You are your own real age

 I'm seeing the ableist, oppressive concept of "mental age" or "developmental stage," that has long been (oppressively, baselessly) applied to developmentally disabled people, begin to be more frequently applied to psychiatrically disabled people. Apparently, according to this idea, people who were psychiatrically disabled as children never had a "real childhood," and therefore failed to grow up to be "real adults."

Please don't buy into this.

Humans, neurotypical and otherwise, experience a varied range of childhood circumstances. Some children grow up with a loving and supportive family, a fulfilling social life, a strong sense of identity, material security, and a well-rounded education. Some children do not. Their childhoods are no less "real." Neither are the adulthoods that follow them.

If you are neurodivergent, you will always be infantilized. Your experiences, your learning, your identity, will always be seen as lesser than that of a neurotypical person. That's part of pervasive neurobigotry. Whatever "standard" (upper-class, abled, neurotypical, white, American) childhood experiences you lack, this is not the cause of your alienation. The cause is pervasive neurobigotry.