Published on 12, July, 2020
I’m gonna confess to a lot of horrible decisions I’ve made. I will also provide context and explanations, not to excuse my bad actions, but to try to make sense in order to solve this issue.
Naturally, my autism makes me highly emotional and sensitive to rejection. Although there is nothing shameful about experiencing intense emotions, it doesn’t make my vile behaviour acceptable. Regardless of what I’m upset about or what caused it, no one else is responsible for my actions, but myself. And it’s no one else’s responsibility but mine to do better.
To simply put it, I’ve became a massive ***. Starting from 17-20(current age), I’ve been more openly rude to others. Although I’ve always had mean thoughts as a teenager, I knew to keep it to myself and remain polite because:
• It’s common sense
• I want others to treat me the same way I treat others
Growing up, I’ve been an easy target to bullying. However, I never stood up to myself as a teen and the aftermath would leave me in tears, feeling significantly insecure, depressed, anxious and suicidal. In Addition, I started self harming due to the bullying. Regardless, I still treated others with kindness because I hated the thought of being a horrible person. Nowadays, I fear that I’ve became what I hated the most.
During college / my first job, I was bullied for being ugly and socially awkward. At some point, I relapsed and began to self harm again due to the treatment I received at work. As well, I developed body dysmorphia and considered suicide. I’ve been targeted by many men my age and I noticed a pattern. They were all conventionally attractive men who were loved by everyone. They received little to no consequence. As a result, I became jealous, leading to never ending bitterness. This made me think to myself, “if no one cares enough to be kind to me, why should I fucking care about being kind to others?”
I’ve developed bad anger issues leading to me saying horrible things which I later regret. When someone hurts me, I go to the extreme end and take my anger out on that person/others with the intention of wanting to hurt them. These are a few examples:
• Despite having body image issues, I take out my insecurities and insult others for their looks. One includes a guy who first targeted me a work. I went on a rant about his acne, saying that his skin is disgusting to look at, and how I’m surprised he hasn’t been cheated on. Another incident includes a male coworker who I thought was being rude to another female coworker. As a result, i picked on his height and said he has “small boy energy”.
•when I thought a coworker was mocking my voice, I called her a “whore”.
•When my teacher noticed I was in a bad mood, he tried making me laugh by screaming my name in a shrieky voice. In response, I yelled at him to “shut the *** up”
•when a girl I was jealous of (she was the gf of a guy who targeted me) was singing purposely badly and loudly, I yelled at her to “shut the *** up and kill herself.”
Once again, my actions are inexcusable. It doesn’t matter whether someone hurt me first, I should learn to control my anger.
How do I control my anger and stop myself from saying horrible things?
Well, at least now you know what happens when you don't stand up for yourself, and when you do. But when you do, you go to the opposite extreme and become rude and aggressive. I don't think you found a good balance, a good way to let the other person know you don't like what they've said. I think that you might be mirroring the rudeness or aggression that was applied to you in the past, plus the anger and hatred you felt, so it just comes out as all negative.
Of course, everyone gets angry, anger is a natural emotion that everyone feels, but not everyone takes it out on other people, or hurts people when they're angry. But it's equally bad to be silent about the anger you feel, as anger usually happens when something unfair has happened to you, so if you don't at least speak up about it, that anger might turn passive-aggressive, and eat away at you from the inside out.
So you know "passiveness" and "aggressiveness," but the healthy in-between of those two, is "assertiveness" which is confidently and reasonably stating your rights, while not violating those of others. Assertive communication is important for stating your boundaries, so you don't get pushed around, while still remaining respectful of the other person.
Rudeness and arrogance, can work well in certain situations when applied judiciously.
One of the more sucessful enterepeneurs I ever met was uttery foul to be around, but he made it work for him.
BUT you've gone to "personally offensive" which is a bit too far.
BUT if you've got what it takes to get away with it so far, you could tune your approach. The small boy energy comment although personal if it was applied in the correct situation could be perceievd as witty and humourous more tan nasty, teh otehrs not so much in my opinion.
ATM you sound like you want "payback", like I used to. The truth is even if you get it, it rarely satisfies...
I'd suggest you move your sights a little higher and look to "dominate the situation benevolently" for brief periods, that is much more fun than the "payback" game.
Sounds like Intermittent explosive disorder. I can be very tactless, but even i wouldn't tell somebody those things, thems are fighting words. Thats something you say before you ready to throw a reverse elbow in their face.
BigNoseGirly0 said:How do I control my anger and stop myself from saying horrible things?
There are a load of simple techniques that may give short term relief but without addressing the underlying causes you will find these losing their ability over time.
From what you have posted here previously it seems probable to me that your core issue is low self esteem and this leads to most of the other issues you are experiencing, either directly or indirectly.
If you can work on this then you have a goof chance of being able to weaken the drive for your other behaviours.
Even if you can build self esteem around some areas of yourself then you still need to deal with the defence mechanisms of anger and lashing out. To deal with these as an autist I would recommend learning about mindfulness as it has a lot of tools to help you consider how you are feeling and decide if you want to let it spiral in the way it is now.
For the more urgent matter of self esteem, I would suggest finding something about yourself that you are good at or are proud of and focus on that.
What are your special interests for example - can these be shaped in a way to bring you some recognition?
Are you strong or fit - can you compete and become good at what you do?
Martial arts are a good way to build strenght, ability, control and self esteem - would you consider this?
Doing all of this without a therapist guiding you will be slow and difficult but of you are serious about it then you will find support and advice here.
Accepting yourself is a big part of this so whatever your situation you can work on it. If you are weak you can work on strengthening yourself. If you lack skills then you can get training to develop them. If you are not conventionally pretty then find people who appreciate your uniqueness and if you lack guidance then find someone who will show you the way.
You have taken the first step by asking for advice now evaluate it and decide if you want to take the next step.
Good luck in whatever you choose.
Some of these things are odd NT behaviour. But I feel this.
Does it help to know we experience EVERYTHING at a much greater intensity? External sensory and internal - emotional, psychological.
I've had to learn to walk way from toxic people. To Exit situations when I can. But when trapped, I've been known to lash back at someone when younger. Now older and having more control about who I choose to allow my self to be around, I haven't experienced this in a long time. And that may be the catch.
We need to be able to identify the difference between playful and abusive, between kind and cruel, but autistics have difficulty reading Typical-others. I never knew if someone was interested in me. I still wouldn't be able to tell. But I do know how to evaluate someone over time. And how to better line up my words/actions/intent and find people who share my values. The Artists Way was one of the first books I read which taught me about boundaries with others. I'd highly recommend.
We all have a limit. You may have been pushed past yours one too many times and could use a break from everyone...
Hi there. It's good to hear from you. I've been away for the last week, but was wondering how you are doing.
I think that being assertive and using anger successfully is one of the things I so desperately want to be able to do. I tend to internalise my anger and behave very passively.
My work coach recommends journalling whenever I speak to her. Have you tried anything like that? (Tbh I go through phases of doing this.)
What I try and do is ask myself, Why? Why do I want to hurt the other person? What is going on for me? Then it helps me to identify the real reason behind it.
I think that there are times when it is really important to be able to stand up for yourself. But then, I still find it helpful to work out what is going on for me first.
xx