Hi all. I've had issues all my life but never had a diagnosis of autism. I recently started to try and take better care and understanding of my mental health. My GP has always been absolutely rubbish. I'm not able to communicate my needs and always end up masking symptoms and agreeing with them that EVERYTHING is "down to my anxiety".

Anyway I've always known I have traits of autism so decided this year to take a course on understanding autism which also teaches you to recognise it I'm children and adults.. now this is where I'm conflicted. If I was using myself as a case study I'd probably put myself down as being autistic but obviously I'm no professional and am not qualified to diagnose myself.

Has anyone who's been diagnosed as an adult been able to access services without GP referrals? I'm 35 and in the UK 🇬🇧

Also to give you an example of how awful my doctors are I went once because a workplace gave me a hearing test and said my hearing wasn't right so referred me to them. The GP put his hand up to my ear and rubbed his fingers together asking if I could hear it.. of course I could but I'm still partially deaf I'm that ear.. "OK so you can hear fine" he says and sends me on my way lol. I have so many examples like this 🙄