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How to deal with embarrassment and shame about having autism (especially interests and social skills?)

RedCamelPenguin

Hi all! I was hoping this would be a good place to find support and advice, especially because of the anonymity aspect this forum provides. I (20 F) have been diagnosed with autism 2 weeks ago, and although the diagnosis has felt freeing, it has also brought out a lot of feelings of shame and embarrassment. Furthermore, I am in my final year of university and I feel quite alone as I am struggling to reach out and talk to friends, and it feels like everyone else is closer to each other.

The main source of shame I have at the moment are my interests. I think the worst one at the moment is the fact that I have started to collect barbie dolls. I feel embarrassed because I already feel kind of emotionally attached to them and because my mind labels it as childish, especially when I need or use them to emotionally decompress and comfort. Furthermore it feels really difficult to express this to anyone I know because I'm scared I  will be made fun of for it.  I feel like maybe I should not be paying for toys at the ripe old age of 20. I feel ashamed that I have OCs and draw them quite a lot because it feels weird. This is also difficult to share because I don't think most neurotypical people do this and and some of my OCs I'm either deeply connected to or are *** like furries which is quite out of the ordinary.  I feel awkward about some of my other interests too, such as how I have enjoyed shows like TADC and Helluva Boss in the past, listen to musicals, get obsessed with certain artists like Taylor Swift. I find it really difficult to ever share interests with others because I am worried people will see me as a massive weird or worse like a baby. Also because I have weirder interests it feels harder to connect with others in the conversation

I think I also feel ashamed because I feel so behind others socially. Like at the moment a lot of the time I hang out with people I feel like the third wheel, or the expendable one. I think this is because everyone else seems to be able to bounce off well with each other. A lot of the time if I am in a room with others I am the quiet voice. I also get a bit upset if people don't understand what I am saying. I have never been the person invited to parties and I almost resent others for that. I also am scared sometimes I am a bit yappy because sometimes I could tell others were irritated by me for asking too many questions. I also feel very anxious initiating things and social interaction can make me feel very uncomfortable at the moment.

Is there any tips that you guys could give me for help and support? Thank you very much either way!

Parents

  • Hi and welcome. I'm in my early 70s and recently diagnosed, so I understand the struggle to deal with that - and especially if you're at university, which is a time of your life when socialising is a deep need. 

    I'll second prof's excellent advice. I can give you some examples from my own life (although I didn't do these things consciously then). 

    Guarding interests - I spent most of my life reading voraciously, studying and writing. I hardly ever talked about the writing because I knew that most people would be bored by an author talking about their own work. I still don't talk much about it. Some of the things I studied or read crop up in very occasional conversations, but I try to keep stuff I know relevant to the conversation because I'm deathly afraid of being a bore and nearly always ashamed afterwards if I feel I've blurted out far more information than the other person wanted. I tend to keep the things I have that will freak other people out hidden away in one room in my house, not on view to other people except close friends I trust.

    Researching interests - I spent some years as a seniorish trade union rep and fiorced myself to keep up with some football, as most of the people I was in meetings with were men and most of them seemed to be avid football fans. I didn't deeply research things, just enough to know which teams were in the premier league and how well they were doing.

    Asking questions about things people are interested in always goes down well. I've never perfected it but I can get by. One thing I did that really helped me was to read a few books on counselling, as they gave me a lot of help on listening skills and also identifying typical psychological defenses people have. if you like, the red flags that warned me when to steer clear of soimething and how to ask questions without asking them. Stuff like picking up on the tone people use when talking about things, so I could say "that sounds awful. What did you do?" or "are you OK with that?" Mild things that invite people to talk about the impact something has on them.

Reply

  • Hi and welcome. I'm in my early 70s and recently diagnosed, so I understand the struggle to deal with that - and especially if you're at university, which is a time of your life when socialising is a deep need. 

    I'll second prof's excellent advice. I can give you some examples from my own life (although I didn't do these things consciously then). 

    Guarding interests - I spent most of my life reading voraciously, studying and writing. I hardly ever talked about the writing because I knew that most people would be bored by an author talking about their own work. I still don't talk much about it. Some of the things I studied or read crop up in very occasional conversations, but I try to keep stuff I know relevant to the conversation because I'm deathly afraid of being a bore and nearly always ashamed afterwards if I feel I've blurted out far more information than the other person wanted. I tend to keep the things I have that will freak other people out hidden away in one room in my house, not on view to other people except close friends I trust.

    Researching interests - I spent some years as a seniorish trade union rep and fiorced myself to keep up with some football, as most of the people I was in meetings with were men and most of them seemed to be avid football fans. I didn't deeply research things, just enough to know which teams were in the premier league and how well they were doing.

    Asking questions about things people are interested in always goes down well. I've never perfected it but I can get by. One thing I did that really helped me was to read a few books on counselling, as they gave me a lot of help on listening skills and also identifying typical psychological defenses people have. if you like, the red flags that warned me when to steer clear of soimething and how to ask questions without asking them. Stuff like picking up on the tone people use when talking about things, so I could say "that sounds awful. What did you do?" or "are you OK with that?" Mild things that invite people to talk about the impact something has on them.

Children
  • in reply to Alexa
    Alexa said:
    because I knew that most people would be bored by an author talking about their own work

    Same! Yeah, I rarely bring up my writings to even my close friends even though my novels are deeply important to me. It’s kind of sad, but I feel like there will be a time and place to someday terrify someone with the existential dread of my stories lol. Hopefully my kids will be curious when they grow up a little.

    Alexa said:
    fiorced myself to keep up with some football

    Sports is a particular area to keep an eye on for sure. You can just focus on loosely keeping up with one team of one sport, so even if another sport/team comes up that you’re unfamiliar with your scant knowledge of your “home team” could inform you of questions to ask about what you don’t know. For example, my family LOVES baseball (which I don’t understand the appeal of at all) and American football, so I’ve channeled a faint interest in the US soccer team Seattle Sounders to find at least a bit of common ground. I have very little idea of who is playing for Seattle right now or how they are doing in their current season, but I know enough to at least appear like I’m engaged with their fandom. Both my family and my wife’s default to me being the resident soccer and FIFA expert lol

    Alexa said:
    One thing I did that really helped me was to read a few books on counselling

    A life-changing thing for me was reading a book on leadership, but I totally forget the title. Overall it gave some rather mundane and obvious advice, but a few nuggets of wisdom totally changed my perspective on conversations. The best one was the idea of the “compliment sandwich,” in which you give someone criticism by beginning with a compliment, diving into the critique, then end with another compliment or a reiteration of the original compliment. That significantly lessens the emotional impact of criticizing someone else. Apparently allistic leaders innately know that social rule, but it’s not so obvious to us Autists lol.