Yes! I hate phone calls because I have to think and speak on the fly, without a chance to digest first what the other person said, and without a chance to analyze how my response might come off or how I might improve it to better explain what I’m trying to get across. Email and written communication allows me to do that.
had a therapist say “do you think your social anxiety causes you to assume the worst? Would you agree?” I said NOPE. I’ve literally had numerous people to my face say I was rude, disrespectful, and unpleasant to be around… when I wasn’t trying to do any of that, and was just speaking normally. or just spoken over in conversations and ignored. the social anxiety certainly doesn’t help, but it feels warranted when I’ve been having people criticize my entire life and always assuming I have the worst intentions
I do really want friends, my partner is the only person that I socialize with. when I talk to coworkers, I feel a bit more energized and less alone. social connection is super important, humans are social creatures. I just want someone to fucking directly tell me when they are offended and not just ghost me. I’m always trying to improve my social skills. I can’t if NO ONE tells me anything
I think they often call us rude because they don't have another word for describing something in our air, or "vibes" that they don't like.
Rudeness is something committed rather than omitted. If they can't say what thing you did was rude, chances are there wasn't one. If you didn't say something they hoped you'd say, or if your body language was different than they expected, neither of those things are rude.
god I've had this so much from counsellors etc, I'm "assuming the worst" because it's my experience of interacting with people, it's not catastrophising if its likely to happen
I got told this recently when I was talking to my therapist about my family. I told her I'd rather think about every single thing that could happen then expect it to randomly go well (when it never has with them) and be blind sided and not know how to react in the situation. I tried telling her I'd have a meltdown and it wouldn't go well at all but I'm starting to think she just has no idea how autism actually affects people.
Or how autistic people function in toxic family dynamics.
Yeeeep and even if/when I do understand soemthing, it doesn't mean it magically becomes easy for me. It's still draining and exhausting. It still means some people expect you to be masked and treat you like garbage if you're not masked.
Like, it's not fun socializing most of the time. It's hard explaining that to someone who can't empathize with autism lol
I 100% agree. Therapy needs to take into account that the same things are not good for everybody, and there is not a one-size-fits-all prescription for improving mental health.
Yep, definitely! This is why pre-diagnosis they thought I had social anxiety and tried to use cbt for it, and got me into a bigger pickle, because I learned to invalidate my own fears, that were actually completely rational and based on real experiences. This is also why it's extremely important, that once you know about the autism, to only choose a therapist who is specialized in autism. Most of us have such a tiny social battery anyways, and others can usually not conceive of how small it is and that the comfort zone for socializing may be super short.
I'm honestly doing so much better since I work from home. On weekdays I spend my days alone, and my partner comes home in the evening. He has adhd, and we both still need a lot of space anyways. I reduce my social interaction to an occasional online work meeting or call, and only plan one physical social outing a week. And I always plan buffers around it, for mental preparation and sensory decompressing etc.
I saw an interview recently between an autistic Youtuber and an autistic therapist, and they were discussing how traditional therapy techniques can actually traumatize autistic people further rather than help. The therapist has written a book called The Autistic Survival Guide to Therapy, based on her experiences both as a professional and a patient. I highly recommend the interview (easy to find if you just search "therapy traumatizes autistics), and while I haven't read the book yet, I'm confident it's a good one based on the interview!
Yes! I remember once trying to explain this to someone. I had had a friend staying for a week (fortunately not in my house, in a nearby hotel) and she assumed that I must have had a great week and be in a great mood. But man, it was exhausting. Even with someone I like and actively went out of my way to spend time with, I didn't fully enjoy it. Being responsible for someone who didn't know the area or where anything was, socialising every single day for five days in a row, doing stuff he wanted to do that I wasn't keen on and wouldn't normally to be a good host etc etc. I also realised too late that he had gotten heavily into alcohol at exactly the point I'd decided to get out, so spent most of the evenings watching him getting drunk lol. Not the same if you're not joining in.
I felt at the end of it almost like ending the friendship. And that was with someone I liked, and had actively asked to come. Previously he'd come for two or three days, it was too much. She could NOT understand, just looked at me blankly as I tried to explain that socialising doesn't always leave me feeling good at all. Even when it goes right. Perhaps it's because it's not naturally what I do day to day - the kind of 'shock' of a very different 'pace' to things? I felt sad after he left as well, despite secretly counting down the days. I felt like I can't win with my emotions, when he wasn't there I'd miss him and want to hang out, when he came to visit I just wanted him gone. I don't know how much of it is me and how much of it ASD. Whatever, it sucks. It would be so easy if socialising was what made things better, people are EVERYWHERE. There's 8 billion of them. It would make life so much easier.
Excellently articulated point! While its not wise to get too isolated, subjecting yourself to social torture and ostrasizing from your peers is a reiteration of trauma. While its good to maintain social connections, I've noticed that anxiety and stress tends to go way down when I'm by myself, and being alone allows me time to recuperate from dealing with the public.
I don't these therapists understand that it is not some sort of ignorance of social information, but a differentiation in the way your neural networks is wired, and practice can help, but will not "fix" your social skills or make you able to interact normally all the time without burnout or rejection.
Seriously! I have a hard time putting my experience into words and this subreddit is so incredibly helpful. I'd expect that therapists would listen to the more articulate of us but apparently it's still a challenge.
This is actually one big reason I've mostly given up on trying to get into therapy! Before I was aware that I might be more than ADHD, I tried multiple times at multiple therapists to explain my struggles, and every one of them either triggered me with 'tough love' or seemed so baffled my take on things that they ended up telling me they couldn't help me. Looking back, I now know that I was probably throwing out tism flags left and right and they simply didn't know what that looks like. But it still was an exercise in frustration and pissing money away that I can't really afford. It's just so disheartening to explain in clear words *why* socializing strains me and ask for coping mechanisms to avoid burnout, and be told 'you just need to accept that everyone has doubts about how they're perceived, and it only gets better with practice'. Like dude...I literally do not have social anxiety; what I *do* have is a very small social battery and I just need advice for how to gracefully leave when I'm getting overwhelmed, so I can avoid looking rude or rousing concern when I need to dip out. Nothing irritates me like someone ignoring what I actually say and filling in their own blanks with assumptions, especially after I've told them take me at face value and simply ask me, if they think I'm trying to imply something 🤦♀️
This is why I feel as if therapy doesn’t work for me! It’s as if they always dismiss my trauma and try to push me into socializing or being “normal.” I know that complete solitude isn’t healthy, but it sure beats constantly being exposed to harsh judgment and rejection all the time. I isolate myself for a reason. Practicing putting myself out there while I’m still traumatized by people is only going to make me feel worse. It’s going to push me to retreat further into my shell.
I’ve only had maybe 5 or 6 sessions with my new therapist and she’s already acting as if we’ve made progress when I haven’t been feeling any better. She doesn’t seem to get that I’m still struggling to heal from the emotional pain I’ve been dealing with for years. I’ve told her all of this plenty of times, but she still thinks that I can push through by thinking more positively and practicing being around people again. It’s not going to be that simple for someone like me…
The best thing I ever did for myself was stop forcing myself to socialize like a neurotypical person would. Learn to accept who you are and build your life to suit that person.
I wish I would have learned this earlier in my life. There are so many times in the past when I pushed myself to attend some social event that I didn’t enjoy. I wish I had stayed home reading books more when I was in my twenties.
Therapists never understood me and always wanted me too change like the typical person..
In the recent years I cut ties from toxic people in my college and I don't WANT them to reach me at all! I don't want to call unwanted calls or texts..
*Now an unwanted number called me - I always AVOID and BLOCK*
We should be how we want
There’s just so so few of us therapists that specialize in adhd and autism. It requires a lot of additional knowledge on top of usual therapeutic knowledge. I’m sadly, not shocked at how bad some people’s experiences have been. It makes me so disappointed to hear that you and so many go through this. (I am diagnosed ADHD, suspected autistic).
>if I'm isolating for awhile it isn't necessarily detrimental to my mental health, it's sometimes the only thing saving me
Same. I find more comfort and warmth talking to people on reddit than I do with people irl.
It's like I go into fight or flight mode everytime I socialize or have to interact with a person. Being completely alone makes it go away. And because I've always had people around, big family, I've been in a constant state of fight or flight my whole life. Told my therapist I don't think I've EVER felt relaxed. Thankfully she understands although she still doesn't know how to help lol
[удалено]
had a psychatrist yell at me for not doing phone calls. i just never returned, ghosted her. Screw people yelling at me.
That's fucked up 😧
This is such a thoughtful and nuanced explanation. Thank you.
Yes! I hate phone calls because I have to think and speak on the fly, without a chance to digest first what the other person said, and without a chance to analyze how my response might come off or how I might improve it to better explain what I’m trying to get across. Email and written communication allows me to do that.
had a therapist say “do you think your social anxiety causes you to assume the worst? Would you agree?” I said NOPE. I’ve literally had numerous people to my face say I was rude, disrespectful, and unpleasant to be around… when I wasn’t trying to do any of that, and was just speaking normally. or just spoken over in conversations and ignored. the social anxiety certainly doesn’t help, but it feels warranted when I’ve been having people criticize my entire life and always assuming I have the worst intentions I do really want friends, my partner is the only person that I socialize with. when I talk to coworkers, I feel a bit more energized and less alone. social connection is super important, humans are social creatures. I just want someone to fucking directly tell me when they are offended and not just ghost me. I’m always trying to improve my social skills. I can’t if NO ONE tells me anything
I think they often call us rude because they don't have another word for describing something in our air, or "vibes" that they don't like. Rudeness is something committed rather than omitted. If they can't say what thing you did was rude, chances are there wasn't one. If you didn't say something they hoped you'd say, or if your body language was different than they expected, neither of those things are rude.
god I've had this so much from counsellors etc, I'm "assuming the worst" because it's my experience of interacting with people, it's not catastrophising if its likely to happen
I got told this recently when I was talking to my therapist about my family. I told her I'd rather think about every single thing that could happen then expect it to randomly go well (when it never has with them) and be blind sided and not know how to react in the situation. I tried telling her I'd have a meltdown and it wouldn't go well at all but I'm starting to think she just has no idea how autism actually affects people. Or how autistic people function in toxic family dynamics.
Yeah. The "just do it" method forgets that ASD doesn't understand how.
Or it doesn’t benefit us
Yeeeep and even if/when I do understand soemthing, it doesn't mean it magically becomes easy for me. It's still draining and exhausting. It still means some people expect you to be masked and treat you like garbage if you're not masked. Like, it's not fun socializing most of the time. It's hard explaining that to someone who can't empathize with autism lol
I 100% agree. Therapy needs to take into account that the same things are not good for everybody, and there is not a one-size-fits-all prescription for improving mental health.
Yep, definitely! This is why pre-diagnosis they thought I had social anxiety and tried to use cbt for it, and got me into a bigger pickle, because I learned to invalidate my own fears, that were actually completely rational and based on real experiences. This is also why it's extremely important, that once you know about the autism, to only choose a therapist who is specialized in autism. Most of us have such a tiny social battery anyways, and others can usually not conceive of how small it is and that the comfort zone for socializing may be super short. I'm honestly doing so much better since I work from home. On weekdays I spend my days alone, and my partner comes home in the evening. He has adhd, and we both still need a lot of space anyways. I reduce my social interaction to an occasional online work meeting or call, and only plan one physical social outing a week. And I always plan buffers around it, for mental preparation and sensory decompressing etc.
The NTs who bully and exclude are the ones guilty of antisocial behavior.
I saw an interview recently between an autistic Youtuber and an autistic therapist, and they were discussing how traditional therapy techniques can actually traumatize autistic people further rather than help. The therapist has written a book called The Autistic Survival Guide to Therapy, based on her experiences both as a professional and a patient. I highly recommend the interview (easy to find if you just search "therapy traumatizes autistics), and while I haven't read the book yet, I'm confident it's a good one based on the interview!
I saw this too, it was such a good video. I think it was YoSamdySam’s video
Yes! I remember once trying to explain this to someone. I had had a friend staying for a week (fortunately not in my house, in a nearby hotel) and she assumed that I must have had a great week and be in a great mood. But man, it was exhausting. Even with someone I like and actively went out of my way to spend time with, I didn't fully enjoy it. Being responsible for someone who didn't know the area or where anything was, socialising every single day for five days in a row, doing stuff he wanted to do that I wasn't keen on and wouldn't normally to be a good host etc etc. I also realised too late that he had gotten heavily into alcohol at exactly the point I'd decided to get out, so spent most of the evenings watching him getting drunk lol. Not the same if you're not joining in. I felt at the end of it almost like ending the friendship. And that was with someone I liked, and had actively asked to come. Previously he'd come for two or three days, it was too much. She could NOT understand, just looked at me blankly as I tried to explain that socialising doesn't always leave me feeling good at all. Even when it goes right. Perhaps it's because it's not naturally what I do day to day - the kind of 'shock' of a very different 'pace' to things? I felt sad after he left as well, despite secretly counting down the days. I felt like I can't win with my emotions, when he wasn't there I'd miss him and want to hang out, when he came to visit I just wanted him gone. I don't know how much of it is me and how much of it ASD. Whatever, it sucks. It would be so easy if socialising was what made things better, people are EVERYWHERE. There's 8 billion of them. It would make life so much easier.
Excellently articulated point! While its not wise to get too isolated, subjecting yourself to social torture and ostrasizing from your peers is a reiteration of trauma. While its good to maintain social connections, I've noticed that anxiety and stress tends to go way down when I'm by myself, and being alone allows me time to recuperate from dealing with the public. I don't these therapists understand that it is not some sort of ignorance of social information, but a differentiation in the way your neural networks is wired, and practice can help, but will not "fix" your social skills or make you able to interact normally all the time without burnout or rejection.
Yeah, everyone keeps thinking I'm depressed because I don't want to hang out with people. I'm not depressed, it's exhausting to hold a conversation
THANK YOU
It really bothers me that we have such well spoken and detailed people in out community, and therapists still don't change shit.
Seriously! I have a hard time putting my experience into words and this subreddit is so incredibly helpful. I'd expect that therapists would listen to the more articulate of us but apparently it's still a challenge.
maybe we all just have to write a ton of letters to our therapists where we have time to articulate stuff and explain in detail after research :D
This is actually one big reason I've mostly given up on trying to get into therapy! Before I was aware that I might be more than ADHD, I tried multiple times at multiple therapists to explain my struggles, and every one of them either triggered me with 'tough love' or seemed so baffled my take on things that they ended up telling me they couldn't help me. Looking back, I now know that I was probably throwing out tism flags left and right and they simply didn't know what that looks like. But it still was an exercise in frustration and pissing money away that I can't really afford. It's just so disheartening to explain in clear words *why* socializing strains me and ask for coping mechanisms to avoid burnout, and be told 'you just need to accept that everyone has doubts about how they're perceived, and it only gets better with practice'. Like dude...I literally do not have social anxiety; what I *do* have is a very small social battery and I just need advice for how to gracefully leave when I'm getting overwhelmed, so I can avoid looking rude or rousing concern when I need to dip out. Nothing irritates me like someone ignoring what I actually say and filling in their own blanks with assumptions, especially after I've told them take me at face value and simply ask me, if they think I'm trying to imply something 🤦♀️
This is why I feel as if therapy doesn’t work for me! It’s as if they always dismiss my trauma and try to push me into socializing or being “normal.” I know that complete solitude isn’t healthy, but it sure beats constantly being exposed to harsh judgment and rejection all the time. I isolate myself for a reason. Practicing putting myself out there while I’m still traumatized by people is only going to make me feel worse. It’s going to push me to retreat further into my shell. I’ve only had maybe 5 or 6 sessions with my new therapist and she’s already acting as if we’ve made progress when I haven’t been feeling any better. She doesn’t seem to get that I’m still struggling to heal from the emotional pain I’ve been dealing with for years. I’ve told her all of this plenty of times, but she still thinks that I can push through by thinking more positively and practicing being around people again. It’s not going to be that simple for someone like me…
The best thing I ever did for myself was stop forcing myself to socialize like a neurotypical person would. Learn to accept who you are and build your life to suit that person.
I wish I would have learned this earlier in my life. There are so many times in the past when I pushed myself to attend some social event that I didn’t enjoy. I wish I had stayed home reading books more when I was in my twenties.
God you guys just get me
Therapists never understood me and always wanted me too change like the typical person.. In the recent years I cut ties from toxic people in my college and I don't WANT them to reach me at all! I don't want to call unwanted calls or texts.. *Now an unwanted number called me - I always AVOID and BLOCK* We should be how we want
There’s just so so few of us therapists that specialize in adhd and autism. It requires a lot of additional knowledge on top of usual therapeutic knowledge. I’m sadly, not shocked at how bad some people’s experiences have been. It makes me so disappointed to hear that you and so many go through this. (I am diagnosed ADHD, suspected autistic).
>if I'm isolating for awhile it isn't necessarily detrimental to my mental health, it's sometimes the only thing saving me Same. I find more comfort and warmth talking to people on reddit than I do with people irl.
I agree.
It's like I go into fight or flight mode everytime I socialize or have to interact with a person. Being completely alone makes it go away. And because I've always had people around, big family, I've been in a constant state of fight or flight my whole life. Told my therapist I don't think I've EVER felt relaxed. Thankfully she understands although she still doesn't know how to help lol