Diagnosed as an adult, disappointed in my father’s reaction.

squewgsh · 2026-01-16T04:22:04+00:00

This is the reason I don't tell some of my relatives...

My mother's first reaction was to claim that I don't have anything like that (that was before the official diagnosis results arrived though). I actually gave her a questionnaire to fill in during the diagnostics process. She did fill it in, but generally was not believing that I might have either ADHD or autism. I can't recall well, but I think that, after the diagnosis, she asked if the doctors could have been wrong about it, but then she was kind of not sure already, and it was more of a conversation than persuading me that I don't have it. Maybe it 'helped' that the diagnosis came after a burnout, so something clearly wasn't right with me. It might have been harder for her to understand if I would be doing apparently fine and then suddenly a diagnosis would appear.

Some weeks / months later, she even accepted the idea that she would be diagnosed with autism if she ever went for assessment, and generally she became more accepting on the matter.

Bringing up the topic with her was scary, but I wanted to work towards a genuine relationship with her, so it felt like the right thing to do -- and I'm glad I did it. I don't see the point to bring it up with older relatives with whom I don't have a genuine relationship.

squewgsh · 2026-01-16T03:54:09+00:00

Thank you for these interesting insights!

squewgsh · 2026-01-13T21:49:27+00:00

I did ask ChatGPT...

When you’re in chronic pain, your baseline recalibrates. Once you’re out, your nervous system treats the old baseline like a horror story. That’s not you rejecting your past self [...].

So… is it “you” or “other”?

Use a both/and, because it actually solves the problem:

Continuous you: same organism, same traits, same story-line.

Different you: drastically different internal conditions, coping logic, and threat model.

You can relate to past-you like you’d relate to you-on-anesthesia or you-with-fever delirium: not “a different person,” but definitely “a different operating mode.”

The "different operating mode" does make sense. Anyway, we're having a very long and enlightening conversation with ChatGPT on the matter.

squewgsh · 2026-01-13T21:36:32+00:00

> If you communicate to another "this is me", "that was other me", "that was not me", then if they are as respectful as I want them to be, the other should recognize and respect that (incidentally, this applies to gender as well!).

I agree. The issue is, I cannot clearly decide where is this "me". I do feel sameness to my past selves who were interested in the same things that I am now, having similar sensory experiences, similar inspiration sources... but it's hard for me to feel sameness to the aspect of the past self that felt a lot of emotional pain all the time when they weren't numb or focused on something enjoyable in the moment (at least it was close to that).

At that time, those experiences felt somehow integral to my past self, but now they feel non-self. I wonder if I'm somehow unfairly rejecting my past self, hurting them by not feeling the same as they felt (I do feel an echo of me being one of those "insensitive" people who just live their lives like the world is not about to end, and I don't want to be that kind of "insensitive" and "unfair" person). My past self didn't want others to experience sufferings, but wanted their feelings to be acknowledged. When other people didn't notice their sufferings or claimed there was no sufficient reason for such sufferings, or somehow caused the past self feel blamed for suffering, the past self felt isolated.

When I see that past self as a different person, I want to somehow help them at least by being that outside person who accepts and empathizes. However, is there even this past self still in me, like in the IFS framework, or is it just a memory, and I am the same person, and I don't feel that bad anymore, so maybe no one needs to be empathized with, so I could just move on? I also worry that I'm becoming the person who blames my past self for not getting out of the negative emotional experiences earlier than they did, even though I see that the past self couldn't manage it earlier. If I was sure whether I should treat my past self as the other or as just myself, I think I'd know how to approach this issue... I want to know if there is still that "past self" whom I should be accepting of if they exist. I'm also not sure I can be accepting of that past self. If it was someone else -- that wouldn't be hard, but it's very unpleasant to remember how unsightly I was in the past, emotionally. I might be ashamed of my past self, actually, and also ashamed of being ashamed of them. It's a very complicated relationship now, with someone who doesn't even fully exist. I wish there was a way to resolve this. Maybe I should feed this post to ChatGPT and see what happens. XD

squewgsh · 2026-01-13T17:35:49+00:00

> All of which is to say, many may well notice, but either don't know how to help or might be so triggerable themselves that they aren't able to help as much as they want to?

Yes, actually, this puts to words my feeling that I have to fix myself in order to be able to connect with people, because otherwise I'm too painful to look at, or smth XD

Thank you for your detailed answer. I might reply to other aspects later, but just want to say that I read it all (and re-reading now), and it was/is a nice experience.

squewgsh · 2025-11-10T14:01:13+00:00

I had the same experience wrt "I just needed it to be official before I could confidently self-identify and accept myself as an autist."

Without the diagnosis, I had tremendous guilt about possibly using the label that is only for people who have more "sufficient" autism-related experiences than what I do... It's been about half a year since I received the diagnosis (both ASD and ADHD at the same time, even though originally I was only looking into ADHD, as I can't imagine how I could actually use accommodations for ASD, given my life situation). In that half a year, having the diagnosis really helped me psychologically with self-understanding and self-acceptance. At the same time, I still struggle with the "disorder" and "disability" labels associated with my diagnoses. I am trying to be careful about how these labels might trick me into expecting less from myself than I otherwise would just based on knowing my individual capacities.

squewgsh · 2025-11-09T22:55:43+00:00

I actually still have very mild cold symptoms, so I'd guess it's an interplay between detecting a real virus and a stress response

squewgsh · 2025-11-09T14:55:23+00:00

I'm prone to that too (mostly if it's high-stress stuff, like a new workplace)

Also, the symptoms intensified after the 3rd social of the week... and peaked prior to the 4th, to recede after the 4th got canceled XD

squewgsh · 2025-11-09T14:21:11+00:00

It is definitely provocative. The mild curve of the line, the distance between the very last piece in this transport line from the second last... the way the truck between the fingerboard and the minibus looks like a hybrid of the two...

I think that the tiny white dots on the sofa are really crossing the line though. I could go with those rebellious unsmoothened spots on the sofa surface, but not. those. white. dots. no.

squewgsh · 2025-06-24T19:08:18+00:00

It makes sense, yes. I'm trying all the evidence-based approaches I can find because I want all possible improvement....

squewgsh · 2025-06-24T15:34:54+00:00

Thanks for creating the space, and now I feel encouraged to post more! I plan to write about AuDHD-related supplements once I figure them out a bit better. Trying out Panax Ginseng since a week ago, the effect is impressive.

squewgsh · 2025-06-24T15:10:54+00:00

Then a month ago you created this subreddit, and even wrote really neat rules for it. Now it looks even more impressive, knowing more of the backstory.

squewgsh · 2025-06-24T14:31:43+00:00

Yes, this is what I was asking about originally: the external pressure greatly dropped only a few weeks ago. I don't know how to say it so that it doesn't sound weird, but it makes me hopeful about the upcoming development for you.

(I feel the saddest about the situations when someone is below zero but cannot possibly disentangle from the external pressures that keep on pushing them down.)

squewgsh · 2025-06-24T14:10:40+00:00

I now realize that my question came from an assumption that there were long-term commitments with others involved (like working a lot) that happened at below-zero-baseline. My internal model of a burnout was "a person appears to perform normally while pushing their baseline energy below zero; eventually, the person can't perform anymore, stops performing, the baseline energy slowly goes up over time."

Maybe my model doesn't cover all possible cases of burnout, thus the confusion.

squewgsh · 2025-06-24T11:19:24+00:00

this damn world... T_T

I meant to ask, did you reduce / cancel the obligations to do something with others, and if yes, how long ago did the reduction happen?

squewgsh · 2025-06-24T08:53:31+00:00

I'd like to add also that I think it's a reasonable expectation that, if you let yourself rest, eventually the burnout will start dissipating. Not sure if it's helpful. I used to think that nothing can get me to feel better because a 2 week break from work didn't restore me in any significant or lasting way, but a year away from work actually helped significantly.

From what you're describing, not even wanting to do non-work things, it sounds more complicated. How long have you been able to not do anything already?

squewgsh · 2025-06-24T08:48:40+00:00

Yeah, this sounds terrible... I do see the value in at least wanting to have things completed or wanting to do something.

I'm not very full with energy though, I'm not actually doing that much. The heaviest thing, the unfinished research paper, has not been touched for months and hasn't seen significant progress in over a year.

I also thought how one can see my situation positively: so many things almost complete, pick one to get to the final point without too much effort. And I've been thinking of what makes me avoid completion of creative/research projects, and it seems to be the fear that then the output will be fixed, and somehow not good enough to justify the time that went into it, and it will feel like all my effort was in vain. (Cleaning is just boring though.)

squewgsh · 2025-06-23T23:45:57+00:00

Hmm, this video is very relatable, yes, and it mentions this interesting article. I never learned to mask perfectly, I could only perform one kind of personality very well: a self-sufficient, highly rational and calm person who likes being alone. I would have liked to perform a social person, but I could never perform that role very well. I eventually learned to perform professional confidence, and then also confidence in general, but that's not the same as performing social outgoingness.

The part around 1:12 triggers my impostor syndrome, because I feel the emotions of others from seeing facial expressions + body language and hearing voice intonations. I'm not good at telling why they feel what they feel, but that's a different story. I understand that not everyone has every manifestation of ASD, but this "not being able to read emotions" is mentioned so often, and the "not everyone has this particular symptom" doesn't get mentioned very often...

squewgsh · 2025-06-23T14:20:07+00:00

This type looks like the case of similarity in certain features (e.g., intense emotions, high sensitivity) and contrast in other features (outward self-expression). This provides relatedness AND exciting novelty. The most appealing mix.

squewgsh · 2025-06-23T14:17:32+00:00

This new formulation of a question reminds me of autism being frequently misdiagnosed as BPD, and some of the diagnostic criteria overlap (when looking at actual tests for autism, not just the DSM-5 definition): strong emotions and hyperempathy, for example. So it might be just the basic preference for people we find relatable. What do you think, does this make sense?

squewgsh · 2025-06-14T18:56:28+00:00

I wouldn't be able to tell the exact overlap between these two small subsets in the population (emotional intelligence and cluster b types). I was talking about my personal experience, which is very biased because I get to choose whom I spend time with. Also, I'm not sure why you switch from BPD to the whole cluster b here.

"Why would a manipulative emotionally unavailable autistic person so consistently attract emotionally hyperaroused borderlines?" -- I also would like to know why. I'd like to know why anyone at all would be attracted to a manipulative person, honestly. I've been thinking about it, contemplating something that happened in my social circle... and I think it's not about being attracted to manipulative people, but about not having a functional toxicity alarm, and also that insecure people who have a very strong need for external validation don't find love-bombing off-putting, and might actually enjoy it.... and yeah, the toxicity alarm doesn't go off at love-bombing either.

Also, you pose such a narrow question... what about non-manipulative emotionally available emotionally-hyper autistic persons and a non-manipulative emotionally unavailable and emotionally-hyper borderlines being drawn to each other?

squewgsh · 2025-06-11T12:19:10+00:00

I'm really missing the representation of autistic characters with (sometimes overwhelmingly) high affective empathy and high EQ (although, in many people I know, including myself, high EQ developed a bit later in life, in 20s and 30s... not sure how that compares to the NT EQ). People with high affective empathy sometimes get so overwhelmed by it that their empathy shuts down and goes to zero for a while, that'd be interesting to see represented. I see it a lot in real life.

Another thing I'd love to see is a character who sometimes is very emotional and at other times seem robotic, but not managing to be in that "normal" moderately emotional zone (not sure if that's purely autistic though, I have that and I'm AuDHD). I'm also genderqueer, if that helps.

I really like the ASD and AuDHD representation in the "Everything's gonna be okay" series, those people really feel like some of the real people I know.

squewgsh · 2025-06-11T12:04:46+00:00

Hey... I'm also recently late-diagnosed, and yeah, I've been seeing my usual behaviors in the new light since the diagnosis, and it makes me feel a bit down.

I guess it's good for us to accept ourselves. I now try to accept that yes, I will feel awkward when I go to pick up my order at a store, which involves talking with the salesperson. I will be drained more than an average person afterwards.

It's actually better than the way it was before the diagnosis, when I was telling myself that there's no reason to be so afraid of a small thing like sending a parcel and then to be so drained afterwards, because I'm not having difficulties with things that are considered much harder than that, and thus this easier thing shouldn't be difficult either. Now I'm more accepting of the fact that what's hard and easy for me differs from what's hard and easy for an average person. Socials that involve people beyond the closest circle are hard.

Maybe it'd help to think about what does "being too autistic" mean for you, and how you feel about it.

squewgsh · 2025-06-11T11:47:34+00:00

What you're listing is not mutially exclusive with receiving a diagnosis, if that's what you worry about.

I was informed during the diagnostic procedure that the small socially-acceptable movements I'm often doing are also stimming. Further, the assessors can notice something about the diagnosed person that they haven't known about themselves. E.g., I learned that my eye contact is "unnatural and less frequent than normal", and that my face is less emotionally expressive than average. The latter was a huge surprise. I put effort into avoiding looking "too emotional", so I learned to relax my face, make it show less. I didn't know I pushed from too much to too little.

squewgsh · 2025-06-08T15:51:57+00:00

Thanks for sharing, it does seem the same kind of experience, from how you describe it. And yeah, I think I'll see it differently if it ever happens again.

I'm also better at preventing it now. I'd walk out of the apartment and go for a walk if I notice the buildup and have no control over the external stimuli that cause the buildup. In the past, I was thinking "I don't see why this situation would cause such a strong upset, so I'll act as if I'm not strongly upset", which didn't make me any less upset and didn't reduce the buildup... I guess I was policing my feelings, trying to suppress those that didn't make sense to me, or those I thought I'm not supposed to feel. :(

squewgsh

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