Mental health in the toilet after 5 years of avoiding health services, Now jumping back into treatment. How to I initiate a ASD test/diagnosis?

[CheeseDingo]

Hello, First post on these forums. 30 Male, never self harmed/no suicidal ideation. Never violent/aggressive with people

Early 20's diagnosed with ADHD and Depression. I have Stopped medications when I went on university exchange for 1 year in 2015. In 2016 I came back to Australia after failing to hand in any of my university exchange assignments and dropped out of a Engineering/International studies degree 4.5/5.5 years into the degree.

Over the last 5 years I have worked hard at entry level jobs for 5-6 months of the year, save lots of money, then quit the job to feed a heavy addiction to 1 video game (~15k hours), casino poker (~2k hours), general computer addiction and Cannabis habit. Intense hobbies of cooking/baking, listening to music, herb gardening, listening to podcasts and walking outside for 1-2 hours a day does ground me, but It's not enough for me to move forward with my life.

Since this time I have cut off 95% of interaction with friends and avoid regular interaction with my family. I have been lucky and had some really great girlfriends in the past but have not pursued any female interaction over the last 4 years.

--9 days ago I had my first interaction with mental health services in ~5 years in the form of a NewAccess coach. They wanted me to write a day to day diary/log of problems/emotions/feelings as I had difficulty fully expressing myself in the interview (I also vaped Marijuana 3 hours before interview which didn't help).

--4 days ago I uninstalled the video game that I would play ~50hours a week as it was directly tempting me and sabotaging my recovery efforts. Currently my longest break in 5 years.

--3 days ago Anxiety was through the roof all day. I funneled my attention from the game to the internet and wasted my whole day on social media/internet (600+ pages in my web history that day on PC alone).

--Yesterday early in the morning I installed software across PC/Mobile devices to block access to all websites I would waste time on (excluding YouTube). I booked, attended a doctors appointment, completed a mental health plan and have a psychologist appointment 2 weeks from now .

--Today, cannabis consumption down ~30% in frequency, ~50% in dosage size reduction in 9 days.

I am coming here to ask how to best start my relationship with a new psychologist and how I would initiate a test for what I suspect to be an undiagnosed Autism Spectrum Disorder.

TY

[CheeseDingo]

Highschool and University had been rewarding for me in Maths, Physics, Chemistry and Foreign language subjects. However, any subjects that involved essay/presentation writing and work experiences such as resume writing/work emails have been emotionally traumatic experiences for me that I have never been able to reconcile with.

2015 University exchange involved only sociology/International studies based subjects. The stress and inability to make any progress on these subjects on exchange led me to become an alcoholic + chainsmoker for a year to try to suppress the anxiety and desperation.

I came back to Sydney in 2016 and have really not made any progress with my life since then.

My goals at the moment are to have a medical professional help me better define my educational limitations, help me better define my poor interpersonal/mental health limitations so I can find an education and career path that won't be so unfulfilling and emotionally abrasive for myself

[geoff]

Hello CheeseDingo, and welcome to the foruums.

From what you've told us you seem to be a very capable person, only that various concerns that have been holding you back, unfortunately.

I'm not going to pick out any flaws with your comment, that will not help you so please google this 'https://explorecareers.com.au › career-quiz' and/or this 'https://www.training.com.au › career-quiz' in your browser.

This may or may not help you decide what you want to do.

It would be best, now, to find a psychologist/psychiatrist to help you with your other issues which seem to be clouding your decisions on how you feel about everything else, and a suggestion is to write down what you're struggling with.

There's more to discuss if that's what you feel comfortable with.

Best wishes.

Geoff.

[CheeseDingo]

Hi Geoff,

Thanks for reaching out and the website links. They both have good resources that will provide some guidance.
I was given an activity/thought diary to complete twice a day between 27th Apr- 11th May. However my anxiety goes through the roof whenever I think about it, let alone try to add to it.

*When I am given open writing tasks with subjective topics my brain feels as it it has no logical framework to produce an output. I also struggle to have a consistant "voice" or "prensnce"

*I get lost in the scope and context of what I should output.

*My brain will hyper focus on certain topics or ideas within sentences that derail my thoughts and writing process. I really can't ever recall being in a flow state or being able to build any intertia when I write.

*I find public speaking and presentations difficult and they cause some good and bad anxiety, but the writing of presentations/book report causes more anxiety and does not release any of the adrenaline/good endorphins that a presentation does.

*I understand and can interpret sentence formatting and punctuation but often become self conscious and try to 'perfect' sentence structures. This would also derail my thoughts.

*All of this self doubt, lack of progress and anxiety would lead me to become very restless and incapable of sitting down to write/type.

Anxiety towards this diary has been so strong that It has somehow distracted me from my ongoing ~120 hour break of playing video games and ~72 hour ongoing social media break which has been a blessing in disguise.

[geoff]

Hello CheeseDingo, try and imagine the video game and form it into something you can write about, obviously making it an adventurous and not violent few pages or one page.

Best wishes.

Geoff.