Extra, extra! Greentea going for diagnosis! (of all people!)

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Diagnosis is good if I say so.

I was always against getting a diagnosis, but the constant firings and this economy have pushed me to try to get social benefits. I've had it trying to survive in the NT corporate world.

My heart is jumping up and down, I'm so nervous! And I'm terrified that the Psychiatrist will tell me, like my mother always said: "You don't have anything, you just have to get off your selfish ass and make more efforts to be nice to people, then you won't be fired and you'll have friends.". Or what the zillions of therapists always said: "You don't have anything, you just have to heal the trauma from your abusive mother and that'll automatically make you be nicer to people, then you won't be fired and you'll have friends"."

What will the Psychiatrist do? Ask me questions? Give me tests?

I hope all goes well. You deserve a break.

I may go for one one day though I am hoping I will be able to survive without one. Sometimes I wonder if I wont end up geting one after all though.

Zen, I didn't really need one till life became so totally unmanageable. My self-diagnosis feels as educated as any specialist's, if not more.

If it's a good psychiatrist they should do both; ask you questions about yourself and your past, and give you tests. They also take note of your body language and the way you talk etc as they interview you.

Good luck!

Thank you, sunshower! That's very relevant info for me even though I'm not in the US, because the more I find out about the whole process, the more I see that it's exactly the same as for you guys. Even the price of diagnosis and the benefits money are very similar.

Good luck with it all GT, it can be quite a fraught process - shrinks are a very strange breed of person and you often get mucked around a lot (more money for them), but it seems the way to go, that's pretty much what happened to me as regards work and employability. Rather be working full time ($$$) but had to throw in the towel, just was never given the kind of access or acceptance others are in the workplace. There's lots of threads on the subject (getting a dx) if you have a poke around in the archives.

Good idea Greentea. I'm not sure what will happen but it sounds like, from what you post on WP, you qualify. Greentea, what will having the actual diagnosis mean for you? Will it open any doors?

You'll be able to get benefits with the diagnosis? I thought there weren't any in your country. If there are, that's good news!

good luck let us know how u do! if i was you would print out the results of the quizzes u took, or take the list of symptoms and mark down the ones that fit you, might help. either way hope it only gets better for you hehe.

Good luck, just don't "try too hard" to convince them.

Greentea, I have had it as well. I want to withdraw from society myself. I wish I could be self-sufficient. I have had suicidal thoughts. NTs talk in this roundabout double speak way and I don't understand them most of the time. They're vague in how they talk. Greentea, I don't understand the NT world at all.

The more I interact with NTs the more disgusted I'm becoming by them. They're fake and they're phony. They use each other and hurt each other to get to the top. They are dishonest. I want no part of this. I think I would rather take hemlock exactly like Socrates did.

For the most part, I wish I could only interact in real life with my family and other aspies. Greentea, I wish I could have an older aspie (male or female) be my mentor or something and guide me through things. I'm 30 now.

I don't know what a psychiatrist would do, but the clinical psychologist who evaluated me pretty much went through the Aspie Quiz - http://www.rdos.net/eng/Aspie-quiz.php - It took the better part of 4 sessions (one every two weeks) - so almost two months. He asked the questions, I talked & he listened (he's been extremely good at listening to what I have to say.) At the first session of the evaluation, I brought with me a 15-page bio, filled with examples of how I felt I fit the diagnostic criteria. In the end, he confirmed what I already suspected.

Best of luck, Greentea! Just be yourself & everything should go well. From what I've read of others' experiences (and taking my own experience into consideration), it's best if you go to someone who specializes in adult AS/ASD for your evaluation, since they are best qualified to know what to look for.

Thank you all so much for your support on this day!

Cube, I'm soooo glad to see you back! Pleeease hang around! I'd be reluctant to be a mentor because nothing I did, none of my """"brilliant"""" insights and ideas ever helped...not one bit. Then again, they say that NLD is a progressive condition, so maybe if it had stayed the same, my learning would've helped, I don't know.

Ana, I found out that it's exactly the same as in the US!

Postperson, that's exactly how it is here too with Psychiatrists. I wish I could stay away from them, but they quite have the monopoly on my getting benefits or not.

Zeichner, due to these guys' egos, I'm afraid of appearing too knowledgeable on the subject of Asperger's/NLD/autism. He may not give me a diagnosis, just to prove me wrong. So I won't come prepared with anything, at least not the first time... I'll do the quiz now again to refresh my own memory, that yes. Thanks for posting it! And LOL this is the one case in my life when the advice of "just be yourself" suits me!! !!

Brusilov, that's what I had thought too, that I should be careful about that.

I agree doctors really don't like being told what they already know and they seem to try everything to try and prove you wrong. I have had that experience with my GP.

The reason I mentioned bringing in the bio, is that I sometimes get tongue-tied & forget to mention relevant information. I didn't just hand it to the psychologist & say "your work is done" - I just explained that I didn't want to leave anything out by accident. He was quite gracious & accepted the biographical material in the spirit in which it was intended. Also, I think it helped my case - since they prefer to interview family members about the patient's childhood & my family lives in another city, so they would not be available. The bio included my earliest memories of being "different" - writing them down allowed me to take the necessary time to remember all the details.

Even if you don't give a bio to your doctor, I would strongly suggest spending some time to write down anecdotes from your childhood. During my evaluation, the doctor not only wanted to know if I currently experience xxx, but have I ever experienced xxx - and if so, to what degree. Having already thought about those things & written my experiences down made it much easier to answer many of the questions.

I have a tendency to sound too arrogant for Psychiatrists' egos, so I won't risk it, even though it'd be ideal to bring something written, of course.

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hooray for you, greentea.
I hope you can get backed up by a professional diagnosis.
good things!

As soon as I can get insurance, I'm going to try and finally talk to some doctors about AS and see about a diagnosis. For me, it wouldn't change a damn thing, except the sense of knowing WHY and all that stuff.