Frustrated and despondent at this drawn out business.

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My therapist said she thinks I probably have other things that are not autism, but that she is not trained in this area so she could refer me. I said I would like to be. The waiting lists are about a year. It never got followed up and stuff about a police case the police are not being terribly helpful with came up so it kind of dropped to the wayside.

I was assessed once as a (younger) teenager but the psychologist thought it was just severe social anxiety and trauma stuff so my notes say stuff like 'interpersonal problems' and my doctor has me down as 'socially maladjusted'.

I have just sent an email asking if I am still allowed to have it followed up. I am starting group therapy for personality disorders because they think they will be able to help with my interpersonal problems, although they are unsure whether I have a PD. (Although she said to keep an eye out if it wasn't working, as that might indicate autism/not issues they can help with.)

There's problems I have that don't really fit other diagnostic categories and I wouldn't be surprised if I was BAP (at least) but I'm pretty good at chatting in therapy interviews (I can direct conversation and if I want to loop back to something that doesn't segue in, they go with it) and I have moments when I'm pretty good at short conversations.

Sometimes I (think I) can read emotions but often I am very bad at it. My wife thinks I do not truly know what empathy is or how to act on it. But I wouldn't say I can never read emotions.

I now hide most of the 'autistic' things I do at home so professionals do not see these either (this is fairly easy these days, as I have limited social interaction and only have to pull it off for short times). My therapist asked if this means I am faking it when I talk 'normally' but I think this makes it sound like I lie. I think that sometimes, with effort, I can succeed at communicating but that the things I am saying are still honest.

I am finding it very difficult to participate in my group sport, part of this is my poor hearing but I think it goes further than that - deaf people who play in my sport say that they compensate by watching and that they are very good at observing. By contrast, I find it extremely difficult to compensate in this way, find it very difficult to copy the actions I am meant to be doing in certain tactics, can only (after extensive guidance - my wife, although she is not good at skating comes to help me) identify a small number of tactical actions while watching, even when we have been doing the same drill for weeks as soon as it is put into a 'game' context. I also forget when I have more than a couple things to do in an a tactical drill For some reason I cannot cohesively imagine all four blockers coming together to pull off the tactic. I think this also probably goes beyond my dissociation problems. My team have been told (by my wife) that my hearing also creates processing difficulties as it covers either for mental health or other problems.

By contrast, for individual skills I am one of the top 3 skaters who joined at the same time of me (top two, if the skills sign offs are counted - although the two of us vary very slightly in what we can do). I am also better than most of the cohort who started 6 months before me - so it's not that I can't skate.

If I had a diagnosis, I would also feel validated in getting a pressure or weighted vest now that we cannot fit in an exercise ball for me to bounce on as we have bought a rabbit. For now I just pile layers on (although this is also because I get cold) and tie things around me tightly or pile up blankets. I don't want to seem ridiculous though. I worry that I want autism rather than have it, as I do have other problems too. I don't want to seem like I'm harping up the wrong tree but I also don't want to be missed because I can communicate in a small number of setting either. And I don't want to be given a personality disorder just because the person is trained to catch them but not other problems, if I don't have it. I want people to believe me when I say that I can't have my hearing aids turned up any louder because they hurt my ears and that I'm not just being stubborn by not wearing them as they already do if the situation is at all noisy. (The audiology department have never found any physical reason for this.)

I'm just so frustrated and tired and I want a proper assessment so someone can definitively say 'yes' or 'no', now that my problems are not being masked by social anxiety. I'm tired of being a lurker with no definitive diagnosis even though I have enough problems to land me in a 3 year programme. I wish I could have a multidisciplinary diagnostic process, where people with different expertise could work out what is wrong with me. (I have dissociation problems, but nobody where I am is qualified to diagnose them and the only diagnoses they've ever mentioned testing for are from the SCID II for personality disorders.)

I tried to cut a tonne of this out, as it was long. But it seems I failed.

I can relate strongly to you.

The main problem with mental health diagnosis, is the majority of the diagnosis share the same core symptoms and problems.

Anxiety, depression, bipolar, schizophrenia, etc... all overlap each other like circles in a vend diagram that overlap in the middle.

Until you develop key issues to specific a given mental health diagnosis, you will be "lost".

This is why I gave up on therapy, because they couldn't help me anymore until I developed key issues and I didn't feel like paying $100 month to see psychiatrist and psychologist.

The same thing is going on with me on the neurological and physical side with my chronic pain, shaking hands, shoddy and worsening fine motor skills, facial twitches, muscle twitches, muscle tightness, etc...

I have stumped the famed U of Michigan medical school specialist, John Hopkins, and Shiners.

I suggest that you get the weighted vest regardless of diagnosis.
It is not ridiculous to try something that helps you.

For diagnosis, it seems like you will have to wait a long time for the referral, unless you find another place that doesn't have a long waiting list.
I suggest that you continue on the waiting list, but in the meantime, make adjustments that you find helpful for your traits.

I don't want my wife to be cross with me if I get one. She was convinced I had autism a few years ago and made a point of bringing it up lots. But I convinced her I didn't because I was told it was just a combination of other things that made it look like autism.

She knows I like sensory things in general though and makes sure to keep on my case when I do socially odd things. I definitely have some things that have got much better, but as I've been coached and was under extreme stress at the time, I don't think that necessarily negates the possibility of me having it.

When I was looking for Christmas presents for my nephew one time she assumed I was looking for myself and asked if I wanted anything but I think she'd find it more difficult when actually faced with it. She tries to normalise things I do that even the psychologists agree are problems. Plus, I think she really hopes I'll get better at some of the things I'm bad at, but on the other hand maybe if I did get a diagnosis it would be a relief for her (she seems to blame herself or take personal offence for things I (don't) do).

Especially as there's limited research on their effectiveness, especially outside of ASD/SPD. I'm not sure she'd care too much about research but I'm not sure how else I would present my case.

I'm going to wait to see if I can get the referral to the specialist and then I'll bring it up.

I've almost got to the point where I want someone to say 'no, you definitely don't have ASD, your symptoms fit x very well and we're almost certain this will help'. But the honest truth is that diagnostic lines are blurry. I know and have discussed how I don't think I fit into anything exactly and that I fit the criteria for several things but it doesn't mean I necessarily have them.

So frustrating.

Especially as I've got an effective mask for my symptoms - I appear odd, I know that but I doubt people guess what's actually going on under the surface.