I constantly worry my friends are not my friends... That they're friends out of pity and eventually I'll be too much and they'll leave.
A few have gotten past this ceiling, and I love them more than I have words to tell them with. 🥹
I find it difficult to just be me.
To stim as needed.
To use whatever helps me.
To enjoy things I enjoy.
To express joy.
And there's still some left over internalized ablism... A twinge when I or another act too autistic/weird. At least I can refrain from speaking it, and it's lessened with time. I do hate that part of me.
@theautisticcoach@actuallyautistic Constant fear of what other people might be thinking of me. Probably also contributes to my instinct to be as invisible as possible.
@theautisticcoach@actuallyautistic
I learned to mask in various ways - attempted with varying degrees of success to hide my academic ability, tried with very limited success to improve my sports abilities, adopted other people’s tastes in clothes, music etc as my own… basically lost myself.
@theautisticcoach
Getting bullied led to me staying home more and getting really good at computers and video games; intensified masking to the point where it was probably making things worse (for a while I tried to dress like the rich kid douchenozzles who picked on me, and no it did not convince them to accept me); and boxing lessons after the time I was physically beaten up. After I made sure everyone knew about boxing though they never bothered me again, at least not to my face. That was middle school. In high school I started dressing anti-nazi punk (think Sid Vicious look, Dead Kennedys attitude plus skateboarding) and that mostly scared the usual assholes away but led to me being threatened and chased by actual nazis. Sadly, only learning self defense was effective, though I realize that isn’t an option for all of us. @actuallyautistic
@theautisticcoach It has lead to me having major trust issues with people. In the past, I have been treated like a dog and a verbal punching-bag.
Because of it, I get paranoid of going to any soical event and I usually mostly quite as I have no idea what to say/do without being scared about the 'what if it would happen again?' BS in my head.
@theautisticcoach@actuallyautistic I switched schools repeatedly to start over and get away from it but eventually I wanted to stay put and got into fist fights. It was very liberating, because I was surprisingly good at it. I was so good at it that I did black bloc protesting, punching Nazis. I found my people doing it.
@theautisticcoach@actuallyautistic I switched schools repeatedly to start over and get away from it but eventually I wanted to stay put and got into fist fights. It was very liberating, because I was surprisingly good at it.
I absolutely hate teasing as a social bonding ritual. I know it really is nice for folks when they all consent to it, but I never consented to it and in my family of origin it was a tool to silence me. I hate it and cannot tolerate it unless I get swift reminders I am actually loved.
@theautisticcoach@actuallyautistic I'm not like others. I get pissed instead of embarrassed. The bullying I went through toughened me. I am working on being less of a jerk when people judge me. The "other" people made me like this. It is my job to modify it to co-habitate.
@theautisticcoach@actuallyautistic It's hard to know - I experienced a lot of passive stuff, like being ignored by all my classmates, which may or may not really count as bullying, and my general social struggles at that age are hard to distinguish from my experience of school generally... I do sometimes use situations where I was actively bullied as data points in deciding what to do/avoid now, so in that sense even one-off events are still affecting me.
@theautisticcoach@actuallyautistic I used to have pretty low self esteem, and I still have a hard time making friends with other women because my bullies were all female. People didn't just bully me, though. I got treated like an outcast in school. I still kinda feel like an outcast sometimes. I'm more masculine and like to wear men's clothes, so I often get called sir. I'm almost 40 though, and I don't really care what people think of me anymore.