Autism vs 'Women's Problems'

Hi Trainspotter,

‘Turning the tables’ may sometimes help i.e. when you are told to ‘snap out of it,’ gently offer back ‘would you like to be told to snap out of it when you are suffering from Period pain, in the same way you have just told me to snap out of being Autistic?’

This may be quite a confrontational method of attempting to get someone to see things from someone else’s (your) perspective. However, sometimes it’s hard to find a way forward without daring to assert yourself as best you can sometimes? And sometimes people genuinely don’t realise what they are saying until you offer it back to them in a way that may help them to recognise their own behaviours, realise what they are thinking, and think about the things they are actually saying.

I still think this situation is worth mentioning to HR as it seems, to me, to be quite harassing actually. I am still entirely failing to understand why your Autism is even entering into any daily conversations with your colleagues, especially in such a negative way. It would be different if Autism was being brought up positively in order to understand and support you better at work. But, why does this woman think she has the right to even talk to you about something so personal to you in such a flippant, ignorant and judgemental way?

So, I still think her comments about Periods may be being used here to justify the unjustifiable. Perhaps she thinks that, by talking about something so personal to her (her Periods,) it somehow gives her the right to talk (bad mouth) about something so personal to you. But it doesn’t.

My fear is that you may be vulnerable here, in trying to understand her and understand her comments in ways that NTs may not be. By this I mean, an NT may spot a mile off when someone is simply being really inappropriate, when boundaries are being crossed, when someone is being unkind etc.; but, due to you being ND, you may not spot these situations as easily. And I would therefore be tempted to go to HR gently and openly in this way and offer to them that you may need help understanding this situation further and their advice about how to manage it.

My bet (hope) is that HR will recognise that this woman is actually being inappropriate in voicing these comments to you.

Having calmed down a bit now (!) from when I first posted, I hope I can explain a bit better as to what I didn't like about the woman in question's comments.  It was that she didn't seem to understand at all about Autism.  A lot of people seem to have the attitude (not just women, or women's problems may I add) that 'we all feel like that at times' in a way that says that the problems of Autism are quite trite  Trying to say that I don't feel like that 'at times' but all the time, I find maddening.  And then to be told by a colleague at work that her problems as a woman exceed my problems and that I should just snap out of it and try harder was not very helpful at all!

I agree. I get pmt and although it messes up your emotions it is nothing like a meltdown.  Like oktanol said, it really just increases the chances of a meltdown/frequency of meltdowns, but pmt on its own does not create meltdowns.  Maybe talk to her about it so that she can gain a greater understanding of autism? Try not to let it get to you, she is probably just uncomfortable as she doesn't understand what autism really is and what you are going through.  Unfortunately us autistics are frequently misunderstood which can cause many more problems on top of the ones we are already dealing with.  I hope that in time you can overcome these problems and any misunderstanding on her behalf. x

Hmm, not sure, I don't get pmt, but I don't think it is like a meltdown, if anything it makes a meltdown more likely to happen. Otherwise it makes some women quite irritable but I'd say compared to a meltdown it's possible to keep it under a bit more control (unless it causes a meltdown), but then that will differ from person to person. And menopause comes with a whole range of issues too, and they are probably not very nice eiher. Don't think people need official workplace support for pmt, maybe a few with menopause problems, but just others not taking things too personal and being a bit nice even if it doesn't seem particularly well-deserved at the very time is probably often enough. That's helpful with all sorts of mood-problems, I guess. Saying this, I don't mean that you shouldn't take the comments she has for you personal, I mean more if she or someone else is generally irritable and easily explodes about little or nothing.

Strong pain isn't a hormone issue as such and  has not much to do with mood really (or with pmt, as it's not "p"), you just aren't in a great mood if you are in enough pain to keel over. If you dislocate your shoulder you'll feel sick too and possibly be sick and you are likely to faint, it's really quite a physical thing. This being belittled is not much better than belittling ASD or whatever issue someone may have. I have no idea if she actually gets it as badly, but I think if you told me that surely it can't be such a big problem, given that it's normal for half the world's population, then I would feel pretty much like you do about her comments regarding ASD. If we don't function the way we would like then we don't need someone telling us to pull ourselves together in one way or another. Not quite sure why this makes her behave like this and make you feel guilty, instead of feeling more like you both have your issues and could both do with a bit of support from the other or at least just being nice to each other. Seems to argue about whose problem is bigger is a complete waste of energy.

Maybe she doesn't mean to make you feel guilty but is just generally frustrated or jealous that you get support while she doesn't, without intentionally blaming you for this but rather the people that decide about it? It's not fair to bombard you with this, but maybe lots of things make everybody a little "autistic", in a sense that it's harder to realise how our actions affect others when we struggle with ourselves for whatever reason?

I can see that this is not so easy for you (or for me for the same reason) but the same way you can expect her to at least try to gain a bit of understanding for your issues and certainly not belittle them, she can also expect the same from you. Perhaps neither of you is in a position to fully understand the other, but when both of you at least start from the assumption that it isn't necessarily trivial just because you don't understand it then that would perhaps already help and at least avoid comments that cause upset when neither of you needs it. Not sure though how to make her see that, but maybe by showing some will to make things a bit easier for her if she comes up with something that would help? She seems happy enough to talk about it, so that creates an opportunity to ask, she can still decide not to have any suggestion if she's uncomfortable with this.

Yes unfortunately I am ignorant in this.  I cannot put others in my shoes very easily at all, I tend to put myself in theirs (and I think there is a difference!)  It is very difficult for me, I cannot imagine at all what 'happens' inside in this situation, all as I can imagine is the physical and from experience know that some women get very 'moody' every month, and then I wonder what is wrong.  Yes, I know the biology of the thing but this is not the issue, but imagining what it is like and how it affects women inside is totally beyond my comprehension.  Her remarks make me feel very guilty, and not being able to understand makes it worse. 

And this is what really makes any response I give difficult and liable to be misinterpreted.  Is pmt something like an autistic meltdown?  I don't know, how could I know?.   And it really confuses me!  "Emotional intelligence" was never my strong point!  Her remarks make me feel very guilty, and not being able to understand makes it worse. 

Maybe suggest to her to try and get the support she feels may help her? Perhaps there is something she can think of and being a union rep you may be in a position to argue it for her.

I don't mean to offend you, but if you say her condition (well, assuming that it's hers) is accepted as a normal part of being half of the human race then you are being just as ignorant. There are plenty of women who feel a bit under the weather with some mild discomfort, then there are some who would feel pretty bad but can control it with painkillers and function reasonably normal and then there are some who do feel really rubbish to the point of vomiting and passing out, no matter how much pills they take, especially if they have endometriosis where the kind of tissue that should only line the inside of the womb is found in other places too. It's tricky to diagnose though and although it can be treated with surgery that's often not very effective, particularly in the long term. There are more reasons of course and it's also possible that there's no reason to be found and it's still pretty bad. For the time I'm hanging over the loo I certainly think that's worse than not being able to show positive feelings, hide negative ones, deal with being hurt, get stressed about not finishing what I had planned to do... It's just two entirely different kind of things. Why whatever she gets makes her think that you don't deserve the support you get is a bit beyond me, but maybe she's just really frustrated with her issues. In that case someone showing a bit of understanding or willingness to gain understanding may help, it doesn't matter that you are a man because many women will also not understand it, despite being convinced they do, that adds to the frustration.

Funding was arranged through Access to Work and some training was given.  Unfortunately, the original idea was to have half a days training, in the event the management would only allow two hours.  This in itself made me think that autism was not being taken seriously.

Since the training, about three months ago, the woman in question has not got any better, I think her belief, like the belief of many people, is that autism can be switched off at will if I think about it.  I agree it can be 'masked' to some degree but that in itself comes as an expensive cost.  I just really think that one cannot argue with a closed mind.  But thank you all who have replied, I find it very difficult to grasp an argument or answer when someone comes out with something to which I have no experience of (in this case being a woman) and tend to just accept what is said as a true statement.  And I think an argument about a condition which is recognised as a disability (autism) and a condition which is accepted as a normal part of being half of the human race (which I will call for the sake of delicacy 'women's issues') to be something I don't want to get into.

Hi Trainspotter, if such a autism workshop as AngelDust suggests does happen, would you mind telling us how it went, during the workshop and afterwards? It seems like a good idea, especially against ignorance. Not sure if it really reaches people that do it intentionally, they may just find something else. I hadn't even thought about this possibility that she may be doing this on purpose, guess I'm usually quite naive... Maybe she isn't though, she may not think much about her comments at all. Like a woman suffering from MS told me that the visible problems aren't really the worst to deal with because others help her when they see she can't walk very well at the moment or use her hands properly, but what really gets her down is having to rest a lot despite "looking great" as some colleague of hers kept telling her and then still feeling incredibly exhausted. Presumably that colleague didn't really mean to hurt her, hope yours doesn't either.

Very well said. Getting to the crux of the matter not the camouflage. 

Hi Trainspotter,

I’m pretty disappointed that a colleague has said these things to you. It’s not appropriate for her to do so.

There may be many reason why she said what she did. She may be utterly ignorant and not have a clue about Autism. She may be trying to ‘normalise’ your autism in a misguided attempt to make you feel included. She may genuinely believe Periods are worse than autism. She may be jealous of the adjustments you are receiving at work. Or she may simply be harassing and discriminating towards you and cleverly using the fact that she has Periods to confuse and disguise this fact.  

None of the above reasons are good enough.

What concerns me most is that you feel as if she has gone out of her way to belittle you and that she constantly makes reference to you 'getting away with things.' It is not relevant what 'justifications' she may be attempting to offer for her behaviours i.e. whether she is saying these things to you 'because she has bad Periods' or 'women have it worse,' or whether she has two heads. What is important here is that she is being potentially harassing towards you about your Autism, your adjustments at work and your legitimate use of a support worker, regardless of what justifications she is currently using as her excuse.  

I therefore think it might be wise to set aside the 'are periods more debilitating than Autism?' debate as it is totally irrelevant: it is not possible to compare two different things in this way. What concerns me most is if she is using the fact she has Periods (or some such other claptrap) to disguise her blatant discrimination towards you. 

There is no justification for belittling or disrespecting you, no matter how bad her Periods are or any other such suspect 'reason' she may be currently giving. The fact that you are not a woman and therefore feel unable to argue your case back to her (because she has Periods and you don't,) suggests to me this is intentional on her part, to use a reason for belittling you that you have no knowledge of (and no 'power' about) and therefore don't feel you can fight back against.

So I would start ignoring the 'Periods comments' entirely and see past them instead to what she is actually saying to you about your Autism and your work adjustments.

You may want to approach HR and politely request that they offer all staff an Autism workshop so they can gain a real understanding of Autism and the potential challenges it can present. You can even offer HR that you are concerned (suspect) that staff (without naming any individual at all at this point) may be unsupportive of your adjustments at work and you thought that, by educating the workforce on Autism in general, it may head off any potential misunderstandings that may currently exist and help avoid any potential issues in the future.

If this woman's potential harassment of you persists after staff training, I would take it higher to HR. Don't let her 'Periods issues' confuse your judgment on what is acceptable behaviour from her and what isn't.  

If HR do organise an Autism workshop for staff, I would invite HR to attend as well (consider it self-protection if you will) as, in my experience, nothing ferrets out a discriminating colleague quite as well as a good workshop can. Where, by their attitude towards the material presented and often their (sometimes ignorant) questions, resistance and complaints towards the subject matter itself, can often tend to show them up quite clearly for exactly what they are.

Best of luck.

Well, period pain makes me vomit and faint, what has been diagnosed as ASD made me lose the job I really loved, neither causes the issues/damage that comes with the other. As Holly says, stuffing the face with painkillers helps somewhat to deal with the former, stuffing my face with any amount of pills has not helped with the latter. Somehow it's not really possible to weigh them against each other, it totally depends on the situation, what others make of it and how severe it is to start with. Both are considerably worse when facing misunderstanding, especially by people who believe to know exactly what it's like (there's a little difference, with period pain that's mainly women that get away with a paracetamol or two, with ASD it's people that have heard something about it and think that's how it is for everybody while they probably don't even understand that one person). Guess your colleague wouldn't really benefit from a support worker but if she has a job that requires walking around a lot then not having to do too much of this when she's not feeling great would probably help, and so may being a bit nice to her do and not taking it too personal if she reacts the way we tend to react when we feel bad. 

It's not as simple as autism vs women's problems unfortunately because we can only tell you about asd women not NT women and research has shown that it's different. So an Asperger woman's puberty, menstruation, menopause is affected by the ND. Just as Aspergers isn't just a physical thing neither is a woman's cycle of life so I would find it quite difficult to separate or compare one to the other. They are an integral part of us in both cases and individual to each person. 

hi! Yes period pains etc are horrible and unfortunately we have to suffer these every month . However, autism also causes many problems too so I would not say that she suffers more than you at all.  Both cause many problems so they cannot really be compared tbh.  Autism has lots of problems too like meltdowns, as well as other mental health problems that may come with it and yes periods r very painful.  But you can take a painkiller for the pain, you cannot just get rid of the problems that come with autism.  Also, from experience, I would say most people that are horrible is it due to either jealousy or lack of understanding, maybe a mix of both possibly?