This is such a good video, I’ll probably share it with family too https://youtu.be/iGZoRQLbqdI

I will say one of the best things about realising I’m autistic is I can find advice that actually works and experiences I relate to personally rather than hypnotically.

My whole life whenever I’ve sought advice my reaction to it has been “yeah I can see how that makes sense but I think that’s for other people”, and now I know why. Now I get to find things that actually help *me*!

What that video says is soooooo true though, finding little ways to care for yourself better make such a huge difference.

For example, I’m currently in the middle of a shutdown (a thing I now have a word for!) because after weeks of pushing myself on the jigsaws and then autism research, I had a guy in my flat yesterday making loud noises for over an hour to install a fire door.

I’m still in the habit of trying to push myself to work, I want to keep up momentum on my project, but because I know what I’m going through I allowed myself to go much easier even though I took yesterday off.

I’m still a huge mess lol, but now I am actually developing techniques to avoid burnout! It’s so exciting!

I’m exhausted, but excited and optimistic! It’s wild!

What the fuck, not everyone has visual snow????

Are you fucking kidding me?! Whaaaaaaaaat the hell! 🤯

This Wikipedia image almost feels like an attack lol, but it is cool to have a name for the little white dots that skate around my eyes when I look out a window (shame the name is gross tho)

Anyway my first memory of having visual snow is in second year at school when I told my classmates that I could “see the air”.

Anyway this isn’t an explicitly autistic thing, but it’s apparently it’s pretty common among autistic people and I had no idea there were people who just… don’t see it.

I feel like everyone should ask themselves “could I be autistic?” and taking just a little time to research.

It would solve so many problems:
1. Everyone would understand autism better
2. Fewer autistic people spending years thinking something is wrong with them and not knowing why
3. I stop having to fight the urge to personally tell specific people in my life that maybe they should think about it

Like, I try not to think about whether someone I know might be autistic because obviously it’s none of my business, but it’s hard not to when going over memories and thinking about distinct autistic things “yeah but X does that too”. And I know some people are going to be more resistant to the possibility if they feel confronted by it or that it’s imposed on them.

But also, the realisation that I’m autistic has been SO GOOD for me and such a huge relief, who wouldn’t want that for people they love?

Anyway, what I’m saying is please normalise the idea that everyone should give the possibility some consideration and that it’s okay whatever conclusion they come to (or whether they decide to even say)

Seriously though, that urge to tell specific people. It’s so strong, especially with family. How the fuck do I even deal with that?

Maybe I just… come out as autistic to them and drop some info to explain it… that also happens to list common traits they might notice? Okay no that feels manipulative that’s definitely not it.

btw if you know me, you’re reading this and thinking it’s about you - trust me it isn’t.

But also, everyone should give it some thought so I’m not going to tell you not to consider it.

Anyway in other news I really should get some sunglasses because I was just looking at a page in a sudoku book thinking “damn, I wish this book had a dark mode”

Okay, right, I mentioned near the start of the thread that I’d have some thoughts on stims vs tics and I think I’ve figured out what they are.

The TL;DR is, I think they are the same thing with different levels of severity.

Which is to say some things I’d call stims, some I’d call tics, but there is an overlap where they are some degree of both. I think both serve the same purpose (in me at least)

The distinction I’ve found other people say is stims are voluntary, tics are involuntary. I think this probably comes from people with one condition not wanting to step on the toes of another, to stay in their lanes. Which is super fair and admirable, I just think these lanes are reeeeeaaaaallly close and they seem to overlap.

What I’d say about this distinction is voluntary/involuntary is a false binary, things are much more interesting than that!

For tics it’s pretty accepted that if you feel them coming you can suppress them (for a time), otherwise they come out without warning. That already is some variable stuff!

I’ve also heard about stims that if you need to stim you’re going to stim one way or another, even if it’s not super apparent, that’s not clearly voluntary either, you can sim by choice or unconsciously.

All this stuff is way more murky than most people will talk about when making distinctions between stims and tics!

Anyway now I’ll jump into my personal tics/stims discovery journey:

A little while after starting antidepressants I noticed myself ticcing, it started fairly simple but progressed to a variety of complex tics including vocal tics. tbh, it had me really worried something was scarily wrong with my brain!

After a while though, I realised I’d always done things like this, but I’d just kept it tapped down and private in a way I couldn’t do anymore.

I sort of learned that in *some* cases, I could redirect a tic into something else, so instead of shouting “fuck” in the GP’s waiting room, I could wave my hand are make little mouth pops.

These could take pressure off the urge to tic until I was somewhere I could do it safely.

I realise now I was less redirecting a tic than stimming to manage the stress that was prompting it.

When I started thinking I could be autistic I allowed myself to stim much more, and something I’ve noticed in the time since is that as a result I’m ticcing A LOT less.

I am definitely still ticcing, but I haven’t had my tics exhaust me for a while now, it used to be every day.

My current theory is that I was unconsciously stimming my whole life, “oh I always ticced but I was keeping it down” nope that was probably stimming.

But when I started the antidepressants, my guess is they did something to change how I regulate, I had no vent for stimulation in my body and it became tics.

And I think that’s all it comes down to, they are both just ways of regulating this energy in your body/brain but they just have different levels of urgency. Stims are usually lower urgency so you have greater control on how they come out, tics usually have much greater urgency so they can be completely unexpected and uncontrollable. And of course there is a whole world of middle ground in between the extremes.

Anyway those are my thoughts rn, they may change over time but this is what seems true to me at least.

Omg I just remembered one of the biggest stims I did as a kid: chewing/sucking my sleeves and collar. I ruined a few of my school jumpers and would often have damp marks from it. I remember my mum telling me to stop, I guess I did?

I feel really nostalgic about it now somehow.

Took out an old hoodie and look, physical evidence!

Imposter syndrome can choke on a shit!

ngl this stim is still S-tier for me.

though I can't explain why most food is disgusting to me but fabric in my mouth is just fine.

since I brought up a ranking, here is my tier list for stims I've rediscovered, were already doing without realising, or tried out just to see:

S: Bite/suck on thick fabric, Shake fists hard
A: Rattle/roll dice, Flap hands, Music, Rain Sounds, Jumping
B: Spin in circles, Rock side to side, Touch thumbs to fingers
C: Sway, Speed cube (sexy move), Pop-it
D: Alternate snapping fingers as fast as possible, Leg bounce, Tap face/head
F/Hell: Shiver, Blink hard, Scratching, Bite skin

Different stims seem to help with different things, and sometimes I recognise I'm starting to stress and haven't been stimming, so I'll have to cycle a few until I pick one that helps (sometimes hitting ones that make it worse on the way D:). It's much easier when the right one just comes unconsciously.

Also there is no E tier, this is partly due to the nature of stims, but mostly due to me not proof-reading ever.

okay, everyone stop,

you can get bracelets to chew on.

chewelry.

CHEWELRY.

This is a fucking game changer.

Game changer?

Wait…

My autism, and all the resources that can help me… they were… !

Learning that not being good at reaching out to friends but still considering them friends even if you don’t get in touch for years is an autistic thing.

It’s wild how much of my personality can just get filed into this one box.

Also makes me feel bad for allistic people tbh, thinking someone isn’t your friend just because they haven’t spoken to you must really suck.

But also I guess if you’re reaching out to friends all the time maybe it’s not an issue? Seems like one of those cases where some neurotypes work well together but others have a bunch of incompatible kinds of communication.

Definitely aspects of my experience I don’t like too though of course. I have a regular group chat with some friends every week, I love it. But if everyone else stopped I doubt I’d try to bring everyone back together even though it would make me happy to keep seeing them. There’s no logic to it but it’s how I’d be, I rely on others to be social. Which is a problem when I’m super particular about what social stuff I am okay with.

This is probably also why all the D&D games I’ve run fail, when the party misses a couple of weeks I don’t have it in me to arrange a new session.

tbh I enjoy being a player more anyway, so I guess that’s fine.

btw if you’re looking for someone to join your online group… 🙋

I’m just going to say it: I love my autism.

So glad I got all those vaccinations as a kid.

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(The second line is a joke, though I am glad for that for unrelated reasons!)

Ooooooh, so “scripting” is the name for the garden of dialogue trees I keep in my mind for various situations.

tbh it’s super illogical for me to keep such a thing because like every conversation goes into unplanned territory after a couple of branches, and then I’m back to “shit fuck think of what to say and how to say it and then find the right time to say it before the moment is lost and I lose my talk buffer and get discussion lag.”