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Empathy from neurotypical people

pthwaites7

Hi all, 

I'm new here - I was diagnosed with both Autism and ADHD just a few days ago. 

I've told my family about my diagnosis, and they have been very empathic, but not in a way that feels truly understanding! I tried to explain about masking and the lifelong sense that I've been pretending to be "normal", and how the result of that for me has been a sense that I don't know who I am beneath the masking. They responded by saying things like, "I gave up trying to be normal years ago". 

I can understand that response - I don't like the idea of "normal" either. But I'm this case, it just feels like a platitude that allows people avoid trying to understand how hard it is to be an autistic person in a neurotypical world. I don't know that anybody really believes in "normal", but at the same time autistic people struggle in ways that most neurotypical people never will. I don't know how to help my family to understand that. 

Does anyone have any experience of this? 

Peter 

Parents

  • Allistic people are good at cognitive empathy, I think that this is what you are getting. Autistic people are poor at cognitive empathy but often very good at affective/emotional empathy. A clash of empathy styles.

    Everyone in my family and most of my friends have been very accepting of my autism diagnosis, but are still surprised when I behave or react to circumstances in a non-allistic way. I think it is just a cross we have to bear.

Reply

  • Allistic people are good at cognitive empathy, I think that this is what you are getting. Autistic people are poor at cognitive empathy but often very good at affective/emotional empathy. A clash of empathy styles.

    Everyone in my family and most of my friends have been very accepting of my autism diagnosis, but are still surprised when I behave or react to circumstances in a non-allistic way. I think it is just a cross we have to bear.

Children
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