trekster

We can be political without getting personal. I am learning how to do this in my public health masters degree at university.

Congratulations you are officially on the autism spectrum. Hope your diagnosis helps.

Mr Salvador you will get there you just have to find the right person who will help you unlock the way to getting a diagnosis. That might be PALS or your MP or even an advocacy service.

Moderator here. Has your research got ethical approval? If so from who and which university are you with please?

Hello and welcome to the site. Whose the aspie gang? Or do you mean you have local friends who are aspie that you spend time with?

Hello and welcome to the forum. There are books about grief and autism. Could you get bereavement counselling for your sad loss? Ask the gp for support. I highly recommend the book "multicoloured mayhem" as it's by a parent who brought up children with various different types of neurodiversity. Many autistics find boundaries hard to understand or follow. I'm unsure how to defibrillators boundaries as I also struggle with this concept.

Gold MD thanks for your support for transgender people. However homophobia and transphobia are very different things.

This is definitely a behaviour for aspergers folk. People have difficulties realising that 'running an emulator' is hard work and that causes us to seem not ourselves. Really hard work remembering all the things other folk can do without thinking. Even in my later years if there is no pressure to do something or not do something I'm able to do it. Only getting gluten, dairy, benzoates out of my system permanently has allowed my short term memory to work properly.

Hello welcome to the asd forum. I'm one of the volunteers.

I would try and get treatment for your mental health problems so you can move on from this situation. There is also the option of avoiding gluten, dairy, benzoate, aspartame and any other foods you are addicted and fuel your mental health problems. Do you have a trauma related mental health reaction to your experiences? I was told for 20 years by the nhs that I was being refused treatment on the grounds of my autism. Now I'm in art therapy for my trauma related to my childhood and unrelated to my autism. You can get monetary compensation for any violence or threat of violence to you but unsure if you could get legal aid to apply for it.

Hello and welcome hope you find peer support from the forum here.

You can ask for the records of what was said afterwards in writing if you wish. There has to be an accurate picture from the families perspective along with yours. Yes it is your brain but how you see the world and how your family sees the world could be completely different, clinicians need to be able to see that. Any coping mechanisms you have developed because of your self identified autism/aspergers need to stop whilst you are in the assessment. eg, My family used to watch catchphrase on tv, gradually i built up a library in my head of expressions learning them by rote. When i went for my aspergers assessment i knew all the expressions except a few. This meant my aspergers seemed milder than my autism actually is because i had compensated. Diagnosticians are unable to see through the scaffolding of compensatory methods we use. Mention your anxieties to the diagnostician, "i did whatever i could to be like everyone else but it didnt work" (if true). You can restart your coping mechanisms after the assessment is complete and the appointments are over. Then see if you can seek post diagnostic support for yourself and your family. Carers assessments for them, monetary benefits for yourself. You are nearly at the end of your assessment, if it helps i went through similar anxieties to you with trying to get my CPTSD diagnosis and got a few misdiagnoses along the way. I hope your next assessment is finally the diagnosis you are seeking,

I've got physical health problems alongside my autism and other stuff. I have equal difficulties explaining my physical health stuff to everything else and I'm a part time wheelchair user. Cheers nell

That can be a good thing confused traveller. Best you find out what relatives said about you afterwards because that could come up in the testing. Well done for going for the assessment and hope Wednesday 2nd goes well for you.

Hello BW and welcome to the forum Can your sons needs be met by saying they are part of his ADHD? Sometimes adaptations for ADHD folk can in turn help with their autism as well. Do you have a NAS parents group in your area? Or some sort of autism resource centre? If you edit your profile to show your location (or PM me off list if you prefer) i can see what i can find in your area. I have found by thinking of myself as a foreigner in my own country helpful in explaining autism to people. What would you teach someone who had never come to the UK before? There are a few books which can help teenagers and beyond in coping with their aspergers/autism "freaks geeks and asperger syndrome" by luke jackson "aspects of asperger syndrome success in the teens and twenties" by Alex Miller and Maude Brown "multicoloured mayhem" by Jackqui Jackson (luke jacksons mum) (mentions ADHD and autism) "what is asperger syndrome and how will it affect me" "thats the way i think" (mentions ADHD and autism) There are also a variety of autism friendly spaces which you could try with your son. Bearing in mind 'autism friendly' and 'your sons name friendly' can be different things. 1 idea is to attend an autism friendly cinema viewing and see if you bump into anyone else who can help in your area. There is no nationalised diagnostic route in the UK (although there should be). Hope ive helped rather than overloaded you.

Hello BW and welcome to the forum Can your sons needs be met by saying they are part of his ADHD? Sometimes adaptations for ADHD folk can in turn help with their autism as well. Do you have a NAS parents group in your area? Or some sort of autism resource centre? If you edit your profile to show your location (or PM me off list if you prefer) i can see what i can find in your area. I have found by thinking of myself as a foreigner in my own country helpful in explaining autism to people. What would you teach someone who had never come to the UK before? There are a few books which can help teenagers and beyond in coping with their aspergers/autism "freaks geeks and asperger syndrome" by luke jackson "aspects of asperger syndrome success in the teens and twenties" by Alex Miller and Maude Brown "multicoloured mayhem" by Jackqui Jackson (luke jacksons mum) (mentions ADHD and autism) "what is asperger syndrome and how will it affect me" "thats the way i think" (mentions ADHD and autism) There are also a variety of autism friendly spaces which you could try with your son. Bearing in mind 'autism friendly' and 'your sons name friendly' can be different things. 1 idea is to attend an autism friendly cinema viewing and see if you bump into anyone else who can help in your area. There is no nationalised diagnostic route in the UK (although there should be). Hope ive helped rather than overloaded you.

I completely agree and empathise with the feeling young inside but body says no.

Heard recently pots can cause manic like symptoms which is interesting. Still haven't managed to get referred for pots testing I keep chickening out of asking for a referal communicating with medics even really great ones is difficult for me. Trying to get a referal to my local gym on prescription.

Hi and welcome from another asperger edser. The term bendy is sometimes used to describe those who've got eds/hypermobility but normally in support groups. Due to difficulties expressing and communicating pain, I was only diagnosed in 2010 with eds. Aspergers was recognised over 20 years ago but post diagnostic support is sadly slow in my area. There is a thread on eds and autism under the 'related conditions' section of the boards. You can find a few of us on there with similar combinations to yourself. There has been some research to support links between autism and eds. Hope you find the support you need on here. Ally

http://www.asperger.org.uk/index.php/how-we-can-help/services-for-people-with-as/youth-groups/ http://www.asdhelpinghands.org.uk/youth-support/

Are there any aspergers or adhd youth groups in your area?

That's great news hope you get post diagnostic support as well.

It is well documented that autism has nothing to do with nuture ie how we're brought up. However cptsd can be caused by those factors you mentioned in your post wt.

I haven't heard of anyone loosing an autism or aspergers diagnosis so in reality these diagnoses do stay with us for life but in some cases we find ways of coping with our differences. For me they include running social groups for autistic and similar folk and attending autscape am annual retreat conference.

Many socialised females find their experiences of autism are often unnoticed because they appear to cope with life. This is a mask because they script conversations in their heads which they attempt to play out in real life, when these conversations don't go to plan their autism becomes more apparent to people who then don't understand because they are hidding their autism so well