I am fairly certain I fall somewhere on the autistic spectrum. Somewhere at the top end on the mild/high-functioning/low-support-needs/however-you-want-to-describe-it.

I’ve never felt a need to pursue a diagnosis, I don’t think putting it on paper and making it official has anything to offer me that’s worth the aggravation of dealing with extra doctors appointments and such to get diagnosed.

But I’ve occasionally considered doing it so that I could potentially participate in any sort of research being done that might possibly help autistic people with higher support needs. That would be worth the aggravation.

But holy fuck does this administration make me glad I never did.

I always had a little paranoia that a diagnosis would be more trouble than it’s worth beyond just the annoyance of getting diagnosed. That somewhere I’d encounter some bullshit regulation where I’d be considered mentally unfit for something, or be disqualified from a job, or just have people treating me different if they found out.

But now it’s very clear that that’s sort of the plan, where a diagnosis would probably be actively used against me instead of just being the result weird edge cases where I might slip through the cracks due to some outdated poorly worded policy.