"fake aspies" and self diagnosis. DISLIKE, sorry.

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He advice to go through low-income psych care for a diagnosis in the US is potentially quite bad advice. Those parts of the system are often entirely ignorant about developmental conditions in adults. And even the developmental service systems often don't know about any but the absolute most stereotypical autistic adults. I have an autism diagnosis but I have watched the local diagnostic process for poor people and most people, even those who clearly meet all the criteria for an AS diagnosis, end up getting diagnosed with depression, anxiety, or psychotic withdrawal, maybe a personality disorder or two because nobody here knows anything about autism in adults. And psych places look for psych conditions and don't tend to diagnose developmental conditions accurately (many knowing only stereotypes of autism).

IDK, I could be a considered a fake Aspie but I went through all the same kinds of tests as a kid, they just weren't conclusive. I have ADHD anyway(diagnosed) so I'm not a complete phoney. I think I'm probably a very borderline Aspie.

IDK, I could be a considered a fake Aspie but I went through all the same kinds of tests as a kid, they just weren't conclusive. I have ADHD anyway(diagnosed) so I'm not a complete phoney. I think I'm probably a very borderline Aspie.

What I mean by "broken arm" is that about a month ago I fell off a skateboard in my garage and broke my arm. Reduction required minor surgery and the implantation of a metal plate in my wrist. The bills are mounting, but the state won't help because I get $704/month for watching my daughter, which to them means I'm capable of earning a wage and thus not deserving of assistance, and since I don't have the diagnosis of a disability, I'm not disabled - and the people at the local offices don't have the authority to decide that I'm disabled based on my own experiences; they need paperwork from physicians or psychiatrists in order to make the determination.

Without that paperwork, I can't get assistance to see a psychiatrist to get the paperwork. Catch-22. And they seem perfectly content to watch these bills drive me out into the street, if that's what I have to do to get assistance (currently, I live with my ex-wife and her husband - our relationship is, er, interesting, but we like it).

Honestly, even the most well-known AS professionals make mistakes.

Psychiatry isn't absolute science. There are some tests that are good, yes. However, testing can be expensive. People wonder why I did not get tested at school. Part of it was because I've feared the idea of being somebody's lab rat; I was a troubled kid, known to be rude to authorities and anyone else who happened to come near me. But another reason is because all the teachers really care about is your marks. If you do well in school, the teachers would often be willing to make exceptions for you because they can see that you're working really hard.

Also. There are other reasons why people don't get tested. Not everyone knows about AS, and sometimes, even though people can see that there's something off about you, they don't quite know what it is. The media's portrayal of AS/autism is very different from how it manifests itself in real people. Which really skews people's picture of what AS is.

In addition, many self-diagnosed people here are in their older ages. AS only entered the DSM in 1991. Therefore, it makes sense that they weren't diagnosed eariler.

I think the main thing is identifying with other people on the spectrum, as well as having people who are close to you offer their opinion. If the majority of them feel comfortable acknowledging that you have AS, then you probably do have it. I'm all for the self-diagnosed people seeing a professional. However, it can be expensive and thus unaccessible to some. I've also read some posts on here where people said that they prepared for their assessment so that they could come across as being more autistic. That is ridiculous, and a wrong diagnosis is entirely possible. And it is a shame. The whole point of it is to come across as yourself so that the right diagnosis could be granted.

And yes, it's ridiculous to make your decision based on reading some random articles on the Internet. But I do believe that not all self-diagnosed Aspies are fake.

sinsboldly wrote:

I was noticed, as a child. I was diagnosed with Mild Autistic Tendencies, at the age of 5 and a half.

I really prefer just to take a person's word for it.

Who am I to accuse someone of faking? Who am I to add to anyone's personal pain by being holier-than-thou about my diagnosis? Further, even when somneone HAS a diagnosis, how does that suddenly become the gospel truth, written by the hand of God? How many of us (like me) had four or five incorrect diagnoses before we arrived at Asperger's? So, why are we claiming that someone else's doctor (or our own) MUST have been correct on this one?

I really hate threads like this. no matter the motives or intentions. People need support and they need their questions answered. They should not feel like outcasts their whole lives, just to come to an online community and feel like an outcast again.

That's shameful.

i didn;t mean it in a militious way, sorry if you took it like that. Also @Kiley they do an EEG to monitor brainwaves to check for seizures as I sometimes black out and they thought that was related to my Aspergers. I didn;t realise I'd offend anybody and I double checked by saying sorry in the title.

I don't care if you dislike my self diagnosis.

Maybe it depends on the kind of self-dx'ed people you're seeing. If you're talking under 20 years old, there's probably some still coolness factor in pretending to have a psych diagnosis. As time goes on I'd expect that to end pretty rapidly, though. Psych conditions are highly stimagtized in most of the adult world.

If you're talking about older people, you have to remember that no one checked any kids for AS before 1994. And the checks that kids get nowadays are paid for with taxpayer money -- adults have to pay on their own. Your mentioning EEG's and such makes me think you had a really thorough and thus expensive assessment, even if you didn't pay for it. I saw someone on here yesterday say that the total cost of their assessment was about $5000 (holy sh*t).

Also, the diagnostic process doesn't seem to be standardized. If someone has an official dx you don't know if they got it through a 1-hour interview, or a lot more intense testing like you did. Do you also feel uncomfortable with people with the 'quicky' diagnoses?

I think we all tend to assume that our personal experience is the norm. I.e. if someone is diagnosed by asking their GP, and it's all realtively painless and simple, they assume that's how it is everywhere for everyone. There are endless stories here of GP's, psychologists, psychiatrists, and others telling people things like "you made eye contact once, so you can't possibly have AS." I was told by UCSF Medical Center that if you can dial the phone and ask about assessments, then you don't need one, because you can't possibly have an ASC.

As far as precison, and this is just IMHO: I understand, but my experiences in the world leave me with the thought that little in life is known "for certain." I've seen doctors engage in all manner of human folly and screw up with regard to health issues for 20 years. I don't see people with PhD's as gods, doctors are not automatically geniuses, and people with great credentials don't always know what they're doing. It's hard to live with that knowledge, always wondering if the ground you stand on is shifting sand. Certainty is so much more comfortable. But that doesn't necessarily make it more true.