TL;DR: not fully diagnosed/assessed as autistic. Have been masking for so long that I've grown good at hiding who I am. I've been "diagnosed" by a psychologist -- but the "official" one costs thousands of dollars and may not be worth it. What if I get assessed and they tell me I'm not autistic at all?

Sorry, this is just a vent/advice post -- I don't mean it to be a depressing rant! But anyway: I'm autistic, or so I believe. I have known about my ADHD for a long time, since high school (I'm 26 and finishing up university now). However, I've only known about my autism for a couple of years. Looking back on it, I showed many traits that should've led to evaluation when I was younger: compulsive and repetitive behaviours (to this day I do everything in threes), misunderstanding of many social "rules," getting way too into special interests (with excellent memory for these special interests), big problems with attachment security, sensory sensitivity (I couldn't wear anything remotely itchy and I hated noises), unable to tell what other kids and adults were thinking. For example, I would always ask my mum "happy, sad, or angry?" when I was 6-8 years old (around then) because I couldn't tell what she wanted and that was just... easier. But I learned to mask so well that all these traits eventually faded into the background. I became "sociable" and started smiling more (mostly because people told me).

Now, I'm old enough to connect with other autistic and neurodiverse people. In the past couple of years, I've gone from "oh, I'm probably not autistic, just peculiar and weird" to "maybe I am autistic, but I need to keep this a secret forever" to "I am probably autistic -- it's a part of who I am, and I am proud of that." In fact, I went into studying what I study now (neuroscience) because of my interest in "how" people think and interact -- the rules that seemed hidden to me when I was younger. And studying neuroscience (as ableist as it can be) has helped me realize that I think I am autistic. I think the tipping point was when my audio sensitivity got so bad that I described the sound of pots and pans in the other room to my roommate as "needles being pushed into my head," and I had to begin wearing headphones constantly to "take the edge off" sound a few years ago.

But here's the thing. I've learned to mask really well. Not really in terms of academic success -- I didn't receive that many accommodations outside of those for ADHD so my grades have always been shit -- but I learned to mask socially pretty well. When conversations make me tired to the point of collapse, I know how to make an excuse to leave. When people make jokes that I don't really get, I know what to say. It's almost like running a script. This sort of makes me wonder if I was ever really autistic at all. I've discussed it with a psychologist and they've said that I definitely "show behaviour that would put me on the autism spectrum," but I would need to get an official diagnosis to go any further than that. Not only does it cost over $2000 where I live, but what if they just come back and tell me... I'm not autistic?

I would love nothing more than to just stop masking and to lift the pressure off. It would be so amazing. But if they tell me I'm not actually autistic then I don't really know what to think anymore.

Any thoughts? Anyone gone through anything similar?