Turns out... I actually do have AS!! !

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Well..... just thought I would make a post about this.

I have had a tentative diagnosis for some time now, and it has been confirmed this past week. I officially have Asperger's Syndrome. I got a letter and everything.

Did anyone else feel "weird" seeing their name and Asperger's Syndrome/High Functioning Autism in the same sentence? It made me feel strange and almost "sick". I am obviously still "me"..... Why does it make me feel so weird?

Congratulations Whipstitches!

and yeah, it does seem 'weird' to have a piece of paper credentialing what we diagnosed ourselves with as valid.

I'm sorry to hear this. Gee ... .

I got rejected at the intake today. They said they could not treat me, as my case was clearly one of an aspi, so I should find a genuine specialist ... . To me this is a diagnosis of AS.

Given that I'm only borderline aspi (I did most tests and I'm 50/50 NT/AS), I was shocked because some women close to me have more pronounced aspi traits ... they though refuse to visit a therapist.

I'm sad and depressed and I worry about my female aspi friends and family. I love them!

Congrats!!
I would really love to get a "real" diagnosis...for closure and whatnot...

I would like to know...whether I am an Aspie...or a PDD-NOSy....or just a weirdo toe-walking, stimming-pacing, non-driving, meltdown-having. blah blah...message-board addicted woman-child hypochondriac...or something else...

All i have is an "assessment"...an AS specialist's opinion based on an interview...that I am an aspie..and she said I could treat her opinion as a diagnosis....didn't really need to take the tests...and while at first seemed to give me closure, it gradually faded to a state of permanent confusion and doubt.

I later went to see a psychiatrist because I am trying to get on ADD meds. He said that the assessment was likely accurate...but admitted to not knowing very much about "childhood disorders" like AS.
Wrote PDD-NOS on my chart...alongside generalized anxiety....but that does not count as a formal diagnosis either..
Was told that while it was likely that I have ADD, my previous ADD diagnosis (which enabled me to be on meds) did not count..and that I would most likely need the prohibitively expensive tests....Gave me script for Wellbutrin...which often makes me cry and yell and feel disoriented..so I stopped taking it...lucky I tried it via some that someone gave me...because even the generic is prohibitively expensive without insurance.

I would be happy with just an ADD diagnosis..if that meant I could get on meds that actually work.

The mask is cracking.

You don't have to pretend to be one of them anymore.

Let it go, it's liberating.

You got a letter? Cool! (And, congratulations!! !)

I'll admit that I was very reluctant to even research AS at first. What if I actually had it?

Then, I answered the question: "What if I actually have it?" - Well, I decided that it would be better to know than not. I decided to take a closer look at it & just accept what I found.

It really was a number of years before I felt comfortable with the idea of me having AS. But when I started to really research it, I quickly decided to take ownership of it. AS is what made me who I am - I just went through 50 years of my life not knowing it.

My psychologist didn't give me a letter, though. But when we completed my evaluation, he did tell me that I met all of the diagnostic criteria. I felt validated.

Congratulations!

I guess it may feel weird if seen as something "bad" or as a "disease".

But I think you already know it is not, and will soon feel normal again. But better because now you officially know what you always had, anyway.

Thanks for all of the comments folks! I really appreciate it. For those of you who are still struggling.... hang in there! It has taken me about a year to get the diagnosis. I started with a general therapist who is not able to diagnose anything. She in turn urged me to talk to my family doctor about getting a psycho-educational assessment. This assessment consisted of an IQ test, some achievement tests,, a structured interview and several of the AS/HFA self rating scales and surveys. I was lucky and managed to get a grant to pay for it (~$900 test session). The psychologist that did the assessment gave the tentative diagnosis of Asperger's Syndrome and suggested that I follow up with a psychiatrist. My regular therapist assembled the test results, the psychologist interview notes and her own notes into a package for the psychiatrist. I prepared a document (that I sent ahead of myself) for the doctor to read. In this document I basically had the DSM-IV criteria for Asperger's Syndrome all spelled out word for word just like it is in the publication, only I filled in examples of things about me that fit the different categories. The doctor read the stuff and then he had a series of questions for me. At the end of the whole thing he said, "I think you have discovered yourself". From there we talked about how it made me feel and a few other related things. I got a letter because I was registering with disability services at school. I was going to go to graduate school this fall and was trying to get a private study carol or office space because of sensory issues. As it turns out.... I chickened out of school. I have been having some severe panic attacks about school. It is partly me and partly my daughter. She is four and has a PDD-NOS diagnosis. I was going to have to leave her in daycare all day and I was starting to freak out about that, too. I have a routine at home and am scared to leave it behind.

All in all..... that is how I got the diagnosis. Oh yeah.... I found out about AS because it was suggested that my daughter might have some sort of PDD/ASD and/or ADHD. Such a long and winding road it has been......

I am beginning to feel that way, but I'm also worrying that I might be using AS as an excuse not to be more ambitious.

P.S. Graduate school was just a way for me to avoid the real world. I have an expensive piece of paper on my wall that I don't use that proves it.

I was dx with AS in the summer of 2007

It was like the psychologist gave me a pair of gloves and said, "I think you will find these a perfect fit"

On paper, she was off course correct, but my extreme over identification with my adaptive self was so refined through childhood trauma and various 'NT' 'self-help' groups, that I felt way too NT cultured to feel comfortable in the company of most aspie groups.

It is different now two years on, as I feel I am slowly starting to feel my true self.

I have and I continue to be in a 'process' of integration.

Two years ago it just felt like two strangers within me were meeting in a waiting room. They felt extremely uncomfortable with each other.

One part of me (my deeply wounded child within) ached to be loved and not abandoned. The other part of me just wanted to be left alone. This reconciliation of seemingly irreconcilable opposites was achieved through the Dx.

I became a great actor as if my life depended upon doing so, which as a child it did. I would be beaten and humiliated by my parents for my difference, so I learned to 'play out of my skin' and attune myself to their needs.

These two parts of me are slowly being integrated, and the grief and loss which is inseparably connected with embracing my aspie self can at times be crushing.

The joy of the dx was the joy that comes with 'coming home' yet the cries of loneliness and desolation have been hard to bare as i slowly start listening deeply and attentively to this part of me (my aspie soul) that out of survival I had to hide so deeply and so effectively for so long.

I feel hope now, but no longer insulated from my extreme adaptive self, I feel the world with an intensity that is rather new for me.

Chris

It was a weird experience for me in some respects, getting the official diagnosis a couple of months ago. I was surprised because I'd been expecting some kind of elation at finding out, and at having some kind of official defense against employers who seemed to be trying to force me into ways of working that were clearly harmful to me. I'd been tense all the way through the procedure, ever since first asking for a referral and sifting through the lists of diagnosticians trying to find a good one, and was expecting that at last I'd be able to relax.

But when I was first told the DX was positive, I just felt strange. That seemed odd.....it's not as if AS is a terminal illness. The only thing that had changed, surely, was that I now had a name for what had been troubling me all these years, and perhaps with that name I might begin to tackle it more effectively. Objectively I seemed to have a lot to be elated about, but emotionally it was another matter.

It's hard to describe the grave feelings it gave me. Perhaps the biggest problem was that previously I'd spent my entire life thinking that everybody else must be essentially just like me, so if I felt a certain way about a certain experience, so would anybody else. Aspies are not reknowned for their ability to predict how other people might feel, but I'd always done my best on the assumption that they were pretty much like me....and now, suddenly, I had to grasp that they weren't like me; they were strange creatures called neurotypicals whose brains were wired differently to mine. Enduring rules of engagement such as "do as you would be done by" could never again be used with confidence.

And there's still a sense of emptiness - that no matter how sympathetic the diagnostician was, the rest of the world may reject the concept or just fail to understand what it means. I've already seen evidence of how little difference it can make - when I told my GP, her only reaction was to make sure I understood that I'd be getting no NHS help for the condition whatsoever - if AS made me anxious or depressed I could have sedatives or antidepressants, beyond that, nothing. It would have been nice if the GP had said "well, your DX explains why we've had so much trouble understanding you - Aspies often have a hard time getting what they need from others. We'll try to make your sessions here a little more Aspie-friendly in future. Perhaps you'd like to give a little thought to what changes we could make in order to get you to feel more able to talk to us? As you're better at communicating in writing than face-to-face, here's an email address - have a think about what we can do to help, and we'll give it our best attention." But it didn't happen that way, and I expect that my condition will be met with the same apathy in many walks of life.

There was also what some have called the psychosomatic effect - I may be less likely to attempt a thing if it looks outside the capabilities of the "standard Aspie," which may mean that I won't achieve things that I could be entirely capable of.

All in all, though, if I could press a button that would make me forget I'd ever heard of Aspergers Syndrome, I wouldn't press it. Knowing what I have has to be a good thing in the long run. A lot of my problems make more sense to me now, though it's hard to see any great change for the good as a result of that clarification. Life is a long song, and it takes time for such a profound shift in the way I view myself to show through as new coping strategies. I like to think that a door has opened for me that will eventually get me places I couldn't have got to without it. Just that it's a big change, and even if it's a good change, I'm not going to take kindly to it until I'm really used to the idea.

Dude. Jethro Tull. Very cool.

Yes Ian Anderson always was good with words wasn't he?

I always thought he knew my brain was 'thick as a brick'

One of the tattoos in my 'to be done' notebook is to have "My words but a whisper, Your deafness a SHOUT." done in script across my upper chest...