Published on 12, July, 2020
Personally, my negative emotions have often been dismissed and/or mocked whenever I try to talk about them. I’m told I just need to get over myself while they value their views over mine (to be specific, have no consideration toward my personal views) and expect me to follow through.
This would result in me having a meltdown, constantly questioning myself whether I’m in the wrong for feeling this way. I often catch myself saying “you’re going to be ok” and “act like a normal human being” whenever there’s a bunch of stress and sadness building up inside me and I try to bottle it up. I discredit my feelings because of this. And it’s damaged me.
Many times I get involved in fights and arguments with other people that I end up being the only one facing the consequences, I feel like everything is my fault. I’m trying to move on, but it’s difficult for me to. I felt like I deserved to be scrutinized, criticized by every skeptic that I run into, feeling often uncertain of myself.
I felt like I’ve said enough. Anyways, what are your experiences?
Yep, that was exactly what they wanted. This happened to me as well. And me standing up for myself was the reason I got banned from a forum, but to them I was “violating the rules”, on a mental health forum that stated that you are free to express your struggles regarding it in the first place.
...then let me guess it ends up being you that makes peace with them and having to pretend the whole thing never happened. Totally glossing over the fact that they were in the wrong and have upset you in the process!!
I have similar experience, as I found out that people trying to push out in me their opinions in a manner that I should follow without talking back to them. Or they will push their opinions over me and expecting me to act likewise. And as a result of that if I don't do what they ask me (because I found it inappropriate as an action), they will be angry at me, not talking to me for at least three months, and I will find myself thinking of 'what I done wrong.'
OMG, I have tears in my eyes!!
It's like you reached into my brain, pulled out my unconscious thoughts and wrote them down. This is exactly how I felt. I was always told I was over-sensitive, pedantic and just need to try harder at things I wasn't good at!
After my diagnosis I felt a lot of anger because it was like 'F*** You' to those people. I am Autistic, I am not difficult but different. I may not be great at some things but I am amazing at other things.
In fact, strangely since my diagnosis I actually have more compassion to those around me and have helped family members to appreciate those around them as being more fragile than they appear on the surface.
We all mask too much and don't allow people, including ourselves, to see the real feelings and emotions. We all need time to process. No-one is perfect. If I want someone else to accept my fragility and vulnerability I need to accept theirs too and treat them with the same care and leeway that I would like to receive.
I used to be in conscious denial a lot, I don't have alexithymia, I think I always knew when I felt bad really it was just that I had gotten into the bad of trying to constantly squash down my feelings of overwhelm because I was determined that I must have been misdiagnosed, and had really unhealthy expectations about what I could cope with along with really heavy masking too. It would also lead to shutdowns and meltdowns a lot.But now I don't think of autism as disabling in the sense of an absolute inability, I had to come to terms with the fact that in order to do the same things as others I have to do them in a way that specifically works for me, that guards my energy and emotional investment budget, and makes sense to me even when I don't have great executive functioning days and feel thoughroughly brain scrambled.And that means touching base with myself regularly, looking out for waring signs that I've been going at things too hard, too fast, or too long, and taking breaks and delegating some stuff where I need to. That sort of thing.
I’m very sorry for you. Know that your feelings are valid and it is ok to feel frustrated at things many people won’t understand or even accept. You have my full support.
All the time,
For me its all related to Fawning and Masking my Autism for many years and not wanting to admit I struggled with thing others were doing as it felt like if they can manage I should be able too as well, not knowing really the sensory difficulties and the reasons for my anxiety
Before my diagnosis i had a burnout because I kept going on when I shouldn't have, on the plus side it did lead me to get my assessment so something positive came out of it.