The Hidden Danger of Suicide in Autism

A friend has just forwarded me this recent article.  I found myself nodding my head a lot as I read it.  The points on bullying and 'camouflaging' are particularly pertinent for me.

The Hidden Danger of Suicide in Autism

  • If only people thought more about the full impact of their actions.  But they don't.  I make a jokey comment - and get unfriended and blocked without an explanation or a further word, and by someone I liked and trusted.  It makes no sense.  It's screwed me up.

  • Tom i don't think you (and I ) are over sensitive, personal comments or actions are meant personally. I would have to leave as well in that circumstance, if nothing else there could be no trust between those two colleagues.

  • One of the ways i hope we can challenge the status quo is to collectivise and create a unified voice backed up by a body of evidence drawn through testimony, documents etc, this should then go to the UN.

    The Only Thing Necessary for the Triumph of Evil is that Good Men Do Nothing

  • I'll be blunt: seems like an overreaction over something that happens all the time to a lot of people.

    This is true.  It's why I've been told so many times in the past that I'm over-sensitive, and that I should just let it go over my head.  I can't do that.  Stuff like this, which many would look at and say 'So what?', hits me like a train.  I think it's probably a lot worse because I'm feeling pretty frayed at the moment.  Work is getting me down.  I wouldn't go sick simply to avoid that colleague, but I find it very hard to work in an environment where someone has taken against me in some way.  I admire people who can do it.  Another colleague at work was reported by someone else about perceived abuse and faced a disciplinary - which was thrown out.  They still work together, keeping it professional.  I simply couldn't do that.  If it happened to me, I'd have to leave.

  • Sorry, ended up making breakfast. I shall do so shortly :)

  • Belated Good morning, ElephantInTheRoom.

    Lack of services is one thing. Lack of even an explanation after a diagnosis is another. Writing people off and then promoting 'learned helplessness' over social security assessments is yet another.

    Who might have this 'strategy'? There is some good stuff in Think Autism, but very limited and patchy money from local authorities or NHS, and to be frank most people don't know how to help. We can keep pointing this out...

    I think this thread and the article may also be relevant to and the 'separate protected characteristic' petition.

    Discussing abuse and suicidal thoughts can be an essential thing IMO. So long as we're not telling people which are the best tall buildings to jump off ('don't try this one, it didn't work') I presume the mods are fine with it.

  • Hello. I'll be blunt: seems like an overreaction over something that happens all the time to a lot of people. Would you be going off sick just to avoid your colleague? I'd try to force myself to go in, and in some quiet moment make a bit light of it and put on a hurt tone: 'you defriended me' and see what she says (and be prepared for saying nothing and holding hands up in an exasperated and uninformative way).

    (Edit: sorry, I realised you said she'd be away next week. Jumped to the wrong conclusion.)

    I can't advise against making a GP appointment though.

    Hope you and your cat have a good afternoon, and try to do something nice.

  • When i compare what is happening now to nazi germany this is not lightly done, elements of the early nazi regime are in play right now, it started with the removal of financial and medical support.

    Yes.  Following my breakdown in 2010, I was on ESA for about 2 years.  It was a hellish time.  Failed WCAs, failed appeals, nerve-racking tribunals... and then the dreaded visits to the government-appointed employment agency, where I was looked at and treated like a malingerer.  It made me worse, if anything.  I have a friend who's going through the same.  She has BPD (and, she now suspects, ASC)  and hasn't been able to work for years in anything other than a part-time voluntary role.  She's now being pushed and pushed towards paid employment and is desperate.  She has a MH key worker who has basically given up on her and offers no support at all.  Thousands have died because of this regime.  And the people who really pull society down get away with it - because they can afford to and have the right connections.

    Sometimes I feel like I'm clinging on by my fingertips in work.  But I almost think that going sick again would be worse.

  • Well said . The working group sound a good idea - start a new thread and find out who’s interested 

  • I'm sorry i havn't commented for a while i have had to cloister myself away and contemplate my next steps on how to tackle this issue within our cohort, this is no small task.

    This issue is not hidden, there have been Parliamentary debates specifically on this subject and they know why this is occuring.

    When i compare what is happening now to nazi germany this is not lightly done, elements of the early nazi regime are in play right now, it started with the removal of financial and medical support. Hans Asperger was a part of that system; Aktion T4. Aspies were the ones he later believed he could save from the gas chambers by using our masking ability.

    Suicide is preferable to gas chambers, if only it wasnt for pesky statisticians..........

    I have been in contact with 2 'experts' cited within these reports and to be perfectly honest, they don't care. I live in the same city as one of them works and have offered physical evidence (videos, letters, recordings) giving an insight into why this is happening and there has been no uptake. 

    Once again i will cite this quote,

                "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!"

    So, what do we do about it?

    It has to be 'we', a grassroots 'we', of the people, for the people. We cannot abrogate our future safety to those who only have a financial or narcissistic stake in the battle, for us it is our lives at risk.

    I would initially like to propose the creation of a small 'working group' to explore if there is a future for such a community - a word purposefully used in this context as i believe we together  can elevate and support eachother in ways no others can.

    Lets start by making the world a little less lonely.

    Peace, love and light to you all. x

  • I think I'll go sick next week and go and see my GP.  I don't really want to go down the route of medication - but I need something.  I'm getting a lot of end-game thoughts.  Anti-depressants can increase those, of course - I know that risk.  I'll ask about medicinal cannabis.  I'm not sure what the status is with that.  I could go look it up.  I think it's probably very truthful to say that if it wasn't for my cat here - following mum's passing - I probably wouldn't be here now.

    This episode with my colleague has really brought me down.  I'm starting to feel more and more alienated.  Or you could say I'm alienating myself.  That's how it must seem.  I try my best to please people and I hate upsetting anyone.  I'm going to deactivate my FB account for now, then think about deleting it.  I can't go on like this.  Social media has its great points.  But the downsides are not good at all.

  • That workshop I'm attending tomorrow may give some answers about services, or lack of.  I'm sure the subject of IAPT will come up.

  • Just a bit odd that they interview professionals speculating about the reasons for suicidal thoughts or behaviour, and fail to get more qualitative stories from autistic people.

    I get the impression that they are not too bothered about autistic people. @Evan on another thread for example citing the lack of support post diagnosis is a fair indication that many do struggle. The topic of suicide and real struggle comes up frequently on the forum and members do their best to try and support.

    I wonder if the forum moderators or community managers keep a tally of key terms/issues that are repeatedly raised? I may get ticked off now and again for using swear words on an adult forum but in recent months I have cited domestic abuse, cohersive relationships and posted on threads about suicide, but nada! It seems such topics are quite normalised that they may well be dissensitised to them. 

    it has been highlighted the lack of services for Autistic Adults but whether there is a planned strategy afoot I have no idea....  

    Good morning btw?  

  • What you wrote didn't seem offensive to me, maybe slightly teasing. Could she have thought you were flirting? I've defriended genuine friends on FB just because I didn't want the interaction.

    The article's fairly interesting, particularly 'Adults with autism who camouflage are eight times as likely to harm themselves as those who don’t' which might help explain why autistic women are proportionately more 'at risk'. Bullying and social communication also seem to be factors. Just a bit odd that they interview professionals speculating about the reasons for suicidal thoughts or behaviour, and fail to get more qualitative stories from autistic people.

    I should get off the computer, go out and get a life. I wish I knew how.

  • One friend suggested that she drinks a lot, and might have been drunk - so she might wake up tomorrow and regret what she's done.  I've done similar myself, so I can understand that.  We'll see.

  • No.  But I'm not especially interested in winning friends or influencing people.  On the other hand, I get along with people.  Most people tell me I'm friendly, affable, easy to get along with.  Which is what I try to be.  I don't deliberately set out to piss people off or make them hate me.  I don't see any point in that.  I've spoken to a few other people at work, in private, and they all say they can't understand her behaviour.  Maybe she'll eventually come to me and explain things.

  • You could well be right, DongFeng.  I find it hard to imagine how, by making a general post pointing at no one specifically, she might take it to be a personal criticism.  But what do I know?  Clearly very little. 

    Free speech is clearly an issue here.  No one has a right not to be offended.  I might read stuff that I personally don't like (I don't offend easily, unless what I read is racist, sexist or homophobic) - but then I just ignore it.  It's the old 'If you don't like what's on the TV, turn over or turn off' thing.  I have one FB friend who is my polar opposite politically.  So when he posts stuff that might inflame me... I ignore it.  Likewise if I post stuff he disagrees with.  We get along.  We don't go 'unfriending' or 'blocking' one another.

    So I'm not going to stop posting things that might upset some people.  I have a perfect right to post it, as she does to ignore it.  And if she was grown-up about it, she'd message me instead of just cutting me off with no right of reply.

  • Look, don't take any notice of me, because I very clearly know **** all about relationships, but my guess is she was offended by your soapbox episode re: smartphones. You thought she was maybe offended. We're **** at reading people, so if you noticed something it might have been a bigger degree of offence?

    Perhaps she felt you were criticising her parenting, maybe she even felt guilty. Later, you pop up on FB. She starts to think, "can't I get away from this guy anywhere?" 

    Then you effectively belittle her opinion again, by making out she hasn't seen anything of life in her forties. 

    I think this might be an unwritten rule (that I've missed myself), but maybe you're not supposed to go to someone else's page and say anything at all that might cause offence. Maybe there is some sort of expectation that someone's FB page is their territory? If so, expressing a strong opinion or disagreeing loudly in someone else's page might be viewed as rather like visiting their house and taking a s*** in the kitchen sink?

    She probably also felt that you were being hypocritical - criticising others for spending all their time on the internet when you...

    Her comment and blocking actions are effectively saying, "leave me alone and give me some breathing space". 

    I would steer clear from her at work, but if you do bump into her, say something like, "look, I'm sorry if I inadvertently caused offence - that was not my intention". 

    Then stay away from her online and outside of work. Smile politely if you work closely together, but keep any conversation strictly job-related and professional. 

  • She's on annual leave until the end of August.  The week she returns, I start annual leave for two weeks.  So I won't see her or have chance to speak to her for almost 5 weeks.  And I'll be stewing the whole time.