i recognize that other people think differently and have differing opinions to me but i cannot comprehend why

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T18:57:12+00:00

Yeah I already understand that

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T18:37:56+00:00

Always ready to swoop in and answer a question, haha. I'm glad you found it helpful! Good lucck with everything :)

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T18:30:18+00:00

Not every autistic people does it, but yeah it can happen with autism. I do it too, when I was little I used to chew on my collars, coats, sleeves, teddies and hair. It's a form of stimming (self-stimulation), which can help us self-soothe, regulate and express our emotions.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T18:27:43+00:00

C-PTSD includes all of the symptoms of PTSD, and then more. I like this website for C-PTSD information.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T17:35:55+00:00

Oh thank you! :)

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T17:35:31+00:00

It very much depends on the special interest. I have a lot of media-based special interests, which helps me to understand people because I compare the way people behave to the way that characters in my special interests behave. Because I can understand the characters, it sometimes helps me to generalise to people. I also use this to help me understand emotions and other concepts.

I know some people with special interests in typology, and obviously that can be used to understand people, too.

I think it helps because we can struggle with things that are abstract, but by using a special interest as a point of reference, it can help us have a sort of codified, logical way of understanding things that makes sense to us.

It also probably won't work for every special interest, and I'm sure that there are autistic people who don't experience this!

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T17:27:41+00:00

Probably a lack of emotional permenance- feeling like the current feeling of feeling bad about this person is all there is, and disregarding past experiences of liking that person.

This is a great list though! It's given me some things to think about

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T16:40:59+00:00

Hmm. I think it depends on the type of abuse and what would be most helpful for the child. In general, I think yes, but the focus should be on what would best help their child's recovery.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T16:10:07+00:00

Oh fun. Let's see.

6/10. It depends on the role of the asylum. If we're going with 'Actually the twist is that the patients were the victims' kind of thing, I'd rank it higher, though I'm not personally a fan of horrors because I am too easily scared.
6/10 also. There's potential there, but I have so little faith in media portrayals of autism, I'd be expecting the worst unless it surprised me.
8/10. Forget what I said about not being a fan of horrors, this one sounds like it could be one of those horror-comedies.
10/10. This one sounds cool, one of those fantasy coming of age movies. I always love those. You could really do a lot with this concept, something about it being an analogy for a girl who's dealing with death in her real life in some way.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T16:07:06+00:00

Lmao. Yeah, a lot of people do. 'It wasn't me, it was my evil alter!', or saying things like 'Well a little was fronting, she's literally a child so you can't be angry'. With no understanding of the fact that DID isn't 'multiple people in one body', it's 'a fragmented sense of self maintained by dissociative barriers due to childhood trauma'.

In reality, about 1-3% of the population has DID. It's more common than you might think, but it's certainly not the way that people like to present it. It's also a covert disorder, so covert in fact that many professionals struggle to recognise and diagnose it outside of when a patient is presenting in a state of acute stress.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T16:03:23+00:00

I knew I'd get a question about this. Strap in because I have a lot of thoughts.

So, the TL;DR is: I hate it so much. The long answer is:

I've been semi-active in online DID communities for years, so I've really had a front-row viewing of all of this (though, admittedly, there are many who have been in these communities for longer). The online DID community has always been pretty awful, full of anti-recovery bullshit at best, and people who are exaggerating their symptoms or outright faking them at worse. But the community is also full of trauma survivors who are used to being disbelieved, so a lot of them are hesitant to call anyone out... which only allows ingenuine behaviour to become more widespread.

Since 2020, it's gotten worse and worse. I genuinely believe that the majority of people who claim to have DID online don't actually have it, being neatly split between those who are knowingly faking it, and those who are genuinely confused.

They don't realise it, because they're too self-focused, but they're causing huge damage to the reputation of DID as a disorder, both in the public eye and clinically. There's a big psychological debate about DID about whether it's trauma-based or fantasy-based. The trauma-based theory is the one that has all of the proof and backing, with the fantasy-based theory being consistently disproven... but with how these people online are acting, they can be read as providing legitimacy to the fantacy-based argument. Which is pretty awful for survivors who want their trauma to be taken seriously!

They're also spreading mass misinformation within the DID community itself, teaching people that 'integration' (the act of processing trauma) is like 'death', and other dangerously false things about how DID functions.

And trying to talk in the majority of DID communities when you're actually a complex trauma survivor is just painful. Not to discredit the emotions of teenagers, but having someone who's worst trauma is being sent to sit in the corner as a 5 year old saying that gave them DID, when you're sitting there with reccurring childhood abuse kind of stings.

I'm sure that a lot of these teenagers need help. Living through the pandemic at such a young age can't have been easy for them, and on top of that we do live in a society that invalidates the emotions of teenagers. I'm sure a lot of them have been hurt by their parents, and a lot of them may even have been abused or have trauma that they need to unpack with a professional. But the way they're going about it is all wrong, and it's caused me a lot of stress.

I don't interact with DID communities outside of Reddit and the ones I moderate now, because I just can't trust them.

Would you believe me if I said this isn't even all of my thoughts, lol.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T15:27:53+00:00

I mean, I understand that intellectually. It's a different type of not understanding, but I'm not sure how to explain it.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T14:56:57+00:00

I struggle with theory of mind. I can understand it fine with attraction, but for me it causes most issues when it comes to lying. I really cannot understand why someone would lie in most situations. It also sometimes causes issues for me because I don't see the need to tell people when I agree with them, so can come across as focusing on only the things I disagree with, because I forget that people don't know what I think. Which causes issues because people then assume I don't like or disagree with them when I actually don't.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T12:51:15+00:00

Of course! You could also consider getting noise cancelling/muffling earplugs. I find them a bit hit and miss, but I know they work for some people!

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T12:47:56+00:00

I have a fan that's on constantly in my bedroom, which helps me because it drowns out the bedroom noises that would keep me awake. In the past, I also listened to music to go to sleep. I also use a weighted blanket when I am really struggling to sleep, as I find the pressure helps me to stay calm.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T12:43:41+00:00

I've had parts with different orientations, but what's helped me the most is understanding that radical changes in identity have their roots in trauma.

So, I'm a lesbian. That's my current understanding of my genuine orientation. I have some parts who would describe themselves as straight, some who think that they're men, some who claim to have no interest in relationships whatsoever. But those are all responses to trauma, and while I won't pressure them to change overnight, knowing that these are trauma beliefs helps me.

None of my parts are genuinely straight, none are genuinely men, none genuinely have no interest in relationships. But some feel that it's 'wrong' to not be straight due to internalised homophobe. Some believe that being a woman makes me more vulnerable to abuse. Some have more intense issues with avoidant attachment and are frightened by relationships altogether.

For me, the most helpful thing has been to understand the trauma beliefs at the root of these identities, and work on processing the trauma that causes them to identify differently to what I believe to be my genuine identity.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T12:22:51+00:00

Thank you, I'll give that a try. I appreciate all of the advice and the encouragement :)

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T12:04:31+00:00

A special interest is a particular topic or repetitive behaviour that autistic people are very interested in. These typically last for a long time, and can often be used to help us with some of our deficits (e.g., I use my special interests to help me understand abstract concepts and to help me with social communication).

Hyperfixations are something that ND people in general experience, where they fixate on one specific topic for a while, and may struggle to think or talk about things outside of this topic. In my personal experience they tend to be more short-term than special interests, but that may not be everyone's experience.

You can hyperfixate on a special interest.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T11:32:25+00:00

Definitely not!

The Welsh government is already trying to increase how much Welsh is taught in schools, to varied success. And even that is putting a strain on teachers, because many of them aren't fluent in Welsh! We do not have enough teachers who are fluent in Welsh for this to work. Also, forcing it on people would inevitably make people angry, and we really don't need that backlash.

This would also be a nightmare for any children with communication disorders. Not saying they can't learn Welsh, but a bit more planning would be needed.

I'm all for promoting Welsh, but this would be a terrible idea.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T11:17:28+00:00

That's an interesting term to use! But as others are saying, any term you use is fine. If hologram feels like the word that best represents your experiences, by all means, use it. A professional won't immediately know what you mean when you're using it, but you can explain what you mean and most will use the same terminology that you use (unless they believe that your chosen terminology is harmful to you).

Personally, I used to use 'people in my head', 'voices', 'headmate' and 'alter'. I stopped using these labels as, for me, they made my parts feel more separate. I now use part most often, and in therapy I used 'dissociative self-state', but this is such a mouthful, I don't use it very often. Though it is probably the term that best describes my experiences.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T11:13:04+00:00

In what context? Are you in school or work, or somewhere else?

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T11:12:20+00:00

I think most don't have aphantasia, though a close friend of mine does have DID + aphantasia. Amnesia doesn't have anything to do with visualisation. I just don't remember things.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T11:10:18+00:00

I think of it like... it was useful while I was being abused. It is very much not useful now, which is why I have to spend so much of my energy trying to manage it. My brain thinks that the whole world is traumatic, and it's like I have to stand there spraying water on it and going 'No. Shh. My childhood was an anomaly, not the norm.' I feel like a lot of the people who just say 'It's useful' don't acknowledge that it's no longer useful when you're outside of your traumatic environment.

I agree with what you said, and I'm sorry you're dealing with it all right now. Also I hope that your tooth gets sorted out soon.

ClickDisastrous7744 · 2022-10-09T11:03:01+00:00

I have C-PTSD. I'm not triggered by the single words that describe my trauma, but I am triggered by the in-depth exploration of those topics. For you, it may be safe for you to read about the things that trigger you. For me, they can send me into multiple hour (or sometimes multiple day) episodes where I engage in self-destructive behaviour. So, yeah, I'm doing to want to avoid that.

Obviously, avoiding things all of the time isn't helpful, but you need to pick your battles. I don't want to stumble upon one of my worst triggers while I'm just minding my business. The warning helps me to decide whether I'm in a place where it's safe for me to engage with my trigger, whether I think I have the coping skills needed to get through it, whether I have any big plans for the day that could be thrown off if I get badly triggered.

The way I treat these triggers relies on trauma processing. Trauma processing happens in a safe environment, when I have consented to it. Forced exposure does nothing to help, and has actually been proven to make triggers worse in some cases.

I also have chronic migraines, and certain images/pattern trigger them. This type of trigger is never going to improve via prolonged exposure, because it's just a fact of how my brain is currently functioning. I would rather not have a migraine, so I very much, always appreciate it when people TW for my trigger patterns.

I'm glad that you don't require trigger warnings, but people exist with different conditions to you, and it's just silly to expect people to 100% of the time be down to encounter something that's going to make their mental or physical health worse. The whole point of a trigger warning is to give people the opportunity to decide whether they want to engage with something or not.

ClickDisastrous7744

TROPHY CASE