A Late Discovery of Neurodivergence Gave Me Self-knowledge But I Wish I’d Had It Much Earlier In Life
I don’t tend to think of myself as an advice giver, but perhaps an insight giver. I like to think that in sharing what I have learned from my 50 + years on earth, someone might find a kernel of something that helps them on their journey.
I didn’t have any inkling that I had a neurodivergent brain until my late 40s. I did have a very keen awareness of being different to other people. And that difference was seen not through a lens of individuality and uniqueness, but one of deficit and weirdness. I was forever out of sync with the world. A stranger in a strange land.
Receiving a diagnosis of autism at 48 (followed by ADHD at 51) was the most deeply transformative thing that has ever happened to me. It meant letting go of the person I thought I was and getting to know the one that had been submerged under it for decades.
Going through my adolescence, 20s and 30s and most of my 40s with unidentified neurodivergence meant I had no alternative but to adapt to neurotypical ways of doing life. I used every bit of strength, energy and will to try to meet the expectations of society that I had…
