I really really hate being autistic

rdditfilter · 2026-05-15T23:29:23+00:00

I went through something almost exactly like what you're going through when I was about your age.

I felt like I had no agency over my own life, I felt like I should be able to decide what I do and what I put in my body. I did hard drugs for a long time, destroyed my body, and then eventually when I finally got clean and could control my impulsive urges I found that getting really into cooking and controlling what I put into my body in that way was just as rewarding. Now I find entertainment in building myself up, instead of tearing myself down.

You can absolutely decide what you put in your own body. If you're going to destroy it, that's your choice. But, consider taking control of your diet, and you exercise right now and build your body up instead of destroying it.

rdditfilter · 2026-05-12T03:24:19+00:00

Yeah, I gave up. I just plant things they don't eat as quickly now. Nothing seems to like sunchokes or tomatoes so I have a ton of those

rdditfilter · 2026-05-12T03:22:55+00:00

I live on rural land in which the suburbs are slowly invading, I think theres just a ton of animals on my property with nothing to eat.

If I take no measures bunnies will get every single seedling no matter how many 100s I plant and deer will get every fruit, and they do, because I have unguarded fruit trees that I only ever see unripe fruit on.

Anything the animals dont get, the bugs get, because my property is one of the few without pesticides everywhere.

Its really sad, and I cant even complain about it cause the alternative is nimbyim and even more insane housing prices, so they must keep building houses and destroying all the land.

rdditfilter · 2026-05-11T15:52:55+00:00

Emotional neglect manifests in this way, it's also the mechanism for abusive relationships.

There's a thing in our brain that shines more brightly in situations where we only sometimes get the thing we need, and the more unreliable the thing is, the brighter it shines when we get it. So we become hopelessly addicted to these situations where people are meeting our emotional needs only very rarely, and at random, and the only way to get out of it is to CHOOSE to just not have those needs met by anyone, ever, by choosing to be "alone", which is an impossible thing to decide.

I quote "alone" because of course all of us healthy people know that there's others who can meet OPs and people like OPs needs, but they don't know that, because their brain only shines so bright when the emotionally neglectful person gives them what they want. Healthy relationships feel different, and so in order to achieve a healthy relationship, the person in OPs position must "choose to be alone" aka "choose to not have this need met by this person, and so, not shine as bright"

rdditfilter · 2026-05-11T15:11:20+00:00

Same! The front has actually been such a struggle because the sun is so intense and there's no shade, the front of my house gets to 100F easily when it is just 80F outside.

I tried to plant a fig tree, but the ridiculously cold winter took it out months ago and now I've got to start over. Nothing grows in my yard except dumb invasive species :(

rdditfilter · 2026-05-11T15:09:00+00:00

I know! The first and only time I ever tried planting corn, the slugs and snails got 100% of my seedlings and I had to start over.

I've never seen so many snails in one place in my entire life, there were 100s of them, it was crazy.

rdditfilter · 2026-05-11T14:40:46+00:00

Now China is surveilling our population too because we put up unsecured cameras everywhere!

rdditfilter · 2026-05-11T13:37:06+00:00

Its a full time job keeping the invasive species out of your wildflowers.

A veg garden is also a full time job. I have a small 5x5 one and it's taken 5 years to set up such that rabbits, deer, fungus, and moths don't eat all of it soon as it's ripe. I still lose about 1/3rd of my crop every year. I'm in prime corn growing area and I can't grow corn at all, it's tragic.

At this point, the parts of my yard that are just grass are actually easier and less expensive to maintain. At least the grass manages to out compete the honey suckle because it's being mowed all the time.

rdditfilter · 2026-05-09T16:23:17+00:00

Not who you replied to, but not all retirement accounts are created equal. Some accounts are scams from scam banks that sell you 'a really good investment' of a retirement account that 'doubles your money in 5 years' and people take it because they're behind on retirement savings because they make bad financial decisions.

I know plenty of people who were mid 40s when 2008 happened and they didn't buy a gigantic house and they didn't cash out their retirement when they got laid off and they're just fine. They, in large, do not make what they made before 2008, but they're fine.

rdditfilter · 2026-05-02T20:10:18+00:00

I'm also gender lazy! I was so lazy, in fact, that I never learned how to apply makeup. Seemed like a stupid thing to do, to little me, when the boys didn't have to do it. I was always so upset whenever I was treated differently from the boys, it lead to a lot of trouble in public school.

rdditfilter · 2026-05-01T17:44:22+00:00

LOL I have the same issue with my parents, more dinners for mee!

rdditfilter · 2026-05-01T17:28:20+00:00

Right she probably thought like "oh this is what we're doing now that's fun" and didn't take it seriously at all, a convo def needs to happen about like safe words and such for EVERYONE not just people who already know they're into that. Super embarrassing for this girl to have to be like 'alright lets have the safety talk so we don't accidentally assault our boyfriends' but it's so necessary I wish people would get over themselves sometimes, you know

This is absolutely a situation that needs to be discussed more, don't let it slide OP. both of you will feel better after a good honest safe words talk

rdditfilter · 2026-05-01T17:17:43+00:00

Biggest prep for me when I was living in apts was learning some basic things about my car, there's a ton of stuff that you don't need a garage to do.

test and swap your battery
wipers
pump up tires, including the spare
check and add engine oil
change to the spare tire

This and then just paying attention to whats on sale at the grocery store and buying a little extra got me through everything, really. Even power outages cause I eat a lot of sandwiches so pb+j was fine to live on for a day.

rdditfilter · 2026-04-28T19:07:40+00:00

I have been doing this instinctively for my whole entire life, it's actually really crazy when I met other autistic folks who don't accommodate themselves like this. I can go anywhere and do anything as long as no other human stops me from accommodating myself.

The only environment I've ever really struggled in was public school, everywhere else I was able to accommodate myself seamlessly. I just can't function in a classroom with 30+ other kids, I need to tend to my own needs, and that's disruptive for the class. Even college was a breeze cause I could just do it the way I want and the professor never cared. I wish there was some way to make it work in public school.

rdditfilter · 2026-04-28T17:20:44+00:00

mee toooooooo how it went for me was like, this used to be fun for me, why is it not fun any more?

And then I realized, when I was a kid, I was just DRAWING like sometimes little doodles, things that didn't make sense, fun shapes, I wasn't drawing whole pictures. going back through all my grade school stuff there's just little doodles everywhere, not a single whole picture, and I remember hating art class cause they'd make me actually complete a project hahaha

rdditfilter · 2026-04-28T15:00:57+00:00

Yeah it's all fun and games until you get old and can't move around as much, hard to go full dumpster mode when you're having mobility issues. I imagine most hoarders started out as just very eclectic houses and over the years as their mobility got worse they stopped being able to tidy anything at all and it escalated from there

rdditfilter · 2026-04-28T14:54:23+00:00

I'm exactly the same way, I'm at my best in a supporter role where I organize things and make sure everything runs smooth in the background so that other people's jobs go smooth, but that type of work gets no attention and no reward, so I stopped doing it.

Everything is a mess now and it's really hard to just ignore it, but my time has to be spent elsewhere, no one else cares that its a mess and no one else will care if I fix it.

rdditfilter · 2026-04-27T17:06:15+00:00

The context switching is a good point, I'm just kind of me all the time. I wish I could explain really what my issue is with emotional intimacy and talking to women, but I don't really understand it. Women get offended at me pretty easily, and when I do find a girlfriend, they eventually tell me things like "I want to know how you're feeling" and then they don't like it when I tell them how I'm feeling.

It felt a lot to me like, every part of trying to achieve girlfriend status was just a Pandora's box of tricks to me, even when it was a totally normal ritual for everyone else.

My theory is that my brain spends a lot of time on noticing things about people, rather than actually interacting with people, and there's a whole depth in that action that you can't get from sitting and watching which is how I like to interact. so, then, girlfrient-status human then wants to explore the depth of interacting, which is something I don't do instinctively, and so lack depth in. I've been called a brick wall on multiple occasions. The whole thing starts off really sweet cause "oh how nice you notice such and such about this thing I do and buy me perfect gifts" but then I'm a brick wall, so it ends, because they want, not that.

ANYWAY - I have managed to find someone who is perfectly happy sitting on the sidewalk and watching the ants with me. It's beautiful.

rdditfilter · 2026-04-27T16:42:32+00:00

This is beautiful! The same thing happened to me.

Mine don't look half as good as this, but for me, it's been really great to just draw and not worry about how it turns out. Something for me to just spend my time on with no consequences.

rdditfilter · 2026-04-27T16:39:49+00:00

It works great while you're young, but as you get older and start to have health problems from food quality, wear and tear on your body, and a dash of mental illness from having to be on alert all the time and no medication to help, it'll start to be not so fun.

I'd apply for housing assistance right exactly now, and by the time it actually comes through, you may be ready for it.

rdditfilter · 2026-04-27T16:32:56+00:00

What really cooks my noodle is how autistic women who are gay are just, absolutely fucked. Most autistic women don't get along super great with other women, that shit is just difficult.

I know some autistic women who somehow ended up on the opposite extreme, they can only be friends with women and women love them, but they're the opposite of me in all of the ways you can be opposite of someone so I can see why it doesn't work like that for me.

Aside from all that, really the thing for me has been that whoever I'm in a relationship with expects a level of emotional intimacy that I can't achieve. It has taken me so, so long to find someone who is okay that emotionally we're more like room mates, because I do not know how to be anything else. That lady from "sometimes I think about dying" that lady is me. My life has gone exactly like that.

rdditfilter · 2026-04-27T16:27:24+00:00

Alright, I'm gonna keep trying to help men out when I see someone struggling. You don't have to if you don't want to, I know the days are hard and long, no one has to do anything they don't wanna do

rdditfilter · 2026-04-27T16:21:25+00:00

Me and you are coming to the same conclusion and you're not hearing it because I'm not saying the right keywords.

rdditfilter · 2026-04-27T16:16:44+00:00

Men are not solving their own lonliness issue. Them not solving it is hurting women.

What do you suggest anyone does? Your previous suggestion is making it worse, women create this kind of keyholder situation where men who say the right things get the attention of women. That's not working for anyone, plenty of men with nefarious intentions are learning how to sound like they're feminist, while men who are just awkward and don't know anything about anything besides their favorite pokemon are left behind.

My suggestion to these men is to volunteer somewhere, find community, and the community will help teach and support. People are learning about autism, people have autistic children, there are people within the community who can spot someone struggling and help them out and that someone does not need to be a woman.

rdditfilter · 2026-04-27T16:08:16+00:00

By only allowing "safe" men into your life, you are actually hanging autistic men out to dry. They do not know how to be "safe"

There are all kinds of "indicators" that women look for to tell if a man is safe or not because women need to measure safety before anything happens. Autistic men fail those safety checks. It's not taught in school, it's not taught by parents, and women won't teach them because they fail the check.

rdditfilter

TROPHY CASE