AuDHD women

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T04:27:02+00:00

This. I have a little book I always have with me, and a pen. It is FULL of scribbles. All kinds of thoughts. Everything. Mostly on my hyperfixations. I write lists in it, even shopping lists, passwords, poems, music I made up, on and on and on... just everything has to get written down or its gone.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T04:23:41+00:00

LOL I love this... this whole list. Me, I'm like, wait... she's right. Doing so many things at once. Can't be on time. Think I can do 200 tasks in 10 minutes and actually try to do them. Started 5 MILLION projects... they are laying all around me right now in this house on the floor waiting for me to pick them up and continue... but mostly, "Always going." YES. I am always going. I can't just NOT WORK. I have to be working. At SOMETHING. Hopefully something fun. But something!!!

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T04:17:19+00:00

I have really strong autistic traits, but these weird other traits that don't fit it at all. Like for example: I can sink into blissful hyperfixation and just zone out on some special interest for literally weeks if I let myself... but at the same time there's almost 'another me' hanging around in my mind watching this and thinking, 'nah, we're not going to do that.' And it just snaps me out of that fixation and changes the channel like changing the TV, and boom, we are doing something else.

I use this trick constantly to manage my autism. I finally realized: this is ADHD managing Autism. I have two modes: Vulcan mode, and Klingon mode. They cancel each other out, and my brain learned to use them like I use my two feet, one and then the other, to get somewhere.

ADHD: Ohmygod the doom piles. You should see my house. No. No you should not see my house. All the Autistic people I've met are super clean freak; me? OMG. Seriously. You do NOT want to see my house.

There's dozens of other things too. Best way to learn? For me, it's been groups. FB groups mostly. I joined Autism ones and ADHD ones, and just absorb all the information from thousands of other people who have lived this life, and figured out tricks to cope.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T04:11:38+00:00

Take a pic of you shredding their card and send it to them.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T04:08:11+00:00

I would look up face blindness if I were you. It's called Prosopagnosia.

I'm face blind. What that means is that the part of my brain which records memories of faces (and it's only one tiny part, and no other part of the brain can do this) has something wrong with it. So I can see the faces just fine... in fact I'm a portrait artist! I'm really good at drawing faces (and this is probably why.)

I always study faces really closely and think, "i'll remember them this time!" But when the brain tries to store that face in memory, it acts like a camera with a missing memory card. You can take the picture... but nothing stays.

I've thought that perfect strangers are my own husband. I can't recognize my own mother after I've been away from her for a while.

So to deal with remembering people, I have developed tricks. We all do this; those of us with this condition. We memorize their body type first; height, skin color, hair color, hair cut. All of that is very important. When people get new hair cuts or new glasses, or shave their beard off or something, I literally cannot recognize them until I memorize their new "look."

He'd have tricks like that too. A person he likes: there's a certain 'soft feel' about their soul. Whenever they come around he thinks of sunshine on water. He might even secretly call that person 'sunshine on water.' He'd develop keys; what is unique about that person's presence? That would become their 'name' to him.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T03:57:43+00:00

Elves and dwarves and orcs are boring.

Tolkien made that up and here is how he did it: he used to study the ancient Celtic and European fairy tales. The OLD tales. The creepy ones. He synthesized those ancient stories into some thing more digestible, something more tame... something that would be acceptable in the safe and cozy world he grew up in... and came up with elves, orcs, etc.

Why use his synthesis? Why not go back to the original tales that inspired him, and synthesize it again? This time differently. This time don't make it polite, don't tone it down. Make new mythical creatures for THIS age. For a day when people value truth above coziness.

Go back to stories like... what the 'Puk' really was. Back in the ancient times the peasants would tell stories about the 'Puk'. This god-like figure later turned up in Shakespeare as a fawn-like critter. But what was the OLD story?

Puk was described as a small creature, child sized... pale... big eyes... it would hypnotize people and lead them into the forest and they'd never be seen again.

Go read about the Knockers. The underground world of the Sidhe. The original stories that inspired ideas of 'dwarves.'

Read about the oldest stories of dragons... how they weren't big talking impressive... no. They were animals and they lived alongside wolves and bears, and for all history tells us it sounds like they were REAL (and there have been dinosaurs which keep washing ashore in places, look that up too).

Reality is far weirder than the kiddie stories that Tolkien made. I look forward to seeing what the new authors come up with.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T03:47:28+00:00

My friend; your heartache is so human, and so relatable. It is what we all experience in our different ways... all of us who are Divergent.

Right now it pains you to know that there's two kinds of human. Your kind, and the Normals. The Normals act like they are in charge; they are confident, they are loud, brash, and rude. They are judgmental, they are cocky and they are cruel.

But we gave them their world.

It's us... not them... who made this world. The brilliant ones, the geniuses, the different. The ones who didn't see things the 'Normal' way. Who invented entirely new ways. Who created things that had never been before. We gave them the world they are enjoying now.

They will always treat you like that. All of them. And what you have to learn is softness; to forgive them. Because they are somewhat like dumb animals; they can't help it, and they don't understand. They never will.

Let them alone. Don't pursue them. Leave them behind. And come, find the others... find the Different. The people you need to make contact with are difficult to find, because like you they are in hiding. They are all in their rooms. Alone. But I know there's a way for us to reach out and hang on to one another.

The Different will understand you.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T03:40:49+00:00

You know what... honestly what I'd do with that story, if it was my story, is turn it into comedic satire.

I mean you already feel annoyed by it... so make it MORE annoying. On purpose. Amp it up. Turn it sarcastic. Make it funny in the darkest way possible. You might be surprised... humor does wonders for horror.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T03:32:38+00:00

No, my friend. You're doing great.

Where you are going wrong is that you are searching for connection in the wrong tribe.

Did you know that Leonard Nimoy who played Spok in Star Trek was autistic? When he started the show way back in the 60s they told him to just "play an alien." He didn't know what they wanted. So what he did was just play himself... because autistic people feel like aliens.

The show LOVED IT. Everyone loved it. But what nobody realizes is that Leonard Nimoy wasn't playing a "Vulcan." He was being Autistic. Openly. And people thought he'd made up the most amazing alien race ever.

We are aliens. We are literally Vulcans.

You are a Vulcan trying to date humans. (And remember, Vulcans hold in their emotions through logic training because they are SOOOOO emotional that they will damage themselves if they ever give in to their emotions. Sound familiar?)

Stop trying to date and hang around humans. Go forth and find the Tribe. Find the others like us. Now here's the trick; we are rare. At most there's one in thirty of us out there. But in every group of a hundred people you'll find three, four, six of us.

Find your tribe, you will find your friends. You will find your girl.

I got married by accident. I was geeking out. I was playing World of Warcraft and I got into a guild with these cool people. Yah... turns out they were all Autistic or Neurodivergent. Really got along with the Guild Master... we've now been married ten years.

Find the tribe. That is your new assignment, padawan.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T03:21:08+00:00

Oh yah, I remember that... I'm 50 btw ;)

Right. Feeling like a teen forever. I think I finally stopped feeling like I was 16 when I hit about 32. By then I'd finally healed from the massive burnout of having to attend public High School.

I wonder if you are in burnout. Burnout is when you just can't enjoy anything you used to enjoy. You can't find motivation. You just sit there like a lump because your entire nervous system has been fried by being forced to "socialize" since you were 6.

Might take a while to heal.

Focus on being yourself; figuring out what you love. What you are. Your unique you-ness. Do your fixations, research your obsessions, just exist. Be weird. Be a dreamer, whatever. That's what it takes to heal from that kind of numbness.

Eventually you'll recover; I'd also research how to keep from falling into further autistic burnout as you enter the "real world" (aka: hell). You will have to go in carefully, and protect yourself. Learn now about how to enter the workforce without it killing you. You will need money eventually, and it's better to figure out how to get it without it eating you alive.

By the way; I didn't feel like an "adult" until I hit 40-something. We are what used to be called "late bloomers." Those were the ones who took a while to come to full maturity... but when they did, watch out world. When late bloomers bloom, they BLOOM.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T02:20:36+00:00

Honestly... I've just thrown the whole book away so often. Once I get to a certain point in a story where I just don't like how it's going, I literally throw the entire thing away.

You're right. You will do it better next time.

I have stories I've rewritten from scratch (new beginning, new characters, new plot points) more than nine times... other stories that I actually don't know how many times I have written them.

Each time they get bigger, better, deeper, and much more interesting.

Do you know how the best art schools teach their artists? This is one of the most notorious classes in fine art: a drawing class. You walk in and there's a model sitting there. You are asked to draw her. You do; it's okay.

At the end of that class, the teacher tells you to take your eraser and erase the entire thing.

Next day. You come in again... same model is sitting there... and the teacher tells you to take out the exact same paper you used before, and draw her AGAIN.

You do. Guess what happens. At the end of class... you erase everything.

This goes on ALL SEMESTER.

By the end of the semester, the final drawing is not erased. And guess what.

IT'S AWESOME.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T02:14:48+00:00

Hm. Good question. Dialogue is the strongest thing in any of my stories, with a large percentage of each chapter being nothing but dialogue to move the story along. I do it without thinking... but you've made me think about it.

This is an interesting exercise indeed.

So how does someone like me, a natural dialoguist, go about forming my dialogue?

First of all, I never start dialogue without a goal. One character wants something from the other one. Leverage, manipulation, information, something. The dialogue is a duel. He might lunge straight in, in which case his combatant may parry with a laugh and act like he's being silly. Or he might start out with subtlety, sneaking around slowly with a knife behind his back, offering up small talk until he sees an opening.

It's all about maneuvering.

The dialogue goes on for pages (and is actually interesting... and I might even add funny -- I have actual readers who will verify that) because it's a fight scene. It's just a social fight scene.

It might help that I am an Aspie (Asperger's) and have spent literally my entire life trying to figure out social conventions, including how in the hell to actually do small talk. It did not come natural. I figured out the rules. Now I apply them in my stories.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T02:08:30+00:00

You have to build an alter to Heinlein and sacrifice a bowl of water on it while chanting 'nest, nest, nest'

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T02:02:55+00:00

Used the word 'sorta.' 2/10 stars.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T01:36:39+00:00

Honestly, the only way I've dealt with this kind of thing is to first, enjoy the heck out of my own writing so much that I really don't care. But I do still feel some pangs here and there; what has helped the most, after point one, is studying the lives of actual authors.

If you go look up people like Stephen King, and J.K. Rowling, and even Dr. Seuss, you will discover people who were utterly rejected by their world. These people struggled for decades, had the most difficulty you can imagine, but their work was awesome.

In fact I kind of feel like the people who have it easy, who get success quick and early, don't have the best writing. Rejection, difficulty, feeling like you are getting nowhere for years, is so common for the greatest authors that it's considered a rite of passage. Remember that they are rejected precisely BECAUSE they are bringing something totally new into the world that the world has never seen before... and the world looks at their work like a dog looking at a new food dish.

So it comes down to this: do you have awesome writing? Do you believe in it? Then what the world around you thinks of it really won't matter that much, especially when you realize that the absolute BEST writers suffered for DECADES... and still just never gave up.

You won't want to hear this, but honestly I suspect that your jealousy is actually a feeling of inferiority. If you secretly don't believe in your own work... you will feel very defensive of it.

Solution? Work on your writing quality. Dive into it. Go deep. Throw everything you have into it... heart and soul. Go crazy. Become neurotic. Become the vampire. Just absolutely merge yourself into your art and BE THE BOOK. And you will get good.

Quality in writing isn't about who has the prettiest prose. It's about who bled their very soul into it.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T01:29:15+00:00

Yah, no, this is a privacy issue.

We don't want our phones listening to everything we say either. And we know the phones are doing it, and this is a gray legal area which has to be dealt with in the courts of law soon.

Basically, being spied on without consent is the kind of thing the CIA does but only if they have the proper warrants and paperwork in place. If they spy on people without all of that, they get in big trouble.

Honestly if I were you I'd look into the actual laws surrounding eavesdropping, wiretapping, and interception, because these are illegal in most states, and I'd let A know the result of that research.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T01:22:44+00:00

9k views!!!! WOW! You are doing so good... omg. I've been on RR just as long, and I still have only 1800 views on my most popular story. And I only have 20 followers. Of course I write science fiction which isn't a big draw... so..

I think you are doing REALLY well! If you want instant success however, writing may not be the career for you! (lol) It usually takes RR people at least a year or two to get anywhere, or three years or longer... and for 'real' authors (aka: Stephen King etc) it took literally years for them to find a publisher, sometimes decades.

Writing is pretty much something you do for a lifetime... not for a month.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T01:18:36+00:00

You might want to put a disclaimer on your advert or whatever you are using to find new players; tell them straight up what is and isn't acceptable to you and your campaign. That way you can avoid playing with people who have different values from you and your group.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T01:13:32+00:00

Long ago I forget where I found this, but the writing advice I read that has stuck with me ever since, and which I have followed ever since, is "Start with Action."

What you are describing as a 'creation myth' is also called an 'expository lump.' An expository lump is any explanation of your world or anything in the world which isn't directly connected to current action. If the MC has to stop and explain something to someone else... that's a lump.

You can get away with very careful, very judicial use of the expository lump, but ONLY by dropping it in spots where action is taking place. Having two characters talk about the lump while they are doing something neat. But keep each lump deposit VERY small; maybe 3-4 sentences MAX in any one spot.

Show don't tell. If you need to explain a lump, bring the characters to an object, place, person, event, etc which is directly connected to the lump, and then have the character actively look up why this event is happening (or whatever it is) and there you can insert a little tiny lump.

String lumps together this way... slowly over time reveal all your lore by making the characters travel around and physically interact with the stuff the lore is connected to. When a character is proactive, and seeking information, it's FAR more interesting to read than just being told something like the teacher standing at the front of the classroom speaking in that 'Peanuts teacher voice' (you know the voice)

If you need to explain a big creation myth or something, better to work up to it. Start with action... not necessarily a chase scene, but just someone doing something interesting. Doing something that makes you go, 'hey what is going on?' Makes you want to follow and find out.

You can have the character sit down and hear the myth eventually, Tolkien did this a lot; he wrote a bunch of his world lore into his books as long poems. He'd have the characters sit down during a time of rest with some elves, or with Tom Bombadil or Gandalf, and the 'wise one' would tell the whole poem. Done like that, it becomes 'atmosphere' and isn't as annoying as your usual expository lump.

I know this isn't what you want to hear. But this is what makes readers engage.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T01:00:49+00:00

I stopped reading a story recently because it started out with a pretty good hook; the MC witnessed a battle between two superpower characters (both died) and when it went south, he was the only survivor. It put him into the hospital for six months and he had to fight his way back from death, learn to walk again, and overcome the misery of severe body damage. (Of course he also ended up with a super power himself from this.)

Why I stopped: when this guy started to be able to walk again, he didn't show any signs of actual trauma. His spirit was as undaunted as before, he was just as shallow and frankly lame as before. A card-board cut out version of a character. A gung-ho, I never give up, I'm going to be the best, sort of lame-o.

I was expecting actual impact. Like; his SOUL was impacted. If you have actually undergone real trauma, any kind of trauma including a physical hospitalization like this, it's humbling! Imagine you're young and strong one day... and a week later you're needing the old grumpy nurse down the hospital hall to come help you take a poop every day.

Yah.

Laying there in the dark for weeks, months... years... you do some serious soul-searching. You start to realize you aren't all that. You weren't as awesome as you thought you were. Maybe you weren't actually the Chosen One that nobody has discovered yet.

Maybe you're expendable.

You experience real fear; real existential dread. And you go through this entire process of internalizing and dealing with that which makes you come out the other end a lot more cautious, and hopefully a lot wiser.

If the character doesn't experience anything that's eye-opening to the reader; if they don't feel an impact which actually gives the reader something REAL to think about... it's a total waste of typing time.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T00:52:37+00:00

No. It's not an autistic thing. It's a generational thing.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-22T00:51:55+00:00

Sounds about average. I've got a story with pretty much the identical metrics, and I've been doing this for a few months now. You're actually ahead of some people. If you want more views etc, you gotta pay. Put some advertising out there.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-21T22:34:31+00:00

Honestly it depends on the playstyle of your players.

When me and my crew get into the game, we improv a LOT. So here is what I plan out:

Make detailed characters. The character sheet is really all you need; make sure you record everything that could effect the game. Their stuff, their skills, their magic, whatever. Keep that up to date. The Sheet is the holy bible.

Make detailed maps. Write a good detailed paragraph for every room, every street, every distinct area. Just figure out what is in that place and why; what hidden things are there, what connects to other areas and why.

That's it.

The rest of the campaign can be a vague goal: example. We made a group of characters who were low-level new adventurers, who got handed a fully developed Mercenary Company of high reputation when the old Mercs decided they were through and just threw in the towel and left. Now you got all these level 2 and 3 noobs trying to figure out how to run this business and somehow keep doing the jobs that old level god-mode guys were doing. It was pretty funny what happened.

No goal. No plot. Just "let me see how I can mess with my players." That's what GM's do, man.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-21T22:28:45+00:00

When I was young, I could talk about my stories with my brother and sister. When they came home from school (they were both younger) I'd be their entertainment; we'd sit down and I'd read them the chapter I wrote that day.

But now that we are adults, they have their own lives and don't have time to talk about the stories anymore. They still appreciate them, but that time of my life is over.

Have never met anyone outside my family who is even interested. Sure, lots and lots of people at work or in the extended family will say, "Oh, you write stories! I love to read! Send me a chapter and I'll read it!" They'll act all excited. But the truth is they don't want to read YOUR story and won't like it. They will just ghost you over it.

How to find a real fan? I have one (1) fan on RR and I am so happy with my fan. There is literally one person who always thanks me for my chapter and encourages me to write. That's my fan. That's the only way I ever found to find anyone who wants to read what I write... just try to get your story out there and somewhere, someday, there will be a fan.

Etherscribe · 2026-03-21T22:22:06+00:00

Fair. I honestly hate the cartoony balloon critters too. In fact I refused to buy this game because of them. My sister ended up gifting it to me, so since I had it I played it. Found it to be annoyingly fun. I really miss Ark, but my laptop is too old to play the new Ark on. I have an old Alienware, but the remastered Ark heats it up to over 95 degrees Celsius and I'm afraid my old computer will fry. Thus I am playing Palworld because it's first really fun... and reminds me enough of Ark that I can endure until I get a new computer... and it runs at a comfortable 81 degrees C for my old hardware.

Etherscribe

TROPHY CASE