What was the process of your diagnoses?

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My first diagnoses was done casually, after one session with my Psychologist he saw the very traits he has been seeing for the past 15 years working with children all over the spectrum, he simply had a talk with my dad and asked about my early childhood and as a toddler and he came up with the diagnoses which no one was really expecting even though all my family agreed something was 'off' about me. after over a year i was hospitalized and the psychologist and psychiatrist didn't see the Autism traits because i could talk, and they said i was knew i was different when apparently 'autistic people are oblivious to the fact that they're different' which we all know is false. After my stay, the hospital psychologist insisted i get a learning disability test and I.Q test. after i got my results, it was clear i was on the spectrum, even more so than before. My Verbal I.Q was below average and my Information Processing Speed was below average as well, which ruled out Nonverbal learning disability, dyslexia and dyscaliculia. but it did bring up a possible diagnoses of Auditory Processing Disorder, which upon research is also found upon the spectrum as a Co-diagnoses. what was the process you went through?

4 steps:

Interview/Assessment with ASD specialist. (3 hours)

face to face/sit down IQ test with same specialist. (3 hours)

Reading/Writing test (2 hours)

Final meeting and diagnosis (2 hours).

All steps were done with the same specialist (Owns/runs Autism clinic).

Mine was very similar to jcq126's. As to the events leading up to it:

I'd suspected I was autistic since my earlyish twenties. I had a burnout at age 26, brought on or at least compounded by the confusing work environment I had, vagueness everywhere, never knowing whether I was doing the right thing or not. I was already being treated for depression and insomnia, so I approached my psychiatrist about AS. They pre-screened me using an interview with me and one with my mother, then decided there were no grounds for a full assessment. I think this was largely down to me being able to hold down a job (somewhat) and living on my own, a story many others will find familiar.

Then when I was 30 I had another episode of poor mental health. I was in the catchment area of a different psych clinic; they reviewed my history from a few years back and found it notable that a longish course of cognitive therapy and various medications hadn't helped much. They also wondered what their colleagues had been thinking when they turned me down for a full assessment. So in December of 2010 I got my formal diagnosis after some interviews, IQ test and a couple of other tests. (And wow, did I have different scores in different subtests of the IQ test.)

It does seem rather arbitrary in many cases. AS is such a good match for my experience with sensory issues, social problems and various other things associated that I think my diagnosis is correct, though.

I don't even remember, I was a kid then when diagnosed and it was a very hard year for me. I only remember filling out a questionnaire when I was 11 and 12 and my psychiatrist looked at those. My parents did one too on me and so did my teacher. Then I remember seeing him a lot and he and my mom always talked.

An interview and a whole lot of standardized tests (including: an IQ test; puzzle-type tests; social skills tests; horrible test of attention; achievement tests) done over two full days with a neuropsychologist who specializes in ASDs.

After the testing the neuropsychologist talked to my mom about my childhood.

Finally I went to a follow-up appt. where I got my diagnostic report.