'Increase' in ASD/ADHD

@Westernesse there wouldn’t be a doctor involved except for a physiological exam which isn’t always done.

You’d expect a psychologist or behaviour therapist, speech therapist anything along those lines. Social workers can be trained to do assessments as well.

I don’t know why they didn’t meet your child face to face unless the assessment took place over the pandemic?

I think you’d need to look back through the report to see the occupations of those involved and the assessment protocol followed.

In any event, you did get the correct outcome and your child and family are benefitting from it so I don’t see why you would complain.

Being skeptical about people who’ve been diagnosed with autism and those who are desperately seeking diagnosis for some resolution is offensive and it attacks the community that your child is part of.

Saying you weren’t impressed with the rigour of the specific assessment that you received is one thing, attacking and invalidating those who have been diagnosed or are seeking diagnoses is another - that’s very apparent to reasonable people.

Westernesse

Your post was ableist and autism is a protected disability. You said a lot of autistic people are faking it, it’s trendy, an excuse and you dismissed all adults as label seeking.

Are you as offensive to more visible disabilities?

The two things you’ve said don’t connect. It can still be censorship when it’s a private business. The post broke absolutely no rules at all and was entirely in keeping with the thread and in line with the topic raised in the opening post.

Hardly censorship, mumsnet can delete any post for any reason, it's a private business. There are plenty of other websites yoy can go to to complain about autistic people.

Why scoff at the private provider who carried out the assessment? Because it was an absolute joke. A shambles and there wasn’t a doctor involved in any way. It was a social worker and a couple of nurses who read his report to sign off on it. They never met my child. I have little doubt that this private provider finds everyone who is referred to them to be autistic. Is that not a concern.

There was absolutely nothing my post that would be offensive to a reasonable person and it did not break any forum rules. Therefore its deletion is censorship.

@Westernesse why scoff at the likes of the service provider who diagnosed your child and be dismissive of the autistic traits they have??

By your own account your child is now doing very well in school. And you are benefitting to the tune of about £3,500 - £5,000 a year. Over the course of your child’s lifetime that is a minimum of a quarter of a million quid. Plus all of the very many other benefits in terms of support and finance.

If the provider followed NICE guidelines I can assure you it was robust.

I didn’t report your post but I can see why it was offensive. Adults are entitled to a diagnosis just as much as children - many have been through the mental health merry-go-round, they’ve been diagnosed with eating disorders, many of the women have suffered sexual assault or rape, the majority will have not reached their potential in school or work. In short they deserve some dignity and decency, an understanding of why their lives have been difficult, and a route to a better life through correct diagnosis and support.

Stick a label on that!!

For the relief of it really. No one really knows about my diagnosis, I haven’t told many people, but for me it is such a relief to be able to understand myself and ultimately, to forgive myself. I don’t use it as an excuse, but I do give myself a bit more of a break rather than not understanding why I fuck up so much

I did nothing of the sort. I engaged with the topic of the thread.

My post was entirely in keeping with the thread and a response to the opening comment. Unreal.

For me it wasn’t a box. It was a way to understand myself after years of feeling like a really useless, pointless human being because I struggled with normal things. If I ever complained that noise hurt my ears, lights hurt my eyes, that I couldn’t organise myself at all, I was told that we’re all like that, I just need to try harder.
I genuinely thought that everyone had this same shitty life experience but they were better at dealing with it - now I can understand that it’s not me that’s crap, and I can manage who I am better, and I can be forgiving of things that I beat myself up about for years.

There’s an increase because why on earth wouldn’t we want to understand ourselves?

It’s not about censoring differing opinions but posters posting ableist shit stirring rubbish.

I didn’t make any accusations. None at all. Are you always in favour of censoring people when they say something you don’t agree with?

Westernesse

Well your post quite rightly got deleted. Your accusations are hugely inaccurate and offensive with or without data( which you’d never be able to find )as it’s just ableist shit stirring.

I see my message has been removed. That is absolutely ridiculous. I shared my experience and opinion as the parent of a child with an ASD diagnosis and this is the treatment I receive from Mumsnet. Wow.

how dare I not be absolutely 100% on message. Silly me with my wrongthink.

No you may not. I wasn’t talking about you.

Nothing from the NHS, school very supportive and he is doing very well. We do now get DLA.

I think we overall got the right outcome by sheer luck in the but the process gave me no confidence whatsoever that there is any real diagnostic robustness as to any of it.

Westernesse

Can we have links to data supporting your very offensive and ludicrous accusations.

I have been diagnosed with autism and adhd at 55 by the NHS. Why am I not allowed to know that I have these debilitating conditions and the reasons for the huge struggles I’ve had in every area of my life? Why am I just a “label seeking adult”? Why is it our fault that women and girls went undiagnosed for years causing many like me to end up getting diagnosed as adults?

@Westernesse what was the outcome following your child’s assessment?

Did you receive guidance/support from NHS, school support, DLA etc to help your child?

@Rubyupbeat

Diagnosis gives

• protection against disability discrimination
• reasonable adjustments at work, school/college/Uni
• access to support services and treatments (drugs for adhd)
• access to funds via DLA/PIP/disabled students allowance/special support grant/family fund/disabled facilities grant/carers assessment etc
• access to support when travelling (special assistance/bus cards etc) and when going to the majority of places (free carer ticket at cinema, theatre, concerts, etc etc)

It also gives you an understand of yourself whereby you can learn more about the condition and find strategies to improve your life. It really does make an enormous difference.

I'm amazed at the sudden increase of adults with adhd and that seem desperate for a diagnosis.
I tick every box on the adhd symptoms, but I've not always been like this, it's because I am going through menopause. I bet loads of women are like this, or suffering anxiety, why are people so eager for a diagnosis, to be put in a box?

...sounds like a service an awful lot of people here might like to know about.

Care to spill the beans? :)

@howshouldibehave

I think you’ve got a point there, and it’s really sad that more capable students are being denied attention/a place due to an influx of kids with much more complex needs.

However, there is a parental choice component having influence on the number of mainstreamed auties and a greater capacity than previous to support them within mainstream (though still not enough).

For us personally I am very against DC going to a special school. Someone we know sent their child to one; a child not dissimilar to ours. Within weeks of attending the child came out of school crawling along the ground because this is what they witnessed in a classmate and now they do not have a firm grip of even basic education.

By contrast our DC is surrounded by predominantly NT, though I’d say about 10% autism in the class, and is thriving. We hope to have 1:1 to bring the academics in line… but I just do not see what purpose it would serve to have DC in an environment with very severely disabled children when the environment he will grow up into has mainly able bodied NT.

Essentially, aside from anything educational, we are using it as a training school so he has some skills to cope with people in adult life… a special school doesn’t provide that environment.

We are waiting for an assessment and in lots of ways DC isn't impacted or effected but are two quite major things that do really effect his life. I have had people tell me I should be parenting differently and it is quite upsetting as we have clearly tried all the obvious parenting solutions. All I want is to know how to offer better support to him and it is going to take years to get to the assessment and it has taken quite a bit of effort even to get this far.

Yes to this! I have ADHD, not autism, it so much here rings true