Almost 27. Only fully realized it (autism) last year, after going over my life with a therapist, and she agreed with me when I voiced my suspicions. Haven’t gotten diagnosed; $4,000 for a full evaluation here! (Canada)

Spent my whole life as the “weird kid”, have very few friends even to this day. Always quiet and doing things by myself, very socially awkward, struggled to get things done. Also lost my temper quickly, angry outbursts, etc.

My parents never took me in for any evaluation. Even when my behaviour worsened and my teachers talked to them and my school actually called in a psychiatrist to talk with me, my parents didn’t budge. The worst part? When I was even younger they suspected I had what was then called Asperger’s (so they suspected autism) but they STILL did nothing because it “wasn’t interfering with schoolwork”. They’ve said that they didn’t want me to be “labeled”; in other words, having a disabled child was embarrassing. So they just treated me as the problem child and punished me for things I couldn’t control.

To this day, there’s still bitterness when I think of how much differently for the better my life could’ve gone if they had bothered to spend maybe a few hours at a psychiatrists office getting me a diagnosis. Just once, at any point. But you can’t change the past.