I think there are a lot of people now who sling around "autistic", "Asperger's" and "on the spectrum" meaning over on the autistic side (aren't we all somewhere on pretty much any spectrum that can be named?) a lot for themselves and (armchair psychiatry) others, without professional diagnosis or even careful attention to checklists of symptoms. It isn't that helpful, and in some cases is annoying/counter-productive. As you mention, there can be blame-avoiding/shifting reasons driving that, as well as fumbling for explanations and/or just being sloppy/trendy.
I understand the desire to name the thing that's going on, though, and to want very badly to be able to say it's not just one's own personal failure. I still remember the *enormous* relief when I got a medical diagnosis for why I was having functional problems in my mid-twenties after losing two jobs in short succession, that didn't just boil down to "I'm a fat lazy loser." I was putting so much on myself for not being a better person and for failing at things, it was making it hard to cope at all. Knowing it wasn't just a personal failing made it more possible to cope, pick myself up, and hunt for yet another job, and keep that one for a reasonable amount of time (still a lot of churn in IT).
Of course, that diagnosis didn't fix some really bad habits I'd picked up along the way. A diagnosis can't fix everything, even when prescription medication will help with the original/root cause.
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I understand the desire to name the thing that's going on, though, and to want very badly to be able to say it's not just one's own personal failure. I still remember the *enormous* relief when I got a medical diagnosis for why I was having functional problems in my mid-twenties after losing two jobs in short succession, that didn't just boil down to "I'm a fat lazy loser." I was putting so much on myself for not being a better person and for failing at things, it was making it hard to cope at all. Knowing it wasn't just a personal failing made it more possible to cope, pick myself up, and hunt for yet another job, and keep that one for a reasonable amount of time (still a lot of churn in IT).
Of course, that diagnosis didn't fix some really bad habits I'd picked up along the way. A diagnosis can't fix everything, even when prescription medication will help with the original/root cause.
Link fix for Not Everything You Feel Makes You Special: https://freddiedeboer.substack.com/you-dont-have-adhd-feelings-you-just (t on the end)
Link fix for Law of Extremity: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/KpMNqA5BiCRozCwM3/social-dark-matter#VI__The_Law_of_Extremity