mild autism vs very mild autism

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I have ADD and my son has ADHD we are both extremely sociable when balanced. My CPTSD makes me more of a recluse these days but my son has many friends though most are ADD/ADHD.
I agree with magz that peers may reject ASD but I would like to add that certain people on the spectrum have "social blindness " which may antagonize, distance, confuse or even hurt those who are interacting with them.
I think that a good deal of disclosure is required on the part of those on the spectrum, explaining that they don't always interpret or respond accurately and appropriately, but only discloseto those who are proven to beworthy and trustworthy or you may make yourself vulnerable to bad people. I'm afraid that those of us who have the problem usually need to invest the effort into being accepted. I know it can be done with the right people, I have ASD friends, most of whom are/were colleagues, students or sharing the same ideological path and activities. My infamous lover as well of course.

I asked my clinician when I was diagnosed "so I guess this means I am level 1". She replied that she doesn't use those terms because they are almost meaningless, especially to an adult. Just because I can take care of myself and my family (right now) doesn't mean that I don't have some serious effects. For example, I look very happy and content on the surface but she implied I was at high risk of suicide in the future and told me I have severe depression and anxiety and should seek immediate help for it. I'm no expert but I doubt few would categorize that as "very mild".

[quote=SharonB"]As far as the OP: Outwardly my ASD is "very mild" (when I am masking) ---- inwardly it's more moderate (and outwardly when I drop the mask). So I have very high control and appear "very mild", but the underlying characteristics are "mild to moderate". My experience is that I know what to do, but it's hard to do it. And that what's easy for others (NT) is hard for me, but what's hard for them is easy for me [/quote]
Couldn't have expressed it better myself. This has been a source of frustration my whole life: when I played hockey with beginners I usually played terribly because I overthought everything and the pace was so slow I got stuck in my head and must have looked like a fool who could barely skate. Therefore, nobody ever called me to play in more competitive leagues. On the very rare chance I did get the opportunity (usually after everyone else in the city was unavailable!!) I usually did exceptionally well.

To put it another way I almost failed basic High School math, dropped out of going for Engineering as a result and proceeded to get A+, A and A+ in my three University math courses. I would probably get fired for incompetence from most minimum wage jobs even though I could do many $100,000/yr jobs with a blindfold on.

You are pretty wonderful. Can't tell if you are strange here

I learned something very interesting about my family. I had my mom in on a conference call today because I have been trying for several years now to get an assessment for eligibility for an Autism waiver. But my state will not give Autism waivers to anyone who did not receive an Autism Spectrum Disorder diagnosis before the age of twenty two. It does not matter to them if the diagnosis did not exist before you were twenty two. But I have been fighting for this for a very long time and because of the my level of severity they agreed to accept my application only if I could provide them with someone who could testify to my Autistic symptoms and traits before I was 22. Fortunately my 80 something parents are still alive because finding someone who knew me that well over thirty years ago, especially since with my father's job, we moved to a different state, country, and sometimes continent, every three to four years, is pretty much impossible. Many of my teachers have passed away and I never developed deep enough friendships or knew anyone as closely as was possible for me for more than a couple of years. And I never lived in the same area as my relatives. A lot of them lived in different countries or states from me.

But fortunately we had a breakthrough with my mom today. She has often been in denial about my Autism and has even accused me of developing it Munchausen style. She has also had a habit of blaming every struggle I have on what she believes is laziness or on what she believes are bad decisions rather than recognizing that I actually have a real neurological issue and that it affects every single part of my life.

I think what happened today to help her was that it was one of my therapists who asked the questions about my childhood. That put a new spin on credibility on all this for her. Also the assessment requirement is that the clinician, it has to be a certified clinician, use the DSM 5 criteria as the basis for the questions. So for the first time, my mom actually heard the actual DSM 5 diagnostic criteria and had it explained to her by people who understand what it means rather than hearing it from me. The other thing that helped was that one of my best friends who is almost my age and who is also Autistic and who comes from a family of Autistics and who is a psychologist, was on the call as well. So she was able to hear what he was saying about me and she was able to ask him a little bit about his issues. So for the first time, she realized that other adults are like me. The only other Autisitic people she knows are children. This was also the very first time that I heard her acknowledge and say that people are born with Autism. She had argued that point with me for years telling me that I had only acquired Autism after my diagnosis because I had researched it. So today was HUGE!!

But the reason I am posting this on this thread is that when my therapist explained each point of the DSM 5 diagnostic requirements to her, and as my Autistic friend was sharing what he was sharing, she actually started to remember how I was as a child. This was actually really fascinating to me because I had been really concerned about how she would respond to the questions. The reason I was concerned is because for the past seven years, since I found out I am Autistic, she has always denied any evidences that I shared with her from my childhood. But all of a sudden, in this phone interview, she started to remember things and share them. And she started to understand that what I have is real and that my sensory sensitivities as well as all of my Autistic issues are actually real and very significant.

What was so interesting to me and what makes all this relevant to this thread, is that I always thought that no one actually noticed my Autistic traits as a small child. I was so incredibly wrong. They did notice and noticed very much. But because there was not awareness of Autism back then, no one understood what they were seeing with me. My mom told my therapist that they just thought I was a very weird and unusual child who was very difficult in many ways. They just thought I have a very different personality. But if people had known then what we know now, I might have been diagnosed as a toddler or as a young child.

The reason I say this here is that I never knew what my parents really felt about me and my differences until today. It is really amazing and actually quite wonderful to know this. But I always thought that I was "mild" enough to not have been noticed. But the truth is, I wasn't. I was very noticed. It's just that no one knew or understood what they were noticing so no one thought to do anything about it. I also had a similar revelation when I got my official diagnosis and read it. I had no idea I was as severe as I am until I read how I am actually off the Autistic charts in a couple of areas and how severely on the charts I am in other areas, so much so that I am actually a level three Autistic.

The problem is that my severe areas are not necessarily very obvious to an untrained eye. But they are still very severe and especially now that I am so neurologically burned out that the services and help that I require are actually a big deal. But we often don't see ourselves as accurately as we think. A lot of people harp on those who self diagnose because they believe that they can't see themselves objectively enough. There is some truth to that but I believe it is not the way that we think. Many people think that self diagnosers see themselves as more severe than they actually are. I think it might be the opposite. We who have lived into adulthood without the luxury of having been recognized, not realizing that we are what we are, have figured out how to survive with our challenges and this difficult life has become our normal. So I believe that because of that, we often have difficulty seeing the reality in how severe our Autism can actually be. I have heard this from many people who got diagnosed as adults. They were shocked when they realized that they were "much more Autistic" than they had ever realized.

So when we are talking about mild Autism, it is possible that even some people who consider themselves mild can actually be much more affected than they realize.

But even though what happened today was great for me, it breaks my heart that so many people in my state will be refused an Autism waiver even if they desperately need one only because they are older than the ASD diagnosis and they have no one to testify about their Autistic traits as children. A diagnostician will accept your own testimony if you have no one to testify for you about this but the department of mental health will not when it comes to assessing who gets an Autism waiver. So if you were diagnosed after the age of 21 and you have no one to testify for you about your Autism as a child, you have no chance to get waiver funding no matter how much you need it. And they don't care that in order to get the diagnosis in the first place, it has to be proved that the symptoms were there when you were a small child.

Why even bother to fit in when you have Autism? Constant social rejection creates social phobia and increases your social anxiety. There is nothing you can do to make people like or accept you. The problem is people constantly rejecting you, that is beyond your control. The only thing to do is to minimise social interactions and reduce anxiety/stress.