Actually Autistic at Forty

This publication is included in the Autistic Autism Scholarship Project. one author of this publication is identified as autistic in the project.

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Twinley, R. (2022). Actually Autistic at Forty. Auto/Biography Review, 3(1), 62-76. https://doi.org/10.56740/abrev.v3i1.3

Publication date: 29 Aug 2022 Added to AutiHub: 26 Sep 2026 Type: Article Article language: English
Publisher source (DOI) Full text OpenAlex source

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Authors

Publication authors
1
Publication authors identified as autistic
1 / 1 (100.0%)
  1. Rebecca Twinley *

Abstract

In October 2019, two months after my 40th birthday, I received a formal diagnosis that I was autistic. I joined all those other thousands of late-diagnosed women in the UK, previously undiagnosed and overlooked. I had spent my years being mislabelled, misunderstood, or misinterpreted. I dealt with feelings I did not understand and sensory experiences I could not bear to process. I felt a need to cope with the ‘normal’ aspects of everyday life. I never knew why I experienced these troubles and troubling feelings for all those years. The discourse surrounding autism is referred to as the cost of camouflaging. In this article, I critically discuss predominant discourses on autism and gender as I reflect on my auto/biographical troubles from my newly confirmed, acquired identity and perspective as an autistic, now 40-something-year-old woman.

Bibliography cited by this reference

Cited references are imported from external metadata sources when they are available. The list may be partial.

Cited bibliography overview

These indicators describe the bibliography cited by this publication. An author name is counted each time it appears in one cited reference, so the same person can be counted more than once. Names not yet linked to an author already present in AutiHub are treated as unknown, not as non-autistic. Last computed: 2 Oct 2026 01:40.

Cited references
23
With a DOI
23
Without a DOI, from raw bibliography text
0
5 / 23 (21.7%) cited references include at least one author identified as autistic.
References with data to complete
1 / 23 (4.3%)
References with detected author names
22 / 23 (95.7%)
Without detected author names
1
Without a structured title
0
Without a stable identifier
0
References with raw author names still to review
0
References with external metadata lookup issues
0
These indicators apply to cited references displayed on this page, after technical duplicates have been merged. A reference without a DOI can still support author statistics when a title and author names are available.
Author names detected in the cited bibliography
89
From DOI or external metadata
89
From validated raw bibliography text
0
Raw names already validated
0
Raw names still to review
0
51 / 89 (57.3%) names are linked to an author already present in AutiHub. 38 / 89 (42.7%) names are not yet linked.
Names linked to a person identified as autistic
5 / 89 (5.6%)
Calculated across all author names detected in the cited bibliography. Among names linked to an author already present in AutiHub: 5 / 51 (9.8%). Distinct people identified as autistic: 4 / 83 (4.8%).
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    OpenAlex
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    OpenAlex
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    OpenAlex
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    OpenAlex
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    Type: Article DOI: 10.1186/s13229-016-0073-0 OpenAlex: https://openalex.org/W2285089828
    OpenAlex
  9. Judith K. Voress (2008). Focus on Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities . Encyclopedia of Special Education, 905-905. Wiley.
    Type: Other DOI: 10.1002/9780470373699.speced0842 OpenAlex: https://openalex.org/W2362300328
    OpenAlex
  10. John E. Dowling , George Wald (2009). Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America . Nutrition Reviews, 39(3), 135-138. Oxford University Press (OUP).
    Type: Article DOI: 10.1111/j.1753-4887.1981.tb06752.x OpenAlex: https://openalex.org/W2398350456
    OpenAlex
  12. Meng-Chuan Lai , Michael Lombardo , Amber Ruigrok , Bhismadev Chakrabarti , Bonnie Auyeung , Peter Szatmari et al. (2017). Quantifying and exploring camouflaging in men and women with autism . Autism, 21(6), 690-702. SAGE Publications.
    Type: Article DOI: 10.1177/1362361316671012 OpenAlex: https://openalex.org/W2543847144
    OpenAlex
  13. Nobuhiko Ikuta , Ryoichiro Iwanaga , Akiko Tokunaga , Hideyuki Nakane , Koji Tanaka , Goro Tanaka (2016). Effectiveness of Earmuffs and Noise-cancelling Headphones for Coping with Hyper-reactivity to Auditory Stimuli in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Preliminary Study . Hong Kong Journal of Occupational Therapy, 28(1), 24-32. SAGE Publications.
    Type: Article DOI: 10.1016/j.hkjot.2016.09.001 OpenAlex: https://openalex.org/W2563934627
    OpenAlex
  15. Laura Hull , K.V. Petrides , Carrie T. Allison , P. Smith , Simon Baron-Cohen , Meng-Chuan Lai et al. (2017). "Putting on my best normal": social camouflaging in adults with autism spectrum conditions . J. Autism Dev. Disord., 47(8), 2519. Springer Science and Business Media LLC.
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    OpenAlex
  16. Dori Zener (2019). Journey to diagnosis for women with autism . Advances in Autism, 5(1), 2-13. Emerald.
    Type: Article DOI: 10.1108/aia-10-2018-0041 OpenAlex: https://openalex.org/W2918185263
    OpenAlex
  17. Sneha Baxi Srivastava (2019). Language: A Powerful Tool in Promoting Healthy Behaviors . American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine, 13(4), 359-361. SAGE Publications.
    Type: Article DOI: 10.1177/1559827619839995 OpenAlex: https://openalex.org/W2936471917
    OpenAlex
  20. Samuel Tromans , Verity Chester , Eli Gemegah , Kristian Roberts , Zoe Morgan , Guiqing Lily Yao et al. (2021). Autism identification across ethnic groups: a narrative review . Advances in Autism, 7(3), 241-255. Emerald.
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    OpenAlex
  22. Gemma North (2023). Reconceptualising ‘reasonable adjustments’ for the successful employment of autistic women . Disability & Society, 38(6), 944-962. Informa UK Limited.
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  23. (2013). Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders . Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders. Springer Science and Business Media LLC.
    Type: Other DOI: 10.1007/10803.1573-3432 OpenAlex: https://openalex.org/W4232007456
    OpenAlex