Provoked by a dollop of hopeful shame, there are times I still wonder if I’m “on the spectrum”. Then something about human society wallops me right into “Yes. Yes, I really am so bloody autistic.” No matter how consummately I try to emulate, anticipate, script, conscript, or model it… neurotypical human social brouhaha is a game I can never ever really play at, never mind win.
I’m too old to really care to try anymore. So… cheers to us. 🥂
@Shufei@actuallyautistic Since discovering my own #autism, I keep wondering how autistic I actually am. I keep seeing characters on TV or in videogames like Sam from #DeathStranding and feeling like a) they seem more autistic than myself and b) I share some of their traits as well. Until I get officially diagnosed, I’ll just keep asking myself the same questions. 🤔
I think as well as sharing my Autistic experiences I'm going to also try and share information about my combination of chronic diseases and what it does to an individual's body over time... It seems many people I am close to have never even heard much about Celiac's or especially Graves' disease...
About 1/3 of the way through “The Body Remembers” and knowing what I do about my life, starting to wonder if my #adhd and #autism aren’t just co-morbid with, but actually came from, the #cptsd. I mean, I’m certain there’s no “cure” for them but I do wonder if preventing infant neglect and childhood abuse reduces instances in the general population. (Please don’t get mad. I’m just wondering about my experiences, not saying anything about yours.)
@actuallyautistic
I am thinking about switching my job. And my mind is a bit flipping between the positiins that it's a really good idea and that it's really stupid.
I think that's not uncommon for any humsn being. But being a little autistic pulls me a bit in the direction of staying on well known ground. And because of that I think it might be the better idea to move.
My #autism side is telling me to go for security. My #adhd side tells me it is never meant for forever, so I shouldn't mind.
i'm grateful for a therapist who respects my wish to avoid any #ABA bs wrt #autism... helping coach me to figure out my own sense of boundaries, develop the ability to articulate my own wants and needs.
I've been in solitude for the first time in a bit as I wrap up things in philly this week, and while i'm super tired of living out of a suitcase and treading water life-wise for even longer… i'm not lonely; just that weird restless/exhausted @actuallyautistic
Autistics can be extroverts. There are extroverted autistics. Social-emotional reciprocity or social communication “deficits” sometimes outshine the deep need for social connection. Never assume because someone is autistic that they aren’t revitalized by social events or don’t love to socialize. @actuallyautistic#audhd#actuallyautistic#autism#autistic#LateIdentifiedAuDHD
Alert #autism folks. A friend is mentoring a founder going through a startup accelerator program. It’s for idea stage founders. He’s wanting to do customer discovery interviews to validate his idea, which is a mental health app to support adults with autism.
I totally can’t play any games where I have to control character movements(especially first-person) by WASD, arrows, gamepads, joysticks etc. Point and click is my everything. Is it something #neurodivergent people often struggle with, or is it my personal problem? If #nd - is it something more typical for #autism or #ADHD? Or should I check some other flavor? @actuallyautistic
My spouse delights me. I've been rumbling this week as we get ready for a move and swamped by shame for my reactions—I hate feeling out of control.
They gave me a gift. I did not respond to the gift, felt awful for not acknowledging it, and then excessively apologized.
Spouse: "I never expect you to be excited about chocolate. If it were an appropriately shaped Reese's, that would be a whole different story." #autistic#actuallyautistic#audhd#AuDHDcouple
@actuallyautistic
Their comment made me feel loved and seen and brightened my evening. I have a particular way of eating certain foods and disassembling them in an order, which makes me very happy. When I struggle to be compassionate with myself or gentle with others, they still reach out to me. #audhd#actuallyautistic#autism#autistic
...but can we do it without suggesting that the reason a woman would dedicate her life to #science & #teaching was to fill the vacuous space of never having children?
...and maybe also without suggesting some intuitive maternal instinct as the source of her #scientific reasoning?
Not only did my blog post go out several days early (whoops), but it's also a bit of a wandering rant prompted by Shop the DSM–5 Collection and an interaction with my #autistic niece on Pokémon. #neurodivergent#audhd#actuallyautistic#autism#adhd
I was given the opportunity to push out an update to the first edition of the Late-Identified #AuDHD workbook. It is always embarrassing to find a typo—even with multiple editors, beta/ARC readers, + the hundreds of times I have read through it—but correcting mistakes is also a privilege. While I was updating the typo, I updated my reference to AANE. They recently updated their name to the Association for #Autism and #Neurodiversity. #actuallyautistic@actuallyautistic#ADHD
"Studies investigating autistic community research priorities indicate a mismatch between what #autism research focuses on and what #autistic people want to see researched."
I've seen a fair amount of anecdotal theories that #autistic sensory sensitivities get worse with age; however I'm curious as to whether that may be caused by many older autistic people experiencing #AutisticBurnout which also makes sensory stuff worse...
Does anyone else have trouble sleeping after a day where you were overstimulated? I had one of those days yesterday. It's now after 3:30 in the morning and I'm still awake. My body feels tense, and when I was with my mom earlier, we noticed that I was jumpy, flinching more often when she touched me. It doesn't help that I'm not feeling great and can't seem to get comfortable. Some of my health issues are flaring. I think being overstimulated somehow triggered them. Just curious if anyone else has experienced this kind of thing. #ActuallyAutistic#autism#neurodivergent#neurodiversity @actuallyautistic@actuallyautistics@neurodivergent@neurodivergentblind@neurodivergents@neurodiversity@neurodiversity
Random Public Service Announcement: The #ActuallyAutistic hashtag means the author of the post containing that hashtag is an actually autistic person, as opposed to a relative, caregiver, or practitioner who is not autistic. It came about because autism-adjacent folks kept speaking over us, and we needed a way to identify when an autistic person was speaking for themself. The hashtag says nothing about whether someone has an official diagnosis, only about whether they identify as autistic. It is not correct for an allistic (non-autistic) person to use the #ActuallyAutistic hashtag to describe an autistic person - #autistic is a perfectly cromulent hashtag for that. @actuallyautistic
@joshsusser@actuallyautistic one to add: friends and I have been getting a lot of joy out of #subthreshold as a self-assigned label for those of us with "autistic tendencies" or "sub-threshold #autism" (which is an actual phrase a psychiatrist said to me once).
It can be applied when the impact of neurodivergence on one's life is not disabling but not without challenges; and when autistic traits and management techniques are applicable.
Any autistic people use Mastodon?