Struggles with Christmas

• I am struggling a lot at the moment, Christmas seems to start in October, the relentless advertising on television and  Christmas songs on radio is  driving me into a dark place.
• Brain never lets me sleep, I’m lucky to sleep for 3 hours per night. I watch a lot of tv though the night. 
  I have to take my youngest son for his driving test in the morning and have a doctors appointment on Wednesday which is giving me a lot of anxiety.
• I know after masking for years that a meltdown is coming.
• I was in my local Waitrose yesterday, a young lady started to shout very loudly and accused her partner of trying to trip her. She was inconsolable, her partner walked with her and helped her to go outside to fully vent.
• people were sniggering and thought it was funny.
• I could see what she was going through and eventually  got back  in my car and cried.
• I  new  the amount of overload  she was having and I suppose could see a younger me.
• Why can’t my autistic brain just let me sleep some nights?
• Sorry to go on, I’ve had to use alcohol to mask and kill the inner me as we had to go to a social occasion.

You're likely to encounter a lot of Christmas promotion on TV now. I don't watch TV and I feel like Christmas is a distant thing. It struck me that just eliminating consuming TV for a few decades has made Christmas seem far far away.

Thanks, I try to explain to my wife, but there is only so much that NT people can understand. 
she is very good and has told me that she  always listens, but obviously doesn’t fully understand.

Unwilling, quite often.Telling hard truth seems almost as difficult for NT's as is receiving it.

It's one of the areas I where I pity them..

Yes, the difference of facial expressions or lack of from me seem to exasperate neurotypicals. I have never masked body language and this freaks them out. It’s also an excuse for them to say they dislike me but then be unable to explain themselves

Yeah I guess I like the logical side of being autistic but at times it can be a real headache when exsplaining stuff to NTs. They see emotions over logic I guess and for me I find emotions are the thing I strugel to exspress the most. Like I lack facial expressions and the ability to camunicate how I feel correctly like when I'm sad I may exspress it in anger or when I'm happy I may it exspress it in sarcasm like everything in reverse more or less. 

I can do stuff normies can't. I can face truths that normies rely on ignoring to make normie life work.

MOST of the time, yeah, it's all disadvantage because of OTHER PEOPLE. 

When I was in my twenties, I didn't know I was Autistic, but I did knwo I was always being singled out for the "special treatment" and I didn't want it.

There were too many of them to fight (and expect to win) and sometimes you NEED them, were the basic and unpleasant facts I had to face. Sounds like you and many others here have hit the same "wall".

I took a utilitarian approach, and learned about Transactional Analysis, a branch of psychology and was able to use it kind of like a human relations "swiss army knife" (or "leatherman tool", if you are an engineer!) to both improve (or at least manage better) my existing relationships and form new ones. 

In short, I used my Autism* against itself and I believe others can too.

Useful Autistic traits are: The ability to obtain collate and process new information (that seems to stop dead in "normies" around age 25) The ability to see and do what needs to be done to obtain an objective even if it involves takinig action that others simply cannot. And we can be extremely hard to "manipulate" via techniques such as "depth manipulation" etc. We ask WAY too many questions, and how many of you have heard the phrase "you think too much for your own good" (or something very similar).

I urge you to consider yourself as Different rather than Disordered. 

Nope I remember to much that's my problem all my negative exsperances I've faced in my past caused by others play on a loop over and over again in my head. Tormenting and mocking me in me in my sleep which is why don't sleep anymore. Multiple personalities would be a step up from that.  But I imagine that also being to hell too. Hence why I've always said nothing good comes from autism or why should I or want to accept my autism.

Nope I remember to much that's my problem all my negative exsperances I've faced in my past caused by others play on a loop over and over again in my head. Tormenting and mocking me in me in my sleep which is why don't sleep anymore. Multiple personalities would be a step up from that.  But I imagine that also being to hell too. Hence why I've always said nothing good comes from autism or why should I or want to accept my autism.

Unwilling, quite often.Telling hard truth seems almost as difficult for NT's as is receiving it.

It's one of the areas I where I pity them..

Yes, the difference of facial expressions or lack of from me seem to exasperate neurotypicals. I have never masked body language and this freaks them out. It’s also an excuse for them to say they dislike me but then be unable to explain themselves

Yeah I guess I like the logical side of being autistic but at times it can be a real headache when exsplaining stuff to NTs. They see emotions over logic I guess and for me I find emotions are the thing I strugel to exspress the most. Like I lack facial expressions and the ability to camunicate how I feel correctly like when I'm sad I may exspress it in anger or when I'm happy I may it exspress it in sarcasm like everything in reverse more or less. 

I can do stuff normies can't. I can face truths that normies rely on ignoring to make normie life work.

MOST of the time, yeah, it's all disadvantage because of OTHER PEOPLE. 

When I was in my twenties, I didn't know I was Autistic, but I did knwo I was always being singled out for the "special treatment" and I didn't want it.

There were too many of them to fight (and expect to win) and sometimes you NEED them, were the basic and unpleasant facts I had to face. Sounds like you and many others here have hit the same "wall".

I took a utilitarian approach, and learned about Transactional Analysis, a branch of psychology and was able to use it kind of like a human relations "swiss army knife" (or "leatherman tool", if you are an engineer!) to both improve (or at least manage better) my existing relationships and form new ones. 

In short, I used my Autism* against itself and I believe others can too.

Useful Autistic traits are: The ability to obtain collate and process new information (that seems to stop dead in "normies" around age 25) The ability to see and do what needs to be done to obtain an objective even if it involves takinig action that others simply cannot. And we can be extremely hard to "manipulate" via techniques such as "depth manipulation" etc. We ask WAY too many questions, and how many of you have heard the phrase "you think too much for your own good" (or something very similar).

I urge you to consider yourself as Different rather than Disordered.