Did you notice any changes in your early to mid twenties?

Post Reply New Topic

The brain stops developing around this time.

I have the same traits that I've always had but I feel much less flexible now, my ability to swing into NT mode when necessary is a bit compromised and I definitely do make more social blunders, now. This is something that didn't happen often before, I just had more control.

Do our brains become more cemented in an autistic way of thinking after development stops?

Studies have shown the brain never actually stops developing. I think it's just that the demands on adults are different from the demands on kids and teenagers. I went from an extremely high-functioning high schooler to an extremely low-functioning college student. This will not last, I am coming up with strategies to be high-functioning as an adult but they are not the same ones that work for most neurotypicals. Have to make up my own "program."

Yeah things now seem even more hopeless then they did when I was a child/teen.

I noticed I was not as awkward around people as I was in my teens.

I became even more clueless, because others in my age group became even more clueful.

^^This^^

Actually my 20s is when I started to become aware that I wasn't quite "getting it" like my peers. Before that I was oblivious - the differences were definitely there, but I wasn't as aware of them because I didn't really care that much. It was only when I started dating my (now) husband, had to hold down a job, pay the rent and became exposed to many new situations that the obliviousness left me and things became difficult.

Sometime a few years ago, I was accused of aging backwards. Yep, I'm getting worse, for whatever it's worth. It started happening slowly from puberty though. But now... oof.

Oh, I believe the autistic brain does most certainly stop developing in specific areas, at somewhere between the ages of 17 to 25 (roughly). That's why its called a 'Developmental Disorder' - while our social skills develop slowly, sometimes not completely, we don't develop in 'grownup stuff' at all beyond that point, thus the common problems with Executive Function issues. Intellectual development doesn't seem to be affected at all, and I would agree that barring some other damage or disease, the brain's capacity for intelligence and data storage does remain fairly plastic and flexible throughout one's life.

But talk to any Autistic person who has lived with it through middle age and I believe virtually every one of them will tell you that they feel that their brains' abilities in specific areas of coping with life did in fact quit maturing just after (or during) the transition out of adolescence. While all my peers grew up into (relatively) mature, responsible adults, I remain to this day a Big Kid - book smart, but unable to wrap my head around how most 'grownup stuff' (financial planning, mortgages, insurance contracts, funeral arrangements) even works. All that stuff is scary and overwhelming.

Your comment hits home big time, Willard.

Ditto...

Thats the exact same thing that happen to me when I first entered college. The demands are so greater, while I think all young adults have some trouble during the rough transition but for me, I ended up in the psych ward. But it didnt last, only because I put in more work then I ever had to in my entire life to survive college. I also went away for college. Everything, school work, social life, dealing with profs, living in dorms. It wasnt easy but when your determined enough to survive and not come home, you just do it.



Well I aint middle age and Im still a young adult. I can tell you quite the opposite, my brain started maturing rapidly after adolescence. Because I couldnt pass anymore. When a shy kid that follows the rules, people think your fine. Once you arrive into young adulthood, you cant get away with nothing anymore. Thats when you gotta pull it together to survive. Right at 17 is when I started growing up. Before 17, my brain had developed very little socially/emotionally because I was mute and adults consistently allowed me to slip through the cracks. At 17, I had the maturity of a 7,8 year old. Now Im 22, I probably have the social/emotional maturity of a 16 year old. So within the last 4-5 years I've been pushing in massive development and Im proud of myself. So I dont agree with the theory proposed in this thread at all. If you sit around on your computer all day isolated and dont do anything else, you wont develop.

It was the worst time of my life. It's a period when people around you look for evidence that you are making the transition to full adulthood successfully, and I was failing to do so. AND feeling guilty about it. Later on, people were willing to grant me adult status automatically, as long as I didn't make too many mistakes, and I also stopped feeling guilty about being myself. So I could squeak through in ways I absolutely could not in my 20's.

I was always awkward, but I feel that when I was 15, 16, 17, I was much more sociable despite the awkwardness. I had quite a few friends in high school which was a change from the rest of my life.

I feel this may depend more on what you're doing... I noticed this when I left college and started working in computers. But once I changed careers to education, I found myself developing more personally and socially than ever before. Noting that the age range Williard and the OP both gave is around the time people typically start their careers, I wonder if this might not be a developmental issue at all - just a result of people with ASDs choosing careers in which they are too isolated and too singularly focused.

No.

That's exactly what I'm going through now. I'm in my 20's and it's becoming painfully obvious that other people my age are clued in to something that I'm just not getting. Never noticed it much before but these past couple of years it's like my "strangeness" sticks out like a sore thumb!