Hi, I’m Sarah and I might be autistic

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Hi,
My name is Sarah and I am a 28 year old woman. I have previously been diagnosed with social anxiety and a schizoid personality disorder. I have recently started to see a new therapist for some trauma I experienced recently and during the first few sessions, she asked me if my previous therapist ever mentioned autism. She did not. I have since researched everything about the topic and found out that almost every symptom fits to some extend. I mentioned that to my therapist this week but she could only refer me to a special clinic to get a diagnosis. She actually knew less about the topic than me. Now I have to wait for almost a year to be seen by a specialist and find out if I really am autistic or not. To anyone else who was in a similar situation, how did you manage the wait?
I have already done every possible test that is free and available. I found out that I am highly masking (passed that test with flying colours! Yay?). Every other test showed that I could be autistic but also maybe not. Since I went through 28 years of my life thinking I was just a bit weird, I am now really hopeful to get an explanation for basically everything. Especially since I went through the criteria for social anxiety and a schizoid personality disorder with my new therapist again and we found out that I actually don’t fit into any of the two. She wouldn’t give me that diagnosis anymore (yay again?) which only leaves me with more questions. Now I have no explanation for anything.
I would love to look up things that helped autistic people with the things I’m struggling with but I feel like an imposter. I live a pretty regular life with a family and a stable job. How could I be autistic? Shouldn’t I struggle more? What if I just imagined everything or just looked for examples that fit into the criteria but subconsciously ignored the rest? I feel like I’m just offending everyone in the autistic community if I self diagnose, especially if I’m wrong in the end.
I tried to consciously stimm the other day and it felt so weird. It helped me in that situation but like I said, I feel like an imposter.
Does anyone have advice?

hello
Now that you've made it through the first 28 years of your life, believe that you've found a way to live your life, just get on with it
If you get a diagnosis of autism, it means that there are some traits that you were born with and you don't have to change.
Live the way you like.

Schizoid personality disorder and its symptoms overlap with autism quite a lot, so it is certainly a possibility you could have autism instead, or even both of the disorders. Although you did say you don't fit the criteria for the former anymore.

The only way to be satisfied one way or another is to have an assessment to determine whether you are autistic, with a specialist provider in the medical field.

You could definitely still use online resources to learn coping mechanisms for stressors and to learn about changes you could make to make life a bit easier for you. You don't need to have a diagnosis or even be autistic for a lot of stuff in those resources to help you.

You can still participate in communities as neurodivergent without saying that you are autistic. You don't need to have autism to look at information to help autistic people. .

Some autistic people can have families and jobs if they learned a lot of masking stuff. I got married last year. Struggles are different for everyone. Many can even appear to be going along with their life easily and well but they struggle a lot mentally or get burned out fast. it is different for many.

As for the stim thing. I don't think you should force something like stimming, especially if it feels weird or isn't natural to you. Just let it happen if you feel like you're in a safe space. I wouldn't recommend increasing repetitive behaviors if you do not have difficulty masking them because it would not be very nice if you lost the ability to mask them. The world usually isn't that nice to people that have repetitive behaviors in public or in the workplace.

A diagnosis at your age only provides the certainty of knowing you have a diagnosis.

In most places assistance is only available for children. Once they become adults they don't get help.

You can certainly stick around here and find ideas that may help.

Assistance from an employer is largely theoretical.

Everyone with autism has a different diagnosis.
Some of us are good at some things and bad at others.
Some of us aren't particularly good at anything. Some of us are good at a lot lot of things.

Bottom line is that telling an employer you have autism isn't likely to help compared to telling them what sort of help you need.

Welcome to WP! I think you belong here.

Note: You do not need an Autism diagnosis to be here. You do not need to suspect you are Autistic. Even if you are certain you are not Autistic you belong here if the topic interests you.

Question: What country do you live in? The path to diagnosis varies between different countries.
(From what you've said, I'll guess you're not in the U.S.)

welcome!
I didn't discover my autism until I was in my late 60s and professionally diagnosed at age 68.

What a relief, because it explained so much, had diagnosis of depression and anxiety long before that, but autism could be seen behind almost every tough part of my life in the past, once I got looking!

Its a lot to sort, but it sounds like you are getting answers.

Glad you are with us.

This is a good place to get insights and suggestions from others with lifetimes of experience (even if some of us have not known about our autism diagnosis for very long)
Hope you find what you need.

Welcome to Wrong Planet.

Welcome to Wrong Planet!

Welcome! I was diagnosed last year at age 29. I score on the higher side of functioning/low support needs for certain.

There is no 100% surefire way of knowing you're autistic for sure, though I find studying the DSM 5 criteria to be very helpful. And a formal diagnosis can give a feeling of validation if that's what you need.

Not with autism, but I have in the past struggled very greatly with imposter syndrome. For me, it fell into an OCD pattern where I was constantly going into thought loops and fighting my thoughts with the compulsion to "check" my questions over and over.
I think the main reason I didn't struggle in that regard with discovering my autism, was that by that point I had been on meds for OCD for a few years.

You wrote about your quest to find out about yourself, "Does anyone have advice?"

There are test available on the internet that can provide you with a fairly good assessment. They are not official but they are fairly accurate in my humble opinion. So I would recommend you take some of these and see how you score.

I tend to think since you are asking these serious questions, you probably fit into the autism category. But the on line tests can provide you a good inexpensive unofficial reading.

One other bit of important information. The way our traits manifest is different between males and females. Therefore many times accurate assessments are many times overlooked because females have a better ability to blend into society. They try to fit in and blend in. So many times this trait is hidden. But also around age 30 they begin to become more stressed and fearful.

Hello. Do not worry if you are or are not autistic. Is a good idea to see if you can be assessed as knowing you might be and not knowing if you are can play on your mind for ages, so one may as well have an assessment to find out. (Also to explain a few things etc etc).
Also one can ask questions on this site. (Can't diagnose on this site but can ask questions about autism traits and experiences, bearing in mind that everyone is different... But some can share things which may make sense and even help you).

I am in a very similar situation, though I am well into my 30s at this point. I haven’t yet been officially diagnosed (yay for being in a rural area in Australia where appropriate health care professionals are hard to find as is, let alone finding one that is suitable for assessing autism) in any case, accepting that it is extremely likely that I am according to every test has been quite helpful in self regulating. Hopefully this helps.

Welcome to WP!

Sarah , welcome to the forum.

See it this way, you at least are heading in the right direction, finding out. You will get it right this time

Imagine living in ignorance. I guess that has its own value too. Some people do not want to know and it doesn't affect their already formed identity. What is the worse thing it can happen?