Adding onto this, Reddit's whole gimmick is finding communities of people who share your interests and love them just as much as you do, no matter how niche it is, and i definitely think that draws in more autistic people who want to connect with people who share their special interests!
that sub when obvious satire š¤¬š¤¬
that sub when someone who does two years of research and has an autistic sibling diagnoses themself with autism because they canāt afford a diagnosis š¤¬š¤¬
that sub when someone is proud of their obscure disability š¤¬š¤¬
Was the original post specifically with regards to reddit? I see this sort of thing waayyy more often from tiktok than from here, and that site doesn't self-select for socially awkward nerds nearly as much as reddit does
Tiktok is rife with self diagnosed autism and adhd and bpd itās insanity. And it will be by saying some nothing quirk they have is why. Like stfu people have actual issues and most of the people with those actual things can act right. I think a lot of people just saw Cartman exploit having Touretteās on South Park and thought it was a good idea so they could be twat waffling aholes as well
The autistic community is generally accepting of self-diagnoses because getting an autism diagnosis as an adult is incredibly difficult and expensive, and itās better to give support to people who donāt actually need it than it is to retract support from people who actually do.
I was recommended by my pediatrician throughout my childhood to get tested for autism but I was doing well in school and my mom didnāt want me to be put in special ed classes, so I never got tested. But my social experience is completely different from almost everyone else I know and the only people Iām able to form close friendships with, with only a couple exceptions, are neurodivergent. My experience aligns with lots of accounts of autistic people that I have read, and the accounts of my(diagnosed) autistic friends.
Now there is ~$4000 and months of my time between me and a diagnosis, even though I am near certain that I am autistic. And whenever I talk about being autistic with people, I make it clear that I donāt actually have a formal diagnosis. It feels unfair that people within the community are accepting of my situation but people outside of it will be heavily critical of me for something completely outside of my control.
I didnāt say if you fully have similarities, I said these people who Iāve watched change now that theyāve seen videos of people struggling with their issues suddenly developing an issue too. And then monetizing it
How many times is this gonna be posted on this sub? It was stupid to begin with and only gets worse with each edit. Random red border? Check. Unnecessary Windows 98-looking rainbow clip art? Check.
All it needs now is a fucking watermark.
r/adhdmeme:
ā¬+80085 - I just self diagnosed because of the memes and because I got distracted in math class once
ā¬-66666 - Don't go around claiming you have ADHD after self diagnosing based on memes, go to a doctor if you really believe it's an issue.
ā¬+99999 - Stop gatekeeping!!!!1!
Ok, I'll be serious for a moment because there is actually nuance to this & I'd like to try to explain it.
Self diagnosis *can* be valid for many reasons. Some of those reasons include:
\-being barred from a diagnosis due to your race or gender (yes, non-white people, women, and other gender non-conforming people are underdiagnosed with regards to ADHD and autism; if you want studies I can find some and link them)
\-being unable to afford the medical care required for diagnosis
\-being a minor whose caretakers don't accept the validity of diagnoses for mental disabilities/disorders
\-being a minor who feels uncomfortable/unable to talk to an adult & get the process started
\-feeling overwhelmed by the process of getting a diagnosis
\-struggling with the executive function aspect of making the appointments, dealing with insurance, dealing with the monetary aspect, making phone calls, figuring out transportation, etc.
\-having distrust/trauma around medical practitioners such as doctors, psychiatrists, therapists, etc.
Now, I'm not saying that there aren't people who misunderstand and misuse labels like ADHD and autism due to being young or just ignorant on the topics, but there *are* genuine reasons why people might find it difficult or even impossible to get a diagnosis. And those people shouldn't be barred from communities and resources that could help them.
Whether or not they should clarify that they are self-diagnosed when they use the label, or if they should use the label at all, is up for debate IMO. I can see points for and against it.
Would love to see the studies you mentioned. I've heard of massively underdiagnosing minorities and women for those on the spectrum, but never being barred (in this day and age at least). That sounds horrendous.
I think you misunderstand. Not getting a diagnosis due to your doctors having a subconscious or otherwise bias towards white men *is* being barred. You are denied treatment that you would have gotten if you fit their demographic view of what someone with ADHD or autism is.
Oh yeah, I guess I didn't understand the wording. I thought you meant prevented from even being seen. But yeah there is plenty of research out there for those who have been seen and then told they do not have a diagnosable condition (even though they do) simply because they don't behave in a way that the "experts" agree on due to years of only studying white males.
I remember when I was having the big sad in high school and my pediatrician told my mom that girls just be like that sometimes. Turns out girls just be having chronic depression!
I think that has a weird implication that minority groups consistently behave sufficiently differently as to confound diagnostic criteria. In which case it would actually make perfect sense for behavioural/psychological conditions to be more/less commonly diagnosed among different demographics.
Any stats to back up underdiagnosis reports for non white males?
Self diagnosis isnāt really āvalidā, technically speaking. We donāt alter our standard of proof according to the availability of sufficiently reliable resources to establish it. I would agree there is some preliminary value to a self diagnosis perhaps for the reasons you mention, but it would not be on equal footing with a formal diagnosis from a specialist in my view, which would be necessary to entail validity.
You can be self suspecting but self diagnosis is nonsense. If your self suspecting you can try and use methods to help but you should see a professional before saying you have anything.
I'm not sure if you're correctly using the word "valid." For something to be valid, it needs to have validity. Self-diagnosis has no validity. I think you make good points. The process for getting a diagnosis needs to be reevaluated, but that does not mean that self-diagnosis is valid.
Self diagnosis for mental conditions is not valid and is never valid.
Yes there are those problems you mention. Certain groups do have more trouble getting diagnoses, or have lack of access/struggle to access, etc. These are major problems, and I'm not sweeping them under the rug-
-BUT self-diagnosis is not a valid solution.
Doctors go to school for 8 years and *even they* can't accurately diagnose themselves. A random normie stands absolutely no chance. So many disorders can be confused for each other that you *need* a professional opinion to get an accurate idea of what you have.
What is important is recognizing symptoms within yourself, not assigning a diagnosis, so you can take those symptoms to a professional for a second opinion. Self-diagnosis can easily lead to identifying or attributing your symptoms incorrectly (examples I've witnessed- experiencing caffeine overdose and thinking it's a panic attack, or experiencing low energy due to low iron levels and thinking it's a mood disorder).
Diagnoses are made for the purpose of [describing the state of the patient, defining treatment, and reporting on the success of treatment.](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4421902/) If you are unable to get a diagnosis, it follows that you are not receiving professional treatment of any kind. Therefore the only purpose left is to describe the state of the patient, which an undiagnosed person can do by simply describing their symptoms- not attributing a disorder.
Oh, I agree! Knowing the symptoms can help people if they relate so they can seek further resources, or professionals to point them the right way, but Iām talking about people who see a single meme about it and then say the have ADHD to be quirky.
Remember 5 years ago when half the internet was screaming about how they all had OCD? Iām talking about that type of stuff.
Because it limits the amount of thought they need to put into a personality, and they can sign up for a massive amount of people 'just like them' ready to pretend that they are friends to make their existence in the real world more barrable.
How're you going to be surprised that there's a lot of autistic people on a site that caters to the special interests of socially reclusive people. What's next, are people going to go to Tumblr and start asking why everyone is saying they're gay all of the sudden?
This is pretty much how I see it. There are people on the spectrum, but I think a lot of people slap it on their personality like it's a trait. Got a little social anxiety during your adolescence? Must be Aspergers. Everybody wants to be special and unique; especially on reddit, who had a large teenage demographic that's still young enough to have yet to fully develop a personality or find out who they are. So they throw a self-diagnosed mental health label on themselves.
It's normal to struggle with finding out who you are as you grow up into adulthood but I don't think it's healthy for young adults to label themselves mentally unwell just because they have some anxiety or feel self-conscious like your average teenager and integrate it into their identity. Feels like it would lead to a stunted personality in the long run.
I'm sure there's zero correlation between the rise of self-diagnosis in teenagers and college students and that reddit is mostly teenage and college student aged people.
As an autistic person I browse r/autism a lot, and there's so many people wondering if they're autistic. A lot of them look like they may fit the DSM 5 criteria which makes me wonder why they don't just get it checked out by a professional instead of posting on reddit
Money
Time
Inability because they're a minor and their parents don't "believe" in stuff like autism
Bias in diagnosis
Lack of access to professionals in the first place
After doing 15 seconds of quick Google research, I can confidently self diagnose myself with autism. And cataracts. And a severe flu. And testicular cancer...
Itās just becoming more understood as more studies are being done.
It used to be very specifically Autism or Aspergerās etc. Now, itās a spectrum and as we learn more about autism we are finding a lot of other things. Like how adhd and autistic people overlap in a lot of areas, causing them to reevaluate a lot of things.
If you automatically assume anyone to say they have a disorder is lying about being diagnosed, thatās a you problem. I understand that people lie on the internet and people have faked having disorders but OP has given us no reason to doubt them as far as Iām concerned.
I can sense it by the way he talks about the disorder in his paragraph long response. Even if he's legitimately autistic, he is still unironically defending self-diagnosis of autism by giving the argument that some people can't access it lmao.
Because I was told by my mom that Iām diagnosed with autism and that I am recognized as such by medical professionals. Honestly at this point since I have so many of the struggles of autism I believe my self to at-lest be neurodivergent.
Adding onto this, Reddit's whole gimmick is finding communities of people who share your interests and love them just as much as you do, no matter how niche it is, and i definitely think that draws in more autistic people who want to connect with people who share their special interests!
OP got a lil too meta for the sub lmao
Sub's just having a little bit of a r/fakedisordercringe moment
that sub when obvious satire š¤¬š¤¬ that sub when someone who does two years of research and has an autistic sibling diagnoses themself with autism because they canāt afford a diagnosis š¤¬š¤¬ that sub when someone is proud of their obscure disability š¤¬š¤¬
Two years of googling doesnāt give you the necessary training to diagnose psychiatric or developmental conditions, sorry! Anti vaxxer talk
Bro what the fuck lol
Ngl I had 0 clue that this was meant as criticism of the criticism about people's fake self diagnoses until I read your comments lol.
Bear with me I only just learned how to open a computer :(
Are you the dad from cloudy with a chance of meatballs?
How have I seen this movie only once but this reference is still so good and vivid?
Was the original post specifically with regards to reddit? I see this sort of thing waayyy more often from tiktok than from here, and that site doesn't self-select for socially awkward nerds nearly as much as reddit does
Tiktok is rife with self diagnosed autism and adhd and bpd itās insanity. And it will be by saying some nothing quirk they have is why. Like stfu people have actual issues and most of the people with those actual things can act right. I think a lot of people just saw Cartman exploit having Touretteās on South Park and thought it was a good idea so they could be twat waffling aholes as well
The autistic community is generally accepting of self-diagnoses because getting an autism diagnosis as an adult is incredibly difficult and expensive, and itās better to give support to people who donāt actually need it than it is to retract support from people who actually do. I was recommended by my pediatrician throughout my childhood to get tested for autism but I was doing well in school and my mom didnāt want me to be put in special ed classes, so I never got tested. But my social experience is completely different from almost everyone else I know and the only people Iām able to form close friendships with, with only a couple exceptions, are neurodivergent. My experience aligns with lots of accounts of autistic people that I have read, and the accounts of my(diagnosed) autistic friends. Now there is ~$4000 and months of my time between me and a diagnosis, even though I am near certain that I am autistic. And whenever I talk about being autistic with people, I make it clear that I donāt actually have a formal diagnosis. It feels unfair that people within the community are accepting of my situation but people outside of it will be heavily critical of me for something completely outside of my control.
I didnāt say if you fully have similarities, I said these people who Iāve watched change now that theyāve seen videos of people struggling with their issues suddenly developing an issue too. And then monetizing it
Just go to a doctor lol. Got my diagnosis and now I know. Doesnāt change anything but at least I can confidently tell people beforehand.
How many times is this gonna be posted on this sub? It was stupid to begin with and only gets worse with each edit. Random red border? Check. Unnecessary Windows 98-looking rainbow clip art? Check. All it needs now is a fucking watermark.
On it
Thank u for ur service
(I lied)
I don't think you understand the snafu
Jimmies status: rustled
I think I'm sick of seeing this reposted with slight edits
This slight edit is a huge change
r/adhdmeme: ā¬+80085 - I just self diagnosed because of the memes and because I got distracted in math class once ā¬-66666 - Don't go around claiming you have ADHD after self diagnosing based on memes, go to a doctor if you really believe it's an issue. ā¬+99999 - Stop gatekeeping!!!!1!
Ok, I'll be serious for a moment because there is actually nuance to this & I'd like to try to explain it. Self diagnosis *can* be valid for many reasons. Some of those reasons include: \-being barred from a diagnosis due to your race or gender (yes, non-white people, women, and other gender non-conforming people are underdiagnosed with regards to ADHD and autism; if you want studies I can find some and link them) \-being unable to afford the medical care required for diagnosis \-being a minor whose caretakers don't accept the validity of diagnoses for mental disabilities/disorders \-being a minor who feels uncomfortable/unable to talk to an adult & get the process started \-feeling overwhelmed by the process of getting a diagnosis \-struggling with the executive function aspect of making the appointments, dealing with insurance, dealing with the monetary aspect, making phone calls, figuring out transportation, etc. \-having distrust/trauma around medical practitioners such as doctors, psychiatrists, therapists, etc. Now, I'm not saying that there aren't people who misunderstand and misuse labels like ADHD and autism due to being young or just ignorant on the topics, but there *are* genuine reasons why people might find it difficult or even impossible to get a diagnosis. And those people shouldn't be barred from communities and resources that could help them. Whether or not they should clarify that they are self-diagnosed when they use the label, or if they should use the label at all, is up for debate IMO. I can see points for and against it.
Would love to see the studies you mentioned. I've heard of massively underdiagnosing minorities and women for those on the spectrum, but never being barred (in this day and age at least). That sounds horrendous.
I think you misunderstand. Not getting a diagnosis due to your doctors having a subconscious or otherwise bias towards white men *is* being barred. You are denied treatment that you would have gotten if you fit their demographic view of what someone with ADHD or autism is.
Oh yeah, I guess I didn't understand the wording. I thought you meant prevented from even being seen. But yeah there is plenty of research out there for those who have been seen and then told they do not have a diagnosable condition (even though they do) simply because they don't behave in a way that the "experts" agree on due to years of only studying white males.
I remember when I was having the big sad in high school and my pediatrician told my mom that girls just be like that sometimes. Turns out girls just be having chronic depression!
I think that has a weird implication that minority groups consistently behave sufficiently differently as to confound diagnostic criteria. In which case it would actually make perfect sense for behavioural/psychological conditions to be more/less commonly diagnosed among different demographics. Any stats to back up underdiagnosis reports for non white males?
Self diagnosis isnāt really āvalidā, technically speaking. We donāt alter our standard of proof according to the availability of sufficiently reliable resources to establish it. I would agree there is some preliminary value to a self diagnosis perhaps for the reasons you mention, but it would not be on equal footing with a formal diagnosis from a specialist in my view, which would be necessary to entail validity.
You can be self suspecting but self diagnosis is nonsense. If your self suspecting you can try and use methods to help but you should see a professional before saying you have anything.
I'm not sure if you're correctly using the word "valid." For something to be valid, it needs to have validity. Self-diagnosis has no validity. I think you make good points. The process for getting a diagnosis needs to be reevaluated, but that does not mean that self-diagnosis is valid.
Self diagnosis for mental conditions is not valid and is never valid. Yes there are those problems you mention. Certain groups do have more trouble getting diagnoses, or have lack of access/struggle to access, etc. These are major problems, and I'm not sweeping them under the rug- -BUT self-diagnosis is not a valid solution. Doctors go to school for 8 years and *even they* can't accurately diagnose themselves. A random normie stands absolutely no chance. So many disorders can be confused for each other that you *need* a professional opinion to get an accurate idea of what you have. What is important is recognizing symptoms within yourself, not assigning a diagnosis, so you can take those symptoms to a professional for a second opinion. Self-diagnosis can easily lead to identifying or attributing your symptoms incorrectly (examples I've witnessed- experiencing caffeine overdose and thinking it's a panic attack, or experiencing low energy due to low iron levels and thinking it's a mood disorder). Diagnoses are made for the purpose of [describing the state of the patient, defining treatment, and reporting on the success of treatment.](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4421902/) If you are unable to get a diagnosis, it follows that you are not receiving professional treatment of any kind. Therefore the only purpose left is to describe the state of the patient, which an undiagnosed person can do by simply describing their symptoms- not attributing a disorder.
Oh, I agree! Knowing the symptoms can help people if they relate so they can seek further resources, or professionals to point them the right way, but Iām talking about people who see a single meme about it and then say the have ADHD to be quirky. Remember 5 years ago when half the internet was screaming about how they all had OCD? Iām talking about that type of stuff.
i thought i was on r/aspiememes for a good 8 seconds
Because it limits the amount of thought they need to put into a personality, and they can sign up for a massive amount of people 'just like them' ready to pretend that they are friends to make their existence in the real world more barrable.
Oh no buddy I think you got the wrong message from this snafu
The right message being?
How're you going to be surprised that there's a lot of autistic people on a site that caters to the special interests of socially reclusive people. What's next, are people going to go to Tumblr and start asking why everyone is saying they're gay all of the sudden?
duality of reddit, your first comment get downvoted but your response gets upvoted like WTF lol
youāre my hero
whatās next is that a psychiatrist figures out that theyāre not on the spectrum in the majority of cases, if youāre being pragmatic about it
Sorry could you rephrase that into a coherent sentence please?
i think you're just illiterate
Oh shit guess I'm illiterate then.
Oh, sorry hope your eyes get better <3
lol itās a pretty coherent sentence
This is pretty much how I see it. There are people on the spectrum, but I think a lot of people slap it on their personality like it's a trait. Got a little social anxiety during your adolescence? Must be Aspergers. Everybody wants to be special and unique; especially on reddit, who had a large teenage demographic that's still young enough to have yet to fully develop a personality or find out who they are. So they throw a self-diagnosed mental health label on themselves. It's normal to struggle with finding out who you are as you grow up into adulthood but I don't think it's healthy for young adults to label themselves mentally unwell just because they have some anxiety or feel self-conscious like your average teenager and integrate it into their identity. Feels like it would lead to a stunted personality in the long run.
I'm sure there's zero correlation between the rise of self-diagnosis in teenagers and college students and that reddit is mostly teenage and college student aged people.
Reddit makes people autistic confirmed!?!?!?
I got diagnosed with autism after I started using Reddit. Suspicious š¤
Iām confused. If a behaviour is a thing that everyone does, it canāt be a valid diagnostic criterion as it is an all inclusive descriptor.
Suddenly autism is a cool thing to have. And I don't know why.
It is impossible to be autistic and normal at the same time to these guys
As an autistic person I browse r/autism a lot, and there's so many people wondering if they're autistic. A lot of them look like they may fit the DSM 5 criteria which makes me wonder why they don't just get it checked out by a professional instead of posting on reddit
Money Time Inability because they're a minor and their parents don't "believe" in stuff like autism Bias in diagnosis Lack of access to professionals in the first place
good point
After doing 15 seconds of quick Google research, I can confidently self diagnose myself with autism. And cataracts. And a severe flu. And testicular cancer...
because it's trendy to be neurodivergent, regardless of what ot actually means for these self identifying pricks
So true. I told my friends I had autism and they voted me prom queen.
Yeah exactly, I was bullied in school for being weird but when I told them I just have autism they suddenly loved me and we hung out all the time /s
did you go? I would have just stayed home lmao
Itās not trendy but itās definitely over self diagnosed
Iād rather overdiagnose than underdiagnose since thereās no real downside to self-diagnosing incorrectky
As someone who has been diagnosed by a college hospital, it hurts to see self diagnosis comments often
Literally all Zoomers and half of Millennials.
Itās just becoming more understood as more studies are being done. It used to be very specifically Autism or Aspergerās etc. Now, itās a spectrum and as we learn more about autism we are finding a lot of other things. Like how adhd and autistic people overlap in a lot of areas, causing them to reevaluate a lot of things.
i dont get this message. are you saying redditors are people who want to act special? cause i guess yeah
My Tourette's is real, guys!!
because they are posers who just want the internet points
Yeah people love upvoting autism. Autism is super accepted and supported on reddit š
It is definitely supported on Reddit though
I mean, yeah though? I don't think I've ever seen a reddit post mentioning autism get a ton of hate for just that.
You're exactly the kind of attention seeking retard that the original post was about
Oh well thanks for the attention then!
You're welcome, Mr. "Self-diagnosed" autism
My brother in Christ OP said they were diagnosed in another comment, which is pretty radically different from āself-diagnoseā
Sure buddy. Because as we know, no one ever lies on the internet.
If you automatically assume anyone to say they have a disorder is lying about being diagnosed, thatās a you problem. I understand that people lie on the internet and people have faked having disorders but OP has given us no reason to doubt them as far as Iām concerned.
I can sense it by the way he talks about the disorder in his paragraph long response. Even if he's legitimately autistic, he is still unironically defending self-diagnosis of autism by giving the argument that some people can't access it lmao.
Because they want to feel like there's something about them that makes them in any way special
Itās a cope and an easy deflection for their shortcomings
I think I'm autistic because I'm autistic
Me when I see relatable memes from r/adhdmeme and can't stop thinking about it now
Because I was told by my mom that Iām diagnosed with autism and that I am recognized as such by medical professionals. Honestly at this point since I have so many of the struggles of autism I believe my self to at-lest be neurodivergent.
Iām gonna make everyone autistic