"Do you consider yourself autistic" what does that

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So i had a descussion with my support worker whom i see every week or so and while in the topic of me having Aspergers he said " Do you consider yourself Autisctic ". I did'nt know exactly what to say to reply to him
because i may missunderstand what he said to me like i should know what that meant? Any answers to this ? Or how would you answer that?

I thought about the question as he was drivng me back home and i never brought it back up so i thought to ask on here for any opinions.

BTW i was diagnosed because my mother had sent me to a mental health place and was diangosed with aspergers and now i am reciving support and taking medication to help.

It depends what you were talking about in the lead-up to that. If you told him that you were diagnosed because of your mother without explicitly stating that you yourself suspected Asperger's, then perhaps that's why he asked 'Do you consider yourself Autistic?'.

I can't really think of any other reason he would ask that if he knew you were diagnosed.

When asked whether I think a certain label applies to a person or group, I say what it is I mentally try to do when I am tempted to go around labeling folks. (Examples of labels that seem popular fodder for casual speculation are: Alcoholic, Addict, Aspergers, Autistic, Dysfunctional, Codependent, Gay, OCD, ADHD, and so on.)

I usually try to remember to respond with something along the lines of: "Gee, I dunno. I don't have the diagnostic criteria memorized; and even if I did I don't think I'm qualified to apply them."

I have adopted this approach because it seems that all too often heated discussions can flare up about whether a certain label applies when, truth be known, those involved in the debate have failed to first agree on a definition of the label.

A favorite example from my personal experience was when someone in my family once asked: "Do you think our family is dysfunctional?" I did not want to go there in our discussion because I knew we would just go around and around. So, in one of my few moments of clarity, I responded: "I dunno. Guess we would first have to figure out what a functional family would look like." That ended it - one of the very few examples where I was able to think and respond on my feet, and sidestep a loaded question.

He is your support worker--I'd assume he is trying to understand and support you.

When I hear the word autistic, the first thing that comes to mind is low functioning autism, because that's what I had always associated it with before I found out I had Asperger's. So while I am definitely on the spectrum, I don't naturally think of myself as autistic.

That's all your social worker wanted to know: Does the word 'autistic' match your perception of yourself? In my case, it's no.

Absolutely the only (purely technical) difference between High Functioning Autism and Asperger Syndrome is a slight speech delay in early childhood. Asperger Syndrome IS autism.

Not thinking of oneself as autistic when you have AS, is just a form of denial. Toe-may-toe, toe-mah-toe, they're the same thing.

Maybe he was just asking to clarify whether or not you were aware of that.

I consider myself Aspie-Autistic. I can say I am aspie and that fits me, I can say I am autistic and that fits me also. The concept is similar to being Jewish-American or Italian-American. There are certain characteristics I have that are different then Kanners-Autisim but there are more similarities then differences. And I am officialy diagnosed with Aspergers under the DSM IV and Autism Spectrum Disorder under the DSM 5

I am hoping then when the new Wrong Planet software it will allow me to change my user name instead of having to create a whole new account. If this feature is added I will change my user name to AS-ASDPartOfMe.

More importantly if there is a DSM 5A they change Autism Spectrum Disorder Level 1 to Aspergers-Autism, Autism Spectrum Disorder Level 3 to Kanners-Autism. I have not figured out what to call Autism Spectrum Disorder Level 2 yet