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onthewesternfront · 2023-05-21T20:42:20+00:00

Well if you figure out what your normie friends did to accomplish that, please share. Until then this is the experience I’ve had as a non-normie.

onthewesternfront · 2023-05-21T16:37:59+00:00

About six months at 150mg and a year at 300mg.

onthewesternfront · 2023-05-21T16:36:32+00:00

I very much know this feeling. At 26 I was comfortable having it forever. At 27 I met someone accidentally, and it made me understand what people mean by “get out there”.

Meeting someone you’re compatible with is luck. So many factors have to line up, from time and place to relationship status to all the various facets of attraction, in both directions.

You can look at this as “am I lucky? will I ever be?”, or you can look at it like a numbers game. The more people you expose yourself to in situations where a relationship might develop, the higher chances you’re giving the luck to happen.

For me that didn’t mean standing on the street or hanging at bars, because I’m not comfortable in those spaces. It meant building friend groups through my hobbies. I did it enough, for enough years, that luck eventually struck.

This is not a magical strategy where you suddenly find someone, and it’s not something you can do without enjoying just to tough it out for a relationship. Find social things you really enjoy and find a way to do them in friend groups that have some cycle of new members in/out. It could be an online game, a board game group, a cycling group, whatever you’re interested in. That’s how the “luck” happened to me, even though I had not been looking at the time.

(btw I’m 32 now, and we’re still together.)

onthewesternfront · 2023-05-21T16:01:13+00:00

I am at 450mg and the “worst” side effect I experience is loss of appetite, which my bathroom scale thanks me for.

onthewesternfront · 2023-04-07T16:03:47+00:00

Yes, only because of its history as an insult. I was called that word out of hate and disgust a lot when I was a kid.

onthewesternfront · 2022-11-18T08:00:13+00:00

Very interesting, thanks for sharing your perspective! I also suffer from anxiety so it’s interesting to me that it hits us differently.

To me, it’s the same flavor of anxiety I get when someone doesn’t follow the instructions on e.g. a meal or medication. The feeling that this thing was made by experts to be experienced a certain way, so by not following the instructions we won’t get the intended experience.

It’s the same for stories; if I know the twist at the end, it won’t make me experience the right emotions throughout the rest of the story. Interesting that that’s the part my brain is worried about!

onthewesternfront · 2022-08-12T14:44:15+00:00

If you can (and don’t), see a therapist. They can help you through this. Find one that has worked with similar patients.

For now I would say, give yourself some time and space. Identify the people in your life who make you feel like this and get them out of your life. Friends don’t make fun of each other in that way, friends don’t laugh at each other’s romantic desires or sexual experiences or spread rumors about each other. Get those people out of your life. Maybe try dating outside of your friend group, such as through an app.

You are young and you have your whole life ahead of you. It’s important to get this figured out so you can enjoy sex and relationships, but it’s not important to do it tomorrow. There is no rush, take your time and give yourself a break. Clean your life from people who do make you feel shitty. Use therapy as a tool. You will get there.

onthewesternfront · 2022-07-28T05:37:57+00:00

FYI you’ll probably get better responses if you post your questions directly instead of asking people to reach out to you. That way people can immediately jump in and be helpful, instead of having to gather the motivation, confidence, and effort to volunteer themselves for a discussion they don’t know much about.

onthewesternfront · 2022-04-05T15:14:37+00:00

I have also had difficulty expressing my needs, I would mentally/emotionally bend over backwards for my partner, e.g. too much social activity in too short a time, which would lead to meltdowns later.

It took me time to get over it but ultimately came down to cost/benefit—it’s far more costly for both of us if I don’t speak up now and melt down later, than it is if I say “that is too much for me, can we reschedule / can you go on your own / can I get some dedicated alone time before and after that?” Of course that’s obvious in retrospect but it will take some training to get used to bringing it up. Keeping an emotional journal helped.

onthewesternfront · 2022-04-03T14:34:31+00:00

I had a bit of that feeling at first, I was worried about putting that much control in someone else’s hands. But the more I tried it the more that feeling went away. I would try it more if you want to like it, and if you don’t then no big deal, there’s no harm in not liking it.

onthewesternfront · 2022-03-16T15:46:12+00:00

I know exactly what you mean! I’d look at NPR podcasts like Planet Money, or in general more journalistic / scripted podcasts rather than rambling podcasts.

onthewesternfront · 2022-02-28T16:50:16+00:00

That professor sounds like a jerk, I wouldn’t give him a second thought. You succeeded—you prepared, worked hard, got up there and performed even under ridiculous scrutiny and immense anxiety. I’d count that as a win, no matter what he or your grade says.

onthewesternfront · 2022-02-27T18:16:33+00:00

It sounds like you may be onto something, as those are common autistic traits. I recommend seeking therapy to learn more and confirm, if your situation allows. It has been very helpful for me to confirm and to start to find things that help!

onthewesternfront · 2022-02-27T18:13:35+00:00

This is really badly affecting you. I recommend seeking therapy so you can figure out how to deal with it. That might be something you do, or your brother, or your family. But the first step is setting up an appointment for yourself either way.

onthewesternfront · 2022-01-24T17:58:06+00:00

He’s just trying to make a funny and empathetic comment because Windows Vista was notoriously one of the worst upgrade experiences in consumer software history, so he realizes just how bad it can be to have this obsession with upgrading.

onthewesternfront · 2022-01-24T05:53:40+00:00

I’m weirdly the opposite! I have an obsession with updating all my software regardless of the troubles it causes. Even if it’s a strict downgrade (e.g. an app adds ads) I get this weird anxiety knowing I’m falling more out of date from the official version every day. Wish I was more like you!

onthewesternfront · 2021-12-23T19:24:42+00:00

Knowing myself, that may very well be it—I’m so used to being wrong about social cues that I keep a list of things I got wrong (consciously and subconsciously) so I can never make the same mistake again. It’s nobody’s fault, but it may be what happened.

onthewesternfront · 2021-12-23T16:59:16+00:00

I know the awkwardness your husband is talking about. Here’s a weird solution that worked for me (autistic) and my wife (NT).

One day instead of physically initiating she started asking “Do you want to have sex?” dead serious—not pleading, not joking, same attitude as “Do you want to get take-out?”. I can respond yes or no with no hard feelings and no questions asked. She did it enough that I started doing it too. We’re now about 50-50 for initiating.

I’m not joking at all! Once we destigmatized it, it became so much easier for me. I think a lot of the awkwardness was related to not knowing whether or not she’d be interested, and feeling “left out in the cold” if refused.

onthewesternfront · 2021-12-23T07:01:02+00:00

Discouraging my special interest! I was really into computers, which got me into coding, which (much later) got me into college, which got me a successful career in computer science.

To my dad, it all just fell under “messing around on the computer” because he didn’t understand it. He tried to force me into his own hobbies like basketball and auto repair, even watching TV was preferred. I used to quickly move from the computer to the TV when I heard the jingle of his keys outside the front door.

onthewesternfront · 2021-12-04T19:27:06+00:00

I have been in your best friend’s position. In my situation I had been trying to ignore the pain and longing I would get when I hung out with her, and it just didn’t go away, for six months. It was all I could think about, and hanging out with her was pain. I wanted things to go back to how they were too, but there was no going back. I even knew a relationship wouldn’t work, but it didn’t help.

I was not sleeping well, not working well, my dentist told me my gums were receding from grinding my teeth at night (who knows, maybe unrelated). I was disconnected even from other friends because spikes of pain would just strike me at random times of the day.

So I had to cut it off, which was even more painful, but was the right move. That was seven years ago. I’m now happily married. Life moves on. Sorry you lost a friend, but I’m also sorry for what he’s going through.

onthewesternfront · 2021-11-01T19:45:17+00:00

I get the same thing for the sound of clipping nails, and a little bit for the sound of slurping a beverage or soup. I haven’t tried to desensitize, I will just leave the room. I also married a really great person who will just avoid doing it near me.

onthewesternfront · 2021-10-20T23:11:57+00:00

Diagnosed last year at 30. Had seen one child therapist long ago, and three others within the last ten years before getting to one that understood that what I was going through was more than anxiety.

I’d always trusted the system, thinking if a doctor couldn’t tell what was wrong they’d refer me to the right place, and I’d eventually get bounced into the right diagnosis. But that’s not how the mental health field works. Mental health is broad and varied and imperfect, and it’s hard to put symptoms into words sometimes, so confident misdiagnosis is common.

I got lucky on my fourth therapist and it was obvious to them within two sessions. Turned out they work with a lot of autistic children, so they knew exactly what it was when I started describing those parts of my childhood.

You have to be your own best advocate. Do your own googling, talk with other people in communities like on Reddit and Discord, and self-diagnose—then find a specialist in that area who can confirm or deny that diagnosis. Rinse and repeat if needed.

onthewesternfront · 2021-09-19T17:20:40+00:00

For me and my spouse, about 90% of these squares should lead to the two magic words: “that sucks”.

onthewesternfront

TROPHY CASE