Confused and scared

[WhitewaterWoman]

Welcome Aspie Chris, I understand your position, although I did not know I had autism until much later.

I know that working my way through that maelstrom took years and years. But, I didn’t have the advantage of current understanding of autism or the internet or forums.

I hope you find some helpful perspectives here.

 

[AspieChris]

Welcome Aspie Chris, I understand your position, although I did not know I had autism until much later.

I know that working my way through that maelstrom took years and years. But, I didn’t have the advantage of current understanding of autism or the internet or forums.

I hope you find some helpful perspectives here.

Myself as well. Although I am discovering that there are those on the spectrum who struggle with understanding the whole picture, then focus on something insignificant, and reply in a manner that sort if undermines the larger conversation. It’s EXACTLY what I have done for decades. But as I tend to focus on facts that really don’t matter, I am having a bit of difficulties focusing my attention away from posts that came from those who also make the same misdirected comments and conclusions. So far the responses I have received in this post have been awesome, and I am very grateful. But it’s hard to ignore bad information from good-hearted and well-meaning folks.

I’m not sure this site is the best place for myself to look for advice.

 

[AspieChris]

I’m learning a lot in the last few weeks. I found a YouTube channel from a woman who calls herself “The Articulate Autistic”. 30+ short videos that have answered dozens of questions going back to my childhood regarding the reasons I made mistakes around people. Missing social ques such as flirting. Or getting into a big fight with a girlfriend because I appeared to be flirting with someone else (for example)…. There’s a dozen more. But every encounter left me confused, terrified, exhausted, etc. But what is really eye-opening for me has been that each one of those people who misunderstood my intentions was usually going to abuse me based on their misunderstanding of my intent. My mother punished me in both physical and psychological ways. My ‘best friend’, girlfriends, co-workers. It always ended with them taking advantage of me shutting down to pounce and hurt me, if only because it made them feel strong to win a fight that I didn’t even know was happening.

My wife was the first person who seemed to know I was different, but also recognized that I was ‘good’. I’m sure it’s the reason that I eventually disconnected from absolutely every person in my previous life except for her. We had some heavy arguments over things I said or did (or didn’t say or do). I never felt like she took pleasure in winning a fight. Even before I discovered I was on the spectrum, I had disowned my parents, siblings, and basically my whole family. At least I had the brains to see that these people were happy to hurt me if it made them feel more powerful. I’ll never understand why any person would knowingly cause pain to anyone else and be fine with that. And how can someone say that I’m a great guy…. and then call me a liar when I’m clearly not lying.

There’s a lit of horrible people in the world and they seem to have me in their sights all day, every day.

 

[Nitro]