What It’s Like to Get an Autism Diagnosis as an Adult — And Why It Can Be a Game Changer

April is Autism Awareness Month, and as a psychologist who has diagnosed many children and adults with autism, I’ve witnessed firsthand just how impactful a diagnosis can be—especially when it comes later in life.

Reactions to an autism diagnosis vary widely. I’ve had people cry. I’ve had people ask if they can hug me. I’ve had folks say “that’s what I thought,” and others just sit in silence, taking it in. One thing that really stands out to me, though, is how many people have struggled for years before they finally get clarity.

Replacing Old Labels With a New Understanding for Your Adult Autism Diagnosis

So many adults come to me feeling like they’ve spent their lives being dismissed, shamed, or made to feel like something is just “wrong” with them—but they don’t know what. They’ve gathered a long list of negative labels from themselves and from others. A diagnosis isn’t a magic fix, but it can shift the narrative. It can be the start of a different kind of self-understanding.

Rather than just give you my view as a clinician, I asked a former client to share what being diagnosed as an adult was like for them. Here’s what they told me:

“I think that if you go through life as an undiagnosed autistic person, you are constantly noticing that you are different than you ‘should’ be, but don’t know why or how. You end up collecting words to describe yourself, given to you by both yourself and by people around you, because of these differences: picky, lazy, awkward, dramatic, sensitive, stubborn, difficult, weird, rude.

Learning that you are actually autistic doesn’t make the challenges of being autistic in a neurotypical world suddenly disappear, but it does start to replace the other descriptors. Autistic is a much nicer word.”

As a psychologist, I’ll admit—I have mixed feelings about diagnostic labels. They can be rigid, and sometimes feel like more of a box than a guide. But I’ve also seen how powerful it can be for people to finally have language for how they experience the world. And that kind of understanding? It’s a total game changer.

Knowing You're Autistic Doesn’t Solve Everything

But diagnosis doesn’t make the challenges of life as an autistic adult disappear—especially when it comes to "adulting." Think about all the executive functioning, social navigating, and sensory juggling that’s expected just to get through a regular workday. One of my clients explained it perfectly:

“Working full time hours is challenging for most people, and can be extra challenging for autistic people because of sensory issues, slower processing, needing to hide stims, missing social cues/unwritten rules that other employees can pick up on no problem, etc.

The amount of energy required also makes it really difficult to keep up with the other demands of adult life: grocery shopping, seeing friends/family, washing dishes, etc.”

Misinformation Hurts—Understanding Helps

And then there’s the public conversation around autism—which, frankly, is all over the place. We’re learning more every day, but we’re also battling a lot of misinformation. Some of it even comes from people in leadership positions, and it’s honestly infuriating. Here’s what another client shared about that:

“I hear people say often, on social media and in person, that (1) we’re all somewhere on the spectrum and (2) everyone is autistic nowadays.

I completely understand people being confused by how many people that have not ‘seemed’ autistic according to their understanding of the word now getting diagnoses. I think the confusion can have a negative impact though.

Sometimes I get joint pain, but that doesn’t mean I have a little bit of arthritis. Sometimes I have low blood sugar, but that does mean I have a little diabetes.

In these cases, the assumption can be ‘well I deal with that too sometimes, so they should be able to deal with it as well.’ Instead, it could be used to empathize, as in ‘I don’t like experiencing that in small doses. It must be challenging to experience that all the time.’

Connecting with someone’s experience as a bridge to empathy is a wonderful thing. Assuming that your experience is the same as someone else’s can be misleading, and can lead to people being deprived of the supports that they need.”

So this Autism Awareness Month, I want to encourage all of us—not just as professionals or family members or coworkers, but as humans—to listen. Let’s empower autistic voices, not speak over them. Let’s work to understand, not judge. Autism is not new—but our understanding of it is evolving. And if we stay open, we can evolve too.

If you’ve read this and are wondering whether an autism evaluation might be right for you or someone you care about, we’re here to help. Our office offers comprehensive autism assessments for adults and children, with a focus on understanding the whole person—not just checking boxes. If you’d like to learn more about our evaluation process or have any questions, please reach out and contact us. We’d love to talk with you.