Hi! I've been thinking about my experiences and realizing that I have no idea if I'm using the "right" vocabularly to describe them because while I certainly know other autistic people through nerd circles on the internet, I haven't really talked in depth with anyone about our internal experiences and I only really have the narratives told by allistic people about autistic people to go off of.
So like, I think I'm sometimes nonverbal? It's not that I can't talk when I feel this way, or that I won't talk if I need to or feel like it's worth it, it's just that sometimes when I'm tired or overstimulated talking just feels uncomfortable. Not painful really, just gross. Like my voice is too loud and I can feel all the muscles moving in an overly strong and disgustingly organic way. Not very much fun really. But I don't know if this counts as being nonverbal because as I said it's not like I can't talk. I just don't want to in the same sense as I don't want to lift heavy things when my arms are sore.
Anyway now that I'm in a living situation where I don't just have to push through these things and can instead reflect on them and try and find ways to interact with the world that feel natural to me (I might be watching cartoons with one of my roommates later! Without any expectation to talk!!!) I've been reflecting on these things.
I guess my main questions are is what I just described being nonverbal? What are other people's experiences with this sort of thing? I'd love to just "hear" people "talk" about their experiences with being nonverbal, since I haven't ever heard them before.
