At the very beginning of my AuDHD journey, when I was 20, my mum told me that she’s known I’m Autistic since I was 3 years old. She explained that my traits were the reason that she was able to recognise Autism in my younger cousin many years later. So, why didn’t she ever get me assessed? Why didn’t she tell me? Well, I’m now nearly 24 and I can see why.

I went to primary school in the 2000s and I started nursery in 2003. Back then, we weren’t as progressive as we are now and Autism was still very stigmatised. I was already labelled as ‘badly-behaved’ because I didn’t do as I was told but the teachers weren’t telling me why we were doing these things. Therefore, I refused. This landed me in trouble many times with my mum just not understanding why I was so good at home and not in school. I was eventually put on an Independent Education Plan (IEP) which, back then, was more for badly-behaved kids. I was labelled by my teachers as a bad kid.

Then I started seniors in 2011, where I was known as polite, shy, intelligent, well-behaved. The precise opposite to my toddler self’s reputation and yet I was still labelled. This time by my peers as ‘weird’. I was treated differently from day-dot in seniors and for the 5 years I was there, that treatment never relented. If anything, it got worse as we all got older and the mean kids got more creative. It went from name calling, to cyberbullying, to false and harmful rumours being spread around school about me, to even threats being made. I never understood why I was so targeted, what I did wrong to warrant all of that. I still don’t.

So, I was already dealing with labels being placed on me by teachers and peers without a diagnosis and I was being treated differently because of those labels. A diagnosis would’ve just made me feel alienated due to the treatment I would’ve received from others. My primary school teachers wouldn’t have known how to handle an Autistic child back then and a diagnosis would’ve just given my bullies more fuel to use against me. The ‘R’ slur was already thrown at me shamelessly a few times because teenagers can be awful so my diagnosis would’ve just made them more sincere when they called me that word.

My mum didn’t get me assessed when I was a kid because she knew what an added ‘label’ would’ve done back then and I agree with her wholeheartedly on that matter. But there’s another reason I’m glad I wasn’t assessed as a kid and that’s because I know myself too well.

I would’ve milked that diagnosis for all it’s worth as a teen and then as a young adult. Kid’s calling me the ‘R’ word? I would’ve called them out for discrimination (I mean, it is discrimination but that’s not really a route you want to go down in a UK secondary school). Homework? Yeah… that’s not happening. I have ADHD, remember? I would have had a plethora of excuses and pardons all to do with ADHD and Autism and I would’ve used them all to my advantage. I would’ve gotten so cocky with it.

All that being said, a diagnosis when I was in college or uni would’ve been very handy given how much I was struggling. But better late than never and I’m glad I was diagnosed when the world had a much better understanding of ADHD and Autism.