Auties, Aspies, and other CloudCuckooLanders!

No, no, I get you - I feel the same way.

Ugh, I feel you on a lot of those. My parents have kept telling me about "the social game" or whatever, but it sometimes feels like it's a game only I'm supposed to play while nobody else seems to have to follow the same "rules".

For the longest time, I've had issues with conversations with others just... dying, no matter what I try. I remember conversations I've had back when I was in my first year of uni where people seemed really interested in finding out that I studied energy development, but as soon as I mentioned that I dreamed of being a game designer, they flat-out lost interest and stopped talking to me. Like, what, was I not supposed to say that? Why not?

And if the convos don't die, people instead start suddenly acting like I don't exist, flat-out ignoring me in favor of talking to somebody else. I talked to my family about it at one point, and they said that it's because people apparently don't understand what I'm saying due to the vocabulary I use. Which is, you know, fair enough; I guess I get losing interest in a conversation like that. But when I asked why people don't just tell me that they don't understand what I'm saying or ask me to explain, their only response was: "Oh, honey, they won't do that." Because people apparently don't want to see stupid by asking for clarification.

... Oh. OK. I see how it is - I'm supposed to read people's minds and just know when they don't understand what I'm saying. And obviously, the only courses of action to choose from in a conversation with somebody talking about a subject you don' know much about is "ask questions and maybe look like an idiot" and "ignore this person and start talking to somebody else instead." Not show any genuine interest, or change the subject with the same person or anything like that. Nope. No, sir. Impossible. It's either "ask for clarification" or "pretend like this person doesn't exist." Right.

I don't get it, man. It just makes me feel even more alienated. And even though I try to change my vocabulary, I still get left out a lot in conversations, or get interrupted or talked over or have the conversation get flat-out hijacked by somebody else. I genuinely don't know what I'm doing wrong, and nobody will tell me.

Sorry for the double post.

One thing I've come to realize is that I enjoy wearing my headphones even when I'm no actually listening to music or having a video playing in the background while I work. And not just for noise-cancelling purposes, either; I find the pressure over my ears to be soothing, somehow.

Maybe it's the same principle as weighted blankets/duvets. (Which I also have)

I have the same thing with the headphones, it's kind of a calming feeling (not autistic, though).

I've found the same thing happening with me - What makes it so comfortable to have headphones on without any audio coming through them?

I expect I'll receive nothing but bile for this - but is it my imagination, or are the "good people" w.r.t. autism looking exclusively for girls/women and enbies? I have nothing against them, of course, but they're a minority, aren't they, in the autistic community? I'm self-diagnosed, I know, I'm terrible.

...also, I'm not going to mince words. When I've gone on camera, I've been told multiple times I'm a dead ringer for an autistic minor celebrity who literally, and I mean literally, raped their mother.

What are you talking about? Clarify what you are saying there. What do you mean by "good people", or w.r.t.?

But I am fairly sure that women and enbies put together outnumber men, as much as men and enbies together outnumber women, and women and men together outnumber enbies.

Autistic women and enbies I think are a minority of the autistic. (w.r.t. = "with regard to")

Edited by TwinBird on Jan 13th 2023 at 9:45:29 AM

considering average underdiagnosis rates of other conditions that are similar, and that most things appear in the population relatively evenly, that's unlikely.

Besides in most places there's slightly more women than men.

Besides even if it were the case they were a minority even put together, I really don't understand what the point you're trying to make is.

I guess... it's something I can't say here, or anywhere, really. I guess the answer is to cast us aside.

Edited by TwinBird on Jan 13th 2023 at 10:09:44 AM

I'm an autistic woman (maybe an autistic enby, I have no clue honestly) and growing up I only really knew autistic guys. But online I meet way more autistic women and enbies and I relate to them the same, probably even more due to how autism and misogyny/transphobia can intersect in annoying ways.

I don't understand the conversation. Are you talking about dating? What makes a "good person" in this context?

I didn't know many other autistic people growing up (I wasn't diagnosed myself at the time), but the few I did know were guys. Since coming to university and getting involved in more social groups (some specifically related to autism, disability, etc and some just coincidentally having a lot of neurodiverse people) I've met a whole lot more, including women and enbies. The majority of the autistic people I know are still men though; not a surprise when you look at the statistics.

I'm not sure if I posted this before (I know I'm on wicked thin ice right now, and TBH I'm about 90% I've already posted this on this very thread, but it's not very offensive and a cursory search hasn't found it, so I might as well) but does anyone else know someone who literally can't swallow soda? I want to be clear that it's not a choice - I have vivid memories of coughing it up on the sidewalk. Despite my deservèd reputation on this site as a lush, I have never in my life downed a can or a glass of beer - I'm not totally sure whether I've downed a sip of beer. As I've said ad nauseam, I've never been officially diagnosed with autism, but (and this is something I think I said last time) the only other person I've ever met who's the same way had been. Literally the only other person. I wrote her once, ill-advisedly, and she told me it was an autism thing, even though she knew I'd never been diagnosed.

Edited by TwinBird on Feb 3rd 2023 at 6:25:13 AM

I think this probably belongs here... ish... maybe. A particular app that starts with G has effectively told me I'm too stupid to be gay. I feel I'm entitled to some sort of trophy.

Someone has both ADHD and Autism but I'd able to remember all their multication tables while me, also ADHD-Autistic can only remember half of it

How is their memory not shit?

Edited by Cutegirl920fire on Feb 6th 2023 at 4:34:06 AM

I just long for the day when using autistic as an insult becomes just as unacceptable as saying "that's so gay".

Or thinking being deliberately ableist toward problematic neurodivergent people like Chris-chan is "different", for that matter. It's not, just like misgendering problematic trans people(which coincidentally is the case for Chris-chan) on purpose is also transphobia. Neither of these are okay.

As an autistic aroace, both piss me off equally.😡

Edited by CosmosAndChaos on Feb 7th 2023 at 7:18:01 AM

Not sure if this is an autistic thing, (again not officially diagnosed), but it drives me absolutely nuts, to put it mildly, that I apparently strongly resemble that person, who's committed perhaps... no, unquestionably the most unspeakable act I can imagine. I've been told off before for saying too much personal, but I think this thread is kind of for that? I'm pretty much a dead ringer for this person, who committed, again, the most unspeakable act I can think of. I think of my own mother; I've hurt her so many times in so many ways, for thirty-odd years. I keep on hurting her; I can't stop. Not so egregiously as that person, of course, but in so many little ways.

Yeah, that drives me nuts. Also the way people treated Chris-chan in general. I mean the incessant bullying. Chris-chan as a person sucks. But that doesn't make the bullying okay.

Agreed.

Reading about her years ago before... that happened, I was always like "What the hell is wrong with you people?! Yes, her comic isn't very good and she's done some not very good things otherwise, but that's not a sign that she deserves to be turned into a laughing stock! She needs help, not mockery!"

I think we're not supposed to talk about her personal life on the wiki anymore because the bullying was that insane.

I've been exceptionally out of it this week. And one of the ways that manifested, aside from general fatigue and depression, is that I've experienced more Sensory Overload than usual.

Like, in my case, my oversenstivity usually concerns light and sound; I'm very sensitive to stuff I perceive as noise. Not only has that been even worse this week, but I've also noticed that I started to get bothered by the fabric in my jeans. This kind of discomfort when it comes to fabric isn't usually how my sensitivity makes itself known.

I guess that just goes to show how shitty I've felt this past week.

Question from a non-autistic, is Autism Awareness Day considered a good thing or not? Wikipedia says that some autistic people don't like the term.

Personally I think Autism Awareness Day has done its job. People by-and-large are aware that it exists. That doesn't mean they know what it is, much less care about anyone that has it. By calling it Autism Awareness instead of something like Autism Empathy we missed the mark from the jump.

I'm autistic and I don't mind the term. But I'm not all autistic people in the world, so...