Autism Assessment - Part 10: The Report

I received the report on 25 February. I asked my carer to go through it with m because I knew that I would struggle, mainly because it was 18 pages long, and my eyes would object to reading that much all at once, and I wanted to understand it fully.

I won’t bore you with every detail, but I want to clarify a few things, and some are very interesting and helpful for others to know.

I think the first thing is quite stupid… The report suggested that I deliberately banged my hand on the table, presumably in frustration. I explained how I was scared of losing a friend, and my involuntary movements were going mental because I was nervous and got upset. Any strong emotion can cause my movements to increase. I wouldn’t bang my hand on purpose!

It mentioned that I didn’t show any obvious signs of anxiety. To those who don't know me well, my anxiety doesn’t show much. However, I was incredibly anxious throughout the assessment. That's probably one reason I cried on the friendship tasks. One telltale sign that I’m really anxious is when my nervous laughter turns into crying. I was going to say this comment was BS, but now that I’ve thought it through, it was probably because she doesn’t know me and doesn’t know my thought processes.

It said “emotional distress occurred appropriately in response to discussing meaningful relationships”. My immediate thought was “what the f***? I dread to think what an inappropriate emotional response would be”. I asked my friend what it meant because I had no idea. She looked it up, and apparently, some Autistic people look at friendships as being more logical than emotional.

At the end, along with the discharge note, there was information on education and employment. I found out lots of interesting facts about access arrangements that Autistic students could be entitled to when taking exams. Did you know that they could be entitled to 25% extra time and request a room with fewer students?

The final thing mentioned was the potential entitlement to use a computer and ClaroRead in exams. In exams, I had a scribe and reader, but all they were allowed to do was read the questions and my answers back to me, and not the passage that you get in the reading part of the English paper. I had to read a page of block text without any help, pick out bits of information and analyse them on my own, and that was what I struggled with the most because my eye muscles don’t work properly. Luckily, I was allowed to use ClaroRead for my re-sit at college, which really helped.

There were many links to websites with support information, books, short articles, and podcasts about Autism. I’m planning to listen to some podcasts in the coming weeks. I prefer podcasts to articles because I’m not a lover of reading. When I looked at the websites, I expected more articles about Autism, but unfortunately, there wasn’t much information. After some digging, I found a few podcasts…

One video by Tony Atwood stood out to me because he explained many interesting facts about girls with Asperger's Syndrome, and I related to many of the points he made.  He spoke about girls having a strong liking for playing "schools" using dolls, and often, the reason they do this is to try to figure out social situations by replaying their day at school, often continuing this roleplay into adolescence. Most of the time, when they play with other children, the Autistic girls like to be a role like a teacher so that they can "be in charge" and lead the play. Then it clicked! From pre-school age right into my final years at school, I loved playing "schools" with me being the teacher. I sometimes played with other children but mainly with my dolls, especially my Baby Anebelle doll. I even learnt to tie a tie with my feet! 

Here is the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wfOHnt4PMFo

It also stated that mental health difficulties are more prominent in Autistic people, although it didn’t say why.

Although this company did give me answers, which I am grateful for, I don’t think much of their communication because they didn't phone when they were supposed to, and the woman who did my face-to-face assessment wasn’t even told about my physical disability, so it surprised her.

I was once asked why having this diagnosis meant so much to me, and the simple answer is to understand more about myself. I didn’t want empathy or sympathy. I just wanted and needed clarity, not as an excuse, but I needed a reason as to why I am the way I am. I needed validation. I needed to know to help myself continue to accept who I am. This isn’t the closure of a story because my story is far from over, but it’s closure of the multiple chapters of identity struggles. The chapters of who I am are finally neatly coming together.