Am I really stretching the truth when it comes to screeners?

Ross1975
Ross1975 Online Community Member Posts: 460 Pioneering
in Autism and neurodiversity

When I did a screener for the first time I only scored 2 out of 6. I ended up speaking to my friend who is a therapist and who has ADHD herself the other night, and she really believes I do have ADHD and I think it's totally possible too, she asked me pretty much the same screener questions, again I did badly, and she said she was worried about how I'm interpreting the questions and thinking of answers and that this will probably go against me in an assessment and I'll likely be diagnosed as not having ADHD.

For example one of the questions was 'How often are you distracted by activity or noise around you?' I put 'never' since I took it meant noise in general (which doesn't distract me) rather than unwanted noise, and as for unwanted noise I wear earplugs all the time to block it out, so I'm never being distracted by noise, and my friend said 'But Ross, you have to wear earplugs all the time right? Because you can't stand the noise from your neighbours, if you weren't wearing the earplugs wouldn't you be distracted by your neighbours very often?' and she is right, when it comes to unwanted nose from my noisy neighbours, if I wasn't able to block it out I would very often not be able to concentrate on what I'm doing at all. So it seems I should've put 'very often' rather than never?

Then the question about how often do you fidget and squirm, I answered with 'rarely' as it is rare that I physically fidget and squirm, but then I thought maybe the correct answer is 'very often' as the only reason why I don't fidget and squirm often is because I'm always keeping myself occupied/entertained, if I didn't then I would fidget and squirm all the time as that is what I always do whenever I am bored or waiting for something, also every day when I brush my teeth I have to pace up and down the hallway while I'm doing it because of how tedious I find it, and I do suffer from internal restlessness which I guess is internal fidgeting as I'm usually distracted by many thoughts and scenarios going on in my head.

There's loads more examples too.

So it seems I've been originally interpreting the questions wrong and thinking about my answers in the wrong way and so I was under reporting? I can't help but feel that the new answers could be really stretching/bending the truth like I'm grasping at straws though. What do you guys think?

Comments

  • OverlyAnxious
    OverlyAnxious Online Community Member Posts: 5,595 Championing

    Hi,

    I can't speak for all of the answers. But regarding the noise question I agree with your friend. If you have to wear ear plugs all the time then the answer to that question is clearly 'very often' rather than never.

    The question about fidgeting seems a bit more complicated. Perhaps an option between 'rarely' and 'very often' would be more appropriate if you are able to keep yourself occupied for much of the time. I'm just thinking that someone with ADHD would struggle to keep themselves occupied.

    Ultimately these screening tests are just the first step, so it doesn't really matter if you get it slightly wrong, as long as you score enough points for the next step in the diagnosis. That's where someone will talk to you directly and watch your behaviour so they can see exactly what's happening rather than relying on written interpretation.

  • chiffchaff
    chiffchaff Online Community Member Posts: 3 Listener

    screening tests are awful. It took me 2 hours to do the ASD 10 with a psychologist. They seem to require you to compare yourself with some other person without ever saying this, or who they are

    Basically the questions are written to be answered by a NT parent about a ND child. That’s why they are so impossible to answer. They assume you know what the ‘control group’ experiences and compare yourself with that. So: do you take more precautions/are more bothered by noise than other people. These questions also don’t work if you are ND family.

  • 66Mustang
    66Mustang Online Community Member Posts: 15,375 Championing

    I was asked to do an ADHD assessment by my psychiatrist, I didn't request it, but I went along and was diagnosed with moderate symptoms

    I felt similar to you: I thought I could tick maybe half of them, but then I did it with my parents and others and they pointed out that I don't fulfil the others because I'm adapting

    I think it's very common to not realise how much things affect us when they've affected us so long they're just part of normal life

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