Getting drunk/alcohol = illusion of been neurotypical?

Alcohol inhibits certain emotions and causes you to let your guard down, hence why you felt that way.

I concur, similar life experience and same issues.  being lesbian in late1980s meant only meeting and drinking in bars and clubs.  University in 1990s again, bars, bars, bars for socialising.  Now without being able to go out and limit my drinking, I am unable to socialise. Yes alcohol helped me, but its also harmed me. 

To answer the original question above "Personal circumstances mean I'm considering drinking again, at home. What relationship do you have with alcohol? Have you ever felt a sense of freedom whilst inebriated?"

Alcohol is addictive and some people can easily get addicted more than others.  Its effects can change with mood, age and context as well.  I wish I had never started drinking ever, as its contributed to the worse things that have ever happened in my life and my own misbehaviour. 

I am using the online SMART therapy to kick the habit and its very difficult but now 2 months in, I'm hoping the zero alcohol will enable me to eventually discover the real me, as an authentic autistic lesbian approaching retirement, whereby lack of work will be so bloody marvellous. 

This is absolutely not medical advice. I have categorically not given any advice whatsoever. It is solely a commentary on medical research. Medical research usually finds its way into the general public's view via media reports which very often are either grossly exaggerated or present results as definitive, when they are not. As a retired biomedical researcher I feel that I need to point this sort of situation out. 

Headlines often say things like, 'Eating X doubles the risk of oesophageal cancer'. They do not say that it doubles the risk from one in two million to one a million - which is in reality still a very small risk.

Whatever the evidence says, my lived experience is that using alcohol to cope can take me to very dark places. 

Please take care not to offer medial advice as per rule 6.  Always seek professional help for these matters.

Thanks

Suzann Mod

The jury is out. There have been studies that support the contention as well. Large scale population studies are difficult to design and open to variable interpretation.

HiDarkElf (  

I remember feelings similar to this, especially the way you described feeling free for the first time. I think I experienced something similar when I was younger, although not to the same extent. Alcohol seemed to take the edge off my anxiety and made me feel more confident socially.

I sometimes wonder whether what we’re really searching for is that feeling of being able to relax enough to be ourselves, without constantly monitoring what we’re saying or doing.

I get why you might want to start drinking again…..not for the alcohol itself but maybe for the freedom it brings.

I agree. Wonderful is very subjective, and after getting diagnosed at 4 I will never ever know what neurotypicality (or the illusion of it) is. People can say "It's not that important" but they won't really know how I myself feel (which I know is stating the obvious somewhat but it still boils down to that). I'd go as far to say getting diagnosed effectively ruined my life before school. Kids subconsciously pick up on a lot, and if a child is walked in on his own, or given a staff member, or given constant reassurance kids will pick up on that and in my view naturally segregate in their heads. By 14 I'd heard every slur imaginable regarding autism. I was always known as "the autistic one" in school and at family gatherings. It was always a convenient excuse to block me with, be it from getting work experience (I was in a special needs school at this point) to engaging in two very important hobbies. British towns are small, and let's be frank here, insular, rumours travel and it's no surprise to me none of my four GFs were from the UK.

Like you, I probably do have C-PTSD due to a lifetime full of issues related to autism. (a clinician and therapist both pointed to C-PTSD anyway)

At the risk of sounding nasty here (I honestly don't mean this as a dig towards anyone, really, because I do get the sentiment) I find the people who say autism is wonderful are the kind who veer into infantilization and romanticizing of the condition. It's why I avoid telling people about my condition...that, and once people find out, many feel the need to alert others as if I were a leper or something.

True story, you never feel smaller as a person than when getting your hand held to buy fried chicken at a football match, I wish I was exaggerating.

I discovered alcohol at the age of about 15, it made me more normal and sociable. I ended up drinking heavily for about 40 years, I was a functioning alcoholic, I was drinking 100+ units per week. I didn’t know I was autistic. It was only the realisation of autism that set me on the path to finally understanding myself and eventually a diagnosis.

I could never have one drink, autistic and adhd brains can have a craving for dopamine, alcohol supplies that boost. I could almost turn my autism off with alcohol. Unfortunately the next morning was always horrible. I’m 2 years and 4 months alcoholic free and don’t want to ever go back, I always knew I was different, I ended up thinking I was just broken or faulty from birth, 

I won’t say autism is a blessing because it’s not, it has its challenges, for me finally knowing I’m autistic saved me, the alcohol doesn’t just give that lift, it also creates those dark days when checking out seems the answer. I now actually enjoy waking up in the morning.

This study from last month suggests there aren’t protective effects from low consumption of alcohol.

Perhaps people who don’t drink make healthier lifestyle choices such as exercising, having a largely high plant based diet. Maybe financial stress and family stability is a factor, or perhaps moderate drinkers are more likely to be financially comfortable, be wine drinkers, have stable social networks and less stress.
https://www.jsad.com/doi/full/10.15288/jsad.25-00435

It is not controversial, alcohol does increase cancer rates, but the overall effects on health are not simple. I just wanted to highlight the complexity. Alcohol, taken in low to moderate amounts, seems to confer some protection from cardiovascular disease.

Sorry I will remove that bit if it's controversial.

My view is that, for me, my autism has had both negative and positive effects.

Negative include: finding school very stressful, being so anxious about exams that it impacted my ability to revise effectively, an almost total inability to do mental arithmetic, an inability to work at things I find boring, being unable to initiate romantic/sexual relationships for many years, being so anxious about public speaking that I could not consider applying for lectureships, sensory problems, an intense aversion to touching people I do not know very well, being unable to function in crowded situations.

Positive include: unusual approaches to solving difficult problems, being able to hyper-focus, having a very logical mind and abilities to argue from this position, not being influenced by fads and trends or peer pressure, being hyperlexic, having a very well developed eye for detail (two academic theses passed without correction, proofreading more PhD theses than I can easily remember), a freedom from superstition.  

I too am a scientist and, if scientific papers and book chapters, and six historical monographs count, also a writer.

"For all-cause mortality, a meta-analysis of data from eight studies found that moderate drinkers had a 16 percent lower risk of all-cause mortality (death from any cause) compared with lifelong abstainers."

Swings and roundabouts, like most things in life it is not simple.

Yes, I did feel the change with alcohol, but I feel the opposite that it isn't the true me, and I didn't like the loss of control it can bring. I think it's better to be yourself and just do social things that you are happy with rather than trying to force yourself to fit in places you aren't happy.

Alice_Mod said:

Autism does not need to be cured and is a wonderful part of who you are. 

I wish to add another perspective to your statement -

whilst this is true for many, maybe the majority of autistic people, it is not universally true. Being autistic has been a major factor in my four suicide attempts. I was born autistic yes, but not fitting in and not understanding sub texts, plus being perceived as annoying led to abuse from multiple people and several large organisations over my entire life (Im now 68, female). As a consequence I developed C-PTSD and when an autistic meltdown is triggered by a trauma flashback I become very mentally chaotic, often with the consequences I described above. This is NOT wonderful. 

I agree that the majority view is that autism cant be cured, this doesn’t logically mean that are people such as myself who would have had a healthier life without it.

Finally, as by implication from it  ‘being a wonderful part of who we are” why is it diagnosed?  Im presuming it is in DSM and ICD. illnesses are diagnosed wonderful aspects of our personality are not!

ALICE (Writer and scientist)

Of course alcohol loosens inhibitions in everyone, but I think it does extra things for autistic people. It gets rid of the constant hyper-vigilance, the checking on everyone else's behaviour, so that we can copy it; all the scripting and uncertainty in social interactions goes out the door as well. The problem is the health effects of overindulgence, and the potential for behaviour that might be regretted in hindsight.

I used to drink quite heavily when younger, both as a student in the 70s then in a business sector where drinking, and even driving under the influence, was not on considered acceptable but expected. Fortunately though I lost that job, had a six month break to reassess my life and started a totally different career in local government, where thankfully such drinking was neither required nor advantageous. As I aged the hangovers became intolerable, utter misery when drinking even small amounts.

I am now in the fortunate situation to be able to enjoy a social drink occasionally but then only say one glass of wine. It never made me made me feel freedom as you enquire, it caused me to make bad decisions and to feel extremely ill. It shortens ones life expectancy in numerous ways and I really wouldn’t recommend it, quite the reverse. 

Alice

I don't drink at all now, menopause put a stop to that, making me sick and with monsterous hot flushes.

But I think it was how I am when drunk that made me realise I might be autistic and eventually get diagnosed, the drunker I got the more my inhibitions went and the less I was able to or could be bothered to mask.

Not drinking has had a seriously bad effect on my social life, to the point where I pretty much don't have one anymore, theres a lot of peer pressure for people of my age to drink and not a lot of alternatives to alcohol, so I don't bother at all now.