For some people these diagnoses will be a very good fit with clear predictive outcomes. But many of us have a grab-bag of traits from several categories and still mostly get along in life, maybe with some assistance particular to one of these diagnosis but no more help overall than anyone else needs otherwise.
The diagnostic models suck. They are too broad here, too narrow there, misunderstood by professionals. I had a psychiatrist (mis)diagnose me as bipolar based on a 45 minute appointment when I was in some sort of crisis in my early 30s and that ended up haunting me years later when applying for a job with a security clearance. I didn’t even know about it at the time. This was one of the top rated doctors in a major metro area. What a sham.
The field is a mess. It has a terrible history of horrific abuse. Some autistic children still receive involuntary-to-them ECT. I think we should be supportive of research into these topics while also being critical of the very obvious problems with them.
Did your sporting team have success on the weekend? Wonderful, direct eye contact, smile, mirror. Ok, now, to business:
The brain is neuroplastic, especially when young, but I doubt you can just influence the growth of significantly more dopamine receptors out of pure willpower and habit-forming; especially given that ADHD disrupts those two facilities.
This is in part why dopaminergic drugs such as Adderall work so well, and why dopamine/reward-center disruption due to childhood trauma can have such a negative impact on one's ADHD symptoms.
Again, I don't know how much this applies back to autism, but it has definitely been a bane of my existence constantly explaining to people why I can't just meditate, habit-form or diet or exercise away my symptoms.
These things help, as does directed research and experimentation with what does and doesn't work for me, and because of my ADHD these things are integral to my ability to function as an adult in this insanely complex and stressful world. And it's definitely made a difference in how I manage my symptoms, especially when I look at how my siblings don't manage theirs and lack basic coping mechanisms.
But I frequently run into people who arrogantly assume I've never even heard of meditation, or that I have a bad diet, etc. and offer them up as panaceas. These people often get defensive and more arrogant whenever I try to explain to them that ADHD is not just some "mental block" or collection of bad habits that can be "fixed".
So yea... I also think we need to do way more clinical studies about the effects of teaching coping mechanisms at a young age, but I don't think autism is something that you can grow out of, there are likely specific underlying genetic and neurological factors that affect how much a specific individual can control or cope with their symptoms.
Society is moving in the right direction at least. At one point, the bell curve had 3 sections: normal, genius, retarded. Now we have more gradients and some of them trigger help or maybe longer exam times.
This causes over-diagnosis and resentment. Coping mechanisms grow over time. It’s definitely better if you can appear neurotypical.