How to code for ASD on SF-256?

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I have an interview tomorrow with Bender Consulting, the firm that helps match persons with disabilities with federal agencies hiring under Schedule A or with private firms seeking to increase disability hiring. Among things they will be wanting me to fill out is SF-256, which we will be discussing tomorrow. For those who have disclosed their ASD to the US government on SF-256, did you only use 91 for Psychiatric Disability? ASD can also be considered an intellectual disability, but I don't want to be lumped in with the mentally ret*d. If I complete forms for Part II -- Other Disabilities as well, it's going to be an even bigger mess, because Goldenhars cuts across so many disability areas they list.

I would be asking Bender Consulting those questions.

But I would also make sure that they understand ASD doesn't mean reduced mental capacity, only specific sentivities and person-person interaction. All else is good.

I don't consider it to be either a Psychiatric or Intellectual disability, it's a Neurological Dysfunction. Would they have people with Dyslexia classify themselves as having a mental illness or retardation?

People have got to start differentiating disabilities involving brain processing dysfunctions from those involving psychological imbalance, they are not the same thing, and letting the Government classify you incorrectly can screw up the rest of your life.

I totally agree, Willard. The form tries to pigeonhole people and appears to have been created by a moron. In the case of ASD it reinforces the stereotype in the media and popular belief that Aspies are maniacs, rather than persons with a neurological condition that sometimes cooccurs with certain psychiatric disorders. The former stereotype likely cost me not only my job but my career as well as making it hell to find a new job -- any job. We don't tolerate discrimination against people with Parkinson's or ALS, even revere figures such as Michael J. Fox and Stephen Hawking. People need to be made to understand that Asperger's is also a neurological condition and similarly can be managed though not cured. I don't even understand using the form. Why not have a restricted access of database of diseases and conditions, then allow persons to check off the frequent systemic manifestations or disabilities associated, so there is a record if disability issues should occur? As I indicated, it gets even messier for me as a person on the oculoauriclovertebral spectrum as well. It would be much easier if I could just indicate hemifacial microsomia and check off which facets I display, e.g. croniofacial underdevelopment, refractive amblyopia, tinnitus, scoliosis, facial paralysis, etc. For that matter, as a competent neurologist would point out, my ASD is also just another neurological manifestation of the parent oculoauriculovertebral syndrome. I was glad that the psychiatrist that I had to consult for a second opinion for my disability retirement evaluation picked right up on that. I expected having to go through the battery of ASD tests I've already taken online, but he knew his neurology well enough that he realized that it might be stranger to have Goldenhars or hemifacial microsomia without ASD than with ASD.