• Welcome to Autism Forums, a friendly forum to discuss Aspergers Syndrome, Autism, High Functioning Autism and related conditions.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Private Member only forums for more serious discussions that you may wish to not have guests or search engines access to.
    • Your very own blog. Write about anything you like on your own individual blog.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon! Please also check us out @ https://www.twitter.com/aspiescentral

Newbie!

overtherainbow

New Member
Hi, I'm a 49 year old woman, mother and grandmother and it's taken me the best part of 10 years to get a GP to refer me for an ASD assessment, but it's took for me to have multiple breakdowns (?meltdowns) multiple job losses recently, my life I would say has always been messy but even I have struggled to understand myself let alone other people understanding me, about 6/7 years ago my mother agreed with me that I was on the spectrum so I asked 2 different GPs for a referral, all I got back was "what would it change or do for me?" That one sentence was so debilitating!
 
1686081216096.png
 
HI and Welcome @overtherainbow

Sorry it has taken you so long to get a referral from the GP.
Do read some of the older threads here - there is much to learn from other people's experience.
 
Welcome, @overtherainbow

I am glad you are getting a ASD assessment. Though, with or without it, you are still you. It just confirm what you already have become aware of. Alot of us are self-diagnosed and have never gotten the proper assessment. But it hasn't stopped us from still being who we are~
 
Hello and welcome. We can help with learning, understanding, and support. Glad you found us. Let us know if you need any help figuring out the forum.
 
A warm welcome and a giant hug because I think you deserve and need one at the moment. Self-awareness and acceptance are big hurdles to get over. I hope that your consultation brings you validation. I know an official diagnosis can be helpful for while mine did little for me at the time, it did save my job when I was much too old to go looking for another and in so doing allowed me to retire at 70 with a small pension as well as a 401K to sustain me.

I wish you all the best for you have earned consideration as a mother and grandmother.
 
Hello and welcome. It certainly isn't easy to be older in life and then have a diagnosis. I'm 55 and self diagnosed at 55, so I get that. I don't have kids, but I am married. Life makes more sense to me now, and it is difficult releasing old pent up tensions, and really I can tell worth it. So anyway, hope you like it here.
 
Welcome! Sorry about your challenges and with your doctors not being supportive.

Hopefully, if you are still seeking a diagnosis, that the rest of the process is smoother - in my case, the first doctor I was referred to refused to see me on the basis that I was wanting confirmation (which I suppose doesn't result in many billable hours) and it took several years before I was able to get a diagnosis (after reaching out to several others).
 
Many thanks for all your replies, it helps that I have a psychologist for therapy who is totally on my side.
I decided to try again after failing to manage at work yet again, it just got too much for me and I had a meltdown ❤️
 
all I got back was "what would it change or do for me?" That one sentence was so debilitating!
Very sad. I often wonder if such a response to you reflects the medical logistics of wherever you are. That they may be overburdened to a point of deliberately discouraging those of us who are in this age bracket. Tragic, yet it wouldn't surprise me. Equally I suspect this remains an element of medical science where those in authority are not willing to admit they are as proficient in their field as they like to think.

I didn't begin to unravel this "personal mystery" until I was 55. -Twelve years ago. Though I never intended pursuing any government entitlements or anything like that, so I have always eschewed any formal diagnosis. But yes, even at our age if we seek such entitlements of any kind we have to somehow secure that formal diagnosis.

Sometimes I also wonder if there is a prevailing mentality in play that essentially "writes us off" at our age, simply because we have gone "under the radar" and somehow managed to survive all these years without support.

A bureaucratic logistical decision more than any medical thought process. I guess in their eyes it's easier to convey a message of "Why bother?" rather than to explain all their logistical limitations. It IS discouraging. :rolleyes:
 
Last edited:
Hello and welcome to the forum! sorry to hear it's taken you so long to get your assessment. I hope it works out for you!
 

New Threads

Top Bottom