Invisible Asperger’s: Michelle Vines on Late-Life Diagnosis

Michelle Vines grew up knowing she was different from other people. She always assumed she was just a bit odd and eccentric but never in a way that suggested she wasn’t neurotypical. She lived in Australia where she excelled in math and science and became a chemical engineer in the oil and gas industry. After finding her work environment deeply unsatisfying and her personal relationships increasingly frustrating, she was forced to sort through why she was struggling. When the possibility of Asperger’s syndrome was raised, it was both jarring and illuminating.  

In 2008 she put her chemical engineering career on hold and moved to the U.S. where at 30 years old she was formally diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome at the University of Texas Health Science Center. The experience of living her entire life without fully understanding her own brain inspired her to write her memoir, Asperger’s on the Inside. Since being diagnosed, she has been a strong advocate and spokesperson for autism and Asperger’s, and hopes to help people on all ends of the neurological spectrum form a better understanding of what people with Asperger’s go through on a daily basis.