“What If I’ve Always Been Neurodivergent?” — Late Discovery and the Rewriting of a Life

Many of us grow up with a quiet, persistent sense of not quite fitting in - A feeling of being slightly out of step with the world, and the people within in.

Of never feeling fully understood. Of watching others move through life with an ease that always seems just out of reach - like everyone else was given a manual for life, that we somehow missed.

Often, the meaning we make of these experiences, often from very early in our lives, especially as girls & women, is something along the lines of:

"There is something wrong with me - I've just got to keeping trying harder to fit in, to please people, to avoid this horrible sense that I'm sometimes 'never enough', yet 'too much' at other times".

And, in many cases, this meaning we make seemed to work for us - it does make us work harder, and we learn (often the hard way) to copy the people around us, and how respond in conversations. We learned what to say, when, with whom... and when to stay silent. We learned what behaviours we naturally engage in are "allowed", and which invited negative judgment from others - we did more of the former, and hid the latter as best we could, and so on.

Many of us find this strategy takes us quite far in life - we learned a lot - perhaps we got an education, held down jobs, embarked upon a career, made friends, socialised often and perhaps travel the world, and/or got married and had children...

On the outside, perhaps it's always looks like we're absolutely "succeeding" in life...

The hidden cost of "looking fine" on the outside

But inside - we're often still feeling baffled, often chronically anxious, feeling lost, or like an imposter, and often also exhausted and burning out - especially when the expectations on us increase - when the pressures on us intensify, or when our support structures thin out.

For women, these more destabilising times can centre around our puberty (as our hormones start shifting dramatically), or in our 20s (as we're expected to stretch our wings into an adulthood of our own making), or when we become mothers (when we begin to live the multitude of daily tasks needed to care of a tiny human), or when we enter perimenopause (when our hormones, again, shift dramatically, impacting the capacities of all our body's systems).

At these times of intense transition, we may well still look like we're coping well enough on the outside, while internally we are carrying chronic anxiety, shame, or a sense of 'failure' we can’t quite explain. We're also very often exhausted and burning out - with perhaps a dawning realisation that all of the effort we've had to put into life (all the pretending, and copying, and learning, and adapting we've always done) has been silently, and yet quite severely, draining us...

Whatever we've always done, to get through life, simply isn't feeling sustainable anymore, and often, as we start to burn out, we have no idea why... until we learn about late discovery of neurodivergence in women, that is. And then it all begins to make sense...

The question that changes everything

With growing public awareness of the many ways neurodivergence can present - particularly in adults, and especially in women - many of us find we are asking a startling question, later in life:

"What if I’ve always been neurodivergent, and just never known?"

This can be a profoundly destabilising question to ask in adulthood. And it can also be a deeply validating one - For some of us, it’s the first time our experiences, struggles and gifts, all begin to make sense.

A glimpse into my own lived experience

I am personally navigating all of this myself, right now, in my 40s - I have always known life has often felt very hard for me (despite my many privileges), and I've always known how hard I've had to work at everything & how sensitive I have always felt. I've also always been aware that I've often felt "never enough", and yet "too much" all at once (I've been called "too intense" a lot in my life). I have often felt awkward, I've always felt anxious, and sometimes I've felt traumatised within relationships, in my personal life and career. When I entered motherhood, at the same time that perimenopause began for me, and all at the same time as a global pandemic... I then knew that I was burning out, in many ways.

What I have not known, until recently, is that these life experiences are all common among women who identify as autistic and ADHD. And this realisation feels life-changing for me.

As I continue to examine the relevance of these diagnostic labels for myself, I am grateful of my background as a compassion-based psychologist for women, which has made me aware of what I need to do this task.

What we need if we're asking ourselves this question

With my extensive psychological tool-kit, I am grateful to know what I need to navigate this life-changing shift in perspective, is: time to go at my pace with this exploration; reliable resources; curiosity and an open-mind, to explore this uncertain, liminal, new, unsure space; non-judgemental spaces & a community of women who identity with my experiences, and can help me make sense of them; and loads of self-compassion, and emotional support - to gently meet & honour the many complex feelings that are coming up for me, in this process.

I know that I need all of this, for a potentially very powerful new understanding of myself to unfold, at a pace that works for me.

As well has navigating all of this myself, I now offer specialist, women-centred, psychology services, to compassionately support other women in developing their own self-understanding, in a neuroaffirmative way, according to the above priciples - with everything that these life-changing reflections can bring up for us, such as:

Revisiting your whole life through a new lens

Asking this question often means revisiting your entire life story - Suddenly, childhood memories, school experiences, friendships, relationships, work patterns, and recurring struggles can be reinterpreted through a new lens.

What once felt like personal shortcomings may begin to look more like unmet needs, differences in processing, or adaptations made in order to survive.

This life-reflection process can stir up a great deal:

• Grief for the support you didn’t receive

• Anger for the ways you were misunderstood or missed

• Relational traumas that have been minimised or normalised

• Overwhelm at the scale of what feels like an entire 'life re-write'

And yet, alongside all of this, many women (like me too) also describe a sense of relief, freedom, and empowerment. Some of us feel that, finally, there is a framework that explains everything that never quite fit anywhere before.

Making sense of anxiety, shame, and uneven functioning

For many people, a neurodivergent lens brings compassion to experiences that previously felt inexplicable.

Chronic anxiety and shame often begin to make sense - not as character flaws, but as the cost of years spent masking, pushing, and trying to meet expectations that were never designed with our nervous system, and unique brain-wiring, in mind.

It can also explain why we may have excelled in certain areas of life, while struggling significantly in others. Many people (me included) notice this pattern across:

• Work and career

• Friendships and intimate relationships

• Daily living tasks (such as managing finances, cooking, organising, parenting)

Begining to understand that there is a neurological reason this unevenness, and that it's not related to a flaw in our personality, can be deeply relieving.

To diagnose, or not to diagnose?

For many adults, this period raises complex questions about whether to pursue a formal diagnostic assessment for ADHD, autism, both, or another form of neurodivergence.

There is no universally “right” answer here - Seeking a diagnosis can require significant time, emotional energy, and financial investment. For some, a formal diagnosis is validating and practically helpful. For others, self-identifying feels more aligned, sufficient, and empowering.

Both choices are valid - What matters most is that any decision you make feels informed, intentional, and in service of what you are actually seeking at this point in your life.

The emotional work of late discovery

Late discovery is not just a cognitive exercise - it is a deeply emotional process.

Grief and trauma often need space to be acknowledged and processed. At the same time, there can be genuine joy and relief in finally feeling understandable. For many, this is the first time they feel represented, reflected, or part of a community.

There is also often our internalised ableism to gently unpack - beliefs absorbed over a lifetime about what is “normal”, “acceptable”, or “successful”, and where we believe we fall short - This tender work deserves care, time and emotional support.

Support before, during, and after diagnosis

I do not offer diagnostic assessments for neurodivergence. What I do offer is expert emotional and psychological support throughout the entire process - whether or not you choose to pursue a diagnosis.

With both my clinical expertise and my own lived experience of asking these questions myself in my 40s, I support clients to:

• Explore whether pursuing a diagnosis feels like an aligned investment of time, energy, and resources

• Process the trauma and grief that can emerge when these questions arise in adulthood

• Bear witness to, and celebrate, the relief and joy that can come with recognition

• Unpack internalised ableism and make sense of a neurodivergent identity later in life

• Process and integrate the outcomes of a diagnostic assessment, whatever the result

• Explore the ways in which you have been masking, and support you as you begin to take down these masking behaviours, and live more authentically and vulnerably.

• Decide when and how to communicate this discovery to your family, friends, colleagues, etc., and offer extra TLC if/when those people respond in ways that feel hurtful, or invalidating.

Sadly, many people describe feeling “diagnosed and dumped,” or "lost in the system", after an assessment - both when outcome was unexpected or invalidating, and even when it was the hoped-for outcome. Accessing the right emotional support at this stage can be crucial, and I can provide this support in a strengths-based, compassionate, neuro-affirming way.

Living differently, with more self-trust

Whether or not you seek or receive a diagnosis, this journey often brings new insight into your unique constellation of strengths and struggles.

From here, it becomes possible to make meaningful adaptations - setting different boundaries, rethinking self-care, moving your body in ways that suit your nervous system, restructuring daily life, and perhaps most powerfully - relating to yourself with more compassion.

If you can resonate with any of these experiences, and you wish to gently explore them - you can make an enquiry to work with me here.

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I'm Dr. Jenny Turner, Clinical Psychologist, Mum, late-in-life-self-identifying AuDHD human, and founder of Mind Body Soul Psychology - a specialist, trauma-informed, private psychology service for women.

I can help you at any stage of your life journey - whether you need support to enter adulthood, navigate perimenopause, heal from trauma, finally transform your relationship to your own anxieties, shame, guilt, rage and/or overwhelm - I can support you to enrich your life & relationships.

My services are trauma-informed, non-pathologising, compassion-focussed, neuroaffirmative, and always offered through an intersectional feminist lens - most people I work with identify as a woman, but my services are trans & non-binary inclusive.

I offer online appointments to women based all over the UK, and I offer in-person appointments in Ripon, North Yorkshire - click here to find out more: www.mindbodysoulpsychology.co.uk

You might also like to follow me on Instagram, @drjennypsychologist , or perhaps you'd like to receive regular doses of solidarity and compassion right into your inbox? If so, you can sign up here to my Substack newsletter for regular moments of solidarity in the challenges of being a woman in this patriarchal world, as well as compassion & inspirations for guilt-free self-care - so we can all stay resourced for the experiences we're navigating, and fights we're facing.