I Don’t Think I’m Really Autistic

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I was diagnosed with autism in September, but I’m starting to seriously doubt it. I think that my problems can be mostly traced to OCD and Social Anxiety.

When I was a kid, I had sensory processing issues and motor skill issues, as well as behavior problems, and I needed things to be a certain way and I got obsessed with topics such as trains and dinosaurs which I memorized lots of facts about, but I still went to the park and played imaginary games with kids that I just met there and acted friendly and reciprocal, I think.

While I almost never hung out with people outside of school in elementary and middle school, and even high school, a lot of that was due to the fact that I was simply lazy or because I acted too weird for anybody to want to be close friends with me. I had a lot of issues caring about pop culture and other “cool” stuff, which also got in the way. While I was definitely a little behind socially, I was able to read faces from age 12 onwards.

I’ve heard people say that I don’t seem autistic at all and others say that I seem very autistic, but I’m starting to seriously doubt it. I can quickly make friends with new people that I meet and I never really had true meltdowns or speech abnormalities.

I think a lot of my weirdness and social isolation was simply due to OCD and Social Anxiety. While I do talk fast, get obsessed with topics that I can memorize many facts about, and stim, I think a lot of that can be traced back to Anxiety and OCD. My mom and therapist don’t think I have it either, my therapist thinks it’s a combination of high intelligence and social anxiety (but only my verbal intelligence is high, as my IQ is super uneven). An OT who worked with autistic kids and who was a member of the PTA at my high school (her son is one of my good friends) said that she’d bet 20,000 dollars that I’m on the spectrum, but one of my good friends with an autistic brother (who is likely borderline aspie himself) doesn’t think I’m autistic, as we can have great, deep, articulate, recirprocal, and insightful conversations that I can carry regularly.

I was a mess on the day of my evaluation, so maybe that made me seem autistic when I wasn’t. And I could’ve easily answered the questions in an inaccurate way due to my own negative self-perception. My social skills were in the 23rd percentile (seems pretty high for someone with autism) and there were no signs of restricted interests, stereotyped movements, and speech abnormalities. Still, I was diagnosed.

Idk tbh, but does anybody know of any near-universal trait that autistic people or non-autistic people have that could give me a good reason to think if I really am or not. I get that there probably isn’t, but can anybody think/does anybody know of anything?

Sorry I can't offer any helpful answers because I feel the same way you do about my diagnosis. I often question my diagnosis - but I'm not sure if it's partially denial or hope that I don't have it. Do you hate autism? Usually those of us who hate it hang on to the hope that we were misdiagnosed. Or maybe you read too many contradictions. This site is full of autism contradictions for a start.

I was diagnosed with Asperger's when I was 8, but sometimes I feel my 'symptoms' were caused by other factors.
I have a lot of memories of engaging in conversation with other children and I was able to play imaginative games with other children. I disliked being alone and always craved the company of other children.

I didn't have any restricted interests until I was 11, and even then I just got obsessions with people, not exactly special interests. I've always had trouble memorizing facts or hyperfocusing.

I had no speech delays and I reached all my milestones at the average stages. I was a sociable baby and toddler and wasn't interested in spinning objects or lining things up, etc. I just played with toys like a normal infant.

What caught the attention of my parents and teachers was the way I was on my first day of school. I misbehaved and done out of character things, but it turns out I had glue ear and was partially hard of hearing, and I read that can affect a young childs behaviour, especially around other children, as I was otherwise articulate and sociable. It was like I was frustrated because I couldn't hear, so decided to isolate myself instead. Also I don't think I liked the school I started at, as it was a creepy old victorian building and I often remember having separation anxiety and even homesickness (even though I was only there 6 hours a day).

I had anxiety as a child, and also hated loud sudden noises, but I wasn't worried about other noises. Just sudden loud noises like dogs barking or bells ringing. Being in a noisy, hectic environment with lots of children never bothered me and I was even able to filter it out.

I had tantrums a lot but not the typical autistic meltdowns. I loved surprises and wasn't bothered about change in routine as such, like an unexpected snow day (I loved those!), but some change made me anxious, like when I was 12 I heard they were going to introduce a 2-week schedule instead of one week at school (week A and week B), and it threw me into a panic for some reason. But then I quickly accepted the new system.

I had a stim when I was little; I had a habit of moving my eyes around light to form visual shapes (I don't know if that counts as stimming or not but I soon grew out of it).

But I was a social failure as a teenager. I found friendships hard to form at school and I was lonely and socially isolated. I suppose that is basically the only thing that makes me think "well I must have Asperger's after all". Even now as an adult with better social skills, I still can't seem to form friendships with NT females my age, no matter what I do. I think it might stem from all the social rejection I experienced from my NT female peers in the past, it's just made me afraid of NT females my age now. But I fit in well otherwise at work and I'm very good at working as part of a team and I do not lack communication skills with my colleagues in the workplace. I never have done.

You only benefit from it if it helps you understand aspects of your life and gets you the right help. If you don't need either then you can safely ignore it and just live your life.

When I read what you wrote, there are signposts pointing towards autistic traits all the way down. Obviously one can have traits and not have enough to be officially on the spectrum, and also it needs a specialist to diagnose, but one thing I noticed are that I see obvious traits in reading what you say.

Part if the problem is that autism is easier to notice if someone does not mask, and this is why it is easier to pick out with children at a young age because it is before they learn to teach themselves to mask their traits. The ones who don't mask stand out. The ones who do mask hide themselves even though they are not aware why they are hiding themselves. (In school I was doing all I could to hide and not draw attention to myself and I hated more then anything for a teacher to direct a question at me. Not because I could not answer, but because it drew attention towards me when I was trying to blend in and hide. It is why masking is also called camoflaging).

It is also very common for one to have no friends ones own age, or just one friend or maybe two, and others will be friends of the one or two so may seem to cling on, but if one met them seperately, one may chat but that would be it. There would be no jelling beyond that. It is very very common for someone on the spectrum to know people they call friends, but those people will not call in to visit, or if they do it is for a specific task and not for the reason to visit you.
I get people I know visit me because they want something, but if they don't want something I have I would never see them.
I get what I call family friends who come up to visit us because of other family members, where if I was the only one here they would not call in except maybe once every few years to check that I was ok.
So if I was to say who my friends were. The people who would still come back and want to know me for who I am, I could count maybe four or five people... Prehaps six or even seven during my lifetime? The ones who would make the effort to visit me and it not be a one way me visiting them and being kept on the doorstep rather then be invited in. The ones who I don't have to pretend to be somone I am not for them to like me.

Something I have noticed about myself and how I deal with others due to my experiences.
If I meet someone who I can relate to and we start to become friendly, I will withdraw after a wile and be slightly distant for a reason. It is not because I don't like them. It is because I want to retain our friendship and the only way I can do that is by limiting how often I will meet them because I will be masking to make the friendship and I will only be able to maintain the masking for so long, so by limiting how often I meet the person will make the friendship last.

I can't automatically switch off the masking when I want to as I have been doing it too long. One type of masking I can but to switch it off means that I have no way to translate my form of communication to be noticeable to other peoples communication. If I switch off that masking, I will not be able to talk and go all quiet and be ignored, and eventually I will walk off as I would be not only wasting my time being there, but I will feel awkward and not part of things... A bit like a pet dog who is seen but must not bark or try to make himself included as a human as if he does put his paws on the table like the humans are doing and act like a human does, he will be told off. I feel like that when I am not masking with the mask I can turn off.
That mask has a "Use by" date. It is like a packet of something where there are only so many of the something in the packet... So I will withdraw earlier to make the somethings last so I can keep the friendship going for longer before the somethings run out and I am not able to mask.

When you went for an assessment and you said you felt like you were in a mess (Nurves!) that is likely the unmasked you because you are not able to mask due to the nurves and so it was noticeable to them because you could not at that moment hide your traits. Does this make sense?