Telling parents...

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Hey everyone. I suspect I have aspergers but to be officially evaluated is kind of expensive, so I need to tell my suspictions to my parentes so they can set an appointment with a specialist. But telling parents you may have aspergers is very hard. Not exactly news they would like to hear...

So, I was wondering, for you that received a late diagnosis (or have a self-diagnosis), how is it you told your parents? How did they react to it?

My parents think (or I believe they do) I'm completely normal and I am sure if I told them I think I have aspergers they will tell me that I have a low self-steem and that I have to stop thinking there's something weird about me.

If your parents are supportive, telling them about your suspicions might be helpful. But from your description, it seems they would be dismissive.

Have you taken any of the self assessments available online? If you scored in the range for Asperger's then you have evidence that is more than simple opinion. Not definitive evidence, but certainly something indicative of a positive diagnosis.

Maybe have your parent fill out those same assessments. Then compare your answers. There are several out there. Have them do all of them. Your parents may be saying you "have low self-steem and that I have to stop thinking there's something weird about me." because they are trying to be positive and supportive. Use the assessments as a way of having a conversation.

I did not tell my parents. My father passed away and my mother and I are not on speaking terms.

I showed my mom some info (maybe a lot) about AS and told her I felt I had many of the symptoms. I was having a lot of sleeping problems about a year later so when I went to the neurologist she just decided to make an appointment to have me diagnosed officially. My dad doesn't believe there's anything wrong with me to this day -well nothing like that at least.

My parents are in total denial of everything - which is not surprising at all, we even needed to keep my half-brothers epilepsy a secret, so there is no way tey are going to see this, (they also can't deal with my orientation)

A Psychologist told my dad, first he started with my problems, then he told him about the AS.

I told my mom via email (Se already knew that I have trouble talking to people face to face). In her reply she said that she looked up aspergers and agreed that I had several of the symptoms but didn't think I had ALL of them (I don' think she understood that one doesn't need every single symptom to have AS). She seemed really supportive and went on to say that if I really think I have aspergers, I should go for an assessment to know for sure.

About a year later she randomly told me she saw the video I posted on YouTube about how I think I have aspergers.

Mom: I saw your video on YouTube the other day.
Me: which video?
Mom: the video you did about your aspergers.

I think the fact that she said "YOUR aspergers" means she agrees that I havd it.

I haven't told my dad yet. I'm not sure how I wanna go about it because I think he has as many aspie traits as I do.

dont mean to be a butthole but technically you do need about 99% of AS symptoms in order to have AS. Traits are changeable though

I reckon you should just tell them. There probably will never be a best time to do this, so just blurt it out. Once you have said it there will be no going back, so you will just all have to deal with it.

I don't know, what does everyone else think?

In the DSM IV, you only needed 2 of 4 from part one and only 1 out of 4 on part 2.

In the DSM V, you need all 3 from part A, and 2 of the 4 symptoms from part B.

Thanks for all the replies!

I decided to do it, but I thought it was better to ask for my older sister to do it first. I asked her to answer the RAAD-S questions based on me (without knowing what it was! she thinks it's a personality test or something like mypersonalityinfo), she didn't answer it all yet. But so far, I'm very surprised! To some sentences she answers: YEEEEESS!! ! That's so you!!; or "Definitely! You Always were like this"; agreeing a lot with the aspie symptoms.
Also, it seems like I'm going to get a higher score with her replies than mine!! ! When I did it I scored around 121 (average: 22, aspie: 65 above, with no false positives among more than 2 thousand people), but I didn't know I did some of the things. Like, there was a sentence asking if I repeated quotes from TV, and my sister answered: "Yesss!! ! You did it a lot when you were little!" I was like: "I never knew it ".
I thought the one aspie symptom I didn't have was interpreting things literally, I always thought I was awesome at interpretation. I thought because of this I should doubt a diagnosis. But when my sister was answering the sentence if I interpreted things literally and missed what
people really meant, she answered: "Yes!! You do it all the time. " I was like: "no, I don't!" I couldn't believe it! I was missing what people meant all my life and I never knew it! But everyone noticed I misinterpreted things, I didn't because I didn't see there was something else to interpret! Very suprising ! !!
When I tell my sister about the results she will probably help me tell my parentes and be by my side when they deny it. Yes, they will probably deny it because they are supportive, they don't want me to feel different, weird, limited or something; I already had issues with low self-steem. Also they will think I'm not impaired somehow because I'm intelligent and succesful, but those are different things. And they probably don't know I struggle with some things I struggle with.

Last edited by linatet on 08 Feb 2014, 7:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.

There is another test you can take which maps out where you have deficits as well as telling you if you have NT or AS traits.

It's called the Aspie quiz http://rdos.net/eng/Aspie-quiz.php