This is a conversation I had with a representative at Michigan Rehabilitative Services.

I was very on edge, as I am with most social interactions, and it was taking me a long time to figure out what was appropriate to ask/divulge and what wasn't. She gave me an ellipsis and I got defensive. I think I made her upset.

What could I have done differently, and what should I do now?

That's too hard, especially since I'm in an autistic burnout for months...

I go out of my bedroom for 30 minutes, and I'm already overwhelmed.

I can't handle light or people.

I can't do anything. I'm stuck in the dark, waiting for I don't even know what.

This is not a life.

I'm at my parents' house, and I can't work or do outside activities. Cleaning my bedroom is already too much.

It's been months, and my regression is really bad.

I do everything I can to feel better: I rest, take care of myself, and even accept medication. I have a supportive family.

But even with everything going right, my life is hell.

And I will be fucking autistic all my life! That's a hell

I've met a handful unfortunately. Not saying ableist neurotypical people are any better, but I find it bizarre how the ableist autistic people I met are aware of our struggles and they choose to be that way.

Reason for posting this is because I got wildly misinterpreted by a person like that even though I am always careful with my words as an autistic fem person/woman to be clear, not be misinterpreted and no offend anyone. Said person used the r slur.

I've also had plenty of experiences of ableist autistic people who used the r slur the exact way it is used in a derogatory way and when I calmly explained that that's not how reclamation works, I got jumped for it.

I'm tired how everyone buys into fascism and online spaces have increasingly worsened. I'm 22, so maybe it's also that I haven't experienced the old web, or maybe I became more aware idk.

I got my routine cards made specifically for me (even the icons are pink because I love pink) and my emotions cards I got to pick images for the ones that didn’t already have an icon so I picked pictures of animals!

I don’t know if this is an autism thing or a me thing. In my free time I can stare at a picture or replay a small video for up to 40/50 mins or even longer.
I think the longest I’ve looked at something is like two hours.

It sounds weird but let me explain a bit more. I have some special interests (as one has) and I save a lot of pictures on my phone. I can keep looking at a picture and it keeps giving me dopamine. I also have things in my room that I can stare at for hours.

Also the art I make. I love making digital art and I always spend so long staring at what I made. I also love staring at like small animations or other digital art. Is this a usual thing? Does anyone else do this?

Housing worker argued with me today why im not taking medication for autism if its a barrier in my life. I swear this lady is impossible. Telling her its the way my brain is wired and you dont medicate it like that, she told me all her other autistic clients shes dealt with are medicated for autism and ive about had it please tell me Im not going crazy here.

Note: I have to work with her because im in a program and would be homeless otherwise, and ive given up reporting people because of so much retaliation in my past from workers I just don't have the energy for it

I’m turning 36 today, and over the past few years, I’ve come to a firm realization: the older I get, the more I cherish peace, absolute freedom, and my own independence.

A life dedicated to quiet solitude and gaming—my absolute favorite hobby—feels like home to me. Yet, society insists on peddling the exact same tired script: "Just wait until you find the right person!" Why is it so hard for people to grasp that some of us simply don't want to make sacrifices, or subject ourselves to the inevitable friction and stress of romantic relationships?

Maybe it stems from my recent autism diagnosis, or perhaps it’s because I’ve been through enough turmoil over the last few years that no relationship feels worth rolling the dice for anymore. I thrive when I’m tucked away from the noise of the world, and my need for solitude is fundamentally at odds with traditional relationship expectations.

Despite what society preaches about "fulfillment," I am genuinely at ease in my own company. "I'm happy with my autonomy" should be reason enough, without everyone assuming it's a problem that needs fixing.

How do you deal with the relentless pressure to conform, especially if you’re autistic?

For me, going to the movies alone. I found it to be a good excuse to get away from people for a bit, which is something in my opinion all autistics need. Besides, isn't the rule supposed to be you must be quiet? Like, I don't need another person for that, anyway.

every time i remember i have autism, i always feel upset by it. i’m trying to change this mindset, what are some positives i can think of instead?

does anyone else feel like they got the « bad » autism?

I’m not a prodigy at anything. I just have terrible social timing on top of my below-average intellect. My cousin—who also has autism—represents my country in international mathematics olympiads, and got a 1500 on the SAT without even speaking English. It’s fine for him to have no social skills, because his intelligence compensates for it. What do I have? Does anyone else feel like this? Like they’re just disadvantage? Born merely with no purpose.

I know so much discussion here is about people self diagnosing and perpetuating the ridiculous TikTok trend of thinking everyone is autistic, but this is focused on those who go undiagnosed or are dismissed constantly by our healthcare system, particularly women!

I've had two therapists say this to me!! It's like I'm not looking at YOU, I'm looking at the tape next to my camera and you think I'm looking at you!

Also, masking in therapy is a thing too, especially for late diagnosed people like me!

Please, if you encounter therapists who dismiss you over simple gestures based on empty assumptions, find another one!

I'm asking out of curiosity since I'm not an adult yet, but I don't feel like I changed much from when I was younger. I often get really confused when people say I look older than my actual age due to my height and mustache, cuz to me I feel the exact same way as I felt like when I was 10.

Anyway, I was wondering if it gets any better as an adult. You can interpret what I mean however you like since I don't know what you struggled with back then, but I'm also asking about things like the feeling of loneliness and not belonging anywhere.

Did you get better at regulating your emotions, expressing yourself, etc?

Like, it may not only be like that for autists, but its a pain in the ass... sometimes I just wanna sure cool things... and I get corrected by some smug fuck... it really strengthens my social anxiety.

my boyfriend and i included LOL. so i want to open up a poll !! which do you prefer? cats or dogs?

i’m on vacation right now with my family and partner and we’ve been going to a lot of really overwhelming places which i don’t really mind so long as i can have some space when i need it. the issue is that i’m not always able to leave a situation immediately (say for instance, eating out at a restaurant) and i’ve been getting really overstimulated really fast and i keep snapping at my partner when he tries to help. when i’m overstimulated i tend to go into verbal shutdown but the issue is that everyone that wants to help will always start by asking a mirage if questions, and usually when i don’t answer they can get upset (not my partner, he understands verbal shutdown, but he does still seem to ask questions, no matter how many times i’ve told him that asking me questions sort of just makes the situation worse for me. though he is getting better) so i usually end up pushing myself to answer the questions anyway. after a while i tend to start snapping at people over very little or simple things and i can’t seem to control it. i always feel so bad afterwards but it’s almost like the more i try and control it when i’m already overstimulated the worse it gets.
i just feel really bad cause i’ve snapped at my partner a lot over this vacation because i’ve essentially enter a permanent state of overstimulation until i get back home and i just feel so awful about it.
does this happen to any of y’all? if so is there anything you can do to help prevent it? or is this just something i’m gonna have to be continually apologizing for? i try and let people know before i get to that point that if i do snap, that it’s not personal, but getting snapped at sucks, and it can be hard not to take it personally. i just don’t know what to do, i feel so bad.

i’ve also thought about getting cards that i can wear in a lanyard that i can point to when im overstimulated but i find that even when i’m using my phone to communicate i can still get a little snippy.

Lol, this is why I never hike with people, never doing this shit again.

For months now, there has been construction going on in and around the house. The kitchen and the back garden have been completely revamped. It has lead to a lot of messes being made and it has been VERY stressful. Between the dust and the noise, it’s a complete sensory nightmare.

But perhaps the worst part is how people keep trying to force me to get involved in the work.

More than once over the last half year or so, my mum will tell me that I have to help her boyfriend (who is a complete nob) around the house with no warning time beforehand. He uses a lot of very loud tools and he shouts a lot, both at me and people in general. It is very overstimulating. It’s gotten to the point where multiple times I’ll just walk out of the house for a bit and wait for things to quiet down. Which of course leads to people calling me lazy and so on.

I just don’t like doing manual labour. Especially under such circumstances.

I’m venting about this because it happened again today. Mum told me I had to help her and her bf with work in the front garden with like an hours notice. When I do go outside he’s using a chainsaw and shouting at my mum to get some plastic bags or something. I just left the house for a bit.

On a semi-unrelated note, two other things I wanna complain about is the fact that:

A. Multiple times I have been woken in the early hours of the morning by him using drills in the kitchen (right below my bedroom)

B. Out front garden, which once looked so lovely and picturesque, has been gradually ruined, because of how much rubbish they’ve just chucked onto it.

Rant over

33M I’m high functioning or I was at some point, I feel like I’m being “normal” in public, but today I was looking at the wine list at a restaurant and the waitress told me no the drinks are on another page and started paging my menu for me. With that air of you poor disabled man. I tried to make a joke but my sister who was with me just gave me a disgusted look like she hates being seen with me. I was ok but now hours later I hate my life, not being able to mask better, or how I used to. Being treated like a child but feeling like my calm intelligent real brain is trapped inside myself when in social settings. Being straight up ignored by people, like they’re not going to waste their time greeting me, but I’m considered rude? I just understand the life expectancy rumour of 34 more and more. I can’t keep living like this.

i was so upset and crying lots doing lots of biting and hitting and now i feel icky, what does everyone here do after meltdowns?

I’m 20F and was recently formally diagnosed with autism, this did not exactly fall out of the sky.

I was in speech therapy for years as a child and diagnosed with ADHD and situational mutism around age seven. Autism was suggested more than once, but my family compared me to autistic relatives with higher support needs and decided I could not be autistic because I was not “like them.”

My father, 50M, has schizophrenia and strongly influenced that decision. He constantly talked about how he almost ended up in a rest home because he listened to “the people,” meaning medical professionals and taking medications. Because he distrusted professionals and thought labels would hold me back, my guardians did not pursue an autism diagnosis.

So basically, my autistic traits were noticeable enough to annoy everyone, never enough to deserve understanding. That’s just lovely (Sarcasm) .

My father loves conspiracy theories, yelling, talking over people, and giving unsolicited health advice. He picks apart people’s bodies and intelligence, then explains how diet will fix everything. He has called his own mother fat.

Meanwhile, I am already thin, eat well, and do Pilates, so apparently the missing cure for autism is… almonds and stepping in the sun for 30 minutes a day…?

He has a personal Hall of Fame of people he claims to have saved by his own hands. According to him, he helped autistic relatives with diet, he claims he fixed them, helped my aunt through breast cancer, helped his great-grandmother, apparently provides life-changing consultations to strangers in grocery stores. (i am not joking.)

These stories usually appear when someone asks him to stop talking.

Recently, we had company over at my grandmother’s house, where he also lives. I went into the kitchen for food and realized something had mustard on it, which is a major sensory trigger for me. I started shaking and froze while checking the rest of the food.
Then my brain suddenly noticed everything: people talking, appliances running, the ice machine, cars outside, and every other sound in existence. I became extremely overstimulated.

Because we had company, I was already barely speaking and trying to hold myself together. My father came close to me, so I asked him to step away for a second.

Instead, he made it about himself.
He acted like my request was an attack and started talking about how my behavior affects him. We have never really had a back-and-forth conversation. It is more like subscribing to a podcast I cannot pause.

I started crying and went to my room because I needed quiet. He followed me. He always does this. Whenever I say, “We can talk later,” “I don’t want to talk right now,” or “Please leave me alone,” he treats it like a starting pistol.

I told him he was making it worse and to leave. He kept lecturing me while I was crying on the floor. It became my worst meltdown in a long time, and I ended up hitting myself from distress.

During the meltdown, he discussed medication, drugs, rest homes, spirituality, nature, exercise, diet, and the vagus nerve(and so on) He also talked about the autistic traits of mine that make him uncomfortable. Because for some reason me being on the spectrum is all about him.

So while I was having a meltdown, he decided the emergency was how MY autism affected him.(Thanks dad)

The next day, instead of apologizing, he sent me a Google search about the vagus nerve and some emojis. He believes autism is a mental illness and seems to think it can be cured if I fix my diet, exercise more, connect with nature, or adjust my lifestyle. I have explained that autism is a neurodevelopmental disability and that I was born autistic.

My diagnosis did not create these traits; it gave me language for experiences I have had my whole life.
Healthy habits may help anyone feel better, but they will not uninstall autism.

He also regularly tests my intelligence, tells me to “critically think,” breaks apart individual words instead of responding to my actual point, and tells me I am “not slow” or “not the r-word” whenever I do literally anything.

He took one online class involving critical thinking and has apparently been appointed Professor of Every Conversation.

I leave for college again soon, living around him is draining me.. I feel I am constantly bracing for another lecture, conspiracy theory, criticism, or boundary violation.

At this point, I do not know whether I need better autism resources or an industrial-strength pair of noise-canceling headphones.

How do you explain sensory overload, shutdowns, and meltdowns to someone who refuses to listen or have a two-way conversation?

Should I stop trying to make him understand and focus on protecting my energy until I leave?

I would especially appreciate advice from autistic adults whose families dismissed their autism because they were compared to relatives with higher support needs.

TL;DR: I’m 20F and recently diagnosed autistic after signs were dismissed throughout childhood. My 50M father believes autism is a mental illness that can be fixed with diet, exercise, nature, spirituality, and apparently the vagus nerve. During severe sensory overload, I asked him to step away, but he followed me to my room and turned my meltdown into a lecture about himself. He ignores boundaries, questions my intelligence, and thinks he has personally saved everyone he has ever met. I leave for college soon. Do I try to educate him, or just protect my peace?

I tried a beef burger for the first time and i dont really eat new foods at all which id assume is relatable among most of us

It was cause my bf ordered it from McDonald's for me without telling me and it was completely plain except for ketchup and I was scared to try it but did anyway and I actually liked it and ate the whole thing.

Like ive had the chicken burger in there before and liked it and he knew I would like it cause I like the bun from the chicken one and i like beef.

But yea im thankful for him helping me try new things and he even got me a backup meal just incase and hes honestly such an angel.

I’m in another sub and I’m getting a jumped on because I’m asking a simple question to not ask the poster about what caused their trauma. If they wanted to share, they would volunteer that. I don’t understand what’s hard about that. The comment I responded to said they didn’t understand how someone from a stable family could have trauma and where did the trauma came from? I just think that question is wildly inappropriate because even without asking gruesome details just asking someone hey how are you? Traumatized is kind of fucked up. Am I wrong? I wasn’t mean about it. All I simply said was that question is not respectful and they do not owe you that information that’s it and yet people are attacking me for it.

So I recently was diagnosed im 33 high masking , ive always clicked my teeth and looped songs and shook my leg, I also play drums which may have seconded as a hand flapping outlet in some ways. But last night, I was on the cusp of like a rabbit hole of rumination of rejection dysphoria, and spinning out, and worrying about being a freak ( something like this happened 2 years ago and i was insanely depressed for like 6 months) out of nowhere i like got out of my seat and stimmed HARDCORE for like 30 seconds, walking in circles flapping my hands swaying on my toes and i was intensely focused on it. it was like something my body HAD to do, and the only way i can describe it is that it almost felt euphoric. and i swear it was like magic, once it was over I immediately settled down. and those really shitty thoughts dwindled into nothing. It was so strange like i KNEW what i was doing knew it looked weird (luckily i was alone) but i had no control over it and it was it felt SO GOOD (like not in a weird way but like (this feels natural way)) Its so strange though cause ive never done that before and ive never had those really shitty feelings just dissolve like that. it was fucking amazing, all those years of falling into these spirals and all i should have been doing was stimming a bit. It's such a weird shocking unusual thing. I'm still kind of in disbelief how quickly that crash out i KNEW was coming just popped out of existence. Any way thank you for coming to my TED talk

tonight someone very kindly cooked for me, but it was different to what i usually have and was a specific part of chicken which i really cant eat, it had nerves and was pink due to it being a different area on the chicken, also it had a different texture, and i didnt know how to voice that i couldnt physically eat it, since if i did i thought id get shouted at or told im being ridiculous, so i didnt know what else to do, so i unintentionally start crying.. my family members then go on to shout at me and tell me to just eat it and get over it and that the only reason i dont want to eat it is since im staring at it.

i wish they knew what it felt like to be as restricted as i am, its not me being picky or that i want to be like this when it comes to food, i physically cannot stomach other foods except the things i usually have and i wish they could understand it isnt just me being rude.

i apologised for being unable to eat it and left.

luckily the person who cooked for me understands i have these issues whether its new foods or textures, so she (mostly) understands, however i left the whole situation feeling misunderstood and seen as being rude and im just honestly in pieces and overwhelmed from everyone shouting at me at once, it also didnt help with me not being able to say what i felt in that moment and what was wrong.