking, as long as you choose your raw food wisely.
Over here the benefits people tend to look hard for any evidence of a claimant not really looking for a job, and there's a limit to what you can turn down before they axe your allowance. I would imagine that an AS diagnosis could be very useful there if an assessor wanted me to take a job that was really Aspie-unfriendly. I've heard of assessors trying to play down the relevence of an AS DX, but their reasons don't hold water and would probably soon be demolished on appeal.
Also, unlike the USA, employers can't fire us so easily...they usually need to have a pretty good reason, and the failure of an Aspie to do what an Aspie couldn't reasonably be expected to do would probably not be seen as good enough.
Socially, it's another matter - there's no discrimination protection there, if somebody wants to shun you then they're legally entitled to do so - and I agree that it might be completely futile to reveal the DX in that case. I can't say I've noticed that the few people I've told about it treat me any differently as a result. I think mainly it's because they don't understand what AS is and how it affects us. It's hard to explain how it feels from the inside of an Aspie brain, and who the hell wants a lecture on the Triad of Impairments anyway? Even I don't really understand much of it yet.
The only insurance I might want would be for driving......DVLC say that AS is not a reason to disqualify a driver, but I imagine it could cause problems with the insurance people, who would possibly use it as an excuse to jack up the fees. That was one thing that made me hesitate to get the DX, but weighed up against the pressure at work, I think I've taken the right decision. If they won't let me drive at a reasonable price, that's a shame, but if they won't take some of the pressure off me in the workplace, that's likely to wreck my whole life, indeed the world of work has always felt stressful and precarious to me and the reasons seem to be mostly because my Aspie brain isn't compatible with neurotypical expectations. I've come to see working for wages as like being in a detention centre.
But tie DX is also about finding out who I am and how my brain works (or fails to work). Being so subjective, the DX isn't an absolute and you'll never be 100% certain that you have AS, but it certainly helped to shift any lingering doubts that I had. And once you've accepted it, there's a lot you can do. No more jumping into situations I can't hope to deal with. When you know your strengths and weaknesses, you can direct yourself towards more appropriate goals. You should see some of the half-baked Freudian theories about myself that I've been able to discard. The time I've wasted on that stuff is immense. My feelings are nebulous to me because that's how my brain works, and not because of some great trauma that's caused me to repress everything.
I understand a lot more about myself already. I know why I don't like big parties (it's not a phobia after all), and why the world and I can't get much sense out of each other by the verbal route. I can see how to use my intelligence under the right conditions (freedom from distraction, a clear remit) so that it will work more effectively. I can see how my inherent perfectionism and my inability to see the "big picture" give me problems when I'm trying to get things done.
06 Sep 2009, 8:46 pm
