Nostalgia and obsession with the past

Thank you.  I do love to learn, and I wasn't aware of that.  I'll take a look.

Snowman.  You should know this.  I have never before encountered someone quite like you - and I am extremely pleased to make your acquaintance.  If I tried to extract "quotes" from your writing above to indicate its resonance with me then I would need to copy and paste the whole damn lot.  This has never happened to me before.  I am a little freaked out.....but in a good way....I think!

If you review my activity in these pages, you will note that I am a very private human and prefer to chat in the non-public "back room" of these pages on a one-to-one basis about anything that I feel is too private.

If you are comfortable to do so, I would be delighted for you to send me a private message = the rectangular box next to the lightening strike.  After the initial message from you, I am able to respond and then we can converse thereafter whenever.  I prefer this approach so that we don't need to appear as visible "friends" in our respective profiles.  I am unusually private, but for VERY mundane reasons - which others here can attest to.

There's a Dutch poem that talks about rearview lens, translated it goes something like:
'In oval mirrors we drive around, see ourselves in our own background.' I think it's Gerrit Achterberg.

No. I am completely new here. Like I say I had no idea about any of this until I had kids. They've both been diagnosed now and it's been a penny drop moment. I feel kind of stupid for not realising up to now.

I've been basically running in what I've been describing as "emulation mode" for decades, trying to operate in a mode that I don't naturally run in. When I was a kid I spent a *lot* of time on my own and could decompress. I also used to sleep a *lot*. I don't get this now and I feel pretty much confused, tired (mentally and physically) a lot of the time these days. It's made me think about a lot of how my life is and how it's been since I can remember, in a new light and I'm not really sure what I do with it, to be honest. Realised maybe that a lot of the problems aren't going to change because that's just how I am which perhaps means I should consider switching to accommodating things rather than fighting against them. Problems I thought I'd "fixed" are perhaps not fixed at all but I've just worked out how to "emulate" around them but this can be quite mentally draining.

I don't know if it's worth me pursuing a diagnosis myself. On one hand it seems like it wouldn't change much, but on the other hand it might be helpful to be able to say to people look, this is actually a real problem for me. I dunno. Feels like I've run into a dead end where I need to tell people, look this is me, these are my real limitations, this is why I act like this under certain situations. I don't want help, in fact I hate help. I'm not looking for excuses or special treatment or anything but a diagnosis might be a useful tool to say look, someone's confirmed this to be the case these are genuine problems.

To get back to this post though, I think the thing in that got me was that it's not just nostalgia, things in my life were obviously a lot less complicated, I had fewer responsibility and a stack more time for being able to pause etc, however, everyday life has also changed. It's unrecognisable to me now. Apps for everything, everyone with smartphones, everything connected in real time. barrage of information, "news", adverts, noise everywhere. I was fine with complication I was in charge of, in my world, things that I'd decided I wanted and had welcomed but this is something else. I know the pre-Internet, pre-computers everywhere normality and it was great for me :) Ironically, as someone who works in the computing field, I'd go back there tomorrow. I'd take the limitations of the tech back then, limitations are sometimes a good thing.

I got into reading about "minimalism" about 10 years or more ago (Zen Habits etc) as it sounded like it could be a way to be able to "clear the decks" and maybe go back to a more simple, less complicated state but I've never been able to do it. I've come to realise is that I have two massively contradicting mental states. One one hand I'm struggling with being visually overloaded and clutter is the enemy here, my office space is a disaster area, wires, bits of computers, tape decks, all sorts everywhere. My brain craves the clean empty spacious working area to be able to focus / flow and generally get on with stuff but on the flip side I find simplicity is also difficult to maintain when you've got interests that tend themselves to be complicated. All my "clutter" is stuff i want to keep, as everything has a purpose. People have compared it to almost like hoarding but I see it as very different as hoarding appears to be just keeping useless things however all of this stuff has a purpose and is / would be used given time availability - but like I say stuff everywhere, being cramped into spaces and not being able to see the wood for the trees really drives me mad with it all too.

So there you go, that turned into another bit of a ramble. Sorry.

Yes - well now I'm becoming a little paranoid !  All of what you write resonates very strongly.  You are either a dastardly effective bot or troll that has unravelled and exposed my inner self.......or......perhaps we were separated at birth?!   I note that you haven't been around for long on these pages - so "Welcome!" and it is good to make your acquaintance.

Don't apologise - I am very interested and pleased to find someone with a similar "time" experience to me.  I must dash out now for the reast of the day, but I will read and respond upon my return.  Thanks for sharing.

This is exactly my situation. Like 100% spot on. absolutely this. it feels like I'm running on a different timescale completely to everyone else. when I was young this wasn't so much of a big deal but now, I had loads of time outside of school etc and a space I could be left alone. I'd happily spend hours on my own and time would fly by. I've never been bored in my life. Spend hours reading up on everything as a child, needed to know how everything worked, used to take everything apart, video recorders, tape decks. Had and still have an obsession with spinning objects. I used to run the VHS player with the case off so I could watch the record heads spinning round. I'd listen to records for hours literally watching the record spinning. Used to sit in front of the washing machine as a toddler doing the same. I find it massively therapeutic.

I'm in my mid 40s now. I feel a sense of myself literally being crushed by time pressures. I get a weekend and it's drained away, feels like it's gone in no time. I have no contiguous time for any deep thinking. I'm sometimes irritable at interruptions and having to deal with what I see as trivial nonsense. It's got to the point where my partner thinks I have some kind of depression or something, sees this all as something that can be fixed with counselling or something. Complains at me all the time for things like sighing and sat there holding my head etc. She's decided that this means I have some kind of depression. I am not depressed. I feel constantly overwhelmed all the time. I quite often can't stand the noises in the house, kids running about etc. I have a pair of 35dB ear defenders I use from time to time to smooth it out and a pair of decent noise cancelling headphones I use a lot. I can't describe the feeling. It's like a kind of physical cringing, just feels like I have things coming in at me but it doesn't really describe the sensation accurately.

Like you say, I don't feel like I run in the same timescale as other people. I went to Uni and changed courses then dropped out in the second year. I didn't know what to tell people at the time as it's hard putting these things into words. Closest thing I can think of now, looking back is some kind of burnout. I literally couldn't get out of bed in a morning, it's be 2pm before I could go outside in the end. I can't learn anything from a lecture / lab with people talking at me, like real time one to many situations, where you're expected to keep up with everything else. I feel like I've been running in emulation mode (sorry I work with computers so this is the best analogy I can do) where I'm doing things based on what I think I'm supposed to be doing, saying the right things to people, making the right noises. I can do my work, but I feel like I am constantly having to hide a massive problem which I feel could be discovered at any moment. I dread working in teams / real time. I just feel completely stupid as I can't understand what's going on - it has to be at my pace and I have to have a complete understanding of everything from ground up in order to work on things.

I took a job in the early 2000s and basically stuck with it from then on. Most of the people moved to a new company and I moved with them. I was basically working with the same group of people more or less for most of 15 years. I find trying to change jobs virtually impossible mainly due to the nature of the interview process which more often than not involves a time-boxed set of technical tests (here's a laptop, log into this thing, fix all these things, document what you're doing etc). For most of my employment I've been expected to fix things out of hours - some quite massive high visibility platforms where the system being broken is resulting in thousands of pounds being lost by the hour. I'd sometimes be up at midnight to two or three in the morning trying to diagnose problems whilst being the only contact point, thus being on the phone at the same time having CTOs shouting and carrying on demanding updates etc. I could go on. The last 20 years has just felt like a nightmare. If I'm left alone, I have time to do other things, think etc it's a relief but there's a diminishing window of time for any kind of pressure relief. I end up sometimes up till late at night just for some time when everyone's asleep and I can just be in completely left alone, but these pockets of time are now so small and there are so many things I used to do with them that most of the time they just get eaten up by me just trying to clear my head - not getting anything I want to do done.

Both my children have recently had diagnosis now. My youngest especially is like a little mirror. I can completely relate to what he's saying to me, has the same problems, just getting him dressed and out to school in a morning or anywhere really causes him distress as he feels "rushed" all the time / confused, can't commit to what he wants to do etc.

Sorry this has turned into a right old moan :) I just dream of going back to a time when I could be left alone to be me again. Just feels like I've painted myself into a corner. Anyway, sorry.

At age 52, living in the U.K. 20 years but raised in Rural Ireland, with a rich traditional Irish Catholic heritage, as an Irish patriot with the condition, diagnosed during Covid, I’ve come to realise that a lot of changes have happened since then and I’ve also come to understand why I was wrong on so many things in my youth in the 1980’s and lacked the basic “cop on” required that everyone else in my home village in Ireland had - a few years ago, I went back to my traditional Irish Catholic faith after experiencing prejudice and discrimination before my diagnosis from within the LGBT community 

To be honest, I find it rather worrisome to note that my perception of time  has strong similarities to those exhibited by very elderly or senile folk.  I think my rearview lens is very different to most other people....and I think that's because of my 'time' being very different to others.

A really interesting matter.

I celebrate with a profile image.

That's interesting about the concept of time. I remember some years after uni my friends and I were "reminiscing" but it seemed like it was farther ago for them than me. I can't put my finger on it but it was an inkling that I had. A bit unrelated to nostalgia but related to time. I very often do a sort of "analysis" of events like "it was a week / month / year / however many years" since such a thing happened. When I bring it up to my partner he doesn't seem as interested as I am in these things.

Definitely, I'm really dealing with this right now. Personally, I'm not really nostalgic for school but College felt like the perfect time for me when I wasn't too young and old. 

Really can't imagine being happier again as I was back then, and it hurts so bad. I had the best set of friends back then which I really can't imagine having as good as again. I also relate to feeling younger than I am because it feels like people change but I haven't. My personality is still the same as it was back then, and it crushes me because people move on.

I hate being an adult now, there's no fun at all. I feel more awkward than ever now because it doesn't feel like I was made to be independent. Making friends is harder than ever now, there's so much awkwardness and energy trying to befriend people, I want new friends but it's exhausting. How can you make new friends when life is this unsocial is beyond me, 

Unknown said:

I've tried to have this conversation with a few people who are not autistic. They said they feel young at heart but I feel there's something inherently different between our experiences of feeling young. Maybe more of a naiveté on my part.

I agree.  However, for me, I think it is my general perception of "time" that seems different to many others that I speak with - just as much as my own probable naivety.  Moreover, I like to be an "expert" in everything I do and to know a lot about most things that interest me.  With the world "progressing" at its current rate, I feel like I'm not permitted enough time to play, learn and enjoy my current toys before a whole load of new stuff (increasingly inferior stuff) is then thrust in my face and I'm told I should now only want and play with that.

It's nice other people feel the same way. I think some of it is about growing up and "adulting" but I think an awful lot is to do with "modern" progress and a world which is getting faster and louder which can often go against an autistic person's natural grain. As for the comments below regarding feeling young. I've tried to have this conversation with a few people who are not autistic. They said they feel young at heart but I feel there's something inherently different between our experiences of feeling young. Maybe more of a naiveté on my part.

Hey there Snowman.  Based on what you have written, I would recommend that you creep around some of the old threads on these pages and see what else resonates with you.  The dichotomous feelings you have towards the past and present are very familiar to me.  I wish the world could have ceased it's endless onslaught of progress in circa 1995 - 2005 = this was the period when I felt most in control of my world and didn't hate it because I had finally worked out how to exist in that world.  Using an analogy that you can probably identify with......in 2006, I was completely on top of C as a programming language - I was king.  Knew it inside out.  Then, whilst I begrudgingly accepted that C+ would eventually come along........WTAF...they skipped to C++ and I was lost again!  It has gotten worse and worse ever since - endless accelerating progress and rapid disposal of the past.  I'm not a fan!

For the avoidance of doubt, I neither work in IT nor have competencies in the field....moreover, to save any pedants the time, I am aware that C and C++ does not fall into the dates of my analogy.

Keep searching Snowman.........and keep aware from the fire of progress as best you can !  Melty !!

Kind regards.

Sorry to open up a decade old thread. I'm not diagnosed myself but my two kids have recently been diagnosed. I'm mid 40s and the penny's only just dropped regarding autism. The kids are like a mirror.

Anyway. I've been talking about a similar thing to your post with people I know for over maybe 20 years. People tell me it's just normal rose tinted specs "things were better in my youth" stuff but I don't agree. It's an incredibly strong feeling and an immense sadness that these things are gone. I can surround myself with old, nostalgic objects and try to recreate what it was like but it's not the same, modernity has pervaded everything outside my control now and I almost detest dealing with it. The irony being that I've worked in IT for over 25 years and am forced to keep up with it as part of the job. Obviously, there is no way back. I'm just at a loss really as what to do about it.

Anyway, just felt compelled to comment on this as it came up in Google while I was searching for this very topic, and it really struck a chord. Obviously, I might not even be autistic but I think the chances of that, and my mother for that matter, being so are quite high knowing what I now know about the subject. I'm also at a bit of a loss as to what to do about it all. Anyway. Just wanted to say thanks for the post. Even if it's over a decade late  :)

I hate clubs. Don't like dancing, can't judge if people are having fun or are trying to be sexual. I often joke about never needing to ask a girl out, they've always asked me lol. But If I'm truthfull I've never approached a girl as an adult, just can't judge the situation.

I used to visit nightspots a lot when I was younger with friends just to get out, although I frequently didn't enjoy myself, more often than not it just highlighted that I didnt fit in. I always found going to gigs easier, after the small amount of social time, a band comes on and I can relax.

I used to enjoy alcohol and narcotics socially because I felt free, my inhabitions would go. However as I'm getting older they just make me feel poorly. I went out last night and felt really ill and depressed off two pints of Amstel. I really don't know what's going on with that.

Personally I avoid clubs, but others on the spectrum might like them, some might even crave them, particularly those who also have ADHD.

I don't wear makeup and this might explain why people often think I am still at school, and I don't dye my hair either, neither do I keep up with the latest fashions.

But to answer the main drift of this thread I don't dwell in the past as much since diagnosis. I used to be very absorbed in all the things that went wrong. I've become more forward thinking but maybe that's an age thing anyway.

It certainly fits my understanding that people on the spectrum look younger than they are. The cause however may be harder to pin down. One possibility is the need for facial expression to communicate amongst NTs - people on the spectrum by being less effectively interfaced have more relaxed facial muscles?

Ageing is to some extent a prospect of rough usage - drinking, smoking, diet, exposure to strong sunlight. Do people on the spectrum tan a lot or stay out of the sun? For some there may be sensitivity to bright sunlight. But there isn't the social need for a sun tan.

Cosmetics may be less important for people on the spectrum. Some of the chemicals used are harmful.

I used clubs a lot, in my thirties and forties, as an attempt at a social outlet - disco noise is easier to deal with than unaccompanied social noise, though I do suffer from it being too loud. I don't smoke and drink very little in the way of alcohol - I consumed low alcohol lager or plain water in clubs for years. However the smokey atmosphere must have had an effect - it doesn't seem to have had.

Do people on the spectrum avoid clubs?

I've always looked considerably younger than my age, ridiculously immature looking in my twenties and thirties. However being very tall that tended to offset the look a bit, and as a teenager I was perceived as mature because I was pensive. NTs do seem to get confused......