Things you learnt about autism since joining forums

[Misty Avich]

Many go out to do the party thing because it's what's expected, the peer pressures, not because it's their most sought after activity. It's the socially accepted way to find potential partners, to establish within a sub-culture, it's an acceptable way to be pretend rebellious, it's yet another form of social hierarchy juggling - each finding their 'level' in society, who gets to dominate, who gets dominated, and so on.

That's why I kept beating myself up about it, because I wasn't doing what was suspected and so I felt I wasn't normal. It's like I had these normal instincts yet social anxiety stood in my way.

 

[Boogs]

That's why I kept beating myself up about it, because I wasn't doing what was suspected and so I felt I wasn't normal. It's like I had these normal instincts yet social anxiety stood in my way.

I think I just followed the flow because that's what everyone did (and the one's who didn't weren't visible), but never seemed to 'get it' as to what the great pleasure doing so brought. Seemed so much effort of a mostly disappointing time. The best one's were things like a good gig where it was too noisy and hectic to even have to pretend to be able to talk to people, just enjoy the music and chaos.

 

[DrBadStrings]

Maybe for some that can put on a good show or have learned enough social skills to adapt to their surroundings. On the other hand, for people like me, it can increase feelings of being alone even among others because it can create a whole different level of mask. Only being able to interact with others when intoxicated obfuscates the self and no one ever gets to know you at all. I wouldn't call this a "normal social life" - I would call it a desperate and ultimately ineffective attempt at trying to navigate confusing and overwhelming social experiences.

Additionally, there are those, like me, who did most of their drinking/using drugs all alone. Drinking can be a secretive thing and autistic drinkers do not always present as the happy-go-lucky gal at the party. I suspect many of us are/were quiet drinkers, seeking solitary spaces and using the drink to quell the storm in our mind and senses.

See now my drinking ended secretive and alone trying to "quell the storm in our mind and senses" but it didn't begin that way. It's also important to know that I growing up I was autistic, just thought I was a smart oddball. I only started drinking seriously my 2nd year of university so 19/20 and it was completely to get rid of the social anxiety. I wasn't abusing alcohol then but it was the only way I could socialize comfortably. When I drank it didn't feel like I was forcing a mask anymore. I wasn't nervous to socialize and felt like I could act and communicate in a way that I couldn't sober. I also never drank at home then. Only out at bars/clubs. Until my late 20's where I did start drinking at home to deal with everyday stress of life which ultimately let to a burn out and a stint in Rehab in my early 30's. After which I stayed sober for 26 months. Then started again, again mostly for social reasons. And it was fine until Covid hit then I just started drinking more and more at home until my second major alcohol fueled burnout at 41.

Went to detox to safely stop drinking. Now I'm 9 months sober, just finished my 2nd stint in rehab where I finally found out about the autism at age 42. It's still a lot to process but I definitely see the alcoholism in a different light now. I wouldn't be surprised if there aren't a lot of folks around my age +/- 10 years that are undiagnosed and coping with alcohol and other substances.

 

[UFO]

Being intoxicated by alcohol made it so much harder to try and understand people when in conversation.

When I was young, going to bars with people was the only way for me to feel some kind of connection with them. I kept a good control of my drinking and never got "wasted" or hangover (which might explain my different experience?). But when others were drunk, I finally began to understand them and I felt like I am "on the same frequency" with them. Not that my or their way of thinking would have magically changed, or that it wouldn't have been me worrying less about what they mean, but it was that a drunk person is much more sincere and straightforward. They might not want to say things (for numerous reasons), but they end up saying them anyways. Which helps a lot of understanding what is going on inside their heads.

And then there was also that nice tipsy feeling that just feels good and makes things look less stressful and so on - but that I can get by drinking alone.

When I drank it didn't feel like I was forcing a mask anymore. I wasn't nervous to socialize and felt like I could act and communicate in a way that I couldn't sober.

Alcohol is often considered as an excuse for a behavior. Weird things to say and do are better accepted and forgotten (unless they make funny heroic sagas).

 

[Misty Avich]

I think I just followed the flow because that's what everyone did (and the one's who didn't weren't visible), but never seemed to 'get it' as to what the great pleasure doing so brought. Seemed so much effort of a mostly disappointing time. The best one's were things like a good gig where it was too noisy and hectic to even have to pretend to be able to talk to people, just enjoy the music and chaos.

Well I admire your motivation to give those things a try. I didn't. By the way I meant to say "expect", not "suspect". Damn autocorrect.

 

[Boogs]

never got "wasted" or hangover (which might explain my different experience?).

I very rarely got wasted (uncontrollably drunk), in fact just a few pints would (will) start to degrade my ability to communicate well. The intense effort and concentration it takes all evaporates, and so does the wish to bother trying. I'm not a happy drunk, or a miserable drunk, I'm an an unsociable drunk. I'm fortunate I never really liked it too much, just did it because everyone else did.

Well I admire your motivation to give those things a try.

You most definitively should NOT admire me for that!
I did what was socially expected of me. It was just that attempt to be a part of something after a life of mostly isolation when it came to friends and social groups. And mostly due to the insistence of a small but loyal group of friends, and I can't for the life of me see why they bothered with dragging me out, since I was hardly the life and soul of the party, but I guess they were doing the same as I was - fulfilling social expectations - you include the people you like by default.

Damn autocorrect.

Ha! That's one reason I WILL NOT use ruddy tablets and smart phones!
I'm bad enough with a k/board! Spend long enough correcting my own mistakes, don't want to correct Google's too!

 

[Misty Avich]

Yes but you gave in to peer pressure, something I didn't do. I didn't even have friends to do it with. I had a small group of friends I'd met at college but they were a bit chavvy and just turned on me one day, as in bullied me. I had to distance myself from them immediately. So I had no friends.
I went out with my brother to the local pub a couple of times but I didn't get drunk or anything and came home at like 9.30pm, completely sober. It's not normal for a 20-year-old to be so responsible like that. I know it sounds good but it ain't. There was something wrong with me because nobody that age is like that. Even you weren't. I feel like the only person in the world who didn't do what society expected of me. At least you can feel quite normal and relate to others when they talk about their younger drinking days, you can say "yeah, me too!" and know what it meant. I can't. People sit and discuss their younger drinking days and I'm just alienated. They ask me if I did it, and if I say yes it doesn't feel right. It's a huge lie. If I say no I feel embarrassed.

 

[Rodafina]

I feel like the only person in the world who didn't do what society expected of me.

You are part of a forum with hundreds of people who feel this way. Hundreds of us.

 

[Misty Avich]

You are part of a forum with hundreds of people who feel this way. Hundreds of us.

Not exactly. I think more people here gave in to peer pressure when young than didn't.
Also I wonder if I'm the only female member here who has never been pregnant before?
And the only non-severe female member diagnosed with Asperger's in childhood?

 

[Rodafina]

Not exactly. I think more people here gave in to peer pressure when young than didn't.
Also I wonder if I'm the only female member here who has never been pregnant before?
And the only non-severe female member diagnosed with Asperger's in childhood?

I think your notion that you are unique from all others and singled out in every way does not serve you well. It is based on feeling, not fact, and it makes you feel badly. It is an example of "negative automatic thoughts" and it is something you could discuss in therapy when you get off the waiting list.

Spoiler: Negative Automatic Thoughts (excerpts)

What Is Automatic Thinking?​

Automatic thinking refers to automatic thoughts that stem from beliefs people hold about themselves and the world (Soflau & David, 2017). Automatic thoughts can be considered “surface-level, non-volitional, stream-of-consciousness cognitions” that “can appear in the form of descriptions, inferences, or situation-specific evaluations” (Soflau & David, 2017).

As the name indicates, these automatic thoughts cannot be controlled by people directly, since they are reflexive reactions based on the beliefs people hold about themselves and the world. However, people can indirectly control these thoughts by challenging the beliefs that lead to them.

Relevant research into automatic thinking began with Aaron Beck’s research into how negative automatic thoughts affect the development of depression (Beck et al., 1979). Before long, researchers decided that positive automatic thoughts were also important to study, and particularly the relationship between both positive and negative automatic thoughts (Ingram & Wisnicki, 1988).

Studies have indicated that there are a variety of consequences of being disposed toward negative automatic thoughts rather than positive automatic thoughts.

In a study by Riley et al., their focus was on the relationship between automatic thoughts and depression in a research group of people living with HIV/AIDS. They found that in people with both depression and HIV/AIDS, negative automatic thoughts are associated with depressive symptoms, and vice versa (Riley et al., 2017).

Our Cognitive Bias: Construction of the Self-Concept​

Self-concept refers to how people perceive themselves and their past experiences, their abilities, their prospects for the future, and any other aspects of the self.

Aaron Beck’s cognitive triad (discussed below) deals with self-concept and the construction of the self. The basic idea of how our self-concepts and cognitive biases affect our lives has to do with automatic thoughts.

For example, someone with a negative self-referential schema is more likely to take things personally, leading to automatic thoughts like “People are not talking to me because I am an unlikable person,” rather than exploring other possibilities (Disner et al., 2017). A negative self-referential schema can also lead to more severe symptoms of depression.

Most importantly, a negative self-concept can lead to an unending cycle of negative thoughts.

This is because people with negative self-referential schemas exhibit attentional biases. For example, when asked to decide whether an adjective describes themselves or not, people with depression are more likely than a control group to select negative adjectives (Disner et al., 2017).

Depressive people also show an attentional bias by being quicker than healthy the control group to endorse negative adjectives and quicker to reject positive adjectives (Disner et al., 2017).

In turn, being likelier to endorse negative adjectives is correlated with longer depressive episodes (as reported afterward), demonstrating the cycle of negativity.

Aaron Beck’s Cognitive Triad​

According to psychiatrist Aaron Beck and colleagues,

“[the] cognitive triad consists of three major cognitive patterns that induce the patient to regard himself, his future, and his experiences in an idiosyncratic manner.”

According to Beck’s cognitive triad, someone who is depressed will automatically have a negative view of themselves, their experiences (that is, the things that the world around them causes to happen to them), and their future. According to this model, “the other signs and symptoms of the depressive syndrome” are “consequences of the activation of the negative cognitive patterns” (Beck et al., 1979).

According to Beck, this is because a depressed person “tends to perceive his present, his future, and the outside world (the cognitive triad) in a negative way and consequently shows a biased interpretation of his experiences, negative expectancies as to the probable success of anything he undertakes, and a massive amount of self-criticism” (Beck et al., 1979).

In other words, people who are depressed have a negative view of themselves and their lives, and these negative views lead to further symptoms of depression.

These symptoms of depression often then lead people to have a negative view of themselves and their lives, creating a cycle of negativity.

...

Getting Rid of ANTS: Automatic Negative Thoughts​

This simple worksheet starts out by offering some information about automatic thoughts and their consequences.

The rest of the worksheet is split into three columns: Trigger, Automatic Negative Thought (ANT), and Adaptive Thought, and aims to help people understand and dispute (if necessary) their automatic thoughts. This worksheet is a great introduction to automatic thoughts.

Identifying ANTs: Challenging Different Types of Automatic Thought​

Identifying ANTS gives an overview of ten different types of ANTS and what they look like in daily life.

In the space provided, you can practice identifying each type of ANT, to help you better understand your subconscious thoughts and take the first step toward replacing them.

Along with the exercise, you’ll find five Challenge Questions you can use to tackle each ANT when you notice it popping up.

Thought/Feeling Record Worksheet​

This worksheet focuses on specific negative automatic thoughts, one at a time, and examine what triggers them, as well as their consequences.

This exercise can help people understand their negative automatic thoughts and replace them with positive thoughts. It’s excellent for someone looking to extensively examine their individual thoughts.

Positive Replacement Thoughts Worksheet​

This Positive Replacement Thoughts Worksheet also asks users to list all the automatic negative thoughts that come to their minds, then asks them to thoughtfully come up with alternative positive thoughts with which they can replace the negative thoughts.

It is more concise than the two Thought Records above, and since it does not offer information about automatic thoughts, it is a good option for someone who understands the concept and is ready to start replacing their negative thoughts with positive ones.

Questions for Challenging Thoughts​

Another simple resource, this one-page worksheet serves as an appendix of questions focused on challenging automatic thoughts.

It includes a list of questions that users can use to dispute negative thoughts, and works well with any of the other Automatic Thoughts exercises on this page.

This straightforward tool is a great grab-and-go option for people who want to use Socratic Questioning and fact-checking techniques in dealing with automatic negative thoughts.

Source: Challenging Negative Automatic Thoughts: 5 Worksheets (+PDF)

 

[Misty Avich]

Thanks for the information. This conversation would be better suited in my recent thread about my sister.

I just don't like feeling like the only one all the time. I was the only one in my family and class who was statemented at school and required a support worker. I was the only one in my family who had a social worker visit our house. I felt so embarrassed. It's quite normal for any child to feel embarrassed about having a social worker.

It's like I see other people with issues worse than mine but still seem to make friends. I used to work with a girl who had a lot of issues (prone to meltdowns, poor emotional regulation, poor anger management, and lots of other issues to the point where I actually felt normal and emotionally well-adjusted when around her). But the others at work who were our age preferred her to me and would include her in all their social activities outside of work. I got excluded, as usual, and felt very hurt and distraught.

I think the only person I know who is as lonely as me is a friend with Fragile-X syndrome. Her IQ seems average, and she's great to get along with and is high-functioning and seems "normal" on the outside like me, but has never succeeded in making friends, except with me. But I haven't seen her at all lately. She doesn't go on Facebook any more and I no longer have her phone number so I'm not quite sure what she's up to now. Like me, she's never been drunk before in her life either. She's always been a homely girl who prefers to hang out with her family, and I have a feeling she's probably still the same.

 

[Boogs]

I had a small group of friends I'd met at college but they were a bit chavvy and just turned on me one day, as in bullied me.

So, not real friends then? Not judging you at all, just seeing it from my own p.o.v.
I assessed a tiny number of people as being friends, and these I could trust. I may annoy the living crap out of them, but they understood that was just me, and relished whatever it was they got from knowing me, over the annoyances.
Not always, and not forever, I've had some long time friends who have done something I could never forget (forgive yes, but the trust is gone).

Then there were what I termed acquaintances, and these were people who were around, often connected to friends, but only to be tolerated as such, never to be trusted.

Subsequently I never had many friends, but those I had were mostly good one's.

At least you can feel quite normal and relate to others when they talk about their younger drinking days

Hmmm, not really to be honest. It may sound like that to you, but it actually wasn't a good experience. I did it as it was what was 'meant to be done', but in doing so, it ended up isolating me even more!
"So this is what normal is, and I hate it!". Part of that false 'normal' is reminiscing about it! So if you look at it like that, I could just be a massive hypocrite who couldn't stand up on his own! (I of course choose other ways to look at it, more favourable to myself! )
It was a relief to know it wasn't just that I was broken in some undefined way, but rather broken in a VERY defined way!

 

[Misty Avich]

So, not real friends then? Not judging you at all, just seeing it from my own p.o.v.

Well, for a time they were friends, while we were in college. They included me and I was never alone in college, I was accepted by them and had a little taste of what it's like to be NT for a while. Then after we left college we stayed in touch for a while but I think they became dependent on drugs because their personalities suddenly changed and they all took their insecurities out on me for no reason at all. I was very hurt and also disappointed that people who I thought were friends could turn out like that.

Hmmm, not really to be honest. It may sound like that to you, but it actually wasn't a good experience. I did it as it was what was 'meant to be done', but in doing so, it ended up isolating me even more!
"So this is what normal is, and I hate it!". Part of that false 'normal' is reminiscing about it! So if you look at it like that, I could just be a massive hypocrite who couldn't stand up on his own! (I of course choose other ways to look at it, more favourable to myself! )
It was a relief to know it wasn't just that I was broken in some undefined way, but rather broken in a VERY defined way!

Well I felt depressed even when forcing myself to go out with my brother and his friends to the pub. I felt like a fish out of water. I was shy and unconfident. I didn't feel right. I preferred staying home with my mother. But when I did that I then felt guilty for not doing what peer pressure expected of me. Instead I done voluntary work (as I was unemployed back then). That was as appealing to me as what pubs and bars are to normal people ("normal" meaning everyone who went to them, even autistics). I got my desired social interaction fix at my volunteering job, plus having good flirts with men on the buses. But it still wasn't normal. Friends came and went and didn't keep in touch. Then the manager and one or two of the other volunteers there began bullying me, and they were older women in their 60s. I didn't know I had ADHD back then, but I displayed a lot of typical ADHD behaviour that they didn't like (even though I was never nasty or never hurt anyone). They humiliated me to the point where I'd arrive home in tears. So I had to leave that voluntary job and seek another.

 

[Boogs]

I got my desired social interaction fix at my volunteering job, plus having good flirts with men on the buses.

I found work-based type activities the easiest in dealing with others. Something with a target to achieve. The vagueness of social only interactions left me clueless and uncomfortable.

Friends came and went and didn't keep in touch.

I think this may be something to do with just human nature, but being ND and finding friendships harder to make, losing them matters all the more. For those who bounce back and make friends easily (or with less difficulty) they don't feel the same loss, even betrayal from friends who drift away. For me, ultimately, it just told me they were always going to do that, it wasn't a reflection of me, or if it was, then they were never true friends (according to my personal strict and unreasonable criteria).

Maybe it's because ND's don't read the person so well, and assume something in them that was never actually there?

I'd have to say the times I enjoyed in other peoples company the most were usually in a home setting, not in a club/bar/pub/whatever.

 

[Misty Avich]

I found work-based type activities the easiest in dealing with others. Something with a target to achieve. The vagueness of social only interactions left me clueless and uncomfortable.

Work is my social life (outside of family). I think that's the case for many people as we get older.

Maybe it's because ND's don't read the person so well, and assume something in them that was never actually there?

I don't have that difficulty. I think it's just I lack in something but not sure what, and once they discover whatever I'm lacking then they start thinking I'm boring and just lose contact with me. I can always tell the first signs of a person who I thought was a friend start to become less satisfied with my company and begin to make excuses not to see me any more.

I don't really like the "if they didn't carry the friendship further then they weren't real friends in the first place" platitude that I read everywhere. As an emotional and irrational person and with RSD, a phrase like that isn't really going to make a situation like this any less of a loss. It still brings disappointment to know that you thought you had a friend who turned out to not be a friend. But they were most likely a friend while it lasted but then they just drifted away and found people more exciting than me. I think it's just down to the fact that I suck.

 

[Jonn]

Drinking alcohol could loosen my tongue and I fear I might come out with stupid things or become emotional or embarrassing.

I'm the same.
I prefer being in control.
When I have caffeine, I am not.

 

[Jonn]

It lets me spend long periods of focussed internal reverie while also disrupting the rigid logical constraints allowing much better (easier?) free association through which I find a lot of ideas come - a little more like having a lucky dip barrel rather than a rigidly ordered list, and the connections can be far more obscure and interesting.

Sound like the effects of LSD.

and the biggest negative impact of the cannabis seemed to be making recall of facts harder, though recalling processes were fine

It has been said that excessive use of Mary destroys brain cells.

 

[Jonn]

The drugs from the pharma industry are presented as 'good', 'clean' medicine, in nice packaging and names so hard to pronounce they must be good for us!

Like Oxycontin.

 

[Jonn]

(actually, I'd find it more meaningful than reducing myself to a sweating boozy vomiting mess by the end of the evening! )

Spoiler

You would make a terrible Aussie.

 

[Misty Avich]

You have my full sympathy, that sounds so awful and hard on you. Your partner sounds very inconsiderate. Is it possible for you to confront him or dialogue with him safely about the effect his drinking has on your sleep and your life? If not, this could be red flag behaviour.

If I had to not only live with and a deal with a man every night, but a drunk one who was messing with my beauty sleep, I'd have a h0micide record.

I've been with him for 10 years. It's a perfect marriage...except for these binge drinking days, which thankfully isn't every day. Sometimes he can go weeks without touching a beer, then he impulsively buys large amounts of beers and once he starts drinking them he doesn't know when to stop. This changes his personality, which is why I don't like it. I understand how it is to be greedy when something is there, as I'm the same with candy. If there is candy in the cupboard I can't leave it alone until I have eaten the whole lot. And I enjoy it.

So yeah, our marriage is happy - until one of us (him, never me) drinks. I have told him time and time again about how it makes me feel and everything, and I've even come up with a slogan: Think Before You Drink. It sometimes works. But then I feel like I'm telling him what to do, but I'm only doing it for his own good. Having no more than 4 is fine. He's entitled to enjoy a drink. But it's when his personality changes is when I dislike it, also it interferes with his important medication he takes for blood pressure and diabetes. Beer is very calorific, as in high in sugar, and it can't be doing his blood pressure much good either.

I also make a joke of it. I say that I live with two men; Sober and Drunk. I tell him that I much prefer Sober, and that it's best to keep Drunk locked in the closet where he belongs.