Q: Why do people diagnose themselves online with Asperger's syndrome, instead of getting a valid assessment? Isn’t this unethical? I see people all the time diagnosing themselves as “aspies”, when Autism Spectrum Disorder is a real disability. Why do people want to do so?

A: They do this because they cannot get a valid assessment. Some lack access ( Read more... )

I get this sometimes. People look at me; they see I can talk, I can take care of myself, I live on my own with no more than a case manager checking in weekly (thank goodness, by the way; it was long overdue and I'm very pleased to finally be able to depend on someone to help me figure out the little unexpected bits of daily life ( Read more... )

NT toddlers flap their hands ( Read more... )

Q: Would it be a good idea to inform an adult friend that he most probably has Aspergers/HFA? He is very intelligent, has a well-paid responsible job [that he can do from home totally on his own, usually], has verbal but not behavioural meltdowns; his friendships are odd and shallow and his love-life alternately a mess or non-existent.

A: Short ( Read more... )

So where am I on the autism spectrum? With what I know about autism and about psychology, the best diagnosis for me is probably PDD-NOS, like it is for most autistic people.

PDD-NOS is just atypical autism. It is any kind of autism that doesn't fit into a specific subtype (Asperger's, Kanner's, CDD, or Rett syndrome). Ironically, most autism doesn't ( Read more... )

Q: What do you think ARE the real symptoms of autism/differences from NTs? What do you think would be a good way to know if you do/don't have it?
--Anonymous

( Read more... )

So here we are, looking at changing the definition of autism--merging the spectrum, and using severity levels to define specific cases. It makes sense to me, to merge the spectrum; but we need to be extra careful not to fall into the trap of thinking that "severe" autism is a different disorder from "mild" autism ( Read more... )

If you have significant autistic traits, and you have significant impairment, then don't avoid diagnosis just because you think that you will end up using it as an excuse to "give up". It's quite the opposite, actually.

I should have been diagnosed at 11. I wasn't, because my mom didn't want me labeled and kept me out of school because she didn't ( Read more... )

A note: When I mention mental illness, assume I am talking about it in the most general way: Any condition that can be diagnosed by a psychologist; psychological, cognitive, or neurological. It takes too long to write that phrase out every single time I mention it ( Read more... )

There’s a fairly arbitrary split between people diagnosed “Asperger” and high-functioning people diagnosed “Autism”. The big difference between these two categories is that the people with Asperger’s had speech before three (though it was probably unusual speech), and the people categorized Autism usually did not. In the HFA group, they almost ( Read more... )