Autism

I also have religious trauma largely from being queer/trans in a religious family. My gender expression has generally been cisnormative so I don't have the same experience of someone who's more visibly gender nonconforming, but my internal gender experience I've come to learn is very much not cisnormative.

I was diagnosed with ASD and ADHD recently at age 29, but I had been self realizing the autism for years before, and before that I did a lot of work healing from what I understood to be CPTSD.

I can't diagnose a random internet stranger but if I could make money betting on this, I'd bet a lot that you are on the spectrum lol. And for many autists who are gender diverse, their autism and gender identity feel totally intertwined.

I would highly recommend reading Devon Price's book Unmasking Autism. It is very queer and trans inclusive.

I would also recommend reading Paul Walker's book on CPTSD. I've found it pretty helpful in a practical sense.

Before I read both those books, there was a book I found very helpful called I Know I'm in There Somewhere by Helene Brenner. While it's not about autism or PTSD, is cisheteronormative, and targeted toward women (and I wasn't even socialized as a woman), I still found it to be very powerful and it resonated a lot with me. I read it before I even really started self realizing ASD, and in retrospect a lot of the traumas it discusses from a lens of women in patriarchy also apply to autists in a NT world, or queers in a cisheteronormative world.

Does it really matter? You could be. But Autism is not something that can be cured, you're just a bit different and have different needs. Getting your needs met and expressing your unique personality is something anyone should do, regardless of being autistic or not.

You have certain traits that cause certain effects. For the way of handling these traits you can get inspiration from professionals or from people with similar traits. If those similar people are autistic, then you can likely be helped for the similar traits even if you aren't autistic, as long as you have shared experiences.

You can just look how you feel when you act like you're on the Autistic spectrum. In the end, those labels don't really mean anything. They're just a way for people to get to know certain people, to get help, to feel seen, among other things. As long as you don't portray any toxic behavior like using autism as a scapegoat to not grow as a person, or gatekeep people, or purposefully invoke pity or similar shit like that, you're completely fine.

You don't even have to tell anyone, you can just look at resources and participate in discussions for autistic people and see if it helps you. If it helps, that's the most important thing, and your label doesn't matter.

One could also argue that a lot of autistic traits are actually result of trauma from being autistic.

From your writing it seems you have a lot of insight and are very self aware. Use this as your strength. Not sure how you're faring in regards to alexithymia but this tends to be a blindspot for folks with trauma and autism spectrum condition. Matching your needs with your internal states (vis a vis your emotions) will go a long way to manage your life so it's worth living. Don't get hung up on labels too much but they are useful as a shortcut to learn from others and their similar experiences.