"You don't have autism because I met someone w/ autism once"

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I had the misfortune recently. :/ An individual I'm thankfully rid of now (yes!) told me specifically 'I can't have Aspergers' when I mentioned my upcoming evaluation ages ago... Lo and behold - events unfolded and when I next said I'd been diagnosed: "You can't - because I have loads of friends with Aspergers, so I know".
Always, she'd end every other sentence of hers with that curious affirmation: A = B, so I know. She knows. Little pet peeve, there! Bit of an emotionally unstable narcissist all in all, with overdeveloped delusions of omniscience.

Imagine if people acted the same way about cancer.
"You can't have cancer. I knew a guy once who had cancer, and you're different than him."

Was just about to bring up this topic today, since I've been pretty bummed out by what happened to me a couple of days ago. I've been diagnosed with ASD for 5 years now and have only started to feel more comfortable talking about it with other people. To make a long story short, some women ended up interrogating me about my diagnosis and "what kind of stuff do I do". I ended up crying in the parking lot feeling really confused. I don't think I'm going to be talking about this anymore with strangers. I say, let people stay confused and think whatever they want about me. I don't need to explain myself and expose myself to being attacked by someone. People are so ignorant.

I actually had an MD who had spoken to me for all of five minutes say something like, "If that's true you must have the mildest case ever because I could never have a conversation like this with my IT guys."

(In fact I come out as moderate on the spectrum. I've just become very good at mimicking NT conversational patterns. It all falls apart pretty rapidly the second I'm taken off guard or run into an unexpected situation that I don't have an algorithm or memorized answer for. This doesn't happen as often as it used to as I've gathered more and more "routines" throughout my life, but it still happens.)

So people can be ignorant at any education level. Sure he was an MD but he was a family practice MD-- not someone well-versed in spectrum disorders.

I've found myself in similar situations. Most of the time, people are just trying to understand, but sometimes you do get the sense that they are interrogating you because they don't really think you could be on the spectrum. I'm pretty open about my diagnosis, but I'm not very good at thinking on my feet. So when they ask for specific examples on the spot, it's hard to come up with ones that really stand out. So you get the usual, "Oh, I do that, too, and I'm not autistic."

Getting them to understand that it's not the one thing you mentioned first that is the total sum of your condition can be extremely frustrating. I try to explain that it's the cumulative effect of many traits that helps a qualified professional diagnose you, but they always seem to get hung up on the one or two examples that come to my mind most readily.

Of course I think of far better answers an hour later while rehearsing the dialog in my head...

http://2static.fjcdn.com/pictures/Autism+joke+you+cant+just+look+at+a+person+and_41bcbc_6096325.jpg

Reminds me of this

I've been told numerous times I can't be Autistic because I'm "articulate". Funnily enough, it says I'm articulate on my diagnosis report.

Oh I love this one too; "You would've been normal if raised properly".

I would've been better off yes, but normal....no, not at all. I've been a weirdo since I first achieved sentience.

I have met those kind of people yes, but i am lucky enough that most people i know aren't like that.
My mom seems to think that, i have a cousin who has severe aspergers (incapable of doing a lot of things, went to a special school, couldnt find his way home from school, is almost incapable of social interaction etc)
But i see him rarely, but my mom is coming to accept the way i am, but isnt a fan of labels, accepts me for who i am now.

I was recently told by my doctor that a diagnosis meant nothing, as he said if i was to be evaluated by a fixed number of medical professionals, i would be likely to receive as many different diagnosis's as people evaluating me.

This really put my anxiety to rest. I was so pleased that i went to the doctor and paid to see him so that he could undermine the entire medical profession.

If his statement is true, then why do we even have doctors? if a diagnosis means nothing. Surely we should do away with medicine, psychology, doctors and psychiatrists altogether.

I started to think, if a diagnosis means nothing, then why the hell have i been paying this jerk off to diagnose me for the past few years!! !

If opinions mean nothing, then perhaps i can ignore his angry opinion that what i have just done is wrong after punching him...

anyway. i think i am going to get another doctor who actually knows what he is talking about. dick head he is.

He sounds like bit of an idiot.

Doctors and other so-called "professionals" routinely say such cruel, ignorant and limiting things. It is almost as if part of their curriculum calls for delivering hopeless diagnoses by decree. Had Denis Istomin's mother listened to the advice of doctors who said her son would never play tennis again, he would certainly not be alive today.

Those same doctors probably tell him, "You're not supposed to be playing tennis today. You should have been in a bed in some hospital in Tashkent." Denis would say, "Well, I'm here now!" Those stupid doctors probably wouldn't get it, just like those in charge of evaluating, testing, diagnosing and making prognostications about the future of people with ASDs.

OMG, that's a particularly awful one! Managed to insult both you and your parents simultaneously. Nice!

As has been pointed out by Kraft, having a spectrum disorder makes this inevitable.

One of the greatest ironies in my life is that my greatest achievement - my highly adaptive skills, became my greatest impediment in being diagnosed and getting the help I so desperately needed.

Another irony is that I have observed there are many people with autism here who love playing the specialist and voicing their opinions on who is in or out of the spectrum. It seems this is part of the human condition. Again, this for me comes down to autism being a spectrum condition. Ironies of ironies that we all wish the world to accept our difference, yet often acceptance of others difference seems a step too far for many nurotyoical and autistic alike.

So, I guess. I'm doomed af. I'm not autistic because I met someone (me) with autism once.

Oh my god -- nobody said this to me but I myself used to wonder this and think this to myself, when I was beating myself up about my failings and pretty much thinking the same thoughts about my parents.

No-one said those exact words to me, but I did write a friends-locked Facebook post about my (very recent) diagnosis and received an incredulous reply from another aspie about being "way too outgoing". While I did take the opportunity to educate - explaining briefly about masking, differences between male and female aspies, etc. - it was nonetheless discouraging to feel like I was being held up to some autism standard and missing the mark!