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Most if not all of the things you list as being childhood issues you’re attributing to autism are also associated with having an IQ of 180. Most brainiacs are considered weird by their peers and parents who don’t understand and nurture one with that high of an IQ which I’m going to go with yours clearly did not as you would be telling us about graduating high school at 12 if they had.
THIS is what dawned on me when I read Friday's post earlier, that this could be it, too...
As for the graduating high school at 12, I could have done that, easily. My teachers wanted to move me directly to 5th grade when I was 6. But I was 16 kg and tiny (lillesnille means "little kind one"), so my parents didn't want me to be stigmatized, and wanted me to socialize normally. They thus wanted me to go through school at a normal pace, and stopped the transfer. I remember school as excruciatingly boring, and people in my class as incomprehensibly slow. It was torture. I would definitely had been happier in another kind of school with more intelligent kids. That said, I was terrified of other 6 year olds at age 6, so I'd probably have had even more social problems if I had had to meet 12 year olds.
Anyway, I think you could be onto something. :-)
I STILL had an epiphany yesterday, one that makes me want to celebrate, and that makes me less stressed about what's going on with my social experience. Through the autism spectrum, I got something very, very important about my inner experience, I saw my mask, and I didn't know I had it even, but suddenly I saw it clearly, and I know what it is about. What I defend against. I realized why it is there. I felt a hint of compassion for myself, whereas I normally am way too hard on me. Autist or not, I needed that epiphany. It felt like my whole life story was rewritten. A question from long, long ago, when my mother thought I was a psychopath and trained me to be nice with people, was answered. I am also happy I wrote this post, as I got a lot of good info, even if I seem to have hurt people I didn't want to hurt. I feel overwhelmed by all the attention the post got, particularly the more emotional responses. I don't know why I got so much attention. I don't like this much attention. I don't like when people are angry with me, either. Or upset with me. I care about people and I want them to feel good. I feel terrible about misunderstanding @Sideways, and possibly making him/her more likely to not help people who need it. I like moving in the shadows, and I don't want to cause pain. I seem to always do, and I don't get how it happens. It is always based on stupid misunderstandings and me thinking I react the right way, but then it seems I don't. It is always the same shit. This is why I mask. If I react visibly, people always get angry. I kind of suddenly think I cannot unmask. It exhausts me to mask, but I'll be totally broken if people always think I'm bad with them, when I think I'm not. It is so confusing.
It doesn’t take much for a diagnosis of autism or even on the spectrum at this point. Im just saying this as someone who has had a lot of people around them diagnosed with it and then it’s been found to be untrue. You‘ve seen: GP, Neurologist, therapist, and psychologists. All people capable of diagnosing the condition and not one has mentioned it? You’re in your 40’s which means I assume you’ve been to multiple physicians in your life and if your parents thought you were a psychopath I assume your teachers would’ve noticed something and yet in your whole life no professional has even suggested it but has suggested multiple other diagnosis that do seem to fit your cluster of symptoms.
I started school in 1980. They didn't care about how people were back then, so no.
My GP has suggested eating disorders, cancer, celiac disease, nerve system problems, migraines (I got that diagnosis), "hidden depression" and now last bipolar. He suggests it all because he is at a loss. I don't believe I have all of these things... My symptoms don't even fit a lot of these illnesses. I just have brain fog, it is debilitating. I felt scared by it, and it makes me very tired. I want him to figure out why, and he has said sorry he cannot help me.
As for suggesting autism, why would anyone do that?
I seem well-adapted. The stereotype of of autism is Rainman. In the -80s and 90s when I grew up, even more than now.
I don't remember meeting any doctors ever as a kid, unless I had pneumonia. My mother was a nurse, she didn't take me to doctors, and I was very healthy.
I have however, met a lot of experts since 2014, and they have not found anything wrong with me. My symptoms came creeping in after the onset of PTSD. In 2017 I got issues with certain foods and my brain fog issues started. And some of them HAVE mentioned autism, but they haven't suggested it as a diagnosis, I guess because I don't look autistic. Does that mean I don't have it? I have no clue. Do all autists look "autistic"?
My therapist worked on my trauma and on all other little nuances of my personality. I know myself so well after all those years of 3 hours of therapy a week.
The thing she spent the most time on, was to try and teach me how to feel my emotions. She wanted me to get angry, to get sad, because all I ever showed was happiness, even when I talked about being abused. She once almost screamed at me to "YOU AREN'T HAPPY, STOP LAUGHING!" AND she told me that I had to stop answering like an autist, when I was too logical instead of emotional in my answers. I asked her about all sort of disorders, including both bipolar and autism. About bipolar she said she sees no symptoms of bipolar (I asked because my GP kept mentioning it). I also asked about autism, given how she had compared me to autists, and she said she thinks my "autistic traits" are not autism, but trained inability to see my own emotions from parents being too controlling of my experience as a kid. She did also say that I could go to an autism expert if I wanted an assessment. But I myself at that point thought autists were only Rainman-like people, and I'm not one. And thus it ended there. that is the only person who has been asked specifically about thoughts on autism.
I have been in and out of doctor's offices since 2017 without finding any reason for my brain fog or food sensitivities. I feel my GP has given up on me. I am of course interested in finding a cure for my brain fog and my food sensitivities, and no, I don't believe unmasking will help the problem all that much. I just think it will help a bit, as stress causes the brain fog to get worse.So I’ll echo what others have said. Get a proper diagnosis so that you might deal with your issues in the most productive way possible. Unmasking will not allow your brain fog that is causing you to be unable to move to clear. It won’t change your ability to eat things. Masking is something that most PTSD people do so we can function in the real world, this masking causes none of the symptoms you’ve listed.
Going to the doctor to talk about "autism" will not EVER help me. It will just divert. JUST AS YOU SAY. THAT is exactly why I don't want an autism diagnosis. Not even if it is true that I'm an autist. I want the doctor to focus on the brain fog and diagnose that one.