Why do some neurodivergent individuals reply to ableist hurt with deep harm, whereas others reply by distancing themselves from these with greater assist wants? Why do some pour themselves into advocacy, whereas others appear caught in cycles of burnout, disgrace, or defensiveness?
The reply could lie in the place somebody is of their neurodivergent identification arc.
Simply as fashions of identification improvement have helped clarify the psychological journeys of individuals throughout race, gender, and queerness, we want related frameworks for understanding neurodivergent identification.
This proposed arc isn’t a common map. It displays patterns I’ve seen echoed in neighborhood areas, medical settings, and private narratives, significantly amongst individuals who:
Had been recognized later in life
Have spent years masking or passing as neurotypical
Maintain different types of social privilege (equivalent to whiteness, verbal fluency, or entry to schooling or on-line areas)
It might not mirror the experiences of neurodivergent individuals with greater assist wants, mental disabilities, or early diagnoses, whose developmental journeys are formed by totally different boundaries, types of exclusion, and cultural contexts. However all neurodivergent individuals have interaction in meaning-making and grapple with the complexity of their identification.
What Is an Identification Arc?
Identification arcs describe the levels individuals usually transfer by way of as they arrive to know, settle for, and combine a marginalized identification. Fashions like Cross’s Nigrescence Principle (Black identification), Cass’s mannequin of queer identification improvement, and Gill’s Incapacity Identification Mannequin all mirror an identical development: Folks usually start with internalized stigma or disconnection, expertise a turning level or reckoning, and regularly transfer towards deeper self-understanding, pleasure, and integration.
Neurodivergent identification arcs usually observe related patterns—however with distinctive options formed by masking, delayed analysis, and internalized ableism. Whereas this framing is being shared within the context of latest conversations within the Autistic neighborhood, it will possibly additionally apply to ADHDers, dyslexics, and different neurodivergent people navigating identification, stigma, and self-recognition.
Under is a simplified model of the arc. It’s not meant to be a inflexible path, however a compassionate lens, particularly useful in moments of neighborhood rupture or private reckoning.
1. Pre-Encounter: Masking and Disgrace
On this stage, the particular person could not know they’re neurodivergent, or could suspect however resist it. Dominant cultural narratives have taught them to pathologize their traits or see them as private failings. There’s usually a robust drive to “repair” themselves or to look neurotypical.
Emotional Tone: Disgrace, confusion, overcompensation, loneliness.
Dangers: Persistent masking, burnout, identification confusion, and perfectionism.
2. Encounter: Disruption and Recognition
One thing shifts: a analysis, a dialog, an article. Immediately, long-misunderstood traits start to make sense. This stage is usually marked by each reduction and destabilization.
Widespread Experiences: Consuming neurodivergent content material, rethinking previous experiences, in search of language or analysis.
Strengths: Elevated self-awareness, rising readability.
Dangers: Emotional overwhelm, idealizing new identification, rejecting prior coping mechanisms.
3. Immersion: Pleasure and Reclaiming
Many transfer from recognition into immersion. They might really feel a deep starvation to know their neurodivergent identification and a rising sense of pleasure. This generally is a time of therapeutic and community-building, however it will possibly additionally carry dangers.
Widespread Behaviors: Passionate advocacy, unmasking, rejecting neurotypical norms.
Strengths: Empowerment, neighborhood connection, liberation from disgrace.
Dangers:
Rigidity: Problem holding nuance or disagreement throughout the neighborhood.
Superpower Rhetoric: Overemphasizing strengths whereas minimizing actual struggles.
Assist Wants Invisibility: Focusing solely on pleasure could obscure the wants of these with greater assist wants.
Othering Neurotypicals: In the course of the immersion part, it’s not unusual for neurodivergent individuals to answer previous hurt by framing neurotypicals primarily as oppressors. Whereas this can be a protecting response rooted in actual experiences of marginalization, it will possibly slip into dehumanization, reinforcing binaries, and making it tougher to construct cross-neurotype understanding and neurodiversity inclusion.
4. Integration: Rooted and Relational Identification
Over time, the urgency to show or carry out settles. Neurodivergence stays central however turns into one half of a bigger, grounded self-concept. There’s more room for contradiction, nuance, and intersectionality.
Widespread Traits: Authenticity, boundary work, relational progress, advocacy rooted in programs pondering.
Strengths: Resilience, flexibility, sustained dedication to justice with out burning out.
Dangers: Ongoing publicity to systemic hurt, grief over societal boundaries, or neighborhood fatigue.
Why Does This Matter Proper Now?
Understanding these arcs helps make sense of how totally different individuals reply to the identical occasion, particularly when public narratives about autism are dehumanizing or incomplete.
When Robert F. Kennedy Jr. made sweeping claims that Autistic individuals will “by no means pay taxes” or “go on a date,” many felt erased. However some responded by distancing themselves from these with greater assist wants, saying, “He wasn’t speaking about me.”
That response doesn’t essentially mirror cruelty. Usually, it displays the place somebody is of their identification arc.
Folks within the early levels of immersion should be in search of validation by aligning themselves with competence or productiveness. This could develop into particularly difficult when Autistic identification is used as a buffer in opposition to different unexamined privileges, equivalent to whiteness, class, or schooling. With out intentional reflection, this will result in hurt—particularly towards radicalized Autistic individuals or these requiring extra assist.
The Arc Isn’t Linear—And That’s OK
Folks don’t transfer by way of these levels in a straight line. We loop again, revisit grief, overlook what we as soon as knew, and develop in spirals. Identification improvement is messy and formed by social location, trauma historical past, entry to analysis, and the dominant narratives round us.
And once more, this framework is most resonant for these navigating late recognition of their neurodivergence in grownup life, particularly those that, for years, have been in a position (and pressured) to “move” resulting from proximity to whiteness, verbal skill, or societal privilege. It’s important to not confuse this for the one and solely neurodivergent identification arc, however as one sample, seen in a specific context.
Nonetheless, even with these limits, frameworks like this might help us perceive our personal reactions—and others’ responses—with extra compassion. Wherever we’re within the developmental arc, if we will meet ourselves with curiosity as a substitute of disgrace, we create area to maintain displaying up, to continue to learn and unlearning, and to maneuver towards collective care.
