I hear this question a lot in various forms: Does it make a difference? What difference does it make? WHY does it make a difference?
Sometimes it comes from people wondering whether a diagnosis is worth pursuing. Sometimes from the people who care about a person who is newly diagnosed. And sometimes from people who simply don’t see what the fuss is about. Often there’s an underlying query about whether the diagnosis will really change anything if you’ve got this far in life.
In my experience (professionally and personally) it can change a great deal. Very occasionally, it doesn’t change much at all but I’ll come to that later.
Many people who are diagnosed late (most, I’d say) have spent years, even decades, living with a running commentary of negative internal dialogue about themself. It’s a belief that’s often so familiar that they no longer question it but it’s a strong belief that they are somehow wrong. Or incapable. Or broken.
They’ve always felt the difference. It’s just that nothing was around to explain it, other than it being something about them. So that’s the conclusion they came to.
If everyone else is managing this, why can’t I? I must be stupid. Lazy. Incapable.
Everyone else seems to get it, so why can’t I, no matter how hard I try? I’m just not good enough.
People keep telling me I’m too much, so I try to say and do the right thing, but I keep getting it wrong. I must be a bad person.
Versions of these will be painfully familiar to many of the people I work with. Ultimately the theme is that they have come to the conclusion that they are the problem.
What this tends to lead to is suppression of self. They’ve spent most of their life trying to squeeze into something they’re not, and never will be. And there’s a whole heap of negative beliefs about who they are, built up not because any of it is true, but because there was nothing else available to explain the experience.
Then let’s add another layer…. Think of all the self-help books, productivity systems and wellbeing advice we’ve been handed over the last two or three decades. Very little of it was designed with neurodivergent brains in mind. So imagine doing everything you’re “supposed to do” and it still isn’t working. Or still isn’t enough. Without knowing why, it’s so easy to conclude that you’re the one failing, rather than the advice.
So not knowing you’re neurodivergent often means carrying a lot of shame.
Knowing is different. It means understanding. It gives you a lens you can actually see clearly through, rather than one that has been distorting things all along.
Knowing means getting in touch with your real needs, rather than the ones you’ve been told you should have. And knowing means working with your brain, rather than constantly against it.
Knowing you are neurodivergent can lift a huge weight of shame that was never yours to carry in the first place. And from there, something else becomes possible: compassion, acceptance, and a sense of agency about what you do next.
I did say earlier that sometimes it makes no difference at all to know whether you are neurodivergent or not. For some people, finding out doesn’t or wouldn’t change much. Not because it isn’t true or doesn’t matter, but because they were already okay with who they are.
These are people who feel secure in themselves. Who have a sense of safety around who they are, and who have been met with unconditional acceptance by enough important others along the way. For them, being neurodivergent is simply a description of how they’re wired. There’s no shame to lift, because there wasn’t any there to begin with.
I’d say this could be the exception rather than the norm. And it’s usually not the people who find their way to therapy!
But also, in a way, it’s where I’m hoping we might get to.
Because that, really, is the destination: a place where your traits are simply who you are, and nothing to be ashamed of. Where you have agency in yourself and over your own life. Where you can ask for what you need, and ask in ways that make sense to you and mean that those needs actually get met.
Getting there isn’t always straightforward. Often there’s a great deal of trauma in the way. Neurodivergent people can be more susceptible to trauma, and more deeply affected by it, so there are often many layers to work through before acceptance of self feels possible. That takes time, and it takes patience. But it is possible.
Getting there isn’t always straightforward. There are often many layers to work through before acceptance of self feels possible. Coping strategies and ways of masking having often been developed over many years, sometimes so skilfully that they run on autopilot, and they’ve usually kept the person safe in one way or another. Neurodivergent people can be more susceptible to trauma, and more deeply affected by it (or at least differently affected by it). So it can take time to untangle these layers, particularly when it comes to working out what is really me, and what is masking. That takes patience, and it takes compassion. But it is possible. Very possible.
In that sense, knowing you’re neurodivergent isn’t the finish line. It’s often the doorway. It can be a way of finally seeing yourself clearly enough to begin the work of accepting, knowing, and eventually trusting, who you are.
If you’re reading this as a partner, parent, friend or colleague of someone who has recently discovered they’re neurodivergent, it might help to know that this isn’t about “making a fuss” or “needing a label”. For many people it’s the first time their life has made sense. It can bring relief, and often grief too, for all the years spent believing something was wrong with them. Your patience and understanding in that moment can mean more than you realise. And the safety and acceptance you offer can be part of what helps them get to that place of feeling okay in themselves.
So, does it make a difference?
For most of the people I meet, yes. A massive one.
And for all of us, the aim is the same: to feel safe enough in who we are that the difference becomes just that. A difference. Not a flaw.
❤️