Christine McGuinness is to explore the “devastation and heartbreak” she feels over her late diagnosis with autism for a new BBC documentary.
She will investigate how women and girls have long been overlooked by medical science when it comes to understanding autism.
The model and TV personality, who has three autistic children with husband Paddy McGuinness, recently made the discovery that she too suffers from the behavioural condition.
But her diagnosis did not come until she was in her 30s with three children of her own - and has made her wonder about the gender bias that goes on in terms of diagnosis and support.
Get all the biggest showbiz news straight to your inbox. Sign up for the free Mirror Showbiz newsletter.
The hour-long BBC documentary will unravel the untold story of how autism in women and girls has been ignored and misunderstood by science and society - often seen as something mostly affecting men.
In the film, called The Secret World of Autistic Women and Girls, she admits that her young life could have been very different if she’d been better understood during her schooldays.
“My diagnosis is a positive thing and a big relief,” she explains. "But it’s just the devastation I feel for myself as a child. I’m heartbroken for that Christine.”
Christine, 33, revealed she had autism in November. Writing on social media she declared: "I got my diagnosis a few months ago. I have felt different my whole life. Honestly, I am relieved to finally understand myself.”
She said there had been many signs throughout her life, which she now could make sense of.
”My issues with food, my social struggles, how hard I find it to make friends and stay focused, and my indecisiveness. The way I float through life reminds me of how my eldest daughter Penelope is.
"It all makes sense now. And as much as I’m not totally surprised, it’s still been emotional for me to accept.”
The National Autistic Society said that it's "quite common" for people to go through life like Christine, without an autism diagnosis, but feeling like they don’t quite fit in.
Chief executive Caroline Stevens said: "So many autistic people and families will see a lot of themselves in Christine McGuinness' powerful words, particularly women and girls."
Roughly 1% of the UK population, or an estimated 700,000 people, are diagnosed as autistic, which means your brain works in a different way to other people’s, and can impact how you interact with the world.
Christine only realised she had autism after her children were diagnosed. She explained afterwards: “Whilst they were doing all of their assessments, there was so much I just remember relating to. I was sitting in the room thinking, ‘Why is that an issue? Because I’m like that.’
"And ‘It doesn’t matter that they eat beige food, I eat beige food,’ and they used to talk about the socialising and I used to say, “Well, I never socialised, I didn’t have friends at school, I still don’t really have friends now’. And I remember thinking all of those things, but never saying it out loud for anybody.
“I couldn’t understand why the paediatricians were flagging all of these things up like it was a problem, because it was like they were just talking about me.”
She says as Leo and Penelope, eight, and six-year-old Felicity have got older she sees herself in them more and more. “It just made sense to me to go and explore it some more and then I got an official diagnosis last year.”
Christine’s film follows on from the one she made about her family last year, which showed how she and Paddy coped with their children’s additional needs in different ways.
While she threw herself into supporting the children, Top Gear host Paddy focused on his work and providing for his family.
The new documentary will air on BBC1 later this year.
Do you have a story to sell? Get in touch with us at webcelebs@trinitymirror.com or call us direct 0207 29 33033.
