meta_pixel
Tapesearch Logo
Log in
The Story Collider

Late Diagnosis: Stories about being diagnosed as an adult

The Story Collider

Story Collider, Inc.

Arts, Science, Society & Culture, Personal Journals, Performing Arts

4.4 • 824 Ratings

🗓️ 8 November 2019

⏱️ 28 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

This week we present two stories about people who discovered a diagnosis late in life.

Part 1: As a child, TC Waisman is told that she is on the autism spectrum, but her mother refuses to accept the diagnosis.

Part 2: Growing up, Craig Fay develops strategies to hide how terrible he is at math.


Since 1998, TC has worked with leaders in large organizations to enhance their personal leadership capacity and make transformational changes to their leadership practice. Coaching and training leaders and public speaking about adaptive leadership for over 20 years, TC has learned to support her clients’ development using organizational best practices and evidence-based research.

TC is an ICF certified coach, holds a Masters degree in Leadership & Training, and is currently undertaking her doctoral degree in leadership in a post-secondary context. Inspired by her late autism diagnosis at 48 years old, her research focuses on how higher education leaders, faculty, and staff can enhance services and outcomes for autistic students in higher learning.

Since beginning her research two years ago, TC has co-founded a not-for-profit society for neurodiverse individuals, spoken on autism related topics, published an academic literature review on 'autism and the implications for higher learning', and was recently appointed as an editorial board member of the new scientific journal Autism in Adulthood. TC is now a doctoral candidate and is in the midst of her research.

TC is of Indigenous Fijian and Nepalese origin and moved to Vancouver in 1976 where she lives with Dean her partner of 30 years. TC is a proud mother to her fiercely funny 23 year old daughter Sunshine and is the author of the book 75 Traits of Great Leaders. TC is on target to complete her doctoral degree in 2020.


Craig Fay is a Toronto based engineer turned stand up comedian with a “keen insight that allows him to take subjects familiar to everyone and turn them into something new and laughable” (Exclaim). He has appeared on CBC’s Laugh Out Loud, performed at the world famous Just For Laughs Festival in Montreal and is co-host of "The Villain Was Right" podcast, which recently won a Canadian Podcasting Award for Outstanding Debut For a Series. Craig’s debut comedy album “Helicopter Rich” was praised as “observational and self-reflective…worth playing multiple times over” (Exclaim) and is available now on iTunes, Google Play, Amazon and Spotify. You can follow Craig on Twitter For (@CraigFayComedy), like him on Facebook (/CraigFayComedy), or sign up for his email newsletter at CraigFay.com. Or just Google him. You’ll probably just Google him.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

A science story, huh?

0:04.0

Is NYU scientist the...

0:06.0

I felt...

0:07.0

I felt right.

0:08.0

And I just thought, well...

0:10.0

It was that golden moment.

0:12.0

Because science was on my side.

0:15.0

...theid... Hey everybody, welcome to the Story Collider, where we bring you true personal stories about science.

0:30.5

I am your host, Erin Barker.

0:32.0

And I'm your other host, Liz Neely.

0:34.6

This week, we are presenting stories from two storytellers who got unexpected and potentially

0:40.1

game-changing answers to something they'd been questioning for pretty much their whole lives.

0:46.2

And this really resonates with me because I was diagnosed with ADHD just about two years ago now when I was

0:52.9

33. And yeah, I remember you telling me about that.

0:55.8

I was so surprised.

0:57.5

Well, thank you.

0:59.3

I feel like when you have this type of thing for so long,

1:03.7

you sort of develop different strategies and tricks,

1:06.6

maybe without even thinking about it to sort of compensate.

1:09.7

So I had no idea because I always thought ADHD, you know, meant hyperactive kids or impulsive kids.

1:18.0

But one day I read this article, ADHD is different for women in the Atlantic by Maria Yagoda.

1:24.9

And I thought, wow, this is about me.

...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Story Collider, Inc., and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Story Collider, Inc. and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.

Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.