Armchair diagnosis

There are so many things I want to talk about I don’t even know where to start. I planned this article three weeks ago, but my life is kind of busy right now (too busy for an autistic person, but this is not what I want to talk about today). Since then, things have evolved and changed in my mind. 

It all started with me seeing a podcast that talked about a lot of things, armchair diagnosing celebrities as autistic being one of them. I want to talk about this subject today. 

For those of you who don’t know, armchair diagnosis is a term that refers to making assumptions about other people’s mental illness without having the credentials to do so (or without actually treating the person). So, it is easy to understand why there is an entire debate on whether it’s right or wrong to do it. And obviously, in most cases, it is wrong.

Is it ever right? 

It depends on the reason behind the assumption. For example, telling a friend they meet the criteria for a certain mental illness or disorder might be out of concern and only to advise them to seek a medical opinion. It’s no different than saying, “Hey, one of your eyes looks a bit funny and red, has a doctor seen you?”

So how about armchair diagnosing celebrities? We cannot claim to be doing that out of concern because just because I say a certain star might be autistic it will never give them the help they will need if my assumption is true. Yet, I’m sure that most of us have found ourselves at one point or another in our lives doing something similar. Why?

Obviously, I can’t answer for others, I can only answer for myself. So, for me, it’s the lack of representation. If there were actually autistic celebrities outhere, I wouldn’t have to speculate about other celebrities being autistic. I want to find myself in someone, so each time I notice I have things in common with a famous person or another, I wonder if they are autistic. I especially do this with musicians when I find myself in their lyrics. Especially if their lyrics resonate highly with my autistic experience. I like to think that somebody out there understands me, feels the same as me, and has translated that feeling into art. 

In contrast, I care less about actors because actors have the combined personalities of all the characters they bring to life. However, it would be nice to see more autistic characters beyond the few white boy stereotypes that are now available. Women and people of color, autism represented through various cultures, and with its multiple ways it can present itself. An array of human experiences that is just as varied as life itself, offering each of us a chance to find ourselves. 

Until we have that, I will speculate. I will speculate about musicians based on the music and lyrics they compose. I will speculate about famous people who show the public parts of their personalities that seem to match mine. And I will especially speculate about the characters I see on TV or read in books. 

If it’s about real people, I will obviously speculate in private. I don’t believe I have that much power that if I make a claim about someone it will instantly go viral (in other words, it doesn’t matter what I say), but I can’t forget that these are real people, and I’m no medical professional. It doesn’t matter what I think I know and understand, the truth will always be that I don’t know these people. I only know the parts of them they’re showing to the public, which might not even be real. 

When it’s about characters, I allow myself to talk more freely about my beliefs. After all, they are out there for us to dissect and talk about them. They do not get hurt by our words or have anything to lose because of them. They live only to enrich our experiences and help us learn. And we, by claiming a certain character is autistic (or ADHD, or any other neurotype), do nothing else than saying we saw parts of ourselves into that character. That should be the goal of every author. 

So maybe now you’re wondering which characters I believe are neurodivergent? Who are those characters I found myself in? The list is obviously quite long and I can’t remember them all from the top of my head, but I’ll talk to you about some.

Lily from Dash and Lily’s Book of Dares. She is highly resistant to change, obsessed with Christmas, prone to screaming fits that look a lot like meltdowns and finds fitting in with other people difficult. 

Jasmin Santos from From Lukov with Love. A determined figure skater who can’t help speaking her mind and is often mistaken for rude. She’s dyslexic, but I believe she acts a lot like an autistic person. We all know that the two neurodivergences often appear together.

Antonia (Nina) from The Beautiful Ones. She doesn’t understand the rules of behaving in society (this is an etiquette book). She prefers clothes that are comfortable over those that are beautiful. She’s candid and genuine. And mostly, she has meltdowns that in the book are described as an unhinged use of her magic.

Niamh from A Fragile Enchantment. She’s not autistic but ADHD. And I believe the sole reason the author doesn’t openly name her so in the book is because ADHD doesn’t actually exist as a diagnosis. But the author actually names her “scattered-brained”.

Now that I talked about needing representation and not finding enough of it, I want to also talk about those few openly autistic celebrities who inspire me.

I’ll start with actress Chloe Hayden who plays the magnificent character Qunni in the wonderful TV show Heartbreak High. I highly recommend watching it. And the way she brings Qunni to life has been highly commented on and acclaimed by many autistic people. Even more, after watching the show with my husband, I noticed that he got a lot better at handling those negative parts of my autism, like my meltdowns and such. This is all you need to know about how authentic this character is. 

I also like autistic authors and novelists. Helen Hoang, Talia Hibbert, and Chloe Liese, with Chloe being my favorite. They all write romance novels with disabled characters (autistic or other disabilities). Mazy Eddings is also a great neurodivergent author, but I don’t know about the flavor of her neurodivergence. Her characters are autistic or ADHD or suffer from anxiety.

 I love them all. I follow them all. 

But they are not enough in terms of representation.

How about you? Do you know more autistic celebrities to add to this list? Do you want to tell me about a certain character you believe to be autistic? Feel free to do so.