The primary issue has always been autism

firemonkey

My daughter and I had a good chat yesterday. She said that the primary issue is, and always has been , the autism - rather than severe mental illness . That it should've been picked up on  a long time before it was. She doesn't deny that I have some degree  of mental illness , but that it's secondary to the autism , and the effects of it worsened by failure to spot the autism much earlier.  She confirmed that she was the one who mentioned autism at my 1st psych appointment here in Wiltshire, not me.

Certainly I've not had the cognitive decline  that often occurs with a psychosis spectrum disorder. I've had cognitive strengths and weaknesses from as far back as I can remember. If the weaknesses have got worse, it's a big 'if', then its an expected  age related, rather than illness, related thing.

verity

It is good to have this confined, it goes some way to help accept yourself.

What Amity and myself  has been trying to emphasise is acceptance of the the individual Autistic way of being, that is ok to be your autistic self. Not to say it is a walk in that park, but having the space to be yourself is important not having tha space can cause further issues.

Hylian

I think the issues that I have from abuse and neglect affect me a lot more than my autism does by itself. I would probably function a lot better without those problems, and I'd definitely be a lot happier. Having autism is difficult, but it would be less so if I didn't have other things affecting it and my development.