When I was diagnosed Autistic in December they offered me some support sessions (either group or one-to-one) to help me get my head around my diagnosis. I never knew what I could/wanted to gain from these support sessions so I never took them up on their offer until recently when I had a phone call chasing up whether I'd be interested in sessions starting 29th May. I still didn't know what there was to gain from them, but a number of people have encouraged me to go to the sessions so I decided if I'm not there I can't gain anything and went for it.
My first session was 2 days ago and it was interesting despite being mainly an introductory session so that we all get to know each other and have an understanding of what we'll be covering over the remaining 4 sessions. There were 3 of us there, plus 2 adjudicators. There's actually 6 of us in our group, but this week one of them couldn't make it, one was ill and the other was AWOL leaving just the 3 of us for the time being. I was just happy that I met somebody else who chews like me!
Bits of the session itself were interesting. We covered the reasoning behind some of the tests that were done during our assessments, which was nice to get some insight into what they were actually looking for and how - half of which I didn't pick up on at the time, but I guess that's the point.
I'm looking forward to next week's session to get properly into the material and see what I can learn. If I remember rightly, I think it's about the social and relationship side of autism next week, which is the bit that affects me most. I just wanted to do a quick blog post about this week's session just to keep you all updated, and because I'm having a busy day today so haven't got the time to write a usual lengthy post. I'll probably blog about next week's session next week, so stay tuned for any useful insights I might gain in the coming weeks!
This is interesting - it must be a regional thing because nothing like that was offered to me. I was referred for further therapies and assessments after my dx but the ASD service kicked me to the curb because of my co-morbid mental illness and the MH service kicked me out cuz of the ASD.
ReplyDeleteYeah, it's maybe a regional thing. Or even just dependent on the NHS trust. My first referral was in Leeds and it was horrible how I was treated like a child and told I'm not autistic, yet when I moved back to York and went for a 2nd opinion it was completely different. They spoke to me like an adult, took loads more information, offered me the support sessions etc so I think it does depend massively on where you live. I'm sorry that they gave you such a bad experience (and sorry it took a while to reply - it's not often I check for comments as I don't really expect and readers lol).
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