• Replies 22 replies
  • Subscribers 90 subscribers
  • Views 388 views
  • Users 6 members are here
Options
Related
Hints and tips
  • To quote someone's message, first select/highlight the relevant text, and then use the Quote button that appears
  • To "mention" someone, type @ followed by the start of the forum name, and choose from the list; that person will get a notification of being mentioned

Embrace your autism

Larissa

If you've recently just got diagnosed with autism or you believe that you're autistic, my piece of advice to you is to not stop thinking about your autism. Autism isn't one of those things where you can believe you have it or get diagnosed with it and then that's it and you can move on with your life. The fact of the matter is that a lot of your problems come from the fact that you're autistic. And I don't mean to say that in a way of like autism is so horrible and everything, cause I do think that I love my autism. I love that I'm autistic, but I struggle with connections. And I don't struggle with connections because I'm bad at connections. That there's like a personality flaw or that there's some. There's something I'm doing wrong. It's literally a disability. My brain doesn't work in the same way as the people that I want to connect with, and it doesn't allow me to connect to them in the same way that they connect with other people.

This is why thinking about your autism and reminding yourself that your autistic is so important. Because it's so easy to fall back into that pattern of thinking that there is something wrong with you, but there is nothing wrong with you. You are autistic. And although autism is a disability, it is also a beautiful variation of how the mind works. And yes, it comes with it's own challenges but it also comes with so many beautiful things that neurotypicals wouldn't be able to experience. So don't push your autism away. Don't ignore it. Think about it, and embrace it. 

Parents

  • It is good that you are so positive about being autistic as we can easily get bogged down with the difficulties we can face in daily life.

    Larissa said:
    my piece of advice to you is to not stop thinking about your autism

    I take a different approach. I don’t think about being autistic all the time and I don’t want to think about being autistic all the time, simply because I’ve other things to think about and I don’t want to be more inward looking than I already am. It’s not that I’m in denial of being autistic, it’s more that my autism is how I am and it’s how I’ve always been, it’s an essential part of my makeup that makes me the person I am. Trying to think of being autistic all the time would be like trying to think of the colour of my eyes all the time. 

    Larissa said:
    embrace it.

    Yes, self acceptance is essential for mental health.

  • in reply to ArchaeC

    That makes sense. For me, consciously reminding myself helps me avoid self-blame but it sounds like it’s already fully integrated into how you see yourself, so it doesn’t need that same level of attention.

  • in reply to Larissa

    I may have taken a different meaning to that you intended when you said,

    Larissa said:
    piece of advice to you is to not stop thinking about your autism.

    I understood this to mean to think of my autism constantly, i.e, every second throughout every day, seven days per week. That would drive me mad as it is an unachievable goal, nobody can do that.

    I was diagnosed just over a year ago and the should/should nots of potential diagnosis when considering assessment were much in my mind then. I found it essential to try to leave it one side for even a few hours and to focus on other things just to give my brain a rest. I had many low points before and after diagnosis but I have accepted who I am, I just struggle with what other people did because they didn’t understand and I still mourn for the life that could have been had my autism been recognised sooner. People weren’t diagnosed with autism when I was young.

  • in reply to Larissa

    Yes, timely diagnosis is so very important, yet many are needlessly missing out because autism isn’t picked up early enough and waiting lists can be long. 

Reply Children
No Data