About
Autistic Women is a specialist autism and ADHD assessment service that helps women finally understand who they actually are and feel good about themselves.
How did Autistic Women come about?
Kind of by accident! When launching our sister service Autistic Girls in October 2023, many women asked if we could assess them too because they couldn't find a service that understood autistic women.
So we did, and our first few assessments happened to be with women before we even started assessing girls! We have grown both services side by side.
And the backstory is this...
Our founder and Clinical Lead, Dr Becky Quicke, has been assessing children and adults in the NHS and in her own private practice since she qualified as a Clinical Psychologist in 2005.
Fast forward a number of years, and in 2023, Becky went through an autism and ADHD diagnostic assessment with a family member. She described her experience as receiving the 'Ryanair' of autism/ADHD services. It was basic and required more legroom! (ie. time and space to explore, understand and make sense of the differences).
She came to realise that more detailed and meaningful assessment services were needed, especially for girls and women who 'mask' their differences and keep them inside.
Inclusion of a careful assessment of a woman's internal experience gives a more accurate diagnosis and provides a more meaningful process.
Once the idea of developing an autism and ADHD assessment service for women alongside Autistic Girls began to grow, Becky carefully selected a group of experienced colleagues who shared the same vision and passion as her.
With its' brilliant multi-disciplinary team, Autistic Women opened it's doors in October 2023.
Assessing women who are uncovering their neurodivergence later in life requires a gentle yet thorough and detailed approach. As women, we have often doubted ourselves for years, so we want to know due diligence has been done within the assessment. However, we are often raw and entering a phase of grief of what we haven't had and confusion about who we are, so we need gentle holding and complete acceptance throughout.
Some people call this a 'neuro affirmative' services, I call it a bunch of really decent human beings being bloody good at their job.
We're proud of the service we provide women and look to help more and more neurodivergent women understand their differences and feel good about who they are.
Many services don’t understand how autism and ADHD presents in women and how to assess ‘under the mask’ that they hide beneath due to the stigma and shame of showing their differences.
'Autistic Women' has specialist knowledge, experience and skills in assessing neurodivergent women. It's our passion and purpose!
Many services stick rigidly (ironically!) to traditional/medical models of ‘deficit’ based assessments, which are shaming and discriminatory and often not suited to women. This can result in missing a diagnosis or misdiagnosing their differences as mental health issues.
'Autistic Women' practices flexible adherence to the DSM-5 diagnostic criteria and within respected assessments such as the ADOS-2 (Autism Diagnostic Observation Scale-second edition) but considers the whole constellation of assessment information. We translate the out dated 'deficits/disorder' language into 'differences/preferences'.
Many services deliver quick ‘in and out’ assessments for women that might provide a diagnosis but don't provide a meaningful process to help make sense of their neurodivergence in the context of their unique lives.
'Autistic Women' assessments are thorough and detailed and not just diagnostic. They’re an in-depth process through which a woman comes to understand themselves more fully so they can feel good about who they are.
Many assessment services share the diagnosis (or that they're not diagnosing) and leave it at that.
'Autistic Women' assessments include a feedback session, where you will be supported by your clinician to make sense of the details of assessment, including the diagnosis if given. If a diagnosis is not made, we will also discuss why and what that means. We have partnered with carefully selected post assessment support services who can help you if you want ongoing support.