Why do people have a hard time woman can have autism too?

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Does anyone know why people have a hard time accepting that women can have autism? I live in the southern parts of the US and had many encounters with professionals who have a hard time accepting that women can have autism too. While I believe this problem is global I feel the US’s system is behind other western countries.

Is it personal? I feel really sad, one of my favorite neuropsychologist makes it clear on their website that boys are 5 times more likely to be diagnosed with ASD than women. And this is not the first time I’ve encountered this attitude from a professional.

Does it have to do with insurance? And the fear of losing resources. Insurance and politics?

Is it a ego thing where people need to think that those with disabilities are helpless? and it throws off their heroe identity. Is because they have to keep this “group” exclusive. I don’t know.

Does anyone know? I would love to hear from anyone and everyone (men too and people with opposing views). Im open to dialogue.

Good grief, no it is NOT personal.

Autism and Autism spectrum disorders were originally things that were believed to be something only boys could have. When some cases of Autism was found in some females they would refer to it as them having a male brain, which is why they believed they had it...because their brain was male.

Autism has still largely been considered an Male condition, but what is more recently being found/recognized is that females most often present differently than males do (and are often better at hiding it!). Because of this difference many girls and women have been completely missed. For this reason the numbers are inconclusive of just how much more likely a male or female is to be Autistic.

The belief that boys are definitely more likely is based on the old knowledge where the only females that would have a ASD were ones with the 'male brain'.

Just look at the numerous vlogs of women and girls who have all "types" of autism.

They have the "classic" type, the "Aspergian" type, and the "female presentation" type.

You may have been brainwashed by the people who insist that men and women only look different, despite mountains of other evidence. Ma Nature can't afford to experiment on women, because children need pretty much the same kind of care, whereas men are expendable. You have twice as many female ancestors as males because many of us never have children of our own, while others have had many wives.
One early theory of Autism is that it was caused environmentally, by "cold mothers." I had one of those, and it was female Autism, under major denial.

My mom and younger sister were/are autistic, so it's never surprised me much that women can have ASD. Their autism actually seemed pretty similar to the way it presents in males, but many studies suggest it manifests differently between the sexes. And I've read that ASDs are underdiagnosed in women, at least in the past, because doctors weren't familiar with the way the symptoms present in women. However autism is one of those disorders that legitimately occurs more frequently in males than females. ADHD occurs more frequently in males as well.
Depression on the other hand occurs more frequently in females. Doctors and professionals really need to avoid discounting individual cases because males get depressed and females get ASDs and ADHD too, and accurate diagnoses matter a lot. There's a good description of sex differences in ASDs from the National Institutes of Health here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4164392/

There are women with autism who present identically to men with autism.

Then there are women who are able to "mask" well enough, through (perhaps) their "social instincts" for they to be misdiagnosed with other disorders, or be ignored entirely.

The way I presented my autism when I was little was pretty much identical to a male my age at the time, so that led to me getting diagnosed at the age of 3. In addition, I didn't know how to mask around that age so that also led to my diagnosis.

I am much better at masking now, but that's because I am in high school and the social pressure is too great for me to want to tell most people I'm autistic. (They probably won't believe me anyways.)

Because autism was once seen as a male condition.

I was diagnosed at the age of 5 and a half.

I would have liked an early diagnosis too. Could probably have saved me a lot of trouble. Got mine at 60.

Yes it’s so true. I guess it can be off putting. Females autism Never!

I’m just generalizing but has anyone heard about it theorized that autism is only related to the link of the Y chromosome.

I don’t agree with this but I was wondering if anyone has heard about this?

Only in very old theories. I´m sure, they have been debunked - for good.

Autism was once seen as just a little boy's thing.

My stepdad thinks he 'was an autistic child'. I told him if he was an autistic child then he'd be an autistic adult now. But he thinks it's something that you grow out of...

Even though he knows I'm autistic?

Was he even diagnosed?

No, in his day (1950s, UK countryside) people weren't unless they were severely autistic. And he was the 'success' of their family, the grammar school boy. His family weren't exactly proud of him because he was a strange boy but they were proud of his academic success in life.

And like I say, he thinks it's a children's (and me but he thinks I'm a child even though I'm 30) thing.

I think perhaps he was more aspie than he is now but... so was I. That's, I don't know, passing or something as you get older?

Mum works with autistic kids and he keeps saying 'that was like me as a kid' whenever the symptoms come up. I'm pretty sure he's autistic. Just if he was then he is, only way he isn't is if he never was...

There's little point in getting a diagnosis when he's this close to retirement and past retirement age.