Is there any point at 41 getting a diagnosis?

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It seems likely to me (and my wife) that I suffer with Aspergers.

I have a family and job.

I suffer from depression (always have). Whether this is related to the feeling of otherness brought about by Aspergers or whether the depression is independent I don't know.

I suppose the thing I am wondering about is whether there would be any point/benefit in going to the GP/referral route given my age and the fact that there presumably isn't much that can be done for me. I cope with depression through activity rather than drugs. This also helps with my constant 'antsiness' which I believe to be a feature of AS...

Any ideas would be appreciated!

Adam

Are you the type of person that needs to have an expert agree with your conclusions for validation? If you don't have an expert agreeing with you will you have crippiling doubt? Are you the type of person that will have crippiling doubt dispite a proffessional diagnosis?

I was diagnosed at 36, in a similar situation to you.

I wanted the diagnosis for several reasons.

Firstly, I'm intelligent, so I know that lots of people BS themselves into thinking they have all sorts of things - how many times have you heard some irritating moron describe themselves as being 'OCD about...' or being 'addicted to...' or having a 'food intolerance for...'? If you've ever met someone with genuine OCD, addiction, food intolerances or allergies, you know these people with their self-diagnosed 'drama diseases' are idiots, dressing up personal preferences as something oh-so-special. I wanted to hear an objective observer's opinion before embarking on any of that drivel. I wanted to check for observer bias. I'd read all the ICD and DSM codings for AS, and it was fairly obvious I had it, but I'm a scientist. I want multiple confirmation of evidential conclusions! And when I got it, it helped make sense of a lot of my life. You may not need that layer of checking, or have that anxiety about self-serving bias!

Secondly, my employer was changing the way it does things - which is fine, that's their right. I wanted to be able to map myself into the new world with some precision, and wanted a base to do that from. The diagnosis gave me a tiny lever which I could pull in the vast impersonal machinery to help me contribute to managing my own future. My employer has, as it happens, been largely disrespectful of requests - but there is a legal back-up in this country which would mean that if it all goes tits up, there will at least be a record of all the occasions when my employer said 'no'.

Finally, when dealing with other mental health issues (you mentioned you had depression), you can say, 'I have AS', and it helps people understand very quickly some frameworks which will and will not work for you. You cut out a lot of explaining and faux discovery, because in general, when dealing with mental health professionals, if you don't have it written on a piece of paper, they won't necessarily accept your self diagnosis, and therefore can't take the short cuts that can save a lot of time.

Those were the reasons I did it.

I was diagnosed a few years ago and it has been very liberating for me to be honest. I have always wondered why I did some of the things I did, and the research I did pointed me towards ASD but I needed to have a formal diagnosis to 'make it real'. I fully appreciate this won't be the case for everybody but it was how I needed it to be for me. I found the process interesting albeit it cost a lot. The NHS postcode lottery meant that I would have had to wait for years to get an appontment through my GP so I ended up going private. Cost me £680, which I didn't have but battered my credit card instead. I have been able to take a great deal of pride in my myself since the disagnosis which I wasn't able to do before; I can't say whether this would be the case for you, but it is how it has been for me.

I also found it useful to be able to request reasonable adjustments in my workplace. I need a quiet and subdued lighting environment to be able to cope and, thankfully I currently have that. There was the possibility of me being moved into a massive open plan space with 70 people which would have just finished me off in an afternoon. I was able to stop that in its tracks with the report.

I guess it depends upon what you think would be best for you as ASPartofMe says; I think they are really useful questions. Whatever happens, I hope you are able to find some sense of peace.

I was diagnosed at 41. I needed the diagnosis for documentation of impairments, etc. It's really up to you to decide if a diagnosis will help you or not.

It was worth getting my husband getting diagnosed at 48. It made the difference for me not filing for divorce.

I was diagnosed at 57 and it's one of the best things I ever did. Now I can discover my roadblocks and go around them, instead of smashing into them, bewildered.

Also, if you will forgive me - the book listed under my signature is a great example of that - you don't need a Dx to investigate those things, but what if you could change your mindset by changing lightbulbs? Air purifiers are a great boon. Practical stuff like that.

I do not know whether I would have disclosed while I was working, and I never had to decide, but for your own knowledge in ways to help yourself, I think it's worth doing.

Worth doing.

I did it at 47 and it made a huge difference.

Part of it was that I revisited a lot of memories that I had tagged as having some significance that was eluding me and some of these were quite painful. There were things that made sense in the context of the diagnosis that I had chosen not to see or know, and the diagnosis made coming to terms with that reality much easier. I'm glad I did that because it is better to know. You are in a better position to analyze things with as much accurate information as possible.

Good luck.

From a practical standpoint...

1. Validation that you have autism.

2. An important first step if you ever need legal protections against discrimination or to qualify for disability benefits.

I haven't done, but that's because I'm in the US and also have enough acquaintance with psychologists to find their whole diagnostic enterprise dubious at best. I've also never thought labels terribly interesting or informative.

The bit about the US: There are people who like the label because it helps them with a sense of identity, or they can map the symptoms to their lives and find resolution that way, but in legal terms the diagnosis is simultaneously a weapon and a liability. What I've seen of HR says to me it's much more liability than weapon -- at least for someone like me -- and, in historical terms, it looks to me like a time bomb. We live in a paranoid culture and every so often some powerful simpleton cooks up a story in which all [person type] must be cleansed from the culture and that'll solve all our problems. And a life is a long time, and records are persistent. So no thank you, unless it's really necessary to survival in the moment.

I don't know. I guess I've also just seen too many fashions in diagnosis come and go. In the end, you is what you is.

If it's something your wife's pushing for because you're driving her mad and she wants to be able to blame a neurological condition rather than you, and it'll help save your marriage, then do it.

If you got a family and job and are just dealing with depression, then I don't think you have AS. and even if you do. I wouldn't worry about it.

Gosh!

Is a family and a job something that an AS sufferer wouldn't have then? I must admit that I am very much new to this.

First of all, Welcome to WP.

There are plenty of AS people on this forum who have families and jobs and who are quite successful. There are also many AS people whom we don't think are on this forum but of course we have no way of knowing for sure, who have families and jobs. A couple of successful famous Aspergian people are Dan Akroyd and Darryl Hannah. Many have families, many have jobs, many have both.

I am unofficially diagnosed meaning that I have been evaluated by people who work in the field of Autism and who know what they are doing and what they are looking at. So this means that I know for 99% certainty, and I say 99% because I don't have an actual clinical diagnosis, that I am on the Autism Spectrum.

I live in the US and I am in my 40's. I have seriously thought to get a clinical diagnosis but in the US there are a few problems with it. One of them was already mentioned by a previous poster. A clinical diagnosis can give you a stigma here that can hurt you in certain situations. The other issues in the US are, first of all, a clinical diagnosis is not free at all. Some have been lucky enough to get it around the $200.00 range which is excellent but others have paid well in the vicinity of $2,000.00.

Secondly, from what I have found out from my insurance company, if you are between the ages of two and six years old your diagnosis is paid for 100% no questions asked. It is completely covered with, in my case a $10.00 copay from the patient. If, however, you are not between the ages of 2 and 6 years old, the insurance company pays for nothing. You can appeal with a letter telling why you feel like you deserve help paying for this after you have been stuck with the bill but there is no guarantee that they will honor your appeal and in most cases they will not because why should they have to pay when you already got the bill? They literally told me this.

Thirdly, if you live in the US, if you get a diagnosis after the age of 18, you are not eligible for any state or government help or assistance at all. There are private organizations like Special Olympics and little local clubs that will welcome you but that is all. You can't get disability help or benefits at all. The reason I was told for this is that they figured that if you managed to live past 18 without a diagnosis than you don't need help. This is bull****, especially for those of us who are old enough that that particular diagnosis did not even exist or was not even commonly known until after we were 18.

Now if you live in the UK or in other countries it is very different. I believe a diagnosis in the UK is free and I believe that you are eligible for services and benefits no matter what age you are.

So you really have to ask yourself why you want the diagnosis especially if you live the US. If you need it for personal clarification and validation and the costs are worth it to you should look into it. If it will protect you in your job situation than I might say to seriously think about getting it. If it won't do much good for you I might look into taking online quizzes and maybe finding a qualified person who would be willing to give you an opinion off the record without charging you much.

I took every single online quiz that I could get my hands on and I had two professional people evaluate me. They were willing to do it off the record free of charge. I also spent 18 months researching on my own consulting one of the experts who evaluated me. If you are in the US and you can do it the way I did it, that might be enough for you. If you live in the UK I can't see any reason why you would not get one.

Last edited by skibum on 04 May 2014, 11:20 am, edited 2 times in total.

I was dxéd 8 months ago around my 60th birthday and I am one of those who is having doubts - always.
I am quite hard to convince and used to being in defence mode, so I still read a lot.

It was a liberation from years of despair and depression over lack of success in finding and holding a job, over being diagnosed as having personality disorder, over being the black sheep of the family (or one of them) and over just being a "wrong" person.

My identity is changing, my sense of depression and guilt has gone as I understand my former difficulties in a new light, - and I even discover some strengths, I didn´t know, I had.

You might benefit from being diagnosed.

Last edited by Jensen on 04 May 2014, 11:49 am, edited 1 time in total.

That's what I was told by an ignorant "expert": that since I work full time and have stable employment I cannot by definition have Aspergers. I politely pointed out there are THREE types of "significant impairment" and I definitely have the other two and that's not counting how f**king hard it was to land a job, period. I was at the employment centre and was not only by far the most intelligent and most educated but also probably the only one without a criminal record or on drugs! If I lose my job, I am in big trouble because I have no idea how to land another even with my intelligence but I'm luckily I am VERY secure where I am. He just changed the subject at this point rather than admit I was right. I also have depression and I recently discovered that much of it has to do not only with the childhood bullying but the fact I felt I needed to "fake" who I was and hide my nature. Once I stopped pretending to be a confident, extroverted NT and accepted I'm an Aspie and there is nothing "wrong" with me , I felt much better and my depression vastly improved. Like I mention in the L&D forum, rather than put on a "masculine" front I was just myself out there on a date and it worked out great. She even commented how nice it was to see someone NOT put on a front.

To answer your specific question, I ended my counseling session with the following speech. To paraphrase:

"Thank you for all that you have done. I am not going to pursue a formal diagnosis because it won't tell me anything I haven't discovered. I already know I am on the mild end of the Autism spectrum and ultimately labels don't matter. I accept I have limitations like anyone else and I do not view myself as diseased or damaged and don't desire a cure, only to be understood and accepted. In time, Autism will be viewed like Homosexuality or skin colour in that it's only an impairment because of ignorant, judgmental jerks and not due to a flaw on my part. If anyone treats me differently because of this, I don't need them in my life and will seek out those who accept me for who I am. I respect that life and relationships require flexibility but I refuse to deny who I am in order to fit in." She smiled, told me "well said" and shook my hand and wished me well.

Thank you all so much for taking the time to respond! You are all very kind.

I think the main (only) reason for me to attempt a diagnosis is that I might feel better about what I've always considered my massive failings as a human. Specifically that I am almost completely friendless outside my work environment, and that I consistently obsess about stuff that is immaterial in the grand scheme of things (my elderly Volvo, my 2 stroke engine repairs) while being completely poleaxed by the mere thought of any real personal advancement in the 'real' world.

Yesterday my wife and family went to a wedding of a wife's friend. I stayed at home. I wasn't missed by anybody apart from my wife and kids, and I was perfectly happy to be at home working on my engines etc. The thought of attending the wedding makes me feel physically sick.

That isn't 'normal', is it? It makes me feel wretched to know that I'm like that.

Perhaps if I had a name for it, I might feel less wretched?