The Gender Critical Autistic Women’s Thread

[SporadicSpartacus]

I never thought i’d be starting a thread aimed at such a very specific demographic, but there do seem to be a few of us out there.

Anyway, I thought we could use this thread to talk about the interactions of being autistic and participating in the sex/gender debate.

I think it’s particularly relevant as a lot of the argument hinges on clarity (or obfuscation) of language - when many autistic people need clear and unambiguous language to be able to understand, process information and express our own points of view.

Credentials/about me: i’m 31, diagnosed with ASD (Aspergers presentation) last year, and awaiting an assessment for ADHD. I am female, bisexual and married to a man. I’m not a mother yet, although would like to be- and have found Mumsnet very welcoming regardless.

I don't know what to add atm.

I'm early thirties too, and my asd was confirmed a few years ago.

@BeyondSceptical How did you go about getting it confirmed, if you don't mind me asking?

@Offred I never had that, strangely.

I think it was because my parents were always very clear that boy = has penis and girl = doesn’t. And my grandparents would happily buy me any “boys toys” I expressed an interest in, also being very clear that they weren’t boys toys because girls can play with them too. I do remember being very confused about my grandmother wearing trousers, because I thought girls had to wear skirts and dresses!

I think if family had prevented me from having the toys I was interested in (I’m not saying that other people’s families did, I’m just musing about what might have made the difference for me personally), or pushed the point that things were boys’ or girls’ toys, I might have questioned it more. It does make me concerned about the influence of various pressure groups if they have access to young / easily-influenced children.

Not sure if my family were just unusual or if the 70s / 80s were a different time. It certainly felt easier to be ‘odd’ back then.

SickOf, it might be worth starting a thread but on the other hand you might be best giving the whole topic a swerve for your mental health.

Self Id for gender has become a mainstream accepted thing but not for legal purposes at this point. Scottish government led a consultation on the issue which was open until March. They haven't yet published the findings.

SuperLoudPoppingAction that’s also who I meant when I referred to people who self-ID. I remember going on one of the main autism forums shortly after diagnosis and a lot of self-ID, no intention of being diagnosed, men were telling me I was doing autism wrong [eyeroll]

@SickofPeterRabbit yes, it’s the stuff with self ID gender.

My area has self referral for adult assessment, you have an initial assessment and if they think there is a basis for diagnostic assessment you are put on a waiting list (which is years long here).

I don’t know why I didn’t understand sex differences TBH. It wasn’t for lack of information I think it was more about liking certain things without being clear on what the stereotypes said, not being aware of what body I had and then ‘these are boys things’ when I went to preschool from other children and activities being heavily divided along stereotype lines. Social identification was more important than biological identification I think because the things I liked tended to be bordering on obsessions (dinosaurs, rocks, castles, knights, stuff with wheels, experiments).

I must have been so lucky.
I had difficulties at work which meant I couldn't manage without a dx anymore.
Went to gp and he initially referred me to some kind of MH worker to talk about anxiety. Which confused and frustrated me. I have all the mindfulness techniques I need and I was seeing a private psychotherapist at the time, which the GP knew.
So I went back to the GP who referred me to psychology.
From that I had a phone appt where a psychologist read out baron Cohen type questions on systemising and empathising.
She put me on a waiting list for the assessment.
That was a 4 month ish wait.
Then 3 in person appointments and a phone one with a relative. 3 loved ones filled in questionnaires. I filled in 3 different ones.
Then she compiled it all to give a diagnosis.

Took about 9 months in total.

Even with the mix up.

For children it's a longer wait here and then about 4 gatekeeping camhs appt but then only one with a psychologist.

Sick, my OT was here for something unrelated and we got talking on it, she put the referral through to the clinical psych for me

I wonder if any of you would be interested in this bit of research

www.liebertpub.com/doi/10.1089/aut.2018.0001

(if I'd gone to the doctor, I would have had to see the community psych nurse for gatekeeping, and I'd had bad experience of them before so wanted to avoid that)

tentatively dipping a toe in the water. (thread)

I really really suspect autism. dd seems to have it. it is a two year wait here though someone has finally got their appointment after four years. (they fell off the list at 12 and were put on another list. at the bottom) I am dreading the same happening to dd as she is approaching 12.

reading about autism in females, well it would explain a lot obout me growing up .

I think I might hold the record for speed of diagnosis, at least on the NHS - less than 3 months between the first person suggesting I might have it (I had no idea) and the formal diagnosis.

Good that I wasn’t hanging around, but extremely disruptive and took a long time to process.

Hi, could I join In? I'm still awaiting assessment but have strongly suspected for sometime that I may be autistic. (I have only talked about this to close relatives, doctors and posted anonymously online)

I struggle with the modern transmovement for a variety of reasons. I find the transwomen are women mantra to be completely illogical. It literally makes no sense to me yet i'm scared of voicing my opinions as I don't want to be labelled as transphobic. Obviously I don't have a problem with individuals who genuinely have gender dysmorphia. I'm specifically concerned about the possible self ID law that could make female only spaces a thing of the past. I also believe that it's incredibly unfair for men to compete against women in sport. I recently watched a clip of the MMA fight with Fallon Fox against Tamikka Brents and it was brutal to see.

Hi!

Mother of a high functioning almost 18-year-old son (official diagnosis, ASD, ADD, Dyspraxia, several years elapsed between each pronouncement). It was his questions around gender and his inability to understand his 6th form peers that sent me off on my online research. Only this week I decided I am a ‘gender atheist’.

My own diagnosis is NLD (non-verbal learning disorder), which I received via my BA university years (2002-2005). This is one of the learning disorders referred to as ‘non-specific’ but I now wonder if there had been a better understanding of how ASD presents in natal females, if I would have been diagnosed with that instead.

Anyway, my particular quirks are quite a bit like my son’s (oppositional, non conforming, very particular about language and how it is used, no understanding of the difference between left and right and very poor time keeping, for starters).

"no understanding of the difference between left and right and very poor time keeping"

Are you me?

Just posting to thank you for starting this thread, Sporadic.

It feels like a good place to chat and, apparently, share some of the bazillion things I worry about.

While it’s not strictly relevant here, I am also concerned for women who speak English as a second language. I worry that strict rules around what terms are and are not acceptable (leading to increasingly obscure euphemisms) will have the side effect of making the discussion inaccessible to a particularly vulnerable section of our Black and Minority Ethnic sisters, especially Muslim women, who will be most affected by self ID in terms of personal impact.

For instance, I currently use the women only area of my gym because it is the bit that my Muslim girl chums use. Here they are able to dress as they please and uncover their hair etc (honestly cannot imagine trying to work out in a hijab). This freedom space is place where women from different backgrounds are able to bond over similarities and it’s particularly precious to our friendship as much of British socialising is based around alcohol.

My DD was diagnosed in about 6 months superloud, largely because by the time they accepted there might be something more than her being badly behaved/‘emotionally immature’ he difficulties were extreme so when the referrals went in she was seen as an urgent case.

Average time for diagnosis here is 4 years.

There's also a classist element to being required to have a degree level knowledge of gender identity and related descriptors before discussing them.

But then if you do actually have an ability and the leisure time to understand and read foucault you might be uneasy about his worship of Sade from a feminist perspective.

I think it all seems quite tricky to engage would for a number of reasons.

Offred, one of my 3 DC has been seen as an urgent case. From presenting to the GP to seeing camhs was about 16 hours.
Still seems to be taking forever.
School is happy to treat him as though he has autism though.

Hello!
I was diagnosed 2 years ago, and like a pp I find "transwomen are women" illogical as well.

I remember growing up, there were clusters of girls developing anorexia, then clusters of mental health issues with self harm, now as well as the above clusters there are some schools with groups of transitioning girls. I know there are known links with autism for both MH, self harm and gender confusion, and it seems obvious to me that social expectations and arbitrary rules are at the root of it.
Society dictates women/girls should be thin in order to fit in and attract men.
Society dictates fairly rigid social etiquettes which are confusing and difficult to follow.
Society (now more than ever) dictates that girls = pink, long hair, make up, gentle activities etc and boys = blue, short hair, rough tough activities. If you're an autistic girl who fulfills those stereotypical roles, fine, if you're not, you may well believe that you're actually a boy, and rather than having the space to work it e told "yes, you're a boy!"

How damaging and confusing to find that no, you really can't become a boy. Affirmation in these cases could be very bad.
I was, and am, non conforming. Going through puberty was very distressing. I'm certain that if I was a teenager now I would be fully immersed in this and would fully believe I was a boy all along, and that's why I didn't fit in, instead of it really being social and communication difficulties.

CAMHS and learning disability/ASD are separate here. This has basically resulted in DD being diagnosed but then ASD services saying ‘not us, CAMHS, her mental health is prohibitive to accessing our services’ and CAMHS saying ‘not us, ASD services, she doesn’t have MH issues, this is ASD’ 🙄

For anyone awaiting a diagnosis for them or their child, I have one piece of advice from my 12 year plus experience of CAMHS, ECHP, Social Services etc...

Start a folder. Ask for copies of every referral, every diagnostic test result, every appointment. Ask every healthcare provider you meet for their name, job title, contact details and record the date you met them.

No one will join up all this stuff for you, and you never know who you will want to contact again in the future. These jobs are high pressured and staff turnover is high.

Keep every scrap of evidence and never give people your copies, let them make copies at their expense while you wait.

Start a folder. Ask for copies of every referral, every diagnostic test result, every appointment. Ask every healthcare provider you meet for their name, job title, contact details and record the date you met them.

Yy! This is my folder so far!