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Does anyone have someone who fully understands and accepts them as autistic?

Roy

It’s just something I have been personally struggling with, I’m starting to realise how alone I am. It’s great to have you lot to ask questions and chat to, but in my everyday life I’ve stopped even mentioning autism, this is mainly with family. 
Being autistic I can cope with, after all I coped for 54 years before I new there was a name for how I function. Now I sound like them.

I may act ‘robotic’ a lot of the time but I do feel hurt, I feel guilt for being fussy about food, not really trying hard enough with people or work.  It’s hard to explain that I don’t need masses of friends or want to go out socialising. 
I find even with my wife and I know I’m lucky to have a partner that I’m generally not believed or am behaving badly. I could never share how much energy I use in just holding back shutdowns when I’m overwhelmed or show on the outside that I am overwhelmed.

I then think it’s my fault for masking so heavily for so long, my non stop internal voice then rightly tells me that it’s not my fault, I had to mask heavily to survive, it then tells me I should go back to masking more. I now feel I’m oversharing, this could be an autistic thing so I will leave it there.

So back to my original question, does anyone have someone who fully tries to understand and accept them without question?

Parents

  • Yes - my husband and children - my children (adults now) both have an autism diagnosis too - so that means we really understand each others autistic traits. And my husband - though not diagnosed - has a fair few autistic traits too. So there’s a lot of understanding in our family! However my parents totally didn’t understand me in general - let alone anything about being autistic. My father in particular was completely dismissive of the autistic diagnosis of myself and my children and was quite scathing about it. That wasn’t very nice to experience. 

    It’s not your ‘fault’ - try not to blame yourself for the difficulties you are having about this. Feeling guilty won’t help you or your family - it’s wasted energy that will only make things harder for you and for them. I think it’s more helpful to practice acceptance and forgiveness - be kinder to yourself. I always remember a Maya Angelou quote: ‘you did then what you knew how to do, and when you knew better - you did better’. You were doing the best you could in the past - and the past is gone. What matters is now and the choices you make in the present.

    As autistic people we have every right to be ourselves. We shouldn’t have to mask and hide our true natures. Obviously I don’t know your situation and relationships with your family, but maybe you could have a heart to heart conversation with them about all these concerns you have? And be open with them about how you want to feel accepted and acknowledged for who you truly are, and not feel that you have to mask so much? 
    I think often people really respond well to this kind of openess and really do want to be supported.

    But either way - please don’t weigh yourself down by feeling guilty etc - being autistic can make life very hard and you shouldn’t blame yourself for that. 

Reply

  • Yes - my husband and children - my children (adults now) both have an autism diagnosis too - so that means we really understand each others autistic traits. And my husband - though not diagnosed - has a fair few autistic traits too. So there’s a lot of understanding in our family! However my parents totally didn’t understand me in general - let alone anything about being autistic. My father in particular was completely dismissive of the autistic diagnosis of myself and my children and was quite scathing about it. That wasn’t very nice to experience. 

    It’s not your ‘fault’ - try not to blame yourself for the difficulties you are having about this. Feeling guilty won’t help you or your family - it’s wasted energy that will only make things harder for you and for them. I think it’s more helpful to practice acceptance and forgiveness - be kinder to yourself. I always remember a Maya Angelou quote: ‘you did then what you knew how to do, and when you knew better - you did better’. You were doing the best you could in the past - and the past is gone. What matters is now and the choices you make in the present.

    As autistic people we have every right to be ourselves. We shouldn’t have to mask and hide our true natures. Obviously I don’t know your situation and relationships with your family, but maybe you could have a heart to heart conversation with them about all these concerns you have? And be open with them about how you want to feel accepted and acknowledged for who you truly are, and not feel that you have to mask so much? 
    I think often people really respond well to this kind of openess and really do want to be supported.

    But either way - please don’t weigh yourself down by feeling guilty etc - being autistic can make life very hard and you shouldn’t blame yourself for that. 

Children
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