Undiagnosed Females or males - anyone relate? very rambly.

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You may find this blog very helpful: https://musingsofanaspie.com/adult-diagnosis/

I was diagnosed last year at the age of 56. For me, there was a big difference between my suspecting I am autistic and a professional actually validating it. ASD shares many symptoms with other conditions like Borderline Personality Disorder and ADHD. It also clarified that what I suspected was not just my projection of something to explain away certain things. Also, ASD is a clinical diagnosis which means that your autism is having a significant impact on your life. An outside evaluation gave me certainty over my suspicions. Still, it has been a complex journey for me since the diagnosis, but when I start to doubt my condition, I have that validation.

But realizing you have autism, however that is done, has been important. It means getting to the starting line of "normal" is not my goal. I need to create or find the environment that allows me not only to function, but also thrive. I need to learn what it means to be autistic in a neurotypical world and find that middle ground where I can exist, both as autistic and in relation to a neurotypical culture.

BTW, I was diagnosed in the US and it took me one hour with a psychiatrist. I did some preliminary research like interviewing my mother and collecting school records from when I was young for signs of autism in childhood. My wife also came to the session to answer questions about my behavior. My insurance covered the diagnosis and I paid about $200.

glad to see you here! I tend to be wordy-rambly too.

I suspected I might be autistic at age 65 and was officially diagnosed at age 68, I will be 70 this year. Knowing my diagnosis might have been enough, without the official piece of paper, but it helped me to get diagnosis because of the neurological testing involved.

Testing revealed that I have very poor visual( 25th percentile) and very poor audio (35th percentile) processing. That alone helped me finally understand myself in a very concrete and helpful way. No wonder tv, videos, movies, musical concerts, lectures, podcasts, radio broadcasts and other visual/audio things (including real time interactions with other humans) were so confusing and distressing.

I am blessed to have a gift with words, super vocabulary and written expression developed by using the only tool that gave real information and understanding in my world.

Knowing about my autism at this late date has been so useful for healing past hurts and understanding all those painful "why" questions of the past.
Looking at those experiences with autism in mind is explanation for most all of them. Add comprehension that my own mother was autistic, and lights went off all around me, I could see so much that had been hidden in my understanding before. What a relief!

self diagnosis is just fine. There are so many struggles surrounding finding medical/ clinical/professionals with experience in adult autism, women in particular, and the expense is so great in many places, that the autistic community is very accepting of self diagnosis. Being autistic we know you/I/we (autistic) will seek out loads of information and ask a million questions before finally understanding and accepting or rejecting autism as a diagnosis for ourselves.

There are definitely pros and cons to self or professional diagnosis. Take your time and explore. Ask loads of questions, it is a lot to sort out, especially if you have been here (on this planet) for a long time... there will be more to sort out from the new perspective of knowing about autism. glad you are with us.