When I was very young, the psychiatrists my parents saw with me thought I was autistic. I'd throw HUGE tantrums out of nowhere and over very, very small things, I'd suck on my wrists until they were bleeding, I always had to be moving, I believe I was a little slow with development in certain things, and there was so much more that went into it, that they thought this was what it was. Then they told us that I was simply bipolar with OCD. For a long time, I just accepted this, because I never knew anything different. That is, until I started working with children and adults who are on the very, very high end of autism and I noticed that I do A LOT of things that they do, only, of course, much less severe. For example, I have repetitive movements. When I talk, I rock back and forth, and I tend to move my hands a lot. I shake my hands a lot and also clench and unclench my fingers. I can't handle being around people, not even my family. I don't like getting hugs or kisses or any kind of physical contact from anyone, it makes me incredibly uncomfortable and I get really fidgety and shift. I have a hard time understanding when someone's being sarcastic or being serious... There's a huge list more of this, but those are two that really stand out.

I know they have specific testing for this, and I don't know if I ever went through them, but hopefully those of you who have experience with this could tell me? If I were, I think I'd be the lower, lower end, but I've always felt like my diagnosis was wrong. It just didn't seem to fit me very well. I could be totally wrong (and I probably am, since I usually always am), but I thought I'd ask.