Can you diagnose ADHD or autism?

No. Diagnosis of ADHD and autism in the UK is carried out by psychiatrists or specialist clinical psychologists, not psychotherapists. If you're seeking a diagnosis, I'd encourage you to speak to your GP about a referral, or to look into private assessment. What I can offer is a space to explore the emotional and relational impact of neurodivergence — whether you have a formal diagnosis, are awaiting one, or are simply trying to make sense of your experience. The two processes — assessment and therapy — are separate, and many people find it helpful to pursue both.

I think I might be neurodivergent but I'm not sure. Can I still come to therapy?

Yes. You don't need a diagnosis to begin therapy. Many people arrive with a growing suspicion that their mind works differently from those around them, but without formal confirmation. Therapy can be a place to explore this — not to reach a clinical conclusion, but to understand your experience more fully and to examine how it has shaped your life, your relationships, and your sense of yourself. If, through our work together, it seems that a formal assessment might be helpful for you, I can support you during that process.

How is psychodynamic therapy different from CBT for ADHD or autism?

CBT typically focuses on identifying and changing unhelpful thought patterns and behaviours. It can be effective for managing specific symptoms and developing practical coping strategies. Psychodynamic therapy works differently. Rather than targeting symptoms directly, it explores the emotional roots of your difficulties — the shame, the sense of not belonging, the ways you've learned to hide parts of yourself. It's interested in how your early experiences have shaped your inner world, and in how the therapeutic relationship itself can offer something new. For many neurodivergent people, this deeper work of understanding how they've been affected by a lifetime of masking and misattunement may be what makes lasting change possible. However, the choice of which therapy to pursue is ultimately a personal one. Neither is objectively superior to the other, and some people benefit from different types of therapy at different points in their life.

I’ve just received a diagnosis. How can therapy help?

A diagnosis can bring relief — a name for something you’ve long felt — but it can also bring a complicated mixture of anger, grief, and confusion. You may find yourself reinterpreting your entire history through this new lens: the struggles at school, the friendships that didn’t work, the sense of always being slightly out of step with the world. Therapy offers a space to process this at your own pace. It’s not about accepting a label or learning to manage symptoms. It’s about understanding what your experience has meant to you, now that your means of interpreting it has fundamentally changed.

Can therapy help with autistic burnout?

Yes. Autistic burnout is a distressingly common condition characterised by a deep, pervasive exhaustion that goes far beyond ordinary tiredness. It often results from years of masking, adapting, and pushing through in environments not designed for your neural wiring. Therapy can help you understand what’s driving the burnout, identify the patterns that sustain it, and begin to make choices that are more sustainable.

Do you adapt the way you work for neurodivergent clients?

Yes. I’m happy to adjust the therapeutic environment and approach to suit your needs. This might mean adapting lighting or sensory elements in the room, offering grounding objects, allowing movement during sessions, or giving you more processing time before responding. If sustained eye contact is uncomfortable, we can work with that. The standard therapeutic setup is a starting point, not a fixed rule. What matters is that you feel comfortable enough to do the work. We can discuss what would help during our initial consultation.

ADHD and Autism Therapy in Edinburgh | Psychotherapist

Living with a mind that works differently

You may have received a diagnosis of ADHD or autism recently, or you may have lived with one for years. You may suspect that you’re neurodivergent but have no formal diagnosis. You may have been told you’re “too sensitive,” “too intense,” or “too much” for so long that you’ve started to believe it.

Whatever your starting point, therapy isn’t here to fix you. Neurodivergence is not a disorder, and I don’t treat it as one. But the experience of being neurodivergent in a world built largely for neurotypical people can generate real psychological distress — anxiety, depression, shame, burnout, difficulties in relationships — and this is something that therapy can help with.

Many neurodivergent people have spent years adapting, masking, and working harder than those around them just to meet expectations that were never designed with them in mind in the first place. The cost of this effort is often invisible to others. It can show up as exhaustion, as a sense of fraudulence, or as a feeling of being fundamentally different from the people around you in ways that are difficult to articulate. In therapy, you don’t have to mask. Your experience is taken seriously, and you can begin to understand what all this adapting has cost you.

When therapy might help

People come to therapy at different points in their relationship with neurodivergence. Some arrive in the wake of a diagnosis — relieved to have a name for their experience, but unsure what it means for their former sense of who they are. Others have known about their neurodivergence for years but are struggling with a particular aspect of their lives — a relationship, a workplace, a lifestyle change — that has disrupted the routines that previously held things together.

It may be worth considering therapy if:

You’ve received a recent diagnosis and are trying to understand what it means for you — your history, your identity, your relationships
You suspect you may be neurodivergent and want a space to explore this, separate from a formal assessment process
You’re exhausted from masking — performing neurotypicality at work, in social situations, or in your closest relationships
You’re experiencing anxiety, depression, or burnout that may be connected to the demands of navigating a world not built for your mind
Your relationships are strained by differences in communication, sensory needs, or emotional expression that you struggle to explain to others
You feel a persistent sense of shame or inadequacy that you suspect may be connected to years of not fitting in
A life change — a new job, becoming a parent, a loss — has overwhelmed the coping strategies that previously worked for you

You don’t need a formal diagnosis to come to therapy. If what’s described here sounds familiar, that’s enough.

How therapy helps

I should be clear about what I offer and what I don’t. I’m a psychotherapist, not a psychiatrist or clinical psychologist. I can’t diagnose ADHD or autism, and I don’t offer medication, CBT, or structured behavioural programmes. What I do offer is the chance to explore the emotional and psychological dimensions of your experience, at your own pace and in your own way. This may include the question of whether to seek a formal diagnosis, or medication for your neurodivergence. It may be about how to cope with the consequences of this decision, or it may be entirely unrelated to this aspect of neurodivergent experience. All of this is okay.

I draw on psychodynamic and person-centred approaches in my work. The psychodynamic tradition helps us look at how your early experiences — in your family, at school, in your first friendships — have shaped the way you see yourself now. For many neurodivergent people, these early experiences include a great deal of misunderstanding, failed attunement, and subtle or overt messages that something about you was wrong. These messages don’t disappear with a diagnosis. They lodge in the way you relate to yourself and to others, and therapy can help bring them into view.

The person-centred dimension of my therapeutic work means that I won’t impose a framework on your experience. I’m not here to tell you what your neurodivergence means or how you should manage it. Whether consciously or not, you will know far more about your neurodivergence and its specific expression in your life than me. I’m here to listen — carefully and without assumptions — and to help you develop your own understanding of who you are. This includes the parts of your neurodivergence that you value and which strengthen you, alongside the parts that cause you difficulty.

Neurodivergent people are often very well practised at reading what other people want from them and delivering it. Therapy needs to be somewhere this pattern can be noticed and, gradually, set aside. I’m not looking for the “right” answers. I’m interested in what’s true for you.

What a course of therapy might look like

The early sessions are often about establishing trust and finding a way of working together that suits you. Some people talk freely from the start; others need time and silence. Both are fine. If the standard therapeutic setup doesn’t work for you — if sustained eye contact is uncomfortable, if you think better while moving or holding something, if you need a moment to process before responding — we can talk about this and adapt. I am happy to make simple adjustments to the therapy room to accommodate you. Ultimately, the frame of therapy should work for you, not the other way around.

As therapy develops, we may begin to explore some of the deeper patterns in your life. How masking has affected your sense of identity. How years of being told to try harder may have shaped your relationship with yourself. How the gap between your inner experience and how others perceive you has affected your capacity for intimacy and trust. This work is not about assigning blame. It’s about understanding how you got here — and gaining enough clarity to have more choice about where you go next.

For people who have received a late diagnosis, therapy can also be somewhere to grieve. A diagnosis can bring relief, but it can also bring anger or sadness — for the years spent struggling without understanding why, for the support that wasn’t available, for the version of your life that might have been different. These feelings deserve time, and they don’t need to be resolved quickly.

There is no set number of sessions. Some people come for a focused period; others find that having a weekly hour that is consistent and reliable matters a great deal in a life that can often feel unpredictable. We’ll review together as we go to ensure that you’re getting what you want from our sessions.

What you might bring

People seek therapy in connection with ADHD and autism for many different reasons. You might recognise yourself in some of the following:

Autistic burnout — a deep, pervasive exhaustion that goes beyond ordinary tiredness
Masking fatigue — the toll of performing neurotypicality day after day
Anxiety, including social anxiety and the hypervigilance that comes from years of trying to read situations that don’t come naturally
Depression or a persistent sense of not belonging
Shame or low self-worth connected to early experiences of being misunderstood or excluded
Relationship difficulties — including patterns of miscommunication, withdrawal, or conflict that you can’t seem to change
Sensory overwhelm and its emotional consequences
A recent or re-evaluated diagnosis, and the questions about identity that follow
Executive function difficulties and the frustration, guilt, or shame that often accompanies them

You don’t need to arrive with a clear sense of what’s wrong. You just need to feel that something deserves attention.

What to expect

We meet weekly for 50 minutes, in person in Edinburgh’s New Town or online. I work from a consulting room at 22 Drumsheugh Gardens, a few minutes’ walk from Princes Street and the West End. If you have a preference for online or in-person work — whether for sensory, practical, or any other reasons — we can discuss this.

I aim to be transparent about how I work, and I’m open to questions about the therapeutic process at any point. Therapy can feel opaque, especially if you’re someone who likes to understand systems before entering them. Ask anything you need to and I’ll do my best to answer.

I offer a free 20-minute online consultation so we can talk about what’s brought you here and whether I’m the right therapist for you. There’s no obligation. If I’m not the right fit, I can offer you guidance to find someone who is.

“It is a joy to be hidden, and disaster not to be found.” D.W. Winnicott, Playing and Reality

Frequently asked questions

Can you diagnose ADHD or autism?

No. Diagnosis of ADHD and autism in the UK is carried out by psychiatrists or specialist clinical psychologists, not psychotherapists. If you’re seeking a diagnosis, I’d encourage you to speak to your GP about a referral, or to look into private assessment. What I can offer is a space to explore the emotional and relational impact of neurodivergence — whether you have a formal diagnosis, are awaiting one, or are simply trying to make sense of your experience. The two processes — assessment and therapy — are separate, and many people find it helpful to pursue both.
I think I might be neurodivergent but I’m not sure. Can I still come to therapy?

Yes. You don’t need a diagnosis to begin therapy. Many people arrive with a growing suspicion that their mind works differently from those around them, but without formal confirmation. Therapy can be a place to explore this — not to reach a clinical conclusion, but to understand your experience more fully and to examine how it has shaped your life, your relationships, and your sense of yourself. If, through our work together, it seems that a formal assessment might be helpful for you, I can support you during that process.
How is psychodynamic therapy different from CBT for ADHD or autism?

CBT typically focuses on identifying and changing unhelpful thought patterns and behaviours. It can be effective for managing specific symptoms and developing practical coping strategies. Psychodynamic therapy works differently. Rather than targeting symptoms directly, it explores the emotional roots of your difficulties — the shame, the sense of not belonging, the ways you’ve learned to hide parts of yourself. It’s interested in how your early experiences have shaped your inner world, and in how the therapeutic relationship itself can offer something new. For many neurodivergent people, this deeper work of understanding how they’ve been affected by a lifetime of masking and misattunement may be what makes lasting change possible. However, the choice of which therapy to pursue is ultimately a personal one. Neither is objectively superior to the other, and some people benefit from different types of therapy at different points in their life. If you have further questions on this point, you can look at the how I work page, or we can discuss your questions during your initial call, to see if CBT or psychotherapy is a better fit for you right now.
I’ve just received a diagnosis. How can therapy help?

A diagnosis can bring relief — a name for something you’ve long felt — but it can also bring a complicated mixture of anger, grief, and confusion. You may find yourself reinterpreting your entire history through this new lens: the struggles at school, the friendships that didn’t work, the sense of always being slightly out of step with the world. Therapy offers a space to process this at your own pace. It’s not about accepting a label or learning to manage symptoms. It’s about understanding what your experience has meant to you, now that your means of interpreting it has fundamentally changed.
Can therapy help with autistic burnout?

Yes. Autistic burnout is a distressingly common condition characterised by a deep, pervasive exhaustion that goes far beyond ordinary tiredness. It often results from years of masking, adapting, and pushing through in environments not designed for your neural wiring. Therapy can help you understand what’s driving the burnout, identify the patterns that sustain it, and begin to make choices that are more sustainable.
Will you try to change how my brain works?

No. I don’t view neurodivergence as something that needs to be fixed, and my work is not aimed at making you more neurotypical. What therapy can address is the psychological distress that often accompanies the experience of being neurodivergent in a world not built for you — the anxiety, the shame, the exhaustion, the relational difficulties. The goal is not to change how your brain works, but to help you live more comfortably as the person you are.
Do you adapt the way you work for neurodivergent clients?

Yes. I’m happy to adjust the therapeutic environment and approach to suit your needs. This might mean adapting lighting or sensory elements in the room, offering grounding objects, allowing movement during sessions, or giving you more processing time before responding. If sustained eye contact is uncomfortable, we can work with that. The standard therapeutic setup is a starting point, not a fixed rule. What matters is that you feel comfortable enough to do the work. We can discuss what would help during our initial consultation.

About this page

Written by Tom Wells, MBACP, COSCA. Last reviewed April 2026.

Trained at the University of Edinburgh (PGDip Counselling and Psychotherapy). Registered with the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (profile on the BACP register) and with Counselling and Psychotherapy in Scotland (COSCA).

Scope of practice: adults aged 18 and over; individual therapy only. I do not offer couples therapy, EMDR, formal diagnosis, or medication; where any of these would serve you better, I am glad to point you towards them.