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Misdiagnosis...or simply Co-Morbid?

wyverary

wyverary

Well-Known Member
V.I.P Member
I know plenty of people here have been diagnosed with various conditions before finding about Aspergers - Generalized Anxiety Disorder, ADD, OCD, Borderline Personality...the list goes on and on.

What I'm wondering is:
Are these necessarily "misdiagnoses"? Autism is, of course, a wide spectrum, and a very complicated one. For the longest time, I thought my diagnosis of ADD when I was 12 (I was diagnosed with Aspergers and NVLD at 16) was incorrect, but as time goes by, I wonder if it was necessarily, outright wrong. I certainly share a lot of traits of Attention Deficit Disorder (I have trouble completing tasks, my attention flits from thing to thing quickly and seemingly at random), and thinking about it now, I'm not convinced it was necessarily a "misdiagnosis" - just one particular trait that the evaluator caught while missing many others.

My question for you all is:
What have you been diagnosed with besides (or before) Aspergers?
Do you feel these diagnoses were outright wrong, or simply just one piece of your neurological makeup?
How do you think these various diagnoses apply to you, as a person, in various aspects of your life?
 
What's interesting to consider with co-morbid diagnosis, especially when talking about ASD as a neurological thing, is that a lot of personality disorders develop over time, and thus can be the result of your mind interpreting reality in a different way.

I've been over it a few times, but I'm still convinced that a few of my PTSD-ish traits stem from my aspie mind probably interpreting certain things a certain way and just being pushed way too hard, past what my aspie brain could deal with at the time.
 
I was first diagnosed as "Bi-Polar II" OCD... GAD... SEVERE DEPRESSION by a Psychologist. That was many many years ago... since then I've been to a psychriatrist and have been officially given the label.

Aspergers, OCD, GAD, ADD and depression.
 
My biological parents got me diagnosed with a language based learning disability. I agree with this diagnostic as I remember the speech issues I had when I was at school. I also had trouble learning English.

My foster mother at age 15 got me to do a diagnosis of autism. The person did the assessment didn't believe I have it after the assessment was done. This event I don't remember that well. I recently spoke with my foster mother again and she thinks I have high functioning autism.

As I got older and meet other people in my life, they thought I might have Aspergers. I even had someone a few years ago done a non-formal assessment and they believe I have it. A few months ago I felt very frustrated with all the struggles I had this year. I wanted to understand Aspergers to see this is adding to the struggles with my life. After doing my own research, I concluded I do have it and it help me understand many the issues I had in my life.

Also, a disability center I use to use when living Toronto recommend me to read Asperger's on the Job: Must-have Advice for People with Asperger's or High Functioning Autism.... | AspiesCentral.com . It is a really good book and recommend people to read it. This book helps me understand my employment struggles and how to do better on the job. I wish I knew about this book before I lost my job. I also wish I did research on Aspergers sooner as I could have maybe fixed my issues I had in my life in the past. The good news is learning this now, I'm working on to improve my social skills. I told a person I'm working with at the disability center that I have panic attacks when I attend my classes for the business program. We are working on a plan to control it. I'm also working with them to address many other issues that relates of Aspergers, my learning disability and other disabilities I may have. I learned if I don't address these issues, it will be hard to have a successful business. There will still be things I will always struggle with for my disability. But if I can do anything to improve, this can lead to greater success.

I'm also meeting with a neurologist in January to get tested for the Autism spectrum again. If they find out I do have it, this can allow me to access extra services to help me with my life. Even if I find out again I don't have it, I continue to work with people to improve my weaknesses. I don't know if I address all your questions for your post?
 
I haven't been formally diagnosed with AS yet (my first appointment is next week :fearscream:) so this is keeping in mind that I may be misdiagnosing myself (I'm pretty sure though).

I have been previously diagnosed with severe depression and social anxiety. I believe that the depression was co-morbid, but the social anxiety is a more complex issue...

I suspect that my constant relatively high level of social anxiety is a part of my AS, as it has been a constant in my life for as long as I can remember. However, when I was diagnosed as a teenager I know that the social anxiety was far higher than is even normal for me, often leaving me incapable to leave the house for days at a time and cause regular panic attacks, and generally ruining my life. It was a large contributing factor to the depression. I have since largely recovered, am able to function quite happily most days. As far as I can tell I am pretty much back to normal (as normal as I ever was :emojiconfused:) but my counsellor still has me firmly diagnosed with social anxiety. So, while I have no doubt that the Social Anxiety diagnosis was accurate before, is it still accurate now, or is it just a fundamental part of my personality? I don't know :smirkcat:
 
At the risk of repeating myself for the hundredth time,if the "pros" know so little about ASD,how can they positively label symptoms as comorbid to it...pay attention to how many comorbids exist in the same bed with ASD and you may see my logic
I will stand firm with improper subjective diagnosis most of the time...
I am not looking for a repair to what I am,I adjusted to my world and feel pretty good about my ASD bag of tricks
I hope this autie has not ruffled too many feathers with his very open mind
Anybody who clings to their pro's often very biased opinions should go investigate my blog about transorbital lobotomies and another neuropsych quack with an icepick,a mallet and his professional opinion...
My left frontal cortex was damaged in my accident I was in,so I have a pretty good idea of what Dr. Freeman's patients became after his traveling stage show procedures. Trust me,I study a lot of the human brain now that it has become one of my latest obstacles. I have no professional ASD diagnosis,my team of pros did not see or even address ASD when they were working with my traumatic brain injury. The brain damage rehab live-in fiasco and I will be involved in a lawsuit over wasting $80,000 of my money and actually doing more harm to me than good. I am fixing myself through sheer determination and the hope of even more dramatic improvement. Neuroplasticity is a cool word to say when you experience it first hand.
I hold no formal education on the human mind,but a very strong interest in improving my recovery,so before walking the walk,I needed to learn the talk.That process led me to find my own ASD now backing by two pros who work with brain injury,cerebral palsy and low functioning autism.
My cognitive rehab guy has learned from watching me and will work on furthering his education on autism now that he got to play with a fairly special high functioning one...he plays a mean bass guitar in his rock band too :cool:
 
I have been diagnosed at one time or another with bi-polar/manic depression, borderline personality disorder, depression, anxiety and even schizophrenia. I have been on as many as four medications at once for some or all of these, including Zyprexa and Depakote.
I think the fact that no one could really narrow things down suggests that these are just collective manifestations of a larger issue (e.g. possibly ASD).
 
Im on five meds as we speak. I have taken Depakote in the past plus some other meds...... but I had weight gain. So they switched them..... around and now I think Im finally on the right ones.
 
The only thing I was every diagnosed with was "female" and "will be tall when grows up". :p

But for all that I've read, I should think that in some cases it's not a misdiagnosis so much as correctly guessing the comorbid before the main label is found. A lot of aspies do have ADD, OCD, and other stuff that's something of a side effect of being an aspie. To me, that'd be like correctly identifying that you're sneezing and congested before you finally figure out you have a cold.
 
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