🧵 Ok so I’m just starting a thread of autism research/thoughts so that it can be muted if you want/need that:

“Many autistic people report not being able to enjoy humour if it’s at somebody else’s expense.”

This is the kind of thing that makes me worried about people as a whole, I always figured this was true for everyone and the only reason people laughed at “punching down” jokes was because they didn’t properly understand what the joke was about. I don’t know how to feel about a world where people really do understand and just, find it funny anyway…

As an example, when I was little my dad got me some books of anti-Irish jokes and at the time I loved them. I could read them out and everyone laughed, but then I grew up and realised wow, Irish people are actually people! That kind of thing just isn’t funny to me at all anymore. So I always assume laughing at someone’s expense is a result of immaturity or being ill informed? Can people learn and then still be assholes? This can’t be right, right?

Part of what I’m doing is listening to a lot of autistic people to hear about their internal experiences and see what resonates, and in the process I’m finding people I wish I knew about on YouTube much sooner. Eg, this is a great video worth watching outside the context of this thread

https://youtu.be/Nnd74yyf4nQ

Okay, yeah, I’m autistic.

In the end I couldn’t really find anything that could disagree with that conclusion, I even went to research melt/shutdowns and that only triggered some stuff I didn’t need to remember. It all just makes so much sense, it’s so relatable, I’m autistic. Feels like it’s heavy and a relief at the same time somehow.

So yeah, expect toots from me on this topic as I figure things out personally. Like I’ve had a lot of thoughts on where stims and tics meet/overlap and I expect it’s going to take me a while longer to know what the fuck is up with that, especially since I’ve heard personal descriptions of both that are fucking IDENTICAL.

Also given I’ll be tooting about the topic, I feel I better add a disclaimer to my bio that the puzzle piece in my username is unrelated…

… I mean, it’s completely related since it’s my current special interest, but it’s not related in THAT way.

So I saw a couple of things about how autistic folk who have been masking without realising for a very long time tend to dissociate a lot from their bodies to cope with overwhelming sensory information, and that it can be beneficial to consciously try to listen to your body more, a little at a time.

Anyway I’m rediscovering all kinds of sensations and it’s A LOT. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised but yeah, it’s no wonder I had to switch off to cope. A middle ground would be nice.

Examples:
- I haven’t shaved my legs for a little bit, they feel like sandpaper against each other
- I feel like I’m noticing every bump and motion in the building, when a neighbour moves around I worry the floor will collapse
- The carpet feels like scratching on my eyes if I look too long
- Some lights are just too bright, I have to cover my eyes to be in the room
- Water on your hands, not the wetness necessary, but the change in temperature, it starts to feel like freezing ice

There’s a lot of other things too, and it can feel like I’m aware of it all at once. “Listening to your body” seems more like a “floodgates opening” thing than a “try a bit at a time” thing.

I guess I’m glad I gave it a shot though, by experiencing it presently and knowing what I do now, it means I can recognise all the things I did without realising to cope with it. I can make actual choices about which I want to keep up, whether they are worth it, what other options might be, and maybe I’ll find times I can turn off the numbing and enjoy it.

I probably should try to find ways to make my sensory experience a little easier I guess, even if I’m dissociating and ignoring my senses, it doesn’t mean they aren’t still screaming.

Um, holy fuck, it seems like most of my childhood memories are linked to senses? I just remembered SO MUCH about my first year of primary school! I was feeling chilled so I tried to imagine a time when I was warmer, cue a memory of summer in the playground and then a flood of connected memories came!

Bonus: the memory of being warm helped! I don’t really understand but maybe my memory isn’t as bad as I thought, I just don’t know how to use it?

Anyway, we had frogs! They were so cute! I cried when the last one was released into the school pond because it was my friend (one that was perfect, because we were always on opposite sides of glass lol)

Just so many things clicking into place, like “how come everyone else can look forward on a bright sunny day and I can’t?” There’s hundreds of little things like that and suddenly I have an answer for all of them.

It’s simultaneously like I’m knowing myself better than ever, but at the same time it’s so huge a change in perspective of myself I feel like I have no idea who I am. There’s maybe some version of me that can know who they are in the world? That’s wild and scary.

Learned that sympathy and empathy are not the same thing and I’ve only kind-of been performing one and feeling the other. Which is like, okay sure, yes it’s mind blowing but add it to the list or whatever.

What is not okay are that one place’s definition of one matches others’ definition of the other and vice versa. And then there is affective empathy vs cognitive empathy and all the terms and definitions are just put in a blender.

Fucking standardise your shit, society!

tbh I think this is probably something that just isn’t understood properly anyway, since my emotional experience is hard to map exactly to any of the definitions I find.

Like, I think sympathy is something I perform as an immediate response to stuff, but it turns into deep empathy given time and thought? It takes less time if it’s something I’ve experienced before (first hand or with someone close).

When someone says something rough and others are like “I feel bad for you” I’m usually at “I don’t understand yet but I want you to know I care about you so I’ll say I feel bad for you because that’s what people who care do.”

My main feelings at the time are ones of distance and sadness at the distance- that someone I care about is out of reach and I can’t understand or help them.

Plus the usual “wait fuck what is this some new social test? Quick, act like a human, how would a human act right now?”

Also of course there are a bunch of times I don’t react at all because I don’t even realise a problem has been presented until way later. And then I spend a long time wondering if I am supposed to go back to the person to talk about it or if that is weird.

There was a time my mum told me that she very nearly had an abortion when she was pregnant with me, but it was a little euphemistic so I didn’t notice until on my own hours later and had to figure out how to talk to her about it to say it was okay and she didn’t have to feel bad about it. That is maybe another story but the point is she was unloading a huge emotional burden she’d been carrying and it was just so alien to me I didn’t even notice at the time.

Fucking hell recalling this kind of story and it sounds like such cliché autistic stuff. It’s fucking wild how I’m only now realising it.

If I’d ever just taken five minutes to examine my life with a “Autistic maybe?” lens I’d have figured it out in no time. 🙃

Just want to take a moment to say how validating it is to hear other autistic people talk about their experiences. So many little parts of myself and my life I thought were wrong, but it turns out they are just different to what was around me (and are shared with a whole lot of people after all!)

It lets me really feel like I don’t have to be so sheepish about my quirks.

“Why don’t you like beans on toast?”
BECAUSE BEANS ARE FUCKING WET AND TOAST IS FUCKING DRY. WHAT KIND OF MONSTER ARE YOU TO THINK THEY ARE SUPPOSED TO TOUCH IN ANY PLACE BUT MY TUMMY?!

I mean, I’ll probably not be quite so harsh lol, but there’s a new confidence in myself I never had ❤️

But yeah seriously, every time someone talks about how they have focused so much on trying to seem like they are paying attention as a normal person that they didn’t notice what was being said, I feel so connected and real.

And then the shame of feeling like you’re lying by smiling and nodding as if you understand? Ugh I’m just not going to sweat it anymore. I’ll listen my way or not at all. 💪

Okay so here’a a story. When I was a kid, I was a “picky eater” - something that was not especially indulged by my parents at the time. They took the stance that I’d simply learn to eat properly or go hungry, but when faced with food that grossed me out I would always choose staying hungry. I developed extensive techniques to avoid food to accomplish this!