Thoughts on this good people? :-)
Thoughts on this good people? :-)
"it's not just the double empathy problem"
I agree totally with you about a third empathy issue Lotus .
This, in my experience, relates to how an autistic person who has internalised an ablest perspective can understand and empathise with them-self better. Perhaps this is what is meant by seeking to be "authentic" with oneself.
Thanks for sharing and helping :-)
wonder if it's alright if I gentle nudge discussion to skills and strategies to head off damaging misunderstandings off and help heal the trauma in such circumstances
Firstly as I haven't yet participated in this discussion, I just want to add that in my case it's not just the double empathy problem, it's also that I misunderstood myself for 50 years.
Through my younger years I watched people, listened, tried to copy the "right" behaviour. Later in my working years I tried to fit in, tried to improve myself in the hope that others would like and respect me. I became someone I wasn't. When I discovered that I was on the spectrum I first had to learn who I really was.
So what can we do?
In my experience, I realised a few years ago that allistic people sometimes don't mean what they say, or they say things in a way that confused me. So I started asking for clarification. Sometimes to the person themselves, such as "sorry, do you mean xxxx?" and sometimes asking someone else "X said this, but I'm not sure if they were being rude or if I've misunderstood them?"
When I was working I also tried to drop things into conversation now and again about certain things I do, or the way I think or feel about certain stuff, that this is because I'm on the autism spectrum - not in a self-aggrandising way, just matter of fact, to try to plant new ideas in people's minds about what autism really is, rather than the stereotypes they may have picked up, to help them understand us.
Another thing I tried to do was to stop talking about something for too long or oversharing. So if someone asks "what are you doing later?" In the past I might have said "I'm going to read some more of my book, it's about....." With a long monologue describing the plot. Now I try to remember to pass the conversation back, so I'll say "I'm going to do a bit of reading, how about you?"
Now I'm retired, most of the time I don't see anyone except my partner and I'm probably the most content I've ever been in my life. My view is that if friendships/relationships are causing either party to feel bad, what's the point? Sometimes we can try to keep it going out of a sense of guilt or a worry about being judged, but we are the only ones that can change our lives and it really doesn't matter what others think.
Finally, I think that this forum is a valuable resource to help us feel less "different" and accepted, and to know that we are not alone in the way we think. That's very valuable .
Thanks for the response and discussion good people 
So, there seems to be a general response to the post in agreement with the statement that misunderstandings are a primary source of trauma in autism.
It has proved to be a "heavy" topic and for full disclosure it comes about because, yep you've probably guessed it - me too!
The "double empathy problem" of Dr Damian Milton The double empathy problem perhaps provides a framework for explaining it.
From more than a couple of thousand years ago Plato kind-off describes a similar thing of one side of the problem (i.e. autistics) "seeing the light" of the double empathy explanation however stops short of offering a solution to it. Allegory of the cave - Wikipedia
We've probably all felt broken by this experience. Maybe some of us have been able to do a similar trick for ourselves and others to the Japanese art of Netsuke where broken ceramics are beautifully mended and the mends make the item even more treasured. Maybe we all sense that the "fault" lines are still present tho...
So, I wonder if it's alright if I gentle nudge discussion to skills and strategies to head off damaging misunderstandings off and help heal the trauma in such circumstances?
I am tempted to do the neurotypical thing and say "asking for a friend". Hehe in truth I'm asking because I would like more help in this direction myself and maybe there are other autistic friends out there in similar circumstances...
Thoughts on this as well good people?
I wonder if stuff stays with you because it's unresolved and often seems to come out of nowhere? I've had a few situations like that, it's like others have constructed this narrative around me and have tried to force me into it and then I go and act out of "character" and break the narrative. Thats when everyone turns on me and everything goes to hell, I don't know what I'm supposed to have done, or not done and nobody can/will tell me and there seems nothing I can do but curl up in a ball and lick my wounds. I don't think these wounds ever properly heal because there's no closure, because you never know the cause.
Misunderstandings are very distressing to me. It's bad if I'm the one who has misunderstood someone else, but the most traumatic for me is when I'm the one being misunderstood because I don't know how to deal with it or correct it, and any attempt to do so usually makes the situation worse. There are so many instances I can recall, stuff like that stays with me, and unfortunately at the time I didn't have a clue that I was autistic so I was just seen as crazy or a problem.
Yes, I hear, that im argumentative when I'm not, angry, or sad when I'm fine, or even that I take drugs, or look high- I don't. Verbal and nonverbal misunderstandings are stressful. Whenever someone pulls their eyebrows together I think, that they are angry. It turns out its nit that easy, there are nuances that I don't catch. So I often ask the stupid question "are you angry?" Or I hear from others if I'm afraid of them. No, I'm not.
This is a not so great side of autism and it’s a truly heavy point.
Misunderstandings have been a major source of distress, conflict, relationship issues, disappointments, financial penalty, abuse, ridicule, false accusations, name calling …
All the above things were compounded into my brain and resulted in poor mental health. Misunderstanding of autism meant I was treated with a major tranquilliser by a Psychiatrist who said “this will change your thinking” because he thought it was odd that I didn’t want to be near an abusive person and he didn’t recognise that I was autistic.
Can you clarify what you mean by misunderstandings? Do you mean the autistic person not understanding or the neurotypicals not understanding.
Oh the irony of this reply. Heh.
I think for child me? Absolutely.
I can vividly remember being very young and getting on a bus. It was a deisel, very loud engine, very smelly, very busy.
I had...a meltdown. It was a lot. My mum? (It was the 70s try not to judge lol) lost her cool. Children should be seen and not heard and here she had screaming taz pinned down across her knee. She did the thing that parents did back then. Smacked my backside to make me behave. Yowch. Screamed louder. She didnt understand I was different. I was naughty and difficult and needed discipline right?
That bus journey was horrific. The old ladies were all commenting what they would do if I was theirs. I still remember the judgement....and I still remember ZERO understanding or empathy or support for effectively a toddler that was overwhelmed and terrified with a stinging butt. My mum was mortified. I brought her shame. I think this kind of thing was a regular occurence that actually resulted in a mother/daughter bond not existing. My elder sister was not such hard work.
Kids learn quick and my life and relationships to people were shaped by incidences such as this. I always feel judged and always not enough. Core beliefs are difficult to shift.
Consequently I try never to judge other parents in this position. Its not helpful. To the parent but especially to the child who is a little sponge.
I dont know how a child who had understanding and love and support despite their differences, deals with life as an adult? Do they find reactions/disapproval from others less...hurtful? Maybe because on some level they feel safer inside to start with?
But then perhaps the same could be true for neurotypicals who didnt have well adjusted parents vs those who did?
Maybe its a self esteem thing rather than an autistic thing?
I have heard about people being able to switch off embarrassment.
I suspect this is just a high powered form of masking although I have learned to be able to do this by switching off the "do I really give a cluck?" element of the interaction.
When you can stop worring about what they think about you because you don't care about it then you can achieve a lot. I've had to use this when disciplining my team (who were taking the mickey out of a customer), when having to give a presentation to several hundred staff or when trying to cheer up a small child with silly antics in front of a woman I was trying to chat up.
I learned this partly through management training but also with role play with my therapist.
I agree Loz, although I'm not sure miscommunication is a cause as much as just not being listened too, obviously we need to be able to communicate our needs or have someone do it for us, if we're very young or lacking in confidence or are non verbal, but listening a two way process, one needs to speak and the other needs to listen properly.
Reading people's experiences on here I think, the services we need or want just aren't there, probably because ND people aren't the ones makng the desicions about what services ND people need.
Although in everyday life I think poor comunication is responsible for a lot of trauma's and many "micro" trauma's that add into into a big problem
The hypersensitivity part is definatey a feature of my autism. I have heard about people being able to switch off embarrassment. I'm not sure if I can switch off pain, or every time, also as when things/feelings happen it's usually quite tempremental so the science is yet to be proven.
I have discovered this thing where I can just switch off discomfort, but I have to consciously register this as 'the water is hot but i have done this before
Funnily enough I was practicing somethine very similar this week as I had several dentist visits including root canal and a crown (plus cleaning and some filling replacements) and I'm not exactly a fan of the dentist.
I find when I am going to be in the chair for a lengthy time and it is going to be quite unpleasant with your head tilted right back, mouth wide open and various bits jammed in your gob while they work - then it helps to be able to dissociate with the sensations coming from your mouth.
It is especially relevant when they are doing the canalis in the top row of teeth as the files they use feel like they are going up into your brain. I guess it is not far off.
I learned this back when I learned meditation that you can compartmentalise pain / discomfort and swith off its ability to hurt you. In essence it becomes just an informational input and you can stop your knee jerk reaction to pain.
It only works for me in shortish bursts - maybe 20 mins of so max. For longer procedures like a root canal session then I need a break in the middle to catch my breath so to speak then can do it again for another 10 mins.
It has helped me a lot in the past with a few workplace accidents where I could clean out a wound on my own for example.
It does show that the mind has more control over our senses than we may realise.
Yes, mostly and no. We learn as we live, so its impossible to look back in hindsight and say things would be otherwise now. But things I can find difficult now wouldn't have been when I was younger, I felt as if those things didn't affect me as much.
I was thinking about it like this yesterday, you can have a hot bath. Some days you are more sensitive to getting into the hot water but the tempreture can be the same. Really it is variation to approaching a situation.I have discovered this thing where I can just switch off discomfort, but I have to consciously register this as 'the water is hot but i have done this before' I think what happens when I experience this is that those rational boundaries break down and any sensitivity is less exaggerated.
Trauma I tend to lump with mistreatment in various contexts, not of my own making (as often). The benefit of this is that I have seen many facets for people.
We live in a time when having a diagnosis might appear a trend or advantageous. To know who you are, don't you already to some extent, its just that the diagnosis is affirmation. I think that may be very differnt how people accept that from a young or later age. Perhaps having an early diaognosis releases one from much of trauma?
I also have I dentified this side issue that not everyone wants, is happy with or chooses their diognsis. How well diaognosis is accepted can also itself be a point of trauma.
That is a heavy point! I agree with this statement. Misunderstandings really can be a major source of trauma in autism and neurotypical but it is likely amplified for ND. So much of our wellbeing depends on communication - it’s basically the foundation of getting our needs recognised and met from a young age. When your communication is misunderstood, dismissed, or judged, those needs go unmet. And when that happens over and over again, especially from childhood, it can easily build into experiences that feel traumatic. It’s not the autism that’s traumatic — it’s the constant misinterpretation.
Misunderstandings are a big source of stress for me
I struggle to understand what my colleagues really mean, but I’m scared to ask them to explain. If I do ask it just puts me under more pressure to understand.
And when I try to explain myself, I feel like I do a very poor job of it. That blank look that people give me afterwards fills me with dread.
It all just becomes exhausting.
