Have I been wrongly diagnosed?

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Hello everyone,

I'm sorry to jump straight in with a question (especially a long one, excuse my penchant for over-writing, please).

Ever since I bacame aware of Asperger's in the mid to late 1990s, I have always thought that it would explain a whole lot about me. The more I heard, the more it just chimed with everything that had happened to me.

Finally, last year, at the age of 43, after I walked out of another job due to a row with management, I decided I wanted to know. Just to know...... for certain.

So curious, I did the AQ test online and was well over the score of 32 which was apparently the mark around which the result goes from normal to 'possibly' having AS.

The next time I saw my doctor (who I was already seeing regularly for stress anyway) I asked if it was worth finding out and she happily referred me.

This was all a bit of a step for me. Especially as I've always felt completely let down by my entire education, thinking that they should have seen I was different or at least moved to stop the bullying. So I've always had a deep distrust of officialdom because of that. Experience also seems to have borne out that mistrust.


I went back for the results yesterday and though I haven't yet seen the full report, I was told I was not 'on the scale'.
The doctor did however want me to see a shrink for my anxiety, saying she thought it was caused by the bullying and my Dad being an alcoholic.
Well, I wasn't aware of the alcoholism until I was eleven and the bullying at school started in around then too, but I've always been like I am, I'm fact it was more extreme in those early years.
I've learned to mask it well over the years.
Most people won't take the idea of me having Asperger's seriously because I get up and perform music.
Playing drums, always at the back of the band, with mathematical patterns of beats in my head.
Or producing, making tiny tweaks of one db to completely change the sound and it all coming together and being excited by that.
I've learned an extrovert behaviour to get on in the business and also it's calculated; being in a band you are somehow allowed SO much more leeway when it comes to inappropriate behaviour. I don't know why it should be so, but it's saved my bacon many a time because people thought I was being 'rock and roll' instead of that I just didn't know I was being inappropriate.

So just at the moment, I am feeling a bit lost, pacing the room and I went ballistic at my Mum because a delivery driver pretended he'd attempted delivery when I've been home all day and nobody has come to the door.
I'm kind of fending off a meltdown the likes of which I haven't had for years.

Feeling extremely betrayed by 'the man' again. I don't know, I guess I'm looking for some kind of comfort.
I dropped my phone down the toilet and I couldn't even call anyone even if I could bring myself to talk to anyone.

My scores on the tests were:
Aspie Test: 170
AQ: 46

Thanks.

Don't know you or if you have been misdiagnosed.

Introversion or extroversion are not Aspergers traits. Probably most "Aspies" become shy or socially anxious due to repeated social failures.

Being in a band affords more opportunities to learn social skills and if the motivation and inclination is many Aspies can learn them well enough to do well. In one of my support groups there is a very extroverted women in a band.

Would you say Courtney Love is an extrovert?. She was diagnosed at age 9.

But they are not you. You always have a right to a second opinion or ask why you were diagnosed. If you want a second opinion make sure it is with an expert in how Autism presents in a person of your age and gender. Misunderstandings based on only understanding decades old criteria is very widespread.

Last edited by ASPartOfMe on 25 Feb 2015, 12:44 pm, edited 2 times in total.

I always assumed I was an introvert until I had a nervous breakdown due to loneliness. I am "introverted" because it seems like I always piss people off (even here at WP occasionally) and have NO IDEA WHY. People tell me to get over it but when every time you raise your head out of that foxhole a bullet whizzes by your head it's only natural and rational to stay in that hole.

I'd want to see that diagnostic report.

Problem with ASD is that it's a spectrum disorder, so there are a lot of borderline cases where there can never be a firm yes or no, but the diagnostician has to come out on one side or the other, so the result has to be a fudge.

Another problem is that not all diagnosticians are competent or sincere, there can be hidden political, financial, or personal issues distorting their conclusions. My experience so far suggests that if a diagnostician isn't strongly interested in autism, and doesn't really like or understand it, it's likely they'll say you haven't got it. Evidence of that strong interest would show in their history, e.g. if they've done some research into ASD as part of a thesis.

Also, follow the money - if a positive diagnosis attracts state support and benefits where you live, I'd be surprised if there wasn't some political pressure to underdiagnose. But if your doctor is offering you a shrink anyway, I don't see how it would save the gov. money to deny a DX of autism.

I can't tell what your DX is from what you've written, only that being in a band isn't a sign that you don't have autism. If you've answered the quizzes honestly, you would seem to be autistic. If you're not on the borderline, I think you'll eventually see enough evidence to convince you, if you study ASD for a long time and compare the traits with your own.

I think if you have done sufficient research and you think you have it then you do have it, no matter what the diagnosis says. I know that is a controversial view around here.

From the beginning Hans recognised that family members have similar traits, and more recently the Broad Autism Phenotype has become recognised. To me this suggests that the autistic spectrum expands beyond what ever the arbitrary cut off for diagnosis is. I can understand why the level of impairment has to be problematic enough to warrant a diagnosis, otherwise there would be a problematic area of medicalising personality, but as adults it is a grey area. Just because someone has learnt to adapt and compensate in a way in which they function fairly well does reflect a lack of underlying deficit, some people may have just learnt better ways of handling it than others (and as undiagnosed adults you kind of have to learn to deal with it). I think this is a very important point because if the cut off for diagnosis is set too high then there will be no positive role models for people with aspergers (when clearly many successful and innovative people are spies), people would be considered too successful when really they might have been just as impaired as the average aspie but have learnt to overcome it in a way that worked for them.

Sorry I have used this thread to express some musings I have had on this issue recently. But basically I think if you have the three areas of impairment, along with some of the other traits like sensory oversensitivity or language peculiarities then it would be pretty coincidental for it not to be autism, even if it doesn't meet the threshold of your assessor (which is highly subjective and can vary wildly)

I don't know--nothing you said stands out as particularly autistic.

You have any unusual skills or special interests?

I have a remarkable sense of comprehension--I can flip through a book and remember a tremendous amount of information--even though, as a kid--I quickly realized that showing off such a memory wasn't such a good idea...

A good example of a special interest is Hoover vacuum cleaners--the kid know more than the guy who has been selling them for decades!