Published on 12, July, 2020
I'm interested to know how many of the working autistic population (on here at least) work full time. I changed to working part time 4 years ago, pre-diagnosis, because I kept burning out (normal in the job I was doing so didn't attribute it to autism until I was diagnosed and looked back). Now I'm looking at my career prospects post-diagnosis as in many ways I feel more confident in myself since I know I'm not just "lacking resilience" (anyone else had that thrown at them?).
I just don't know if considering working full time again is truly realistic. Interested to know what other people's experiences are.
I work full time. I think in the job I do now, I'd prefer to drop it down to 4 instead of 5. But I have worked far longer hours in jobs that made me so much happier. I did burn out, but I think that's down to being undiagnosed and unaware. I'm seriously looking at returning to that type of work even if it's just partially. It was far more rewarding and I felt like I belonged there. Got to get healthy and pick up the skills again first though! I wish I could afford to go part time.
I can't really afford to be part time, I have a significant amount of debt that is slowly rising rather than falling, but at least I'm not ill. I was convinced I'd develop cancer or have a stroke or something with the constant stress, and when I wasn't worrying about that I was daydreaming about intentionally crashing my car on my way to work to end it all. I do have a reasonable salary though but it doesn't reflect my qualifications so I'm just miserable.