Guardian article: girls with autism are 'let down' by drs

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Article in the Guardian highlighting the difficulties girls with ASD have obtaining a diagnosis.

My best friend has done a lot of research on this issue.

It's 100% true. Female behaviors often mask autism.

I don't know what's more disgusting-- that it still is this way, or that the stigmas and stereotypes make me hope for the sake of my fellow Aspie chicks that it stays this way.

I don't know how many times I have been told to "buy an issue of Cosmo and learn to act like a woman." And this by people who know what I am!

The real pathology, if you ask me, is a narrow-minded culture.

Lol I love the "but you look so normal" or "you don't look like an aspie". Why, because I'm a woman?

Also, on a more serious note, it really worries me that women are not being diagnosed at a young age or getting help. How can people think that it's a good idea to let a socially vulnerable girl grow up without any help or guidance to deal with these symptoms? Do they not realize the consequences for these women in terms of mental health later on?

I am only in the middle of getting a diagnosis now, and that's because my mum researched it, suggested it to me, and has supported me through getting a diagnosis. She took me to the doctor's when I was little, about different things and they always said I would grow out of it.

*head desk*

So. Much. Drama. With. Diagnosis. Related. Topics.

Seriously? I swear, you have to be persistent to get a doctor to do their job these days. That's also not fair; being a girl doesn't mean you can possibly have Autism? Wow.

It used to be widely believed here that only boys got autism. Probably among the older generations that would still be widely held.

One thing I do blame is the media's representation of autistic conditions. Only boys and men are featured unless the article is specifically about how autism presents differently in women. Anything general such as an adult's experience of living with autism, or a parent's experience of raising an autistic child, there isn't a female in sight. NT/AS couples life stories are quite commonplace, but only ever featuring an NT woman + AS man. No other combination exists apparently.

Because we don't think it works that way no diagnosis even if the different signs are there so why does this happen?

This thread is where the over use of sexist is totally overdone.

Your calling it sexist to suggest that sexual difference exists between men and woman.

Yet at the same time there's a 4-1 diagnosis ratio.

Now whether or not that 4-1 is based on signs of autism being different in woman or if that 4-1 is because woman get it less than men, it does not make the biological difference.

Than to blame the doctors to say they just refuse to acknowledge that woman get aspergers, is absurd.

The issue is a little more in dept.

And any use of the words sexist, or something as childish as that is totally side tracking the issue.

There's a vested interest in all parties to find the role gender plays on autism, this ain't the 1960's.