I was diagnosed last year with ASD and ADHD. I’m in my 40s. Still in the process of adapting.

Okay, so I am kinda self diagnosed.

For once, when I was a child Asperger’s wasn’t even acknowledged yet and there was still the “girls don’t have autism” trope going on. Also, my parents were both addicts and abusive. How things looked on the outside was very important to them though so acting and moving “normally” was literally beaten into me and I learned to mask pretty well at an early age. School was still hell though and I never managed to make any friends.

Fast forward to the time of the internet and I started meeting people who weren’t that different from me. I started to make friends and met my husband.

Even more years later all that trauma from my childhood reared its head and I went through lots of therapy. At some point my therapist suggested getting tested for ADHD and autism. I had to go private because it was pretty much impossible to get diagnosed as an adult otherwise and after three years of waiting I was finally tested for ADHD and diagnosed. The neurologist who diagnosed me suggested getting tested for autism as well and let me take the RAADS-R test and I scored a whopping 212 points. She was, however, not qualified to give me an official diagnosis.

Right now, I’d have to wait for three to six years until getting assessed and it wouldn’t change anything for me. I don’t need accommodations at work because I’m a stay at home wife and there are no other upsides to an official stamp. I simply use workbooks and other information to find ways to make life easier for me.