I never have special interests for that long though

Surprise! It's actually OCD!

I just gotta take the word of the professional who diagnosed it.

I won't trust *them * either unless they're autistic enough

if you are not autistic chances are you're an asshole

Why not both?

The "are you autistic" test are the weirdest fucking thing. Every single question I read and look at all the answers and think "well (c) is definitely the one that would be the most autistic in trait. I definitely am most related to (c) but am I choosing this because I'm trying to be labeled as autistic? Am I actually more like (b) and I'm just biasing my answers to the point of the test? Why am I trying to be labeled autistic? Maybe I should focus on finding the least autistic answer and filtering that out first. Because I'm definitely not the LEAST autistic. Fuck, I'll just choose (c) for this one. I'm overthinking it."

Next question.

"Well, I definitely don't have sensory problems. Wait, what about masking? Am I masking so well I don't even realize it? I do hate going into a grocery store that I don't know the layout of. But isn't that normal? Yeah, I wear earbuds and don't listen to anything sometimes. But, that's normal too. Wait, what was the question?"

If I could take a test with someone hearing my inner thoughts, I think I'd be diagnosed before I answered the first question.

I think every single autistic person could answer the test so that they pick the least autistic answer for every question if they wanted to. But I don't think any autistic person could answer these types of test in a way that is accurate to themselves. At least for me. I literally am focusing on how the questions were made, what they are concluding, and coming up with corner cases for each answer that means none of them apply to me.

Can't I be both? Don't limit me!

it's a running gag in my neurodivergent friend group where people are often misunderstood as being blatant assholes when they admittedly have troubles empathizing

but yes, you don't have to be a Musk level of an abomination to be both

I'm not autistic, but I can definitely relate to overthinking and using earbuds without music. I guess there's a decent amout of overlap between autism and ADHD.

Thank you for writing this, I struggle with tests so much and exactly as you described.

Eh. I have severe ADHD, as does my wife. We both got diagnosed at age 30. At age 50, she added autism.

I've felt for years like folks on the spectrum are if not my neurosiblings, certainly my neurocousins, if that makes sense. So I started looking at the screening stuff and reading up on it. I score very very high on the social aspects, but like zero on the hobby/obsession and food/texture aspects… so I'm pretty sure I don't.

But I did kinda obsess about it for quite a while. heh.

I do the exact same lol. Though I've gotten pretty good at quickly deciding what the appropriate answer is for where I'm expecting to fall on whatever aspect the question is trying to measure - not that that helps with test accuracy.

"Which answer are they looking for?" Gets me every time

Here is something that really fucked me up for a while: I didn't think I had major sensory issues but because I am an independent adult with a neurodivergent spouse, we had just eliminated all that from our lives.

Do shirt tags bother me? No, but I haven't bought clothes with a tag in years.

Do certain garments bother me? No, the fact that the only pants I can tolerate are sweats (at home) or jeans (with stretchy fibre content) was camouflaged by those being the only pants I ever wear.

Can food touch? Yes? But I won't enjoy eating if the cold sauce is mixed in with the hot food. I also almost never eat in public/with other people because I am gluten free and vegan so I very rarely eat food that isn't prepared by me, which has been the case for years ☠️

If you've been self- accommodating for so long, you may not realize that you are doing it.

It's obvious once you start reading literature and exploring both conditions deeper. The amount is overlaps is staggering.

Both autism and ADHD are evolving as diagnosable conditions. In DSM4 both conditions could not coexist and autism was boys and trains thing. DSM5 made autism possible for women and deer facto created AuDHD. I can totally see some kind of DSM7 where both are seen as outdated and replaced by a new condition like "regulation disorder" or something.

Hmm. Well, that gives me things to consider. lol.

I don't think I have any clothing issues, except I must have a shirt pocket. That used to be less true, but I highly preferred one most of my adult life because I bucked the "uncool" trend and liked having a pocket protector for my pens. Then I got glasses, and having a shirt pocket was necessary for that. Now I'm a wheelchair users and pockets on shorts/pants are unusable, so shirt pockets are a must. Although I've always tended to buy mulitples of something I found that works because it works and was consistent. heh.

Food touching is generally not a thing I tolerate. Much less mixing food. lol. I mean, something like biscuits and gravy or rice and beans is one thing, but I see people make things like "thanksgiving sandwiches" and I can't do that. I want to enjoy each thing for what it is. And preferably not mixed. I will gladly use multiple bowls to help ensure that does not happen. lol.

But none of that (except I think the food touching was the single exception) seemed to pop up on the assessment tests I was doing. lol.

Blast. I thought I'd laid this one to rest. lol

Whether or not you are autistic only matters if it matters to you, comrade. You can lay it to rest if you want to.

It helped explain some things about my wife - has helped us both. The ADHD diagnosis was much more helpful. I'd like to know either way, but it's not the end of the world either way :)

My spouse and I both sought formal diagnosis last year. I had been on ADHD meds for two years by then and he has not been on any.

I went for ADHD and Autism and he did ADHD only. One year later he's like, um, I guess I'm autistic too eh?

Sharing in case it makes any thing feel more 'normal'.

Honestly, I'm not overly worried about it. If I do and got a diagnosis, it might help bring a little more understanding, but the ADHD explains most of my problems (and strengths). lol. So I'll probably continue to waffle a bit.

But knowing my wife has it for sure helps. We've definitely made some adjustments that just make sense now.

My dad almost certainly has ADHD but never got a diagnosis. In his case, it's more like my possible autism - if he does have ADHD which we're all (including him) pretty convinced, he managed to mask / cope well enough throughout his life - a diagnosis seems like a "whatever why bother".

Sorry to spend all this time talking about myself, it's ADHD verbosity. But I find everyone else as interesting as myself, too! :)

Speaking of which, your comment made me smile. No matter the exact mix of stuff, it does seems like a lot of us find each other, one way or another. lol. That's why my wife and I married - half a decade before our diagnosis - because we were the only people laughing at each others' jokes. lol

Sorry to spend all this time talking about myself, it's ADHD verbosity. But I find everyone else as interesting as myself, too! :)

Something I love about this community is that we can be ourselves. I think people here are understanding that what you are describing is one way ADHD/autistic people express empathy and connect with each other. No need to qualify it!

Hah, well, you know how it is - masking and apologizing becomes instinct. Thank you for the lovely reminder <3

That's why I'm glad I got diagnosed at age 8 when I didn't even know what autism is

Isn't that supposed to be the thought process for basically every IRL interaction?