this post was submitted on 02 Jul 2025
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Autism

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I'm asking because I'm suspicious I might have autism but I cannot access a psychiatrist.

If I do self diagnose and no matter how much evidence I find that I have autism at the end of the day I don't know that for a fact.

So if I go around claiming I'm autistic when I don't even know for a fact I am, it feels extremely disrespectful to people with autism right?

It'll be even worse if I do get access to a psychiatrist and they tell me no I'm not and I'm just weird or something.

EDIT: I don't want to reply to everyone one by one but I do wanna say thank you for everyone's kind and helpful answers. I appreciate it.

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[–] Aurenkin@sh.itjust.works 21 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Yes. My therapist advised me only to seek official diagnoses if I wanted to try medication (for ADHD at least which I also probably have). Being officially diagnosed can lead to discriminating behaviour against you by insurance and even immigration depending on where you live.

[–] monotremata@lemmy.ca 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I mostly agree with this--I commented not long ago in another thread that the political situation in the US has convinced me not to seek any diagnosis right now. But I would say that there can be reasons that aren't specific to medication in particular that you might want a diagnosis. Sometimes there are non-medication accommodations that you can get (e.g. at work) with a diagnosis that they might not be open to giving you without one. Sometimes this can be huge! I've had times where I was in two different different locations in the same office at different times, and in one, half my field of view was taken up by a throughway where people walked across the office, and in the other my view was against a wall and behind a little corner of wall, and I got so much more work done in the second spot. It was just tremendously less overstimulating. So the prospect of being able to get that kind of issue taken seriously is part of what tempted me about seeking diagnosis.

[–] Aurenkin@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 day ago

Oh yeah, this is actually an awesome point that I didn't even think of. Thanks!