Feeling like a failure- idea of how to deal with it

Ann :) said:

but each time it gets worse

That has certainly been my experience.  I think you start at 100%, burn out, recover and eventually return to only 90%.  As you start the next cycle, your max. capacity is now only 90% and then you burn out again and only return to 80% etc.

It means that we do not necessarily take the first couple of burnouts that seriously - because you recover to almost where you started from.......but when you reach your 3rd or 4th cycle, real damage is getting done!

I am sorry that you are physically suffering - my physical manifestations didn't occur until my latest "mega burnout" but I did notice that my overall mental acuity seems to have been permanently whittled away each time.

Unlike the majority of opinions on this particular thread, I struggle to accept the principle that autistic people cannot "fail" or should not view (lets call them missed targets) as "failures."   I simply do not understand that logic personally - and even if I did - I cannot see how that principle can help anything.  We all need to be able to judge our own performances against our own metrics?  Surely??!......and therefore the potential for "failure" is a de facto possibility.

Thankfully, such semantic quibbling isn't relevant to any of the voices here because everyone seems to agree that you should not be concentrating on how to deal with "feelings of failure" (if it were to exist) and that you should instead focus on means and methods of avoid future burnouts.  I am personally working hard on that topic at the moment plus, notably (and very stressfully) addressing the damage caused by my previous "life."  Like you, petty bureaucracy (aka handling finances, forms and normies) is not a strength I possess!

Also like you, I am very new to my autistic realisation and simply cannot afford another burnout.  Primarily, knowing I am autistic has enabled me to become very calm at last - as Roy said a few days ago - "knowing that I'm not bad or mad" has been the greatest gift of all because I can actually target my efforts to a known issue, whereas before, I was simply self-loathing and thrashing around in the dark.

I hope we can keep sharing on this existentially important subject for the both of us.

Be well.

Thank you - I really appreciate that! 

I agree that it's good to look at what contributed to your problems, I just feel that if you label it as "failure" it just fuels the unhelpful guilt feelings. A rule of thumb I've discovered, which I may have shared on this forum before, is that the people who most feel guilty about their life are the ones who least deserve to feel guilty, and vice versa.

I agree about comparing with socially accepted standards (and also individuals). I'm trying very hard not to at the moment, but it's so easy to fall into it without even realising I'm doing it.

i agree with much of what you've written here. And I agree with your son that you're a strong person!

I’m sorry to hear that you had to give up your career because of burnouts. I’m glad that realising you are autistic has helped you- I feel like being diagnosed earlier would be a big help... (i was 25)

I can relate to what you say about just getting more and more burntout and always pushing to keep going. I noticed now that when I get quite burntout I tend to invest even more energy into work as it gives me a temporary kick/energy and as I feel more useful/ leas guilty then but of course this makes it worse. And I feel like even when I did have a break I always had to go back before I was ready and also never really learnt any techniques to cope or addressed the causes of the burnout so I just end up burntout even more and faster than the previous time

Yes I think you are right that the guilt and trying to apportion blame is unhelpful but I am always plagued by such feelings.

I do think that most issues are a mixture of external and internal factors... and I want to 1) address internal factors eg.learn to better deal with stress, putting up boundaries etc etc. And 2) figure out what external factors contribute and can I somehow change those/ try to put myself in an environment where I have a chance of succeeding.

I was having all these negative thoughts about failing but I realised I feel better if I acknowledge things went wrong and then do what I can to learn from it...that is the plan at least...

I also think comparing to others is causing a lot of issues- you say that “I feel like a failure...for a whole bunch of reasons from frequent mistakes in the workplace to the fact I can't work full-time, am not doing an interesting, intellectually-involving job of the kind I wanted, have difficulty fitting in to a community and so on” - I feel like we tend to compare ourselves to these socially accepted standards which in fact do not really apply to most people. 

Hi- yes I agree with you- I didn’t go into specifics but I did identify the key issues: repeated burnouts, no skills to manage stress and anxiety, issues around food/eating and digestion, rigid need for routine and I’m not good at handling finances.  But these mostly are very related to each other...

I am having a very bad burnout now and I had another quite severe burnout a year ago that I never got a chance to really recover from. Thinking back i think 6-9 months before that I again had a burnout (thought it coincided with long covid so I didn’t see as that initially). Then I think I definitely had another one previously... but each time it gets worse and I suffer physically (super underweight) and mentally... 

I only became aware I might be autistic a year ago during the burnout and I have since been diagnosed and grown more confident in being autistic.

I cannot keep going like this with this repeated burnout cycle and never fully recovering so I am determined to address it properly this time...

I think its often about working however many times harder than other people but with same or less pay back

Yes Roy - it’s true. So many autistic people ‘under-perform’ (in society’s way of measuring these things) - our achievements - in the conventional sense - often don’t match our intellectual ability. I think this is because functioning in the workplace involves so much more than just intelligence- it has a social aspect, time pressures, organisational skills etc - so many things that autistic people struggle with. My youngest is so intelligent and also  very wise and intuitive, incredibly kind and caring, great literacy skills and sense of humour. But his school and college life was a bit of a disaster - and I’ve no idea about his future work wise. 
It’s all very complicated. I think though that if a good ‘fit’ can be found for an autistic person and a suitable profession then things can go wonderfully well. It’s just finding the right job/environment. 

Sometimes, think about if what you said to yourself, you said to a friend instead. It wouldn't be kind to them would it? So why are we so unkind to ourselves? Would you like your friend less if you found out they had failed somehow? No, you'd want to help.  

You'll never recover from burnout if you consider you have failed. And I think it's easy to get into burnout if you start again at 100mph. Boom and bust isnt sustainabke and the impact now on your mental health might have physical consequences when you get older.

For a given situation, you might get to step 5 and it might never work out. At what point is it enough that you tried? I get the impression, I bet your 50% is more than a lot of people's 100%! But what's wrong with 80 or 85% if it means a healthier and more sustainable life? You are still probably putting more in than most people even if you took it back a few notches.

What's so wrong about failure for you? I think some acceptance is good. Thinking well something didn't go to plan but mostly the end results are not catastrophic. I get the "pretending everything is ok" thing. Especially when it's difficult to explain ourselves. Its hard work. I'm learning more now "well I didn't get A or B done but achieved C & D and that's better than nothing at all".

I fully agree, we are often a round peg trying to bang ourselves into a square hole. The problem is, we were told for most our lives that we were a square peg. The people I was trying to be like aren’t me, they are wheelers and dealers,  my IQ is higher than most of them put together but I don’t function like them , your son is obviously clever, it’s just find out now where he can harness his skills in a workplace that suits him. It is the forcing ourselves into something unsustainable that causes burnout.

Hi Roy,

I think your point about acceptance is important. My eldest was very academically bright and got a good degree and a Masters, but when he went into the workplace he soon realised that the jobs he tried just made him miserable. He had to accept that that kind of work was never going to make him happy - he didn’t find the work satisfying and he found the social stuff in that type of workplace incredibly torturous and tedious. Ultimately he knows that he has to do something else that is more attuned to him as a person. 
I realise that your situation (Ann) is different to my son’s - but I think that sometimes we just have to accept that we need to change something because it just isn’t going to ever feel ‘comfortable’ for us - be that a job or profession, or a relationship, or a place where we live. 
We need to ask : what can I do to make this work for me? But sometimes we have to accept that we might need to make a fundamental change in some way. 
I think Autistic people often end up in burnout because we are trying to FORCE ourselves to be ok with things that fundamentally are not ok for us - and might never be ok for us. 
My youngest dropped out of college because ultimately the pressure it was putting on him became completely intolerable- it was making him ill. Some people might view dropping out of college as ‘failing’ or ‘giving up’ - but he HAD to do it for his health.  
In my opinion no job is more important that taking care of our health. We have to take care of ourselves - it’s crucial. My son was feeling suicidal - it got that bad. We can only push ourselves so far - or the toll it can take is too high a price to pay. 

Hi Glitter - I just want to second what you say here about ‘forgiving myself’ - I think that’s absolutely crucial. I think a big part of why we end up in this self narrative of ‘failure’ is because on a deep level we are not forgiving enough of ourselves. To say ‘I’m a failure’ is to sit in harsh judgement of ourselves. It’s not good to be so judgemental of others - so why do it to ourselves? Autistic people face many challenges that other people simply do not have to contend with - and that can make some things extremely hard. But it’s not our FAULT that we find those things difficult - it’s not a personal  ‘failing’ - it’s our neurological differences  - and often the life experiences we’ve had due to those neurological differences -  it’s not something we have chosen. We definitely should not be blaming ourselves for finding life so difficult sometimes. I think we need to forgive ourselves on a very deep, profound level in order to find peace with who we are, and to accept ourselves as we truly are. 

Hi Ann,

I really relate to a lot of your message, I had spent my whole life trying to be neurotypical and keeping all the plates spinning or I thought I had been. It wasn’t until the realisation of autism and a year long burnout happened that I changed my perception of me. I occasionally dipped into Facebook and saw  my peers with holiday homes and new cars, why haven’t I got anywhere and struggle, I’ve let my family down, they have sometimes gone without because of me. 
I now realise, I was never neurotypical and never will be, I find I get further now by not setting myself so many goals and not punishing myself if I don’t achieve everything. I now know things that failed in the past weren’t my fault, I was just try to do them like an NT. They were the only model I had to try and copy. I now accept autism and make some aspect of it work for me. Not  putting myself in stressful situations is my right. If I was you which I’m obviously not, I would try and get your physical health sorted out first,  there’s nothing worse than physically unwell and mentally struggling as well. Remember you haven’t failed the world, the world has often failed us.
hope your feeling better soon.

Hi Ann :) 

I think your approach is a good one - and probably very suited to the analytical abilities you have from your education/profession. 
I think that when we have these feelings of failure one of the unfortunate side effect of that is that we lack energy and motivation - and I think that treating our problems as a sort of ‘research project’ is actually very motivating and puts us back in control of the situation. There really is a lot we can do for ourselves - and that feels empowering - which is in itself a huge positive. 
This is why having an autism diagnosis is so important - because the more we understand why we react to things in the way we do the better we will be at navigating those problems and challenges when we meet them. 

I’ve frequently felt like a failure at various points throughout my life. I’ve often felt terrible about the fact that some things - that other people seem to find so easy - are incredibly difficult and stressful for me. It makes me feel weak and useless sometimes. However my son says that he thinks I’m a strong person - because even though I find things very scary I do still try to do them. They say don’t they that being courageous isn’t ‘not being scared’ - courage is still doing things even though you DO find them scary. 

I remember Ann that you’ve done loads of really intimidating and stressful things (like changing job, moving country, moving house) - you may have struggled and got stressed out but you’ve still gone ahead and done these things - that shows incredible courage. 

i think though that you ideally wouldn’t be living with the level of stress and pressure that you are. I think this level of background constant stress is so common for autistic people (it certainly is for me and both my children). It’s exhausting and I think that the constant struggle and high level of exhaustion chips away at our self esteem until eventually we end up feeling terrible about ourselves. And like we are failures. It’s not at all surprising. 

The truth is that the society we live in is not autism friendly, we live in a very demanding, competitive society that puts a huge amount of pressure on everyone. Capitalist societies are not MEANT to comfortable, or feel safe. They are designed to drive people on - not make them feel safe and relaxed. 
I think a part of the ‘average autistic’ person’s psychology is an inherent discomfort with a society that is essentially designed by - and for - neurotypicals. So in a way we are almost destined to ‘fail’ in these systems. I often think though that a very healthy, well balanced and spiritually wise human being would probably also reject a lot of the stuff that society is expecting of us. I think to a degree that being ‘out of step’ with the norms of a western, capitalist society is actually a healthy response. Anyway - I’m going off on a tangent here!

Ultimately I think we feel like failures as autistic people due to multifactorial issues: our upbringing, our inherent autistic characteristics, societal norms that are often unhealthy and toxic, and pure exhaustion from having to deal with it all. Tiredness takes a terrible toll on us. 

There’s no denying that life as an autistic person is hard. It’s not classed as a disability for nothing. Just as with any disability we have to find ways to compensate for the difficulties we have. Like you are doing we need to analyse what our personal difficulties are and find ways to overcome them. Sometimes we can’t overcome them and need to make life changes. It’s a long process and we don’t get nearly enough help with it. 

I think we need to research on many levels - practical, psychological and sometimes spiritual - to find answers to all these challenges. But I think it’s true that this process we go through makes us wiser and more empathetic human beings. Struggle is painful but we grow and learn from going through struggles. So there are rewards. 

I’ve been reading ‘The Book of Joy’ by the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu and it’s absolutely wonderful. Fantastic insights into how we can find peace and joy in our lives even though we face all the challenges and difficulties that life inevitably throws at us. 
There are lots of things we can’t change - but we can definitely change our PERSPECTIVE on things. Changing our perspective is actually relatively easy. For example ‘I am a failure’ is an opinion. Are you a kind person? Are you a thoughtful person? Have you tried your best to do the right thing? Have you worked hard? Are you an honest person? Have you learned a lot in your life so far? I’m guessing that you’d say ‘yes’ to most of these things? Because if you have then you are not a failure AS A HUMAN BEING. When we measure ourselves as a ‘failure’ we often are measuring ourselves against a certain set of standards set by someone else, or by societal rules that might not be valid. 

One of my sons did brilliantly at school (academically) and went to an elite University, and one of my son’s struggled at school, had to drop out of college and currently is at home. Neither of them are ‘failures’ because they are both wonderful human beings. That’s all I ask of them. It’s all we should ask of anyone - including ourselves.

imagine an autistic man who struggled through school, and had many challenges in life. He might get a job 2 days a week volunteering at his local charity shop - and end up enjoying this work and helping people coming into the shop. He’s not a failure. I’m sure you wouldn’t call him a “failure” (I certainly wouldn’t) - so why be so hard on yourself? We need to be kind to ourselves. We’re doing our best. It’s hard but we keep trying, we keep learning, we are doing our best. That takes real courage. We’re trying a find a way that we can be happy as autistic people in a society that in many ways is quite hostile to us. Maybe very hostile in fact. That’s not easy. We should give ourselves credit for all our efforts as we try to navigate this challenge. It’s hard work and it takes a lot of courage. 

I felt like a failure for years, having to give up my career at such a young age following a major breakdown.

However when I received my autism diagnosis it allowed me to look back and re-evaluate the situation through my new found autistic lens. I began to accept that I had not failed. I had been in a job that was totally unsuitable for me and without any support or reasonable adjustments.

Ann :) said:

That’s the past and it doesn’t help to feel bad now about those- only useful thing might be to analyse why it went wrong (if it is same kind of failure) 

It might be useful to work out what support or reasonable adjustments you were lacking in that situation, which may have helped avoid burnout. Then going forward in a similar situation you can ask for those adjustments, preferably long before you think you need them. By the time you think you need the support and adjustments you are already far into the burnout.

The problem with burnouts is that you can get stuck in a cycle, thinking that you have no choice but to keep going. You do keep going until suddenly you can't. At that point it finally becomes clear that work is not as important as you thought it to be.

I feel like a failure a lot of the time, for a whole bunch of reasons from frequent mistakes in the workplace to the fact I can't work full-time, am not doing an interesting, intellectually-involving job of the kind I wanted, have difficulty fitting in to a community and so on, so I empathise with this.

It's good that you are troubleshooting your feelings and trying to deal with them logically and practically. I am very bad at this! Also confiding in other people.

However, I have to say that I don't think repeated burnouts or eating issues are "failures," at least not in the way you describe. Failure implies that you did something and it didn't work, whereas these are essentially external events that happened to you. I did feel like a failure during the (many, many) years when I was burnt out, but I do feel now that it wasn't really my fault. I tried my best. It's frustrating that that wasn't good enough, but it wasn't my fault.

Hi Ann,

Your system for dealing with failures sounds really positive. A great way to acknowledge, so that steps can be taken for the better.

Unfortunately I have no positive coping strategies to deal with either failing, or feeling like I am. And currently I'm trying to resist one of them.

Your method sounds really enabling, and I truly hope it works both for you and for others.

Dear Ann,

You make different proclamations in your writing, namely;

1. "I have been feeling like a massive failure for a while."
2. "I am a huge failure."
3. "I did fail." / "I failed at things."
4. “I am like an experiment that failed.”

These are arguably very different things.

You have identified JUST ONE underlying issue in your writing.

• "Repeated burnouts."

With these aspects of your own writings in mind, I am drawn to conclude that you might be asking the wrong question of yourself (and us on the forum) at this time.

It is arguably fair to say that, if you simply focus your attention and energies at solving the sole underlying issue, the other matters will (or at least, can) then fade away into irrelevance.

Neither the past, present nor future can be attended to successfully if there is a pervasive underlying problem.

May I ask two questions of you, to help me process better advice for you (for whatever worth that might be for you?!)

1. How many cycles of burnout have you endured and how long apart do they seem to occur.
2. When did you discover your autistic reality.

In the meanwhile, I commend you for your efforts to address things and can absolutely assure you that you are not alone in your questions and struggles.  Please feel free to communicate privately with me - you can simply send me a private message without going through the whole "friends" rigmarole because I have settings that allow this. 

I worked with a teacher whose favourites phrase was "mistakes make our brains grow."  It sounds like you are working on taking a similar perspective. 

It is okay to get things wrong, although it can leave an uncomfortable feeling.  Think about it like learning to run marathon.  You won't get there straight away.  You not only need to build up strength but also how to pace yourself.  For myself, I can be rather lazy! But I have learmed to love myself and take care of myself because for a long time there was nobody else to do that.  Part of that is forgiving myself when I don't get things right. 

Nobody gets it right all the time.  So to me, they are just mistakes and not failures.