If you were honest with yourselves, how many of you hate having this condition?

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I've had a personal experiment of not interacting with anyone for 10 years now. In hindsight I would say, keeping one foot in and one foot out of society is the ideal solution. Not everyone has that luxury though. Some are forced to interact full time, others cannot stand NT society at all.

. I'm slowly re-engaging, as I have enough data from a life in and a life out to be able to come up with a prediction of how my life will end up with each path I choose.

This sounds similar to my situation. Running off in to the rainforests gave me the space I needed to re-evaluate my situation, but it didn't give me all the tools I needed to understand properly. It's only when I found this forum a couple of years back that I found the keys I needed.

Now my life is the best it's been since back when I was young and pretty. I'm looking forward to going places and doing things again.

I never suffered social anxiety like a lot of other people describe. I have a lot of social problems but I was never afraid to go and talk to people and never had any hangups about it. I now wonder if it shares similar sources as people's fear of dogs. Some people are afraid of dogs and don't know how to act around dogs, which naturally affects the way dogs react to them. These are almost exclusively people that didn't grow up with a dog in the family home. Lack of exposure as a small child. I wonder if a lot of people's social anxiety has a similar cause.

 

[NB79]

I never suffered social anxiety like a lot of other people describe. I have a lot of social problems but I was never afraid to go and talk to people and never had any hangups about it. I now wonder if it shares similar sources as people's fear of dogs. Some people are afraid of dogs and don't know how to act around dogs, which naturally affects the way dogs react to them. These are almost exclusively people that didn't grow up with a dog in the family home. Lack of exposure as a small child. I wonder if a lot of people's social anxiety has a similar cause.

I believe there are people with different 'traits' etc, that really have it more difficult to interact, even when they tried and be brave etc, and is not because 'social enviromental' etc stuff.

 

[Boogs]

I know what you mean but wishing you weren't autistic is an impossible dream, seems to fit in with the toxic factor you described.

Absolutely, it's not a real thing but rather a construct of a simulation/prediction network tuned to seeking what we perceive as positive outcomes. And this longing to be something else than what you are is perfectly normal, but in our current environment we've not had the time to evolve our core functioning to weed out the less functional examples, and this is where the most toxic aspects tend to become apparent.

Unless keeping it in perspective means 'masking' better. . I understand such frustrations and personaly don't mind the venting about such things. Sometimes I enjoy reading others frustrations as I have the same.

I use the word in it's literal sense, firstly to imply there are multiple viewpoints to select from, and secondly that what I write refers purely to my own position and the data that particular relative position provides (I express this poorly and sound like I'll telling others they are wrong and I'm right, but I'm actually just writing 'the world according to Boogs'). If you were writing about my previous post(s) in reference to 'venting', I wasn't venting at all (or not knowingly and/or deliberately), but I know I express something that gives that strong impression. Any real anger and frustration in my writing is more likely toward myself more than anything else (though that may not show directly), other than with the general human condition which isn't really directed at any individual.

 

[thejuice]

Absolutely, it's not a real thing but rather a construct of a simulation/prediction network tuned to seeking what we perceive as positive outcomes

I guess that's why self help gurus tell you to imagine the outcomes you want and the person you want to be. If I'm not mistaken.

 

[Boogs]

I believe there are people with different 'traits' etc, that really have it more difficult to interact

Maybe non-verbal ASD's are in some cases experiencing an extreme level of this as part of the cause?
A major problem I have is the moment any sort of stress/anxiety and/or distraction (even internal distractions) my conscious mind sort of shuts down. Just blank, which invokes a bunch more stress and anxiety in that vicious feedback loop.

Even attempting to step back outside that area of effect (metaphorically speaking) and try a reboot, which is one of my ways of resetting (often consists of fishing out the original reason I'd started talking, then working through what point I must have been making based on the original context, and as I think of each step, it then triggers the knowledge that I have a memory of that (even if I can't fully recall that memories content), and move on until I don't remember saying it, and continue talking from that point.

As you may imagine, this is not easy to completely hide, even if just a second or two, that pause is enough for me to get paranoid others have picked up on it, which further ramps up the stress levels resulting in ... (blah blah blah).

This blanking may well be one of the primary factors that actively puts me off socialising. It's become so ingrained as I never had any knowledge of even what I was doing internally (the blanking etc; possibly due to alexithymia) I can't determine my state of mind much of the time, in a fashion that my consciousness can understand and rationalise and after 60 years of that, it takes more than just self-knowledge to undo all that bias so much of the time I either end up making some sort of faux pas, or spend an excruciating and exhausting period of time faking it and fervently praying for the engagement to gracefully conclude so I can escape without hurting feelings and/or creating a more negative impression of myself.

Another side to it is intolerance to or even just ignorance of topics of conversation most other people tend to rely on when involved in small talk. I can't find any motivation to want to talk just so that words are coming out of my mouth, in fact doing so feels very wrong but I can't describe that much better. I think it's probably because it's mostly phatic in nature, but I don't pick that up much, so I'm experiencing gaps in the data flow which I find triggering as it's hard to retain the previous stream while waiting for what comes next to give it meaning.

So to answer your comment: Yes. ()

(and I know full well many have it worse than I)

 

[Boogs]

I guess that's why self help gurus tell you to imagine the outcomes you want and the person you want to be. If I'm not mistaken.

You could well be right. A parallel to that for me is, for example, I go to get my hair cut, I have to ask the barber to judge the styling within a very limited description from me. I'm unable to form much self image at all, and nothing visual, only the vaguest of notions, so I literally can't 'see' myself in a particular hair style, or clothing, or pretty much anything like that.

I can imagine how powerful that can be for people who are more visually oriented in their internal cognition. This is a similar technique to advertising of various sorts, where many try to persuade you to see yourself as having product-x, or being helped with service-y, etc. It seems to be a possible mechanism of self motivation to enable indirect methods of self enrichment - to be able to hold an initially abstract target for long enough and consistently enough to be motivated to defer gratification?

 

[Misty Avich]

I think when spectrumers say they couldn't imagine at all what they'd be like if they weren't autistic, (if asked most do typically say "I don't know") it's because they probably are quite severe, or come from a family with more NDs than NTs, or lack imagination. But there are a few of us that can imagine what we'd be like if we weren't on the spectrum, but still in the same body, from the same family, etc.

I guess it's like a girl imagining what she'd be like if she had been a boy, and vice versa. Obviously it's not accurate but those of us with imaginations can take a guess and get an idea of what we'd be like.

If a girl grew up in a family full of boys, maybe two (gay) dads, many brothers, and not much contact with female family members, she might begin to wish she had been born a boy like the rest of her family she knows of, and might imagine what her life might have been like had she been a boy, being so she's been around males all her life (maybe homeschooled?) and so been observing nothing but males. It can have that effect.
So it's a bit like me with ASD/ADHD. I've always been the only one diagnosed with those two conditions in my family, and in my class at school, so really I grew up surrounded by NTs and so have had no choice but to observe NT behaviour and put myself in their shoes. In fact I understand NT behaviour more than I do autistic behaviour.

To use an even better analogy, a person who grew up in the jungle might identify more with animals than with other humans and might wish they were an animal and so feel uncomfortable in their own skin, and have been around animals enough to observe their behaviour and want to become one.

That's exactly my experience with AS.

I have one cousin who I feel has a lot of spectrum traits even from a child, but he was never diagnosed, and every time he posts photos of himself on Facebook it's always been with friends at bars, clubs, pubs, music gigs, stag dos, new years eve parties, etc etc. Is it possible for an Aspie to have such an active social life like that?
So whether he is on the spectrum or not, I still feel alone, because I got diagnosed so early and I've always been the stereotypical shut-in.

 

[thejuice]

I think when spectrumers say they couldn't imagine at all what they'd be like if they weren't autistic, (if asked most do typically say "I don't know") it's because they probably are quite severe, or come from a family with more NDs than NTs, or lack imagination. But there are a few of us that can imagine what we'd be like if we weren't on the spectrum, but still in the same body, from the same family, etc.

I guess it's like a girl imagining what she'd be like if she had been a boy, and vice versa. Obviously it's not accurate but those of us with imaginations can take a guess and get an idea of what we'd be like.

If a girl grew up in a family full of boys, maybe two (gay) dads, many brothers, and not much contact with female family members, she might begin to wish she had been born a boy like the rest of her family she knows of, and might imagine what her life might have been like had she been a boy, being so she's been around males all her life (maybe homeschooled?) and so been observing nothing but males. It can have that effect.
So it's a bit like me with ASD/ADHD. I've always been the only one diagnosed with those two conditions in my family, and in my class at school, so really I grew up surrounded by NTs and so have had no choice but to observe NT behaviour and put myself in their shoes. In fact I understand NT behaviour more than I do autistic behaviour.

To use an even better analogy, a person who grew up in the jungle might identify more with animals than with other humans and might wish they were an animal and so feel uncomfortable in their own skin, and have been around animals enough to observe their behaviour and want to become one.

That's exactly my experience with AS.

I have one cousin who I feel has a lot of spectrum traits even from a child, but he was never diagnosed, and every time he posts photos of himself on Facebook it's always been with friends at bars, clubs, pubs, music gigs, stag dos, new years eve parties, etc etc. Is it possible for an Aspie to have such an active social life like that?
So whether he is on the spectrum or not, I still feel alone, because I got diagnosed so early and I've always been the stereotypical shut-in.

You might have a better imagination, but is it just your imagination I wonder. How could we know for sure what it's like to be NT with a different neural wiring, responsible for how we think and feel. You might be closer to an NT than me though.

 

[Misty Avich]

You might have a better imagination, but is it just your imagination I wonder. How could we know for sure what it's like to be NT with a different neural wiring, responsible for how we think and feel. You might be closer to an NT than me though.

Well I'm similar to an NT enough to take an educated guess on what I'd be like if I was one of them, but on the spectrum enough to miss out on it and make me miserable.

 

[thejuice]

Makes sense

 

[Boogs]

I think when spectrumers say they couldn't imagine at all what they'd be like if they weren't autistic, (if asked most do typically say "I don't know") it's because they probably are quite severe, or

Or another possibility could be that they've simply never known anything else to be able to compare it to?

It's a weird thing to consider, in that if I was asked what it's like to be how I already am, never mind how I would imagine someone else may be, I doubt I could give much of an intelligible answer. Maybe just that I'm incapable of imagining what it's like to be me, so it's hard to make any sort of comparison with another.

 

[Misty Avich]

I compare myself and my life with others in my family, particularly my sister. I think Aspies with this ability to be so aware of others and compare them to ourselves are the most unhappy on the spectrum.

I mean, I'd rather be an NT with my problems than an Aspie with my problems. I say that because I am not one who thinks that NTs have no problems. Of course they do. Many, many problems. But I'd still rather be NT, as I don't think I'd be bullied at work right now if I were NT. Actually I probably would have been a mother by now if I were NT with the same maternal desires I have, as the only thing stopping me is my severe phobia of vomiting and my low pain tolerance. While many Aspie women seem to have children, personally I know my AS is the only thing stopping me, due to my overthinking and being afraid of everything.

 

[Boogs]

I think Aspies with this ability to be so aware of others and compare them to ourselves are the most unhappy on the spectrum.

You may well be spot on there!
And in addition, being that many aspies have difficulty interpreting others, some may have inaccurate views of what that person being compared is really like inside. Others like me find the very idea of intuitively feeling we understand someone else to be, well, odd really!

 

[Ken]

Do I hate being autistic? Actually that’s a very complicated subject. I didn’t know I was autistic until I was 67 years old. Prior to that, I was diagnosed as retarded. Well... no I didn’t like that either.

Being autistic, however, made me passionately obsessive about things I was interested in. Which was mostly science related, but more specifically electronics. I was obsessed with electronics and spent all my time studying and experimenting with electronics. I would typically ignore the class and focus on studying electronics. I was in trouble a lot for that. Not to mention very poor grades.

Throughout my school years, I was deeply jealous of a group of students that was members of a special math and science class. It was a very high esteem class that you had to be picked to be in. You could not enroll like all the other classes. My school counselor laughed when I asked to be in that class saying I was to dumb.

Still, at least I wanted to hang out with those students or at least talk to them on the school grounds. But, that was not to be. I was always scornfully rejected, as if I was a Quasimodo.

I decided to enter my schools science fair contest. The previous year, I helped another student with a rocket project. He won the science fair competition along with a cash award. So, perhaps if I entered and won, I would be accepted. I chose a project that I thought would be very impressive. I designed and built an oscillator and used it to measure the local gravity influenced by the orbit of the moon. I displayed my oscillator and frequency measurement equipment along with all the charts of data and how the results actually matched the known lunar orbit. My project did not even get a mention. The judges only gave it a passing glance and never asked a question. As I attempted to explain it, they looked at me like I was an idiot and walked on to the next project. So, that effort was a total failure. I guess if I knew I was autistic, I would have blamed it on that. I’m sure, however, that my autistic mannerisms and speech (of which I was unaware of) had a lot to do with it.

For the following 55 years, I remained deeply jealous of those special science class students. In 2019, I learned what autism is and that I am indeed autistic. In that same year, I decided I would look up those students I was so jealous of and see how their life and careers turned out. I expected they ended up as science professors or researchers in aerospace, NASA, etc. What I found, however is that none of them had any science related job at all. One became a minister, another an insurance salesman, another a barber, another a gas station operator, etc. None of them had any kind of a career that I expected to find them in. I suddenly lost my jealousy. I love my career far more.

While autism indeed, made (makes) my life extremely difficult, disappointing and depressing, the obsession it inflicted resulted in my electronics design engineering career – the very career I dreamed of as a young child. While autism has made my life extremely difficult, frustrating, depressing, etc., my life ended up with a more fulfilling life than any of my NT peers. However, anytime prior to my 67th birthday, I would have strongly disagreed with that.

Life is complex and variable. It’s never stagnant even when it seems to be. And it’s never over until it’s over.

Also, be careful with jealousy. More often than not, the people you are jealous of does not have as wonderful a life as it appears.

That said – NO, I am not offended by anyone saying anything about hating autism. Your feelings are your feelings and are absolutely valid. No one gets to choose their feelings. It just is what it is.

 

[Misty Avich]

Also, be careful with jealousy. More often than not, the people you are jealous of does not have as wonderful a life as it appears.

I'm not really jealous of one single person, I'm just jealous of NTs for being NTs, with or without problems of their own.

That said – NO, I am not offended by anyone saying anything about hating autism. Your feelings are your feelings and are absolutely valid. No one gets to choose their feelings. It just is what it is.

I know you're not. But some people are, but only when I say it. So it feels personal, even though it's only a few who are maybe PC or something. But most folk, like yourself, know what I mean and don't twist it around to make me out to look bad.


I found some more old school reports from school today, from when I was 10. It seems in all my primary (elementary) school reports the teacher always wrote every little detail of my behaviour in the classroom and it made me out to seem more Aspie than I thought I was.
Tell me, do teachers sometimes bend the truth a little on school reports because they know they have to put something but aren't always sure what, so they just put something like "Misty is getting better at talking to the other children" or other stuff like that? I mean, I have a good memory and I remember interacting a lot with the other children and having friends and getting along in group work in class, etc.
Maybe the teacher was afraid that if they'd just wrote "Misty ain't as Aspie as her diagnosis says" then I might have lost the help I was getting in school? I do know that due to lack of funding you do have to exaggerate sometimes in order to continue getting support.

Ugh, I wish I'd masked the stupid Asperger's instead of the ADHD. I spent all my energy masking my hyperactivity and trying to be a well-behaved student. I've never really masked Asperger's. How do you guys actually do that?

 

[Jonn]

No, you haven't. You should be free to say anything here as long as it's within the rules, and there's nothing in the rules to suggest we can't hate our autism. But different rules apply to me for some reason.

I hate my ritual abuse experience.

 

[Jonn]

Tell me, do teachers sometimes bend the truth a little on school reports because they know they have to put something

Just because you are a teacher, and have a huge responsibility on your shoulders, doesn't mean you also have integrity.
Having been emotionally/psychologically abuse in my formative years by a teacher, you may forgive me if I view the profession with cynicism.

Spoiler

But you have the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.

 

[RemyZee]

It is okay that you feel that way. You cannot change how you feel.

That said, if you do feel that way, you are not optimizing your condition.

You are not a bad NT, but you can be an optimal autistic (assuming that you do not have severe co-morbids). Even severe co-morbids can be optimized.

I was wondering what you think How and which severe co morbids can be optimized and what that looks like?

 

[Crossbreed]

I was wondering what you think How and which severe co morbids can be optimized and what that looks like?

There are too many variations, so no one-size-fits-all answers.
If they are correctly identified, then they can be spoken to (with psychiatric drugs and/or practical therapy, etc.).

That won't be perfect, but can be better.

 

[Jonn]

but I'm actually just writing 'the world according to Boogs').

My style is confusing for some also.