Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and not fitting into anything

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I have ASD and the most frustrating thing is what my mom calls not fitting into the boxes that professional help with pretty much anything needs to check off to make a decision. I only fit into things partway at best. This makes things like medical treatment and vocational services especially complicated. I have been working on creating my own box but that takes a lot of knowledge and experience that is hard to get when I don't fit into the ways most get it in the first place.

That is to be expected. Females weren't diagnosed because the criteria was designed to spot males with autism.

I'm an unusually weird case because I pretty much pass as female. Petite hourglass figure, feminine walk, speech pitch and patterns are feminine as well! 24 inch waist and 34 inch hips means that I look better in some clothes than the models!

I've never fitted into the right boxes either. I had a family social worker when I was a child, who was trained to support autistic children, but all the advice she came up with that helped other autistic children didn't work for me. I think if I had of been diagnosed with ADHD back then, my parents might have been offered advice more suitable for ADHD children, as most of my problems were related to hyperactivity and impulsivity. The social worker was trained to help children with autistic problems such as communication and managing sensory overload and understanding sense of danger, or having eating issues, that sort of thing. I didn't need any help for that sort of thing, because my behaviour wasn't caused by sensory issues, and I didn't have communication problems, and I had a good sense of danger for my age, and I didn't have any more issues with eating than the average child, I was well-fed and ate most things that were put on my plate without a fuss.
But unfortunately back then nobody thought about ADHD, because I was a girl. My mum was often at her wit's end, reading through a book about Asperger's syndrome and becoming frustrated at there not being any information on hyperactivity or keeping a hyperactive child occupied, etc.
There weren't really any solutions to my problems, it was just a "take it day by day" thing. I mean sometimes I could be playing nicely with my toys, then the next minute I could be jumping off the furniture and tormenting my parents because of having surges of energy. There were no triggers for this, not even with food. Actually eating sweets didn't make me more nor less hyperactive.
I remember one time my mum said to my aunt "I think anything she eats makes her hyper", and I thought she was going to stop me from eating or something, so I cried in a panic. I was only little, not understanding that my own parents wouldn't neglect me like that.

I'm male, in diagnosis process, also don't fit in most stereotypes but what matters is the diagnostic criteria which can present in many ways.

I also don't fit in with this society.

I have various mental & physical disabilities in addition to autism & some are related to autism like comorbids but others are completely unrelated. When it comes to support services & assistance, various programs focus on specific disabilities & I'm not quite sever enough or don't have the right official diagnoses to qualify.

When I was officially tested for autism I was told that I communicated too well verbally & seem too intelligent to be autistic. My paperwork said I had Aspergers Syndrome due to having Schizoid Personality Disorder & that I have nothing on the autism spectrum It also said I had Borderline Personality Disorder, depression, & that I fit all the main features of Schizotypal Personality Disorder but don't have Schizotypal. Having a diagnoses of Aspergers Personality & not autism means that I can not qualify for assistance that's for autism or developmental disabilities in general. My psychiatrist & general practitioner doctors believe I'm on the autism spectrum though & I relate to a lot of the typical issues & problems so on this forum I say I have it but it's not quite officially diagnosed. There is a stereotype that Aspies are good with technology & have decent or even great careers in the STEM field but I struggle majorly with technology & most people my age are a lot better with it than me.

My mom was very critical of me sometimes & we had lots of arguments that triggered me into having BAD meltdowns because she thought I was being extremely lazy & not wanting to work & that I could do better when I was working federal minimum-wage jobs not realizing that I was extremely lucky to even have those jobs. My mom has told me various stories about people she knew who had a major disability & were very independent & had decent jobs. Problems was most of those examples were people who only had one disability that was diagnosed when they were little & they were able to compensate since they received services & assistance growing up & were not disabled in other areas. My mom was focusing one disability at a time that I had instead of seeing the whole picture of how the combination of lots of very different disabilities most of which were diagnosed till around the time I became an adult & having very limited supports growing up can majorly negatively impact someone's performance in school, functioning at home, & life in general. Not having assistance in place to help me transition to adulthood was also a major hindrance. I was basically expected to figure out how to get a decent job on my own & was criticized because I had not gone to college due to me majorly struggling in most school subjects. Thank god I moved in with my current girlfriend when I turned 30.

I noticed that various people can have very contradictory opinions of me even if they known me in the same environment at the same time. Like some think I'm a huge a$$hole but others think I'm really sweet, some think I'm very stupid but others think I'm smart, some think I have no sense of humor but others think I'm very funny, some think I'm very lazy but others thought I was a very hard worker, some thought I was not capable of doing most anything but others thought I could do most anything I set my mind to. I've been compared to different scene & cultural groups like dork, geek, nerd, EMO, goth, & punk, even various terms for liberals while other times various terms for conservatives. The thing about me is that I tend to go my own way with things & I don't conform or majorly follow any group or trend. Others don't know what to make of that & haphazardly toss me into different categories usually based on not knowing me well & only noticing a couple factors & then expect me to conform to whatever box they tossed me in.

I pass very easily for NT but that's from years of masking, which unfortunately has been detrimental to me. In general, I have a good work ethic, but I've had to take a lot of time off work in the past few years due to burnout.

I don't fit into boxes full either and I think that's what's made my life a mess at times. People mistake meltdowns for just having a short fuse or being too melodramatic. Taking FMLA time from work because I'm being a hypochondriac or it's in my head.

I'm not sure about the boxes but I'll go with the crowd on this one seeing as I'm here

You have a similar sort of ASD as me, except I'm not Schizoid or anything like that. I'm more ADHD and anxiety/depression.

I was never a stereotypical type of Aspie. I never flapped my hands when anxious or a little professor as a child.

Most autistic children have adults tell them repeatedly not to stim or to make eye contact, etc. I never got anyone saying that to me. All everyone did was say "stop moaning!" whenever I opened my mouth. That was said so often to me, that it just became a catchphrase that didn't mean anything any more. And it means nothing to me now, which is why I get angry whenever people tell that to me. I find myself yelling "I wasn't MOANING" rather indignantly.

I don't exactly have a learning disability but I've never been as bright as a person diagnosed with Asperger's should be, according to the criteria for ASD1. I have more like surface level intelligence, like the average person really. Although I struggle noticeably in some things such as math and technology and most facts.

Yesterday I was having a conversation with someone about music, and I said I loved country music. He started asking me about different country singers and I just shrugged. He was like "how can you like country music if you don't know anything about it?" And I said "well I just like listening to country music, I don't know the details about country singers" - even though right now I'm obsessed with country music, I still don't know much about it. I just enjoy listening to it.