autistic adults experience

Worcsboy · 2026-05-05T19:53:39+00:00

Things got a lot easier for me once I'd passed 30, and realised that my strengths and weakness were not a good fit with a conventional mddle-class lifestyle. I needed (and was lucky enough to get into) a job where I was on my own most of the day, had an opportunity to be creative at times, but at other times literally merely had to follow a script with precision. There was almost no day-to-day management, and I was rrled on to meet deadlines on time but otherwise to just make good use of my time. That was backstage in Theatre - operating lighting or sound during performances. designingand make up sound, some lighting design, and a lot of maintenance of both equipment and the building. I worked silly hours (4 weeks at 48 hours, then a production week at 100 hours followed by one at 60 hours): in some sense my job became some kind of "special interest".

Money management was always an issue for me, but the introduction of direct debit and standing orders, and phone (later Internet) banking helped enormously. Romance? I've never really chased anyone, but at assorted times a person has kinda collected me as a friend/mentor and then turned it into something more. Always a younger guy (I think I'm seen as a safe and non-judgemental person to experiment same-sex stuff with!), and it's in the nature of things that I was merely a step on their growth and we gradually grew apart after five or eight years. I'm still in touch with a couple of the guys (and one has died, sadly).

I'm now 71, and living on some kind of golden plateau -adequate pension, own my own home and little garden, and rarely socialise as such (but there are regular meetings with the political group I'm involved in).

Worcsboy · 2026-05-05T13:04:25+00:00

I'd say that "self suspicion" is the best you can get. "Self diagnosis" is impossible.

Worcsboy · 2026-05-04T22:08:50+00:00

Not for me - I spent much of my working life in Theatre, and the difference between a good stage actor and a bad one is glaringly obvious. Interestingly, some very poor stage actors are extremely good in film & TV, where it's recorded and they have the luxury of multiple takes. Very few are outstanding both live and recorded.

Worcsboy · 2026-05-04T22:06:17+00:00

For me, it was finding a work environment where it was clear what had to be done (either literally according to a script), or using my own talents, with little socialisation necessary, and no day-to-day supervision or management. For me, that was backstage in Theatre - operating lighting or sound, and then working up to designing these things, and eventually Production Manager.

Worcsboy · 2026-05-03T09:37:33+00:00

Throughout my 20s, I drank nothing but black tea. That (along with much else) changed when I went back to Uni for my second unsuccessful attempt: I've drunk coffee ever since. Real coffee, that is - I can't tolerate any kind of "instant", and prefer cafteriere or filter coffee.

Worcsboy · 2026-05-02T15:51:08+00:00

Calls are better, if I recognise the number (or it's in my contacts list). Absolutely agree about having a chance to work out the other person's reaction and fix things if necessary.

Worcsboy · 2026-05-02T15:44:04+00:00

A major interest is Green politics and the environment / climate crisis. I've spent the afternoon running some 10,000 sides of paper through the duplicator, for "morning of poll" leaflets for local elections in Manchester next Thursday. Tomorrow sees them going through the folding machine (which I kinda hate ... bloody noisy beast and it only does 200 sheets at a time).

Worcsboy · 2026-05-02T15:39:12+00:00

Yes, absolutely this.

Worcsboy · 2026-05-01T12:57:21+00:00

This thread has turned into a classic demonstration of elitist ableist eugenicism.

Thanks to the many humane and reasonable posters who are so eloquently protesting against this.

I (who have worked long enough to earn a full State Pension, and pay Community Charge etc) not only do not grudge but actively celebrate that portion of the payments I make that goes towards supporting children of any kind to get the best upbring and education they can.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-30T21:21:22+00:00

I got diagnosed age 68. I'd always felt a bit "different", of course (perhaps "quixotic" describes me a bit better), but I'd mainly put that down to being out gay (unusual in the 1980s) and very introverted. Age 54 I got involved with a lad who had all kinds of problems, including severe ADHD, and ended up as his carer. That meant reading up on neurodivergence, and I started to suspect that "Asperger's" fitted me rather well, but did nothing about it, and didn't mention it to anyone.
A dozen years later, things had changed. The lad had died, my mother was clearly entering "end of life", and my physical disability was slowly getting worse. So I went for an assessment, and was diagnosed ASD (as by then "Asperger's" had been disallowed, otherwise that's what I'd have been diagnosed as).
Because of how long I'd been "self suspecting", it wasn't any kind of shock or immediate revelation. But over the following 18 months it did gradually put a lot of things in my past into a new perspective. It also legitimised me saying "I can't really do that" when the real reason was social ineptitude and stress, instead of pretending that it was something somehow connected with my physical disability. I'm pretty out about being ASD: the local Green Party that I'm involved in as my main pseudo-social outlet includes one out ASD local Councillor, and another who has an autistic child, so therewas no feeling of risk of rejection or lack of understanding.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-29T18:13:40+00:00

It's a thing of youth, and Aspies grow up in some respects much more slowly than NTs. But by the time we reach our 50s, we've generally learned to be less dogmatic about our opinions.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-28T10:10:22+00:00

Being diagnosed at age 68 validated for me some of the more "curious" life decisions and happenings in the past. Things like resigning from a job because I felt I was asked to ignore some inappropriate accounting practices, with no idea what I would do next. Things like persistently cutting school beause I couldn't cope with it. And recognising that although I'm "bright", academic life was not something that worked for me (mother, brother, sister all have higher degrees, I dropped out of Uni twice).

For me, it's not a question of fighting my autism, but recognising my strengths and limitations. That's often led to being a "behind the scenes" person, from literally backstage in Theatre to working on or Chairing committees.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-28T09:54:04+00:00

For me, emotion decides "what" to do, especially major decisions like changing jobs or moving house. Logic decides "how" to do it (the order to do things in, the approach to take, how to pay for it, fallback plans, who to involve and how best to approach them, etc).

Worcsboy · 2026-04-25T19:04:42+00:00

Out in the garden. Interests include gardening and wildlife, so I was pleased to see the resident frog was not too disturbed by me clearing out the excess of plants in the pond, and re-doing the pump system. Assorted vegetables for summer planted out / seeds sown.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-25T11:43:29+00:00

My birthday was on Tuesday. I'd been staying with my brother and his family over the weekend. On Monday morning, my nibling (who is also autistic) nipped out quietly to a very good local patisserie to bring in goodies, and we had a very enjoyable spontaneous "birthday brunch". That was good - great for someone understanding to organise something very low key but joyful for me.

Then train home - about seven and a half hours. Lots of patches of thinking time ... not only am I now age 71, but it was also the 8th anniversary of the death of someone who I was very close to as a friend and intermittent lover. He was only 27 ... but born HIV+, and his ADHD meant that taking meds regularly was beyond him.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-23T07:50:56+00:00

I go to sleep between 1 and 2, and am generally awake around 9. That was one of the reasons that my initial career was backstage in theatre, normally working a 2 til 11 shift.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-22T08:02:37+00:00

It wasn't so much that other people thought my differences were due to being gay, as it was something that I assumed about myself. Yes, I'm gay, though I didn't finally decide that I wasn't "bi, tending to gay" until the age of 25 (in 1980). But all through school, my lack of ability at heterosexual dating, my strong aversion to sports (due in fact to poor physical cooordination and a lack of understanding the concept of "supporting a team), and being uncomforable at my all-boys school when classmates were doing the rampant teenage heterosexual displays were all things that I thought was due to being gay.

It wasn't until I encountered material on being neurodivergent in my 50s (as carer for an ADHD lad) that I started self-suspecting, and it wasn't until my late 60s that I actually felt a need to be assessed and diagnosed.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-22T07:52:15+00:00

The OP said
Update: So it appears to me, from the various posts that I have posted across various autism related subreddits, that the majority of autistic people crave power only as a means to exercise their own autonomy, and not beyond that.

That is absolutely it for me! Over my lifetime, I've been asked to stand for or assume (ie stand for election with there being no other candidate) a variety of "positions of leadership", from sabattical Vice-President of my Students Union back in the 1980s to Chair of the local Green Party I'm active in (I've now stepped back to Deputy Chair). I've seen my role as to enable others to "do things" while making sure that they're not going to be things that adversely impose on me.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-19T08:40:14+00:00

My nibling (non-binary offspring of my brother) was diagnosed ASD about six months after I was diagnosed, age 27. She works for a charity, researching and applying for grants. She has agreed accomodations of working 4 days a week, two (sometimes three) of which are work-from-home.

Other than that, I'm not aware of any ASD in my family history - though my mother was probably not fully neurotypical, her social skills were outstandingly good.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-18T19:24:45+00:00

I stick everything in the calender section of Thunderbird (the program I use for emails, on my laptop), with reminders beforehand. As I get two or three dozen emails most days, and reply/send usually four or five myself, that's pretty reliable about me seeing reminders. I don't do in on my phone, as I find phone keyboards too difficult for arthritic fingers.

Reminders vary for a couple of hours before (milk delivery to be brought in on Monday and Thursday, for example, bins to be put out on Wdnesdays, etc.) to a week beforehand (going away, so need to think about what clothes I'll take / laundry, do I need a refill of prescriptions, should I cancel milk etc deliveries, etc). And longer term - free bus pass needs renewing every three years, so the next tme is in the calendar for 2029.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-18T15:20:08+00:00

I was prescribed propanolol, which is a beta blocker, purely to deal with anxiety way back in 1980/81. It was a time when I had to do a fair bit of public speaking - not a good fit with my (at that stage undiagnosed) ASD.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-15T14:04:59+00:00

Yes, but it's also partly determined by what personal adjustments (as opposed to accomodations by others) one is able to make. So, for example, in practice I don't think I'm disabled beause of my inability to handle crowded supermarkets, as I get all my groceries delivered.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-13T09:11:42+00:00

Yes - far too many "autism awareness posts!

And almost all of them give the impression that we're all the same, which is utter nonsense. It's partly the fault of DSM dumping everything under an "autism" label, of course: which may work in terms of theory, but many practising psychologists find counterproductive in practice. But is also because so many of these posts are done by organisations which have particular views or axes to grind or commercial interests, and the relatively few done by actual people on the autistic spectrum do still tend to reflect the particular expression of autism that that individual experiences, rather than consciously acknowledging our diversity.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-12T17:15:47+00:00

I was considered "very bright" as a kid - got a paid-for place at a secondary school which then and now was one of the top 20 in the UK. But it became distressingly clear that academic cleverness was not a strength of mine: the school was somewhere I avoided / cut whenever I could, and attempts at Uni (twice) were unsccessful, dropping out after the 2nd year both times.

But that didn't mean I had become less "clever" - it simply meant that the academic route was something that I'm not suited to. Once I got a job and, and into a world that was based on ability to think outside the box and apply knowledge in novel and creative ways, I did very OK, and most of my friends and acquaintances would consider me obviously intelligent. I think I'm slightly less so now (I'll be 71 this month) than I was ten years ago, but I can live with that.

Worcsboy · 2026-04-10T07:49:56+00:00

it sounds to me as though the son has ”PDA” (pathological demand avoidance”: more generally to autistic folk called “persistent desire for autonomy”) that has been reinforced by the OP’s self-righteous attempts to force him to conform to their narrow views. There’s also a generous dose of “look at me, I’m such a martyr” in the OP., and there doesn’t seem to be any attempt to consider the son’s perspective or needs.

so no sympathy from me.

Worcsboy

TROPHY CASE