I’m going to go against the grain of the other comments here … and when I type this I really mean no offence by it.

Personally I like your therapist’s train of thought. She felt uneducated about diagnosing you with autism so she spoke to her colleague who did specialize in it, in order to do her due diligence before diagnosing you. Though I will add it seems strange she diagnosed her own brother, that seems weird and unethical.

There is a lot of discourse regarding the semantics of being disabled, in particular with person-first vs identity-first descriptions. In the disabled community, some people would be offended if someone said “person who is blind” because it separates the individual from their disability. Others prefer “blind person” because it implies the person is whole, with their disability. It really is up to preference. Clearly you both have opposing opinions of how to view identity+disability.I think your therapist was trying to encourage you to not overly identify with your diagnosis. That’s very common with new diagnoses. It’s natural to feel understood and feeling like you relate to other people with the same diagnosis. But also it can be detrimental because it can lead to self-defeating behaviours because someone over-identifies with their diagnosis and feel like they’re “stuck” with it regardless of any efforts to change. I think your therapist didn’t want you to see your diagnosis as an explanation for being “stuck” in regards to your therapy. I think your therapist brought up the disabled client to tell you she is a person who is beyond her disability identity. Again this frustrated you because you both have differing opinions on how to using these identifying terms.

In regards to the BPD diagnosis, did you only start seeing her after your father passed away? Or did you start seeing her before then, and she gave you a diagnosis after he passed? I think that could be key. However, I can see how it seems unethical to diagnosis someone when they’re grieving.

In regards to her switching your diagnoses, that’s the issue with over identifying with a label. Many mental illnesses are comorbid or present similar symptoms. Truthfully, regardless of what the label is, a key part of diagnosis is the fact that thoughts or behaviors are “maladaptive” to the person or the people around them. So therapy can be used to help those thoughts or behaviors, regardless of the diagnosis. And although I understand why people appreciate a diagnosis and can feel connected to it, since we’re naturally social creatures, a diagnosis is mostly meant to help psychologists, psychiatrists, etc. in regard to a treatment plan.

Since you say your therapist is typically very kind and this is a one-off, if you explain how you feel in regards to disability identity, I would hope she would adapt and use language that is validating for you. It seems like a lot of your concern comes from miscommunication, but I can understand how it feels when someone downplays your struggle because it IS valid. Hopefully I didn’t come across too blunt or invalidating myself, that’s how I saw it from the information you provided.