Autism is often misdiagnosed with BPD - here's why!

Autistic women are often misdiagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD), so why is this the case? Whitney is a PLPC, who will be answering this question in today's video! 💚
loom.ly/X5lAMHI for more!
.
#AutismAwareness #AutismAcceptance #Neurodiversity #BPD #Misdiagnosis #MentalHealthAwareness #LPC #Therapist #Counseling #Neurodivergent #AutisticWomen #SpectrumWomen #WomenInPsychology #TraumaInformed #SelfAwareness #Empowerment #PatientAdvocacy #MentalHealthAdvocate #Intersectionality #DiversityInMentalHealth

[@SynthApprentice]

On top of this, there are strong gendered assumptions about both BPD and ASD. A common misconception about ASD is that it affects men almost exclusively, which makes it easy for women to get a false negative diagnosis of ASD. Similarly, BPD is often (incorrectly) seen as something that affects women almost exclusively, which makes it easy for a woman to get a false positive diagnosis of BPD. (And also makes it easy for men to get a false negative diagnosis of BPD.)

[@merbst]

Every resource I read circa 2004 about BPD said it was 3× more prevalent in women than men

[@Magdalene777]

What they should do to clarify is look at other things like if the person has sensory processing or coordination issues. Asd has physical components.

[@KDHCollective]

OT has a lot of solutions for sensory processing disorders:)

[@javlapekka757]

Misdiagnosis happens in both ways, I'm a man with BPD and avoidant PD who was first misdiagnosed as autistic.

[@merbst]

as an autistic man formerly married to a BPD woman, I know much about this topic

[@psychosomaticstatic]

It's a little confusing to me bc I personally was diagnosed with BPD _after_ I was diagnosed with ASD. But I also didn't really like the therapist that diagnosed me. But, like, I do have childhood trauma and genetic disposition that wouldn't make BPD unlikely. I'm just not sure if I actually have both or if my old therapist was just being kind of stupid.

[@KDHCollective]

A lot of people get diagnosed with both and probably the better diagnosis is ASD and not BPD. Diagnosing is an art.

[@roberttyner5809]

Quiet Borderlines are often misdiagnosed with MDD or GAD because many professionals are hesitant on working with BPD individuals.

[@Antietam92]

BPD is also misdiagnosed as autism

[@GridSeer]

BPD high rate of false diagnosis where Autism and trauma exist is attributed to pure misogyny, mistrust and invalidation of women's pain. Feel free to disagree. Lumping traumatised, genuinely distressed people in with the same category of narcissists and sociopaths is tantamount to psychological abuse, essentially telling victims that their trauma (e.g. childhood abuse) was their fault. Clinicians who ignore trauma and sensory processing issues should be sued for psychological damage.

[@Charlee12]

I totally agree with you!

[@liferadous]

Consider also, the possibility that the existence of a category of people who are supposed to be monsters at all hurts *everyone* put in it, not just autistic people who you see as undeserving of that treatment as opposed to people with borderline, who, the implication is, are? (Also, they're not mutually exclusive.) People with borderline are also genuinely distressed and traumatized. And, I'm willing to piss people off by saying, so are a lot of people with NPD. This is the same argument used for trying to separate out "high-functioning" from "low-functioning" autism-- rather than people recognizing the stigma and prejudice and dehumanization placed on people with learning differences as a whole is misguided, they just say, well, these particular people don't deserve to be seen like we do the others. Blaming people with Cluster B personality disorders for interpersonal abuse based on a diagnosis rather than that individual's behavior is wrong, for everyone. People should be treated with respect for their intelligence regardless of learning or communication differences, and people should be treated with basic empathy and judged by their individual behavior regardless of what section of the the DSM they have problems from.

[@Tawroset]

@liferadous Thanks, you took the words outta my mouth!