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7 Surprising Reasons Why ‘Everyone’ Thinks They’re Autistic
Reasons why Autism & ADHD diagnoses are on the rise in 2025
Many people wrongly believe that there is an ‘autism and ADHD epidemic’ and that Autism is wildly on the rise. However, people have always been autistic, whether they were aware of this or not. The only difference is that more people are recognising that they’re autistic or neurodivergent in some form. As a result, there has been a sharp increase in the number of people who have been diagnosed with Autism in the last five years.
I, of course, am one of these people, as I was diagnosed with Autism and ADHD in 2022 at the age of 27, and my clinician confirmed I had always been autistic, but I had no idea until I was 26. I had never even considered that I might be on the spectrum or have ADHD, as I couldn’t relate to the versions of Autism and ADHD that my schools, or media representation, or parents taught me.
To put this into further context, I completed an entire degree in Psychology in 2015, and whilst I did learn about Autism, I still didn’t realise that the burnout and meltdowns I was experiencing at the time were autistic meltdowns. I vividly remember learning about Autism in children. We were only taught about autistic children with level 3 support needs or Asperger’s syndrome, but my…
