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Growing up lonely and trying to fit in and completely lost myself

Chris

Hi,

Anyone else grew up trying to fit in throughout their lives to the point where you have lost your self and dont accept yourself anymore?

I am aged 32 and have had alot of different jobs and never made friends with anyone. i have always tried to fit in and changed myself so i can be accpeted in society and felt like i have lived in a gold fish tank my whole life. the effects of this is not great as i really hate myself and hate people who do not understand me or accept me. as they trigger me. I  struggle to live in this mad world and search for acceptance try to get people to understand me, its also impacted my mental health so much on top of other things thats caused my mental health to be so bad.

Parents

  • I am nearly 40 years old. I started masking at such a young age and got so good at it that I really have no idea who I am now.

    This is a problem because to accept myself I need to know who I am.

    To know who I am I need to be myself.

    To be myself means being more obviously autistic.

    Being obviously autistic makes me need to mask.

    Masking means I don't know who I am.

    Maybe this is different to what you are saying, but I wanted to say that this cycle of events feels like it might never end and has a massive impact on my mental health too. Also, even though I have managed to maintain some friendships they are a constant source of anxiety for me. I only got my ASD diagnosis last year, so this is all quite new to me and I don't have any answers, but I'm trying to accept that this is how it is, even if I don't know how to accept myself yet. It is a mad world, but this mad world is for all of us.

  • in reply to Tonik
    Tonik said:

    This is a problem because to accept myself I need to know who I am.

    To know who I am I need to be myself.

    To be myself means being more obviously autistic.

    Being obviously autistic makes me need to mask.

    Masking means I don't know who I am.

    Oh, I recognise that little merry-go-round!

    But how do we get off it?

    Ben

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