Girls, women and autism

Service List

Showing 3 services.

Autism Diagnostic Service Suffolk

Our Autism Diagnostic Service provides assessments to identify if a person has autism or not. We have a youth team who provide assessments for young people between the ages of 11 and 18. We have an adult team who provide assessments for those aged 18 and over. If we diagnose somebody with autism, we offer advice and short term limited support to help them, and their family, to understand their diagnosis. Our team will explore ways that might help manage difficulties or challenges faced at home, work or in education.

Address:
Haymills House, Station Road East, Stowmarket, IP14 1RQ

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Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) - Norfolk

Our Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) provide care pathways for children and young people in Norfolk with moderate to severe mental health difficulties. This is for children 14 years of age and under. CAMHS provide a range of therapeutic interventions. This includes art therapy, systemic family therapy, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR) and play therapy. The service hosts a Looked After Children's team and a neurodevelopmental pathway for those with complex developmental disorders.

Address:
Resource Centre, Northgate Hospital, Northgate Street, Great Yarmouth, NR30 1BU Thurlow House, Goodwins Road, King’s Lynn, PE30 5PD Mary Chapman House, Hotblack Road, Norwich, NR2 4HN

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Primary Learning Disability Liaison Service – Suffolk

The Primary Care Learning Disability Liaison Nurses support people with a learning disability. They ensure people have their health needs met by primary care services in a timely and appropriate manner.

Address:
F Block, Hospital Road, Bury St Edmunds, IP33 3NR

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Why do some people think that Autism is a “boy thing”

When autism was first talked about it was to describe a group of boys who had been noticed behaving in a similar way. How autism was then diagnosed was based on these descriptions.

Over time new information has been added to our ideas of what autism looks like.

Often autistic women and girls are missed or misdiagnosed with something else like depression or personality disorder. This is often because it does not fit this traditional male pattern.

Lots of autistic women have been seen by doctors for their mental health and prescribed tablets. A lot of autistic women will say that the mental health diagnosis they were given never seemed to fully explain their difficulties.

When we look at diagnosing adults with autism, the evidence is that the average age that women are diagnosed is older than the average age for men.

The difficulties with social communication and social interaction, and flexibility of thought are still there, but may look very different.

Girls may be:

Better at copying other’ behaviour
More sociable
May communicate but less likely to do ‘social chit chat’
May be able to make a special friendship
More involved in pretend play and possibly have a more active imagination
May have similar interests to peers but may have a different quality or intensity of interest
Use intelligence in social interactions rather than intuition
Can copy other socially successful individuals
May seem to be coping but are often acting in order to fit in
Maybe better at masking difficulties
More likely to have been misdiagnosed with another problem such as an eating disorder, personality disorder, or OCD

Puberty and menopause

Puberty and menopause are significant times for girls and women. During these times there are a lot of changes in the female body and in how the person looks. Sensory sensitivities may increase. Emotions may seem more out of control. It is also impossible to know when these natural parts of life will actually happen. When a girl starts her periods, she will have to get used to using sanitary products which may feel uncomfortable.

Although puberty in autistic girls has been thought about in the literature, the effects of menopause on autistic women is only just starting to be thought about by researchers and is a very new area of knowledge.