Published on 12, July, 2020
By the time I was 13 years old I knew that I would forever be alone--- no spouse, no "girlfriends," no hope for romance, and no hope for love. This was obvious because I knew I was the only orange monkey in the monkey cage, and I was brutalized because I was (and am) "strange."
If I were capable of feeling hate I would write "I hate being autistic."
I do, however, utterly detest being autistic: autism has robbed me of my life. Autism took from me the chance of finding a woman who found me worthy of standing by her side, as two equal partners. What autism left for me in exchange was 61 years of a loneliness so suffocating, so ravenous, so crushing of spirit that I longed for death --- only my brother's compassion stayed my hand.
I loathe my inability speak nouns and pronouns when I am talking with people face to face: the Anomic Aphasia kicks in and I struggle to say the names of objects (that includes humans) , nor the names of places. My mind knows the word but I cannot speak it: try having a successful job interview when the evaluator believes you are on drugs--- I sound like I am choking because I am.
I abhor my inability to remember something that I heard mere seconds ago.
I deplore the way I rock side to side when I sit; rock on my feet side to side when standing in line at the grocery store; spinning on my heals to release some of the anxiety I collect when I am among the humans.
A few days ago (Monday June 14, 2021) my councilor (via telephone) told me that I "still have around twenty years left; there is still time to find love." I shivered with dread. I do not want to live another twenty years with painful eyes because I am required to look at people's eyes (it is agony for me). Twenty more years of strangers insisting that I must "shake hands." Twenty more years of strangers calling me by my first name--- as if we were already intimate.
Twenty more years of being macerated in the vicious jaws of loneliness.
It is a wonder that I have not been driven insane. Yet.
I never knew that Anomic Aphasia was a thing, but it describes my word forgetting to a T. I don't know if its just nouns etc for me, i just know that i forget words all the time, even just moments after saying them. I could probably continue a conversation without the word if i tried, but it usually leaves me stopped in my tracks focussing on the forgotten word than everything else and i end up forgetting what i was talking about in the first place.
I'm also terrible at remembering things, my long term is great, i remember all the things id rather forget, but anything new is gone just as quick as it came. I have to write everything down before i forget it, but half the time i forget that its written down and forget it anyway.
I really hope im not alone till im 61 or beyond, hell at this point i think id rather be dead long before that, but the way my life has gone so far, i reckon im travelling along the same path as yourself.
It is my boundless hope that no one follow my "path." I lived alone in a cave for 28 months because I could not stand another hour around people: desiring to be among people, meeting women, and meeting interesting people could not be satiated. I lacked all ability to tolerate not participating in love, romance, and social "belonging."
As for Anomic Aphasia, you certainly do describe it well: perhaps you could discuss that with a professional physician. I have read about "speech therapy" that might help.
Oddly enough, i have considered living in a cave, or rather hole in the ground in the forest. I even went through teaching myself all the plants etc i could eat, which were medicinal and what to avoid. You imply it isn't a good thing and yet, the rest of the world hasn't been that great for me either. There are things in society I'm not yet ready to give up on, but it will be an option for me when all eventually goes to pot.
Never enter the Jungle without a Guide.