What Are Signs of Autism in Adults? A Guide to Autistic Traits and Self-Discovery

When you picture someone with autism, there’s a good chance that a child comes to mind. Maybe your nephew or a member of your child’s class is diagnosed, so you’re familiar with some of the behaviors associated with the condition...or at least how they show up in children. But millions of autistic adults exist too, since autism is a distinct neurotype, not something you grow out of. 

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However, if the condition wasn’t assessed already in childhood, it can be harder to spot as an adult. In fact, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that one in 45 adults is autistic, and even more are likely undiagnosed. 

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Though there are many shared traits between the age groups, autism can present differently in adults than in children, which is something we'll discuss in depth within this article. But fundamentally,  the signs of autism in adults include a range of characteristics like:

• Social interaction and communication differences 
• Self-soothing and self-regulatory behaviors
• Sensory and processing differences
• Special interests and activities
• Emotional regulation and cognitive traits

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If you suspect you may be autistic, you likely know the journey toward diagnosis isn’t so straightforward. It can be confusing and frustrating! Especially since no two people with autism are the same, and everyone has their own unique combination of strengths and challenges.

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On top of that, many adults tend to mask their autistic behaviors to fit in with their neurotypical peers, oftentimes without even realizing it. Plus, thanks to gender and cultural bias and other stereotypes, countless autistic adults are overlooked due to their more subtle presentation of the condition. 

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That’s why Prosper Health is here to provide you with a clear, inclusive, neurodivergent-affirming breakdown of adult autism signs: what they are, why they’re often missed, and what to do if they resonate.

Autism, or more accurately, per the DSM-5, autism spectrum disorder (ASD), is a neurodevelopmental condition that causes the brain to function differently, and impacts how people socialize, communicate, learn, and behave. It’s important to remember that autism is not a disease. 

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Though autism is suspected and consequently diagnosed more often in children than adults, there has been a significant increase in adult diagnoses since 2011, according to a study published in JAMA Network in 2024. But for years, autism in most adults was undiagnosed and misdiagnosed. 

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So what does autism look like in adults? Although autistic traits in children and adults are ultimately the same, they can present in different ways. This is why a key factor that can prolong an autism diagnosis into adulthood is a lack of awareness around the nuance of autistic traits.

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Note: In the context of autism, what might often be referred to as a “symptom” is more accurately referred to as a “trait" or “characteristic” and we’ll be using that terminology throughout this article

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“Our understanding of autism has grown quite a lot in the last 10 to 15 years,” Kroncke explains, “so when we meet [a potentially autistic person] who is 40 years old, we know that there wasn't a real awareness of some of their autistic traits when they were two, three, five, seven years old.”  

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“I always felt different but never had the words for it,” says Tobey, 41, who was diagnosed as autistic at age 36. “Social interactions felt like performance, I over-analyzed every conversation, and I carried constant exhaustion from pretending to be ‘normal.’” When his children began their own neurodivergence journeys, he says that it forced him to look inwards and recognize the same patterns in himself.

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Another major difference is that many adults have learned how to suppress or hide their autistic behaviors in order to fit in—a technique known as “masking.” 

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High masking, or Level 1 autistics who can appear to be living just as well as everyone else, are sometimes wrongly referred to as “high-functioning autistic”. The trouble is, many of the stressful experiences caused by living as an autistic person in an allistic (non-autistic) world are largely invisible. And, due to masking, autistic people will suppress the discomfort they feel so as not to draw attention to themselves. This can lead to burnout and have a negative effect on mental health. This is why diagnosis matters, even if you feel like you're "getting by".

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People who fall into this category are more accurately known as “low support needs autism”. The same goes for the term “low-functioning” on the other end of the spectrum; they should be referred to as "high support needs autistic.

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Autistic adults are also more likely to have co-occurring mental health conditions, like depression, anxiety, and ADHD.

Clinicians use criteria set out in the DSM 5-TR to diagnose clients with autism. But there are limitations to looking at autism solely through the DSM-5 criteria.

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First, they don’t take masking into consideration, which may result in misdiagnosis. Similarly, these criteria don’t take co-occurring conditions like ADHD, OCD, and anxiety into account, which may obscure the diagnosis. Don't worry, we'll break it all down for you.

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From a purely clinical perspective, the criteria outlined in the DSM 5-TR, include:

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• Challenges with social emotional reciprocity
• Nonverbal interaction
• Relationship building and development
• Repetitive behaviors, language and actions
• Need for sameness and routine
• Restrictive, intense interests 
• Sensory processing differences 

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It’s important to remember that these characteristics are differences, not deficits—although these differences can create real challenges. “Autistic traits are human traits, and there are so many strengths in neurodivergent ways of thinking,” Dr. Kroncke says. “So many people are successful in looking at problems in a different way, or approaching things from a different perspective.” 

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These characteristics shouldn’t be used to perpetuate harmful stereotypes about autistic people, as doing so emphasizes specific traits and behaviors, rather than the person, and reduces people to a diagnosis. Lastly, you don’t need to have every single sign of autism in order to get a diagnosis.

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There's so much to know about autism and how it presents in adults, so let's get into it.

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Social Interaction and Communication Differences

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One of the key social and communication differences in autistic adults has to do with social-emotional reciprocity, or the ability to engage in conversation with others during social interactions. According to Dr. Kroncke, social-emotional reciprocity is about someone's social approach: the quality of back-and-forth conversation, and their comfort with small talk, sharing emotions, and sharing their interests. 

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“You can think about [it as a] conversational dance,” she explains. “Do you ask questions of others? Do you know how much to stay in response? Do you know when it's time to move on, or when someone's shifted the conversation topic? Can you shift with them, and talk about something different now, and kind of follow?” In short, social-emotional reciprocity is innately understanding what to do and what to say.   

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Another difference has to do with nonverbal communication in social interactions. This can include having autistic traits related to the way you make eye contact and interpret body language and gestures, as well as lacking facial expressiveness and other nonverbal communication.  

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Finally, an autistic adult may experience differences in developing, maintaining, and understanding various types of relationships. This includes family members or friends, to romantic partners and colleagues. “People will come in and say, ‘I've tried to make friends for years, and I just don't know how to bring it past that initial phase.’ Or, ‘I keep having problems in friendships and I don't understand what's happening in them.’” says Jackie Shinall, PsyD, head of reliability and quality assurance at Prosper Health.

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Signs of adult autism related to social interaction and communication

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The following is a list of common characteristics someone might relate to as an autistic adult.

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• Missing social cues or “rules” 
• Frequently feeling awkward
• Rehearsing conversations
• Avoiding eye contact
• Taking things literally
• Struggling with small talk
• Feeling “too blunt” 
• Preferring solitude
• Difficulty making and maintaining friendships
• Lack of inflection or speaking in a monotone voice
• Difficulty understanding sarcasm
• Social anxiety
• Getting too close to others (or getting upset if others get too close to you)
• Echolalia (repetition of words or phrases heard from others)
• Accents
• Intonation 

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Aaron, 34, for example, is typically very direct when people ask him for his opinion. "The number of times I have had someone tell me they appreciate my honesty and candor confuses me to no end,” he says. “Do people normally lie when asked for their thoughts? It makes no sense to me.”

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Self-Soothing and Self-Regulating Activities

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It’s common for autistic adults to engage in self-soothing and/or self-regulating activities, including self-stimulatory behavior—or “stimming” for short. 

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Stimming is repetitive body movements or other techniques that someone uses to stimulate their senses or self-soothe. It is also one of several repetitive and restricted behaviors and interests (RRBIs), or behavioral patterns characterized by repetition and a strong ability to adhere to routine, often alongside a desire for sameness.

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For the longest time, Aaron’s family saw his stims as “nervous tics” and tried to get him to relax or stop. “They never did, and my suppressing them for my whole life while also lacking a diagnosis to understand the purpose they truly serve led to my having stims which aren’t healthy,” he says. “I’ve had a lot of facial and vocal tics over the years which have been distracting to those around me, as well as a few others in major muscle groups in my body.”

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People also engage in stimming if they’re experiencing “a lot of sensory input and they're feeling overwhelmed,” Dr. Shinall says. In addition to autism, stimming can occur with ADHD and OCD.

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Examples of Stimming Behavior

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• Hand flapping or waving
• Pacing in a pattern or in a certain spot
• Finger movements, like finger flicking or finger pill-rolling
• Leg shaking
• Vocal stimming (muttering, grunting, stuttering, whistling, singing)
• Jumping or hopping
• Rocking or swaying
• Spinning or twirling
• Chewing on items that aren’t food
• Pulling or playing with hair
• Picking at skin or nails
• Chewing lips, tongue, or inside of cheeks
• Drumming on a surface with your hands
• Playing with a necklace, ring, or other piece of jewelry 
• Fidgeting
• Repeating words or phrases in your head

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As far as self-regulating activities go, “some of it can be repetitive behavior, [but] some of it can just be things that people do to help themselves feel calmer or soothed, usually in high-sensory situations,” Dr. Shinall explains. 

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Other examples of repetitive, self-soothing behaviors and activities include:

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• Rewatching a favorite TV show
• Listening to a favorite song on repeat (or repeating a specific line)
• Coming up with scripted replies for future conversations
• Having rigid daily routines and rituals
• Disliking change
• Eating familiar comfort foods

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Like many of the other signs of autism in adults, these differences can be strengths. “Being able to maintain routines and sameness often means that you follow rules, you're very task-oriented, you're on time, and you get your job done,” Dr. Kroncke says. “From a professional standpoint, there can be so many strengths to certain autistic traits. It's important to honor and recognize their uniqueness.”

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Sensory and Processing Differences

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One of the most common signs of autism in adults is sensory and processing differences, Dr. Shinall says. They could take the form of hypersensitivity—a heightened response to stimuli—or hyposensitivity, a notably weak response to stimuli.

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People with hypersensitivity are often sensory avoiding except for their own personal safe selected sensory experiences, while those with hyposensitivity tend to be sensory seeking. It’s possible to be both sensory seeking and sensory avoiding. 

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In the context of autism, “we're thinking about a really visceral experience of sensory processing,” Dr. Kroncke says. That can take many forms. For example, this might look like someone who is very sensitive to noise that can't leave their house without earbuds or noise-cancelling headphones, or “someone who is so overwhelmed by textures and food or clothing that it really impairs their ability to find something comfortable to wear, or to, at times, get adequate nutrition,” she explains. 

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Common Hypersensitivities in Autistic Adults

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• Bright lights (artificial or sunlight)
• Flashing lights
• Loud noises 
• Conversations with multiple people
• High-pitch noises 
• Loud music 
• Public transport sounds 
• Clothing discomfort (ie certain fabrics, tags, tightness)
• Touching different textures (e.g. microfiber, carpet, feathers)
• Hot temperatures 
• Food tastes, textures, and smells 
• Strong scents (especially the scent of perfume and other scented products) 
• Busy, crowded environments
• The wrong type of physical touch

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Common Hyposensitivities in Autistic Adults

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• Physical pain
• Hot temperatures
• Cold temperatures
• Small details
• Visual or environmental changes
• Scent
• Sound

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Popular Sensory-seeking Experiences for Autistic Adults

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• Bright colors and patterns 
• Complex images, like scenes of nature or artwork
• Motion/moving objects
• Ambient light
• Specific music (and may play one song on repeat)
• Deep pressure (e.g. using a weighted blanket, wearing tight clothing, getting a hug)
• Certain textures (e.g. items that are soft and/or fluffy)
• The feeling of warm or cold surfaces on their skin
• Certain food tastes or textures (and may fixate on a certain food)
• Certain aromas (e.g. food scents, perfume, scented products, aromatherapy)

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Hypersensitive autistic adults may experience sensory overload or overwhelm. This is “a situation where the sensory input is so great that you feel like you can't function and could shut down,” Dr. Kroncke says. “A lot of people say that they can't go places like concerts or festivals or a family picnic or to Target to do the shopping, because there's too many sensory inputs, and that can create a lot of overwhelm.” 

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This has been the case for Tobey. “I used to think I was just ‘too sensitive’ or ‘overly intense,’” he says. “Now I understand that sensory overload, hyperfocus, and emotional intensity are part of being autistic.” 

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Special Interests and Activities

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Many autistic adults have specific special interests around specific topics and activities. “These can be interests that are quite unique and quite specific and quite specialized, or they can be interests which are very intense,” Dr. Kroncke says. For example, someone could spend much of their free time learning everything there is to know about niche subjects like vintage muscle cars, Civil War history, or 1980s sitcoms.

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Jessica, 37, who was diagnosed with autism last year, finds herself fixating on a topic and wanting to share everything she learns about it with others. “If you start talking about a special interest area of mine or a deeper topic, I will talk nonstop,” she says.

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Dr. Kroncke gives the example of someone who has an intense interest in dogs. In this case, liking dogs isn’t unique, but most people aren’t able to rattle off every dog breed, nor do they spend hours every day researching dogs. Though anyone can have special interests, for autistic people, their interest is more intense and disruptive to some degree, she notes.

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Enthusiasm for special interests and activities can take many forms, including:

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• Hyperfixation
• Hyperfocus
• Niche hobbies
• Collecting
• Routines
• Eating the same meals
• Memory recall
• Expertise in certain subjects
• Strong learning abilities
• Difficulty disengaging from interests

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Emotional Regulation and Cognitive Differences

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For adults with autism, it may be hard to notice, label, explain, and resonate with emotions, Dr. Kroncke says. It’s a type of emotional dysregulation: when someone has a hard time understanding and managing their emotions. This can also manifest as alexithymia, or the inability to recognize and distinguish between different emotions and bodily sensations, and express those emotions.

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“I think some of that is having trouble being able to recognize and identify and cope with emotions at a baseline level,” she explains. At that point, the emotions can become so overwhelming that someone has a more intense emotional response than they otherwise would, causing them to withdraw and/or experience anxiety and distressed behavior.

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For example, after attending a party where you had to mask and self-regulate in order to fit in, you may find yourself curled up and crying when you get home because you struggled to fully realize how stressful the party was in the moment. 

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In addition to differences in emotional regulation, some autistic adults may experience cognitive differences, like executive dysfunction. Executive dysfunction in autism occurs when something disrupts a person’s ability to manage their own thoughts, emotions, and actions.

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One example of this is perfectionism, or setting unrealistically high standards for yourself, and judging yourself harshly if you don’t accomplish your goals. It may occur because of differences in cognitive flexibility associated with executive dysfunction of the frontal lobe. Perfectionism can also involve black-and-white thinking, even when there are gray areas. For example, Jessica is a long-time rule-follower, and previously had a hard time seeing grey areas.

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Other examples of executive dysfunction in autism include:

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• Challenges focusing on one thing at a time
• “Spacing out” or daydreaming
• Time blindness
• Impulse control
• Challenges in starting tasks that you find difficult or boring
• Losing your train of thought or getting distracted mid-task
• Blurting things out
• Being distracted easily
• Struggling to switch to different tasks

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Autistic Meltdown and Burnout

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This could lead to something called “autistic meltdown” in which emotions and situational stimuli become overwhelming very quickly, appear too intense for the situation, and make it difficult to function, Dr. Kroncke says. 

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When autistics spend too much time in environments that overwhelm their system and trigger their sensitivities—often when demands on them in an allistic society become too much for their own cognitive and emotional resources—it can lead to “autistic burnout”. Autistic burnout can look like depression, or a period of time in which the autistic person is only capable of doing the bare minimum and needs ample time to heal from the compounded stress of multiple meltdowns. 

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“Some people would say that masking can contribute to that, because you're working really hard to be successful in situations,” she says. “Then sometimes the cup is already pretty full, and then it overflows.”

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This was the case for Tobey. “When I experience a burnout, I will detach from everything and everyone,” he says. “My social and emotional battery becomes completely drained and I pull away from everyone around me.”

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The Empathy Question

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Although the dominant narrative in clinical texts and academic literature is that autistic people often lack empathy—also known as hypoempathy—2024 research published in the journal Autism in Adulthood found that we’re gradually moving away from this stereotype. 

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In fact, the study found that out of the autistic adults they surveyed, “a high proportion” of participants reported being hyperempathic, meaning that they experience others’ emotions intensely, to the point where sometimes they’re indistinguishable from their own. The research also stressed that for autistic people, empathy also exists on a spectrum, with some people lacking empathy, and others being overwhelmed by the extent to which they empathize with others.

Some of the signs of autism in adults can be subtle, and therefore overlooked or misunderstood. This can lead to a late autism diagnosis—especially for women, who are more likely to have these non-stereotypical characteristics.  Here are a few examples:

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Masking

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When signs of autism in adults are overlooked or misunderstood, it’s frequently because someone has spent years masking. Masking is an attempt to hide and compensate for characteristics and behaviors associated with autism in order to present as neurotypical. 

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One way autistic adults mask is by copying the behavior of their peers, Dr. Shinall says. “They're going to copy certain gestures or phrases, start laughing if everyone else is laughing, even if they don't know what is supposed to be funny,” she explains. “They’re adjusting their behaviors to appear ‘socially appropriate,’ though it may not come naturally or feel natural or good for them.” 

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Masking has been a lifelong experience for Aaron. “I feel the mask on me whenever I’m physically around another person,” he says. “Those moments, when someone enters my general vicinity, are when my brain loads up the social rules I know they’ll be expecting. These rules do not feel natural to me, but I know they are necessary if I don’t want to run into trouble.” 

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Some of his rules include: 

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• Making eye contact
• Forcing vocal inflection
• Monitoring and maintaining his facial expressions to ensure they are visible and natural enough that the other person will see and recognize them without his reactions seeming forced or fake
• Demonstrating both active listening and making situationally-appropriate comments to respond to what they say

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Masking can make it difficult for an autistic adult to get diagnosed. “Part of diagnosis comes from observation, and so you really have to take into account what is natural for somebody versus what is learned and done because of what they think other people want,” Dr. Shinall says. This can lead to the common signs of autism being overlooked or misunderstood until someone reaches adulthood.

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Perfectionism

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Along the same lines, there are also high-masking, high-achieving, or perfectionist adults who “pass” for neurotypical in work, school, and social settings. Sometimes this can take the form of hyperfocus or “flow”—a term Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi coined to describe an “automatic, effortless, yet highly focused state”—during which autistic people can pay close attention to even seemingly minute details.

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Perfectionist autistic adults probably did well in school as children, and after so many years of camouflaging autism characteristics, they could end up with autistic burnout or long-term masking fatigue.

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Hyper-empathy

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Contrary to the stereotype that autistic people lack empathy, oftentimes the opposite is true, and they experience extreme emotional responses. According to a 2021 study in the journal Autism in Adulthood, in some cases, empathy is conditional, and autistic people find it easier to empathize with the people closest to them, other autistic people, and animals than, say, acquaintances and strangers. 

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Not only is hyper-empathy an overlooked sign of autism, but assuming that autistic people lack empathy “is a problem because it denies the lived experience of autistic adults and makes them appear as less than human,” the authors of the 2021 study wrote. Women in particular are more likely to experience hyper-empathy or “empathic attunement,” and, as a result, may find it difficult to get an accurate autism diagnosis. This is an example of non-stereotypical autism.

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Bottom-up Thinking and Processing

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Autistic adults tend to process information from the bottom up—meaning they first identify and focus on smaller details before zooming out to grasp the bigger picture. Because this is a thought process, rather than a behavior or something physical, this sign of autism in adults may be overlooked.

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Stimming

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Stimming doesn’t look one particular way. For some people it may involve more of the stereotypical behaviors, like rocking, hand flapping, or toe walking. Yet for others, stimming involves hair twirling, cheek chewing, or vocal (singing a couple lines of a song over and over), look like nail picking/biting, or be somatic hobbies like dancing. 

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Stimming can also be silent, such as repeating words, phrases, or song lyrics in your head. It may be harder to get an autism diagnosis for those who engage in these overlooked types of stimming. 

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Having Popular Special Interests

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Similarly, some people’s special interests may be overlooked because they’re societally “acceptable” — like being really into television, fashion, or sports.

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Being Hidden by Co-occurring Conditions

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Finally, it’s possible that clinicians misunderstand a person's autistic traits and misdiagnose them with other conditions, including OCD, ADHD, or borderline personality disorder. In fact, they could spend most of their life with one diagnosis, only to find out they have autism as an adult.

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It’s also possible that a separate autism diagnosis was hidden by diagnoses co-occurring with autism. One of the most common co-occurring conditions with autism is ADHD known as AuDHD. 

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Tobey, for example, has both autism and ADHD. “The combination of both made life make a lot more sense once I had clarity,” he says. “I had never properly considered ADHD, although others had said it to me numerous times. I think I was just focused on [autism] and now jokingly call it my ‘buy-one-get-one-free’ offer of neurodivergence.”

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Anxiety, depression, and OCD are other co-occurring conditions. “Probably one of the hardest factors [in diagnosing adult autism] is the co-occurring conditions,” Dr. Shinall says. “Most of our clients come in with a laundry list of diagnoses, some which are accurate and some which are probably not.”

Autism can present and be received differently in adults based on their gender, identity, and cultural backgrounds.

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Women and AFAB individuals

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The signs of autism in women tend to be more subtle than in men, Dr. Shinall says. 

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“At a young age, girls are taught that they're supposed to socialize in certain ways, and so you’ll tend to see more facial expressions and more gestures in autistic women compared to men,” she explains. “But if you ask them about it, their face hurts because they're always trying to plaster on a smile, because everyone says their neutral face is a ‘resting bitch face.’”

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Indeed, women tend to be higher masking, Dr. Kroncke says, leading to more undiagnosed autism in women. “Generally, that's not going to be common when they're young, in childhood, but as they get into teen years and into adulthood, trying to modify behavior, trying to learn things, trying to script things, trying to practice—it's a lot, and that it can be really exhausting.”

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For example, although Jessica noticed she was different as a child, she didn’t recognize what turned out to be signs of autism until she was an adult and began researching the difference between female and male presentations of the condition.

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Trans and Nonbinary Adults

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Autistic adults are more likely to be transgender or non-binary than the rest of the population. A 2020 study published in the journal Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders found that autistic traits are higher in those identifying as gender variant, and gender variance is higher in those with autism. In fact, there’s a link between gender dysphoria and the sensory, communication, and social differences associated with autism, although at this point, it’s not well understood. 

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Along the same lines, a 2021 study published in the journal Autism Research found that autistic adults and adolescents ages 16 to 90 are more likely to identify with a diverse range of sexual orientations than neurotypical individuals. As the researchers note, healthcare professionals need to be aware that autistic patients may be more likely to identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, asexual, and other identities not listed here (LGBTQA+), which may put them at greater risk of mental and physical health difficulties because of discrimination.

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BIPOC Individuals

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Under-diagnosis of autism is a concern in BIPOC communities, Dr. Kroncke says. This begins in childhood. According to a 2021 study published in the Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics, despite the prevalence of autism being similar across racial and ethnic groups, White children are more likely to be both identified and diagnosed with autism earlier compared with Black, Latinx, and Asian children.

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These racial disparities continue into adulthood, with autistic adults from racial and ethnic minority groups experiencing lower rates of employment, social participation, and postsecondary education compared with their White counterparts, a 2019 study published in Current Psychiatry Reports notes.

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Systemic racism and cultural stereotypes can also impact whether adults get an autism diagnosis. No matter what your cultural background, everyone deserves access to assessment services and supports. 

While recognizing some of these signs of autism in yourself doesn’t automatically mean you’ll get a diagnosis, it’s a valid starting point. It’s also an important step because self-identification is a valuable part of neurodivergent identity. 

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In order to receive an autism diagnosis, you must meet the majority of criteria outlined in the DSM 5 and that discussed above. But by no means do you need to have every characteristic we've mentioned.

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If you strongly identify with these traits and feel ready to get officially evaluated for autism, you can start today. There are several different places you can begin, depending on what feels most comfortable for you. 

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• Consider taking a self-assessment test like the Autism Spectrum Quotient (AQ) or the Ritvo Autism Asperger Diagnostic Scale – Revised Test (RAADS-R) to get a better idea of where you might fall on the autism spectrum.
• Seek out self-help books, particularly from autistic clinicians or others with lived experience.
• Connect with other autistic people through social media, autistic friends you know, and elsewhere. “Getting in with autism communities—both online and in your area—is also really beneficial for people,” says Dr. Shinall.
• Try journaling as a way to organize your thoughts and reflections on how you identify these traits and characteristics. This will help you keep track of what you might want to talk to a clinician about, and help you explore your emotions along the way

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Keep in mind that these online tests and quizzes aren’t necessarily accurate. “The sensitivity and specificity of these questionnaires is not great,” Dr. Shinall says, “They could be a potential starting point, but it shouldn’t be someone’s answer, or the only thing that they're looking at. Just because somebody has an elevated score on an autism online questionnaire doesn't necessarily mean they have autism.”

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Finding Clinical Support

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When you’re ready, you may want to find an affirming professional who understands adult autism—like the ones at Prosper Health—and make an appointment to be officially diagnosed. “A clinical psychologist who specializes in adult autism is the best starting point,” Dr. Shinall says. Prosper Health will support you at every step of your diagnosis journey.

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Then, whether you are officially diagnosed or not, therapy can be a great option for managing new feelings about a diagnosis or a new identity. However, it can be difficult to find a clinician in your area, so you may want to consider a telehealth provider like Prosper Health as a barrier-reducing option.

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“When autistic individuals go into therapy with Prosper, we want them to build a confident autistic identity, and we want them to find ways and tools to cope with anxiety and depression,” Dr. Kroncke says.

Can you have both autism and ADHD (AuDHD)?

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Yes, it’s possible to have both autism and ADHD, often abbreviated as AuDHD. There are many overlapping characteristics between the two neurodevelopmental conditions, and they frequently occur together. In fact, a 2021 meta-analysis of more than 50 studies found that among 39% of autistic people also had ADHD.

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What is masking?

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Masking is an attempt to hide and compensate for characteristics and behaviors associated with autism in order to present as neurotypical. When someone masks—especially for large portions of their life—it obscures the common signs of autism, making a diagnosis more difficult, and pushing it later in life. 

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Is rocking a sign of autism?

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Rocking is a type of stimming, and stimming is associated with autism. However, stimming is only one of many signs of autism, and rocking is a common self-soothing action that neurotypical people can engage in as well. 

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How do you know if you have autism?

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The first step towards an autism diagnosis is self-assessment. Learn more about the signs of autism in adults and see how many of those characteristics you recognize in yourself. You may also want to take a self-assessment test, like the Autism Spectrum Quotient (AQ) or the Ritvo Autism Asperger Diagnostic Scale – Revised Test (RAADS-R), but it’s important to keep in mind that clinicians don’t use these tests for diagnosis, and you should take the results with a grain of salt. 

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From there, you may want to speak with trusted friends or family members. You could also find affirming professionals who understand adult autism—like the ones at Prosper Health—and schedule an appointment to get a formal assessment. 

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Is self-diagnosis valid?

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While self-diagnosis isn’t the same as a formal autism diagnosis after assessment by a clinician, Prosper Health supports you wherever you are on your journey. You do not need to have a formal diagnosis to access Prosper Health’s therapy and resources.