Published on 12, July, 2020
I've borrowed this question from something intimated in another thread.
Do you think life has improved for you as you have grown older?
Is it because society has changed or you/your life have changed or a combination?
There was a comparison in another thread with 1980.
I realise some of the readers here won't even have been born then!
I could write a long list of ways in which my life has improved since 1980, both on a personal level and on a 'society' level.
Where 'society' is concerned, the invention of the internet has made me much less isolated, much more knowledgeable, much more in control of my health and not at the mercy of the NHS.
I wouldn't know about my autism and many other things without it.
Also, mobile phones/texting and email mean that I no longer have to make phone calls (including from phone boxes!).
I could go on but I might even bore myself.
There is really very little I miss about 1980, except perhaps a quieter pace of life in general.
It's an interesting question and we all have a past, no matter how far back it goes.
How is it for you.
Better or worse?
Bump
Better now for me.
The start of my life, my mum abandoned me, then I spent many miserable years in care being the kid who no one wanted to foster. Things picked up in my early teens when an elderly couple adopted me, the first people who gave me a chance and took me in to their home. Recession hit and things got tough but we worked through it together as a family. I've always thought of them as my real parents. We got through the hardest days and now life is better, it's good. We're all happy, money isn't a problem and except for my usual anxieties I'm happy and well.
Better now than in the past.
There are little groups of us all over the world finding each other and self organising right now Asperger Mike. You are very much not alone.
Whether you realise it or not.
I have often remarked to my wife "This is not my world" There is sooo much in the way of cultural/political changes that I am at odds with over the last 20 - 40 years. I simply can't bury my head to ignore it, nor can I accept it.--- so,it doesn't work for me. Toleration is my only option.
Yes this thread is 5 months old but I felt strongly about its topic.
In the run up to last Christmas I was starting to feel miserable and depressed, and I decided to list the things that were pissing me off, and it turned out there were 21 things that were nagging away in the background at my happiness. UP 7 from the previous year!!
Suddenly my onset of depression was revealed to be the result of a cumulative pressure in that direction.
BUT NOW I HAD A LIST...
Some things like my own terminal disorganisation (I've already lost the fecking list!!) will take time and organisation and help to overcome , but some things looked to yield much easier with a bit of effort.
And thanks to that list (or currently my memory of it!) I know where to put my efforts into actually making myself (and by extension the people around me) happier.
It works really well, I'm still quite happy and free of depression four months later. * months is my personal record, so it'll be a while yet until I am certain that I hit on a "magic bullet", but the signs are very good so far.
Most of them should get more understanding with more knowledge. If you know, you understand. Autism is a very complex thing to understand for the less intelligent though.
Jeff B said:When I was young I felt I was racing against time to learn how to be normal before my life slipped away.
That's so well expressed and true of me too.
Personally, better, because I now know that there's no point in beating myself up about what can't be fixed.
When I was young I felt I was racing against time to learn how to be normal before my life slipped away. Thank goodness I survived that phase.
On the social side, increased awareness of autism has at least given us an explanation of why we are what we are. Whether neurotypical people have got any more or less sympathetic, I can't say.
Hands down worse now.
Life is on a downwards trend for me since like seven years ago. Absolutely sucks. It was good when I was still a little kid but in recent years just had to deal with so much agro, family fights, my own health is all over the place and I've got chronic anxiety that impacts my life in a negative way every second of every day. And to top I've got depression on top of all that.
I wish I could go back to being a kid... please...
Nothing good about now for me.
Better!
Though anything could happen....
Childhood was difficult, early adulthood alyo difficult, after graduating during unprecedentedly high unemployment. Leaving the UK at the end of the 90's was the right decision I think in retrospect, but then there were the horrors of dealing with immigration and then a long period of what could often be thankless, insecure, low-paid work, and never enough sleep.
Now I have my own place, and hope to ease off the treadmill more and more, and focus more on what really maters to me.
I find all the technology around computers and smartphones enormously exciting, whilst also deploring the way social media can be used to manipulate social media.
I still do this. I use Buses and i don't own a mobile phone. I'm same on the train. Taking in the UK countryside which is still quite beautiful.
It was better in the past. My only happy days were my 80's and early 90's childhood. I don't belong out there in modern Britain at all. I find the people trivial. They're obsessed by things that don't matter to me.
Bumped as this ties in with another thread.
For anyone who hasn't seen this, you might find it interesting ...
Welcome back, Adele.
Hi Adele, really pleased you are back, and more importantly that you are doing well.
Adele I am so pleased you are back :-) . It's lovely to hear you are now doing well and I'm sorry what you went through. I hope you enjoy the forum again, there's some good people here and good chats lately xxx
Hi
Things are better for me now. Much better. The past for me is horrible and full of pain, death, suffering and depression. Last year I was here but in a dreadful place, I had two suicide attempts and had to go to a unit for my own safety. I never believed I'd get through and yet here I am.
Now is better. I'm alive, healthy, happy, enjoying my life. Things are shaky between me parents and me still. Making the most of what we got.
I’m happy you’re in a good frame of mind at the moment I Sperg. I feel it’s a constant battle for m3 and my family to hold on to the more positive frame of mind you describe. More often than not we don’t manage it - but we don’t give up on trying to not be overwhelmed by the stresses we find keep coming our way. It’s certainly not easy! (Understatement!). We seem to have had a very difficult three years (like a lot of people of course). We thought : “Yay! It’s a new year! Fresh start!” And just in January we’ve been hit by so much difficult new stuff that we didn’t see coming. We keep on trying our best though. Like you though the overwhelming feeling is so often feeling so very, very tired. Sending best wishes and solidarity to you
I live each day as if I am in the 50's as much as possible. I am less stressed doing that. I even dress vintage. Love it.
So I think although I was never around in the 50's that the past did have better points than now. yes it had some bad points too.
But people were friendly and you could be seen as shy and gentle, these where traits that were praised now they want people to be all confident and rude.