Can autism symptoms get worse as an adult? If that has happened to you, how have you handled it?
My question is: can any adults who know they are autistic confirm that symptoms don't typically get worse in adulthood? Or if you have had symptoms get worse as you've grown older, how have you addressed it, especially sensory sensitivity and frustration tolerance/handling change?
To be clear, I have not been diagnosed with autism and I am honestly not confident I am autistic at all -- my therapist is pretty insistent I am and is setting up evaluation with a neuropsych, but I'm not sure I agree with their assessment. My symptoms have gotten worse as I've gotten older and entered adulthood, which seems directly contradictory to a neurodevelopmental condition, so I'm curious if that is an experience many autistic adults have had.
My sensory sensitivity, rigidity and black & white thinking, frustration and distress tolerance, struggle to tolerate change, executive dysfunction, and social skills & struggles have all gotten worse as I've gotten older, especially when I started college and then again when I graduated and started working. There were definitely *some* of those traits present when I was a kid, but I don't remember it being nearly as bad -- an an example, I was a horrendously picky eater but I don't remember being as extremely sound sensitive as I am now -- and it was never flagged by anybody like it was for my sister who is definitely autistic. I acknowledge that I'm not a neuropsychologist, but to me, symptoms getting worse in adulthood points to something that isn't developmental and should probably be treated differently. But I know I could be wrong and I am hardly an expert.