Autism's confusing cousins

I have all the symptoms listed by the author. I went to get professionally diagnosed and I have… autism AND anxiety AND ADHD surprisedpikachu.jpg

It feels like that whatever you seek to get diagnosed with you can get it.

extremely high comorbidity rates

This has been my experience, it’s not very convincing and doesn’t give me confidence in the field.

Or it’s entirely predictable that those who have a set of symptoms get diagnosed with the stuff that tends to cause all those symptoms

Do you think neurotypical people often go, "I would like to spend significant time and money to get an autism diagnosis"?

I don't think it's particularly common. When I went through my dx, I was really hoping for adhd because then I could get meds, but my doc and all my screenings were like, "definitely not adhd, definitely autism".

So, maybe you are seeing rising diagnosis rates and considering that too easy? If encourage you to think about why you feel this way.

I would say people who are not as disabled as I am should not get a diagnosis. My condition is obvious. I was hospitalized several times and now I cannot work, I have one friend, and I am homeless living in a minivan.

I had one good PDoc who helped me, with my genetics, not to diagnose me, but to help me find what helped me and my specific symptoms. Diagnosis is not as helpful as looking at your own symptoms and own history and using that to find what helps you.

How do I know if I'm neurotypical? I have some challenges, I've done a few tests, but I could just be a lazy neurotypical bastard. I think if you go to therapy you can get to take yourself more seriously, look at the signs, self reflections and process that. Now that can easily lead to "I need to get diagnosed with XYZ". Just to be sure.

It's not about the rising rates, that could be explained in other ways.

You go to a testing center, not a therapist, to get a diagnosis. The online tests don't count. A thorough test will take a half-day or more, with tests ranging from conversations to Q&A to visual to a battery of multiple choice questions.

You had to catch them all ;)

If you don't get the diagnosis before it causes a crisis, it can be _much_ harder to get appropriate support _after_ a crisis.

Yep. For some extra anecdata, mine included a 2 hour introductory session (briefly covering the many forms and [official] online tests she had me do ahead of time), and then two 4-hour test sessions, each of which left me utterly exhausted.

The real question should be how many false positives does ADOS-2 produce? (The gold standard of autism diagnosis)

That is absolutely false. And I stare that from experience. I was looking for help long before my life collapsed and no one thought I was sick enough.

It feels like some people just say things these days. Research shows that autism and ADHD are highly comorbid, I forget the exact numbers off the top of my head but they're something like ~50% of autistic people having ADHD, and ~20% of people with ADHD having autism.

So then you grow up as autistic and/or ADHD person which creates a lot of social friction and conflict in your life, you're called lazy, careless, difficult, overly sensitive, and this is particularly bad if you're undiagnosed. You don't fit in socially so you develop social anxiety (this is par for the course), and after a while that can spiral into depression or even a personality disorder, you might start to self-medicate which can turn into a substance use disorder, and ultimately people afflicted by these disorders are taking their own lives at alarming rates. You should look up statistics for suicidal ideation among children and adults with autism for a reality check.

Most of this can be prevented if those affected were diagnosed and offered support as early in life as possible.

So no, having ADHD and autism, two very closely related neurodiversities, and then developing anxiety as a result of that is not at all unusual.

How do you measure a true positive? Afaik, we don't have an objective, repeatable method of diagnosis.

If you can't measure a true positive, you can't determine the false positive rate.

Don't read what I didn't say.

I've read that fMRI may be used as an objective diagnostic tool for autism. This was a few years back and I'm not sure how further research panned out.

Sorry, I misread that.

You've probably read about some differences that show up on a population level (just like there are with ADHD) but it's not a diagnostic tool.

How are you so familiar with the topic? I feel like you described my life perfectly.

If there’s a phrase to describe this wonderful experience of life, it’s “social friction.”

> Do you think neurotypical people often go, "I would like to spend significant time and money to get an autism diagnosis"?

The diagnosis is a road to help. I doubt many people travel down that road without there being some merit to their ideas, but even if it is the case that lots of people travel down that road, that doesn't say great things either. That just means we have a giant group of people screaming out for help and they are using one of few outlets to try and get it. I'd rather they get that help through travelling down that road than blocking off the road to anyone isn't 'actually ill', whatever we define that as.

This life trajectory seems quite common in tech tbh. I suspect the proportion of autistics with ADHD in tech is quite high, given the appeal of: not working with people, novel difficult problems to solve, immediate sensory feedback from working on your computer. It also describes my life accurately as well.

I was diagnosed with ADHD as an adult in a healthcare system that doesn't consistently recognize and treat ADHD in adults. Many clinicians are unfamiliar with it and still believe in myths like ADHD being a disorder that only affects children, or who fail to recognize ADHD as the primary condition and waste years of people's lives on diagnosis and medications that don't work, so I was forced to largely figure it out myself to try to advocate for myself - DSM-5, ICD-11, research papers, personal experiences from other people.

Ironically, we chose a work style that requires maintaining prolonged focus, which sucks without meds (especially when dealing with boring tasks).

This is a long shot but have any of you had issues with noise and light sensitivity?

It’s something new that started happening to me in my early 30s. I can’t seem to get a diagnosis. Wondering if it’s autism related.

I’ve been to a bunch of specialists and they say it’s all in my head. But car headlights look 10x brighter than they should. And cutlery sounds 10x louder.

My son has ASD. I think I have it too on some degree. And yes, headlights especially nights are very hard to eyes. I have no issue on sounds though.