Self-Diagnosis

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People who are self-diagnosed should not be going around saying that they have Asperger's Syndrome or Autistic Disorder or Pervasive Developmental Disorder Not Otherwise Specified or anything else. Self-diagnosis is not legitimate and is often incorrect. If someone looks for a disorder they will find a disorder. Also many self-diagnosed people say that their condition does not present with any problems for them and they use that as the reason why they don't need a professional diagnosis. In reality, if you think you have a condition but it does not present any problems then you actually do not have a condition. Mental disorders are not just clusters of symptoms, by definition they must cause some sort of functional impairment that goes beyond subjective impressions of being atypical.

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Last edited by Willard on 01 Oct 2011, 9:09 pm, edited 2 times in total.

You wouldn't happen to be related to Dark_Lord_2008, would you?

That's because people who do not have a disorder tend not to be looking for them. If you are looking for a diagnosis, it's generally because something is wrong and you are looking for the cause. You might not find it, but you're not looking for it just for the sheer fun of it. At least that's what I've seen and experienced.



Haven't seen too much of that around these parts. For me in particular, I've got the symptoms, they do cause functional impairments, but I am not in any hurry to start trying to work with doctors, possibly going through several rounds of it, just to get a diagnosis and follow-up treatment that may or may not help assuming it even happens. (The fact that I dread this process far more than the average person would is another point in favor of me being on the spectrum) So I'll stay self-diagnosed for now.

I am fine if people say they may have it or might or could. Sometimes people don't even need a diagnoses despite their impairments because they already get support from people around them and the fact they have a steady job and a family who understands them. Sometimes they already get support from the system due to other disabilities they have so they don't need another label because it won't do them anything. It doesn't matter if they are mild moderate or severe.

Last edited by League_Girl on 27 Sep 2011, 12:31 am, edited 1 time in total.

In as much as I agree with your opinions (100%), you are about to find out that they will not endear you to the many self-diagnosed Aspies members here.

There are other mental, emotional, and perceptive disorders that can mask or distort one's own perceptions of his or her own symptoms. There is also "Confirmation Bias", in which an individual will eventually find enough "evidence" to support his or her opinions - unfortunately, this "evidence" is subjectively derived, and should not be used in place of an "official" diagnosis.

You may also want to check out this poll and thread: "Is Self-Diagnosis Valid?". Your participation in that thread is welcome.

This time last year I was self-diagnosed myself. I didn't make anything of it though. I waited until a psychiatrist and an autism specialist diagnosed me. Until then I was a plain old paranoid schizophrenic. Even though I hadn't been diagnosed with Aspergers it was clear there was something different about me, to the point I was medicated and kept in regular contact with mental health services.

According to the standards of diagnostics if an impairment isn't caused which significantly affects quality of life then it is not diagnosable. Anybody who truly has Aspergers needs to be diagnosed.

I see some people are still banging the same old drum. Move on. We've heard it all before and it's getting tiresome. Self satisfied and wholly ignorant pronouncements about other peoples lives which really are none of your business anyway.

I agree with you really strongly "thisisautism". One can't go round sticking medical labels on oneself at will. It's completely unfair to the people to whom the label actually applies.

At the same time, according to a recent documentary, there could be an estimated 40,00 to 80,000 people in my country alone who have some form of undiagnosed autism. Translated into worldwide terms it seems an enormous number and therefore I suppose there are a lot of people around who show varying levels of autistic symptoms and who notice it. I am new to this forum and I do wonder when I see people describing themselves as "Aspies" what exactly that amounts to and on whose authority it is said. I don't think anyone should self diagnose anything.

I'm in my late fifties and have always (ie from earliest childhood) had what I would describe as "some quasi-autistic character traits" (no more than that) and these have in many ways shaped my life. So I'm trying to find out whether these character traits have anything to do with real autism. Maybe they do, maybe they don't. Perhaps there should be a separate section of WrongPlanet for the undiagnosed, the confused, the deluded and the mildly affected where we can try to sort ourselves out prior to deciding whether we need to consult a psychologist at all.

Yes, I thought that too...

Give it is rest, while I do not have an official DX I strongly match the profile for AS and my aspie wife pointed out that I had it. I went for several years refusing the accept that I had AS, after one of the worst days of my life I sat down and considered seriously the question of who and what I am.

I am a physical scientist educated beyond PhD level, so I started to use my own training in problem solving on myself. I went through a gruelling process of looking very hard at myself.

I have taken close to every diagnostic test for autism, and I keep testing positive for autism. The flavour of autism which I match most closely is AS. But I hold the view that no firm border exists between HFA and AS. While I have worked with some people who are likely to also have AS, I have never discussed it with anyone at work. I refuse to out myself at this stage of my life, if I get an official DX and am unsackable then I will be likely to out myself.

But until then I will be a crypto-aspie, I hold the view that crypto-aspies (with or without official DXs) should be left in peace. Also the AS community should be accepting of those who can not afford a DX, or dare not get a DX for professional reasons. In some places a AS DX might cause a person to be unable to get the security clearance required for some types of work, I hold a view that some aspies can be trusted with sensitive material in the same way some NTs can be trusted.

"Functional impairment" is a subjective category. In children or kids there's not so much obvious impairment. As a kid I had so severe behavioral problems (at 2nd grade) that for some schools it might have caused kicking me out. Was it an impairment? It wasn't for me that I could get away with it, it was for my mother who had some respect among the teachers, being a teacher (and a principal of a fellow school) herself. Later on I calmed down, but my ADHDish traits remained. Was it an impairment? Now my biggest problem is with relationships with the opposite gender, or more precisely, the lack thereof. Is it an impairment? I think so, but who knows. If I want it, I may be impaired, if I'm fine without it, I may not.

Very interesting. If you say that someone who does not believe themselves sufficiently impaired to seek a professional diagnosis does not, by definition, have an ASD, then you must believe one or more of the following to be true:

* ASDs are conditions of specific kinds of social (un-)acceptability rather than of genetic neurology
* A child who is diagnosed with an ASD who learns enough coping mechanisms to adapt as an adult no longer has the ASD
* The aforementioned child must have been incorrectly diagnosed with the ASD by virtue of their ability to adapt as an adult
* If two hypothetical identical twins, with essentially identical neurology, live in very different social contexts, one entirely unsympathetic to people with ASDs, and the other highly sympathetic, one may have an ASD and the other not
* People with ASDs cannot be happy with their lives to the point where they do not wish to commence a course of prescription medication, hours of psychotherapy, or ask for accommodations in the workplace

You also talk about the subjectivity of self-diagnosis. This is correct, but subjective assessment by another person (professional or otherwise) is still subjective. You can see evidence of this in any of the many threads and posts from people who saw several different psychiatrists before being diagnosed with an ASD. There is no set of criteria for diagnosing an ASD that is wholly objective.

I'd also like to point out that you refer to people not having "any problems". Not having "any problems" is very different to not having enough problems of enough severity to warrant spending the significant amount of time and money to go through the diagnostic process.

As for a physicist making a medical diagnosis, it would be well to consider this an act of committing the Fallacy of Irrelevant Authority, which is committed when an authority figure is reporting on something outside his or her field of expertise, the authority figure is reporting on alleged facts about which there is little or no agreement in his or her field, or there is little or no reason to believe the authority figure can be trusted.

Examples:

• There is nothing to be learned from the East, for Gilbert Ryle, the great British philosopher once said, nothing but the sun rises in the East.
• Nobody is a better judge than public opinion.
• Pacifism is a good idea because the brilliant scientist Einstein advocated it.
• I am a physicist, so I am eminently qualified to make a medical diagnosis.

No self-diagnosis should ever be considered valid without confirmation by the appropriately-trained medical authorities.

Some people here worry entirely too much about other people's access to medical care, or willingness to get a diagnosis given the possible consequences of such a diagnosis.

I don't care if people self-dx. I don't see the point in getting fired up about someone else's self-dx. I don't see the problem.

Without self-dx it's entirely possible I wouldn't have even tried to get help, because I didn't realize I needed it, or that it was available.

If other people self-DX it is completely irrelevant to my life.

I'll carry on, just like I've been carrying on for the past 28 years.

Asperger's isn't some "cool clique" that only hip, awesome popular kids are allowed to join whose parents had enough money to fork over on a "professional diagnosis."

Self-DXed Aspies: you are welcome at my place for coffee anytime.