I am No Longer Annoying
Notes on an autism assessment - part 4
Hello All,
If you are new here, part one is here, part two here, and part 3 here.
After my disastrous NHS attempt at an assessment I finally plucked up the courage to go private with the Adult Autism Practise. They aren’t cheap but they aren’t dear and they pride themselves on being neuro-affirming. And the wait times are short. It’s approx £1000 for a full assessment (but it’s paid in euros as they are in Southern Ireland so exchange rates vary) which is done in 3 parts. Or you can pay 1/3 and go for an initial consultation where at the end of an hour to an hour and a half they will advise whether you should carry on or not.
After feeling so emotionally battered and scared I decided to go for the initial consultation first and to see how it went from there. I applied in mid April this year. It was a simple process, fill in lots of forms, pay your money and then wait. At the end of April they email to say I’d reached the top of the waiting list and sent mini bios and videos of all their specialists to choose whom I would like to have a consultation with. I admit to this bit being a little overwhelming and in the end choosing quite arbitrarily out of a handful. I did play the videos because I knew I wouldn’t be able to cope with anyone that did that ‘quiet, gentle, therapist’ voice. To me, and it’s a personal thing, I feel very condensed by that voice, especially when you hear the person talking normally to someone in the corridor when out of the room. So that was very important to me. I wanted someone preferably used to older women, and LGBTQA+ friendly. I found my one and made an appointment for this week - mid June.
I got 2 very pleasant email reminders from the admin team 3 days out and 1 day out about my appointment with links to change it if necessary. Then on the morning of my appointment I was sent a more detailed email from my assessor where she outlined what we would be talking about. This was amazing and really helped my anxiety.
I set myself up for my Teams call, being sat for at least two hours beforehand trying desperately not to let myself get distracted and go and do something else as I’d probably forget to come back. As usual all worked well on the test run, but as soon as I actually tried it for real I hit a glitch and ended up 3 mins late. I hate being late for anything, even 3 mins.
We chatted for nearly an hour and 20 mins and we went over various sections on my forms. These were on the screen for me to see and refer to, which was good as I often lose the thread of what I am saying. We worked through in a decent order, covering only topics that were relevant, she was positive and affirming about all the things I said, didn’t waffle, didn’t tell me her life story, and kept the assessment moving along. We finished the session talking about special interests and she said she loved finishing the first session with that as it was a joy to see people come to life with happiness.
At the end she told me there were 3 possibilities - I wasn’t autistic, I was autistic and was happy to self diagnose or I was autistic and wanted to go on to the full formal assessment. She told me there and then I was autistic and she was very happy to say so officially. I then chose to carry on for the other two sessions to get it ‘in writing’ so to speak. I have to admit I got a bit emotional, which I didn’t expect really. But hey ho, tears happen.
At the end of the session she emailed me the extra notes she had made and what we would talk about in the next sessions. I can email her extra notes whenever I like. I hope the next two sessions go just as well.
So, I’m not annoying after all. I’m autistic.
Til next time.
That seems incredibly valuable. Goodness knows you get sodall support in the UK. I hope you go from strength to strength.
But therapy generally is often one step forward four steps back. And it takes a great deal of courage to embark on any process when you have to bare your soul.
My son has PTSD, OCD and ADHD. All caused by massive ongoing trauma inflicted by his very violent narcissistic alcoholic father.
I know nothing about Autism. But I know how devastating it is when your brain works in a different way than ‘the norm.’
Me too - I have severe brain malfunction. Due to ME another trauma induced disability. Again due to my son’s bastard father.
And my older son has Asperger’s and OCD plus little confidence.
We espouse terminology from the States. And I frequently have difficulties understanding. Are yourself and me and my guys Neurally Divergent?
Whatever - I’m comfortable with declaring that I’m Visually Impaired. But I hate Partially Sighted. I’m heading towards Severely Visually Impaired. So much kinder than BLIND.
So I guess I have to say “thank you America.”
As a militant Celt I can assure you that you are in the best of hands. But you know that already. We Celts do empathy and compassion by default. It’s in our genes.
For what it’s worth, I send my love and congratulations on embarking on this journey.
Keep on keeping on.
Andrea
in Cornwall
I wrote an initial response to this, then went back and read your previous three posts on this and realized I should have done that before responding. First, I am so glad you finally found someone who treated you with kindness and respect. I have found it so difficult to find good care for issues related to mental health and neurodivergence for our children, I think I'm afraid to really try to find it for myself. I have wondered about the value of pursuing diagnosis at this stage of the game; I really appreciate seeing your perspective on it. I think, like you, I've found my way to a good place. There's a good bit of autism in my family, so pretty sure I'm somewhere on the spectrum but don't really know. It would have been really nice to have considered this as a young person; I'm sure I would have made some different choices. (Teaching wasn't the best career for someone like me.) But, I know myself now and, like you, have figured out ways to be very comfortable in my life. It's so nice to read about someone else's similar experience and feel less alone in mine. Thank you.