Diagnosis and Disability: check.

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My suspicions were confirmed today, and I was finally diagnosed as having Asperger's Syndrome. Now I am having doubts.

Originally, the psychologist mentioned an arsenal of testing and interviewing over two or three appointments. I went in for my "intake" appointment earlier today, and after spending an hour with me, she agreed that I have AS and that she didn't feel the need to do any additional testing.

Does that make the diagnosis less valid? Do I present my symptoms so severely that tests would be useless?

I got myself all worked up over the rigorous mental strain I was expecting to face, and all it took was an hour-long diagnostic interview. I'm finding it hard to express joy, relief, excitement, even though everyone is telling me that is what I should be feeling.

After a year of struggling to get on disability and get diagnosed, it happens within a week with no questions asked. I'm left with a very unsettled feeling, like all of the build-up should have culminated to something more overwhelming than, "Yeah, okay. Here's disability and a diagnosis."

Maybe I just need to wait for the shock to wear off.

When I went in for my testing, the specialist told me that there are some people who are so obviously AS or NT that she can stop testing after about an hour and give them their diagnosis. I was a borderline case so I had to go through the whole battery of tests.

It sounds a little weird that she would do no testing at all, even just to confirm her suspicions-- was your interview just an unstructured interview or was it one of the actual diagnostic interviews where they ask you specific questions about your history and stuff?

It's ok to feel whatever you are feeling after your diagnosis. I personally was shocked and surprised that I met the criteria for an official diagnosis even though it wasn't really a surprise given my symptoms and history. It's not weird I would think to feel how you are after struggling so hard for so long and then having it confirmed so quickly.

I had my intake the beginning of June and was told then that they believe I am on the Spectrum. Next week, I go for 6-7 hours of tests to find out where on the Spectrum I am. Maybe different practices do it differently?

I felt confused, sad, relieved and numb - all at the same time. It felt really weird. Now that I have had time to absorb it all, I feel like a huge burden has been lifted from my shoulders. New (more positive) attitude at work, and really trying hard to figure out the world I live in - which apparently not the world I thought it was.

I'm always skeptical when a doctor says right away someone has AS after one session or a few minutes of meeting them. No one ever picked up had it until after lot of sessions and it took more than one day to more than one session to diagnose me, a lot more sessions and they did tests. Symptoms over lap and you can't diagnose someone over one or two things. Even a doctor told my husband he shows signs of autism but didn't throw the label at him because she said it would take a lot more sessions for her to know if he has it or not. I suspect that is what doctors do and this one didn't do it because she was smart and a good one.

I honestly think one of my former doctors decided after one talk with my mother for like 15 minutes I have it just to get it over with and not bother with the whole thing when I was questioning if I had it or not or if I was misdiagnosed. From my experience a doctor will quickly say you have it after one or few symptoms you mention or show if they are aware of your diagnoses, especially if you are questioning it.

Are doctors really too lazy to do their jobs so they quickly diagnose just to get them out of there? At least really good ones won't toss a label at you right away and will want to keep seeing you to rule everything else out first before knowing what you truly have than just quickly labeling you just so you won't come back and they will keep on seeing new patients.


If I walk into an office and then right away a doctor mentions what may be wrong with me and gives me the label, I would be so skeptical I would throw it out the window and think that doctor is too quick to label patients before they know their whole history and think of them as being lazy and arrogant. I had a shrink that once mentioned I had some oppositional defiance in me but just imagine if he decided I had ODD over a few things? But he was smart so he didn't say I had it and he wasn't so quick to diagnose anyone. Even he said I didn't have it, just that I have some oppositional defiance in me, not ODD. If he were one of those doctors, he may have said I had it. So someone can have a few quirks that are common in AS but that doesn't mean they have it. But that is just how it feels when someone is quickly labeled with it. Even I don't think I have ODD because there is no distress and impairment and I am not like anyone who has it and I do get the urge to annoy someone when they piss me off and I tend to not want to listen if someone is disrespectful to me and rude but I hear lot of people are like that. The difference is we can control it and know to not do it if we know the consequence to our actions like if we do it at work, it can get us fired so we don't even if we do have the urge to do it. We just resist acting on it. But just imagine if I said in a doctor's office, "I don't like listening to people when they are rude and mean so I do the opposite just to piss them off" and right away he said I have ODD before getting to really know me and he just ASSumed and jumped to a conclusion. I feel that is what doctors do with AS.


Maybe I feel this way because I was hard to diagnose and lot of doctors didn't pick up on autism when I was little (except for my toddler years when doctors thought I had it) and said they didn't see it and it took me lot of sessions and it astounds me how others can be so quickly diagnosed it like it's so easy to get diagnosed and just tell the doctor what they want to hear to give you the label. I wonder how do you see autism in someone when you only see them for one hour a day and you don't see them often and you aren't with them 24/7 or you only see them for only one session and that's it.

Well, I had been discussing the assessment with her via email for a few weeks prior to actually meeting. She knew that I suspected I had AS, and that I wanted to be tested for autism spectrum disorders in general.

I have developed a fairly solid "act" that I put on for people to appear NT, but I was so anxious that I was 100% my stimming, gaze-avoidant self. It's been months since I've gone into Seattle, and traffic was terrible on the way there. I was scared we were going to be late, totally overwhelmed sensory-wise, and quite miserable. Basically, she got a good view of how I typically act (I'm usually an anxious wreck these days due to home renovations and school being out.)

The interview was more along the lines of diagnostic than not; she asked me questions about my childhood, relationships (family, friends, etc,) work history, educational background, etc. A lot of the questioning sounded like it was coming from the DSM (ex: repetitive/restricted behaviors, unusual interests, etc.) She also went through a differential set of questions because she wanted to find out if I had any psychotic elements, which it turns out I don't. What she decided was that I was very clearly AS/HFA, with strong elements of OCD (though not enough to be diagnosed) with the usual depression and anxiety components.

I didn't leave with any paperwork stating my diagnosis, but she said if I needed it in writing she would gladly do so. She told me that she didn't think testing was necessary.

So, I guess maybe I was one of those "cut and dry" cases? Or was I just told what I wanted to hear? I guess I'll never know. My mom's insurance for mental health is abysmal at best; this psychologist was the only one covered by my insurance that was willing to do the assessment.