So long story short

I am writing to say hi and hopefully I can find answers lurking in the shadows by everyone here.

Long story:

I guess I believed that I didn’t have this and have struggled a lot over time with the thought of always thinking what I might have and why I felt so different from neural typical people

I haven’t had a formal diagnosis, but I have been unofficial diagnosed with ADHD,anxiety and depression and a nurse off had mentioned that I might have Asperger’s but again no formal diagnosis.

I think I might also display signs CPTSD symptoms and I tend to have a proverbial forest of these lists of traumas albeit it small but are so…persistent that it is quite extensive in the sense that I could write a short story trying to explain myself with how I am feeling with this.

I think because my younger brother is mentally challenged to the point where he cannot look after himself, I think I have been hesitant to claim being neural divergent in fears that I might be thinking I am “broken”

But I have been, I guess, exploring, trying to understand what I might have because I have been forced to really try and make progress in my life after being “paralysed” by not feeling I am making any progress in my life.

I have always been something of a black sheep, generally have been of strong opinion and I am observant enough that I am decent at reading people to the point where I can call out other people’s bs to a reasonable degree.

I believe I am strong willed in the sense that I am not too easily swayed, but tend to fold with a “second inner self” that is on watch once I have experienced something bad. I also feel like I can be caught up in a collective “energy” too

My life is one of wearing masks and figuring out the right “persona” to put on for the right “performance”

I also struggle with interpersonal relationships as I have a tendency to overshare and be verbose in both my words and actions.

I have a bad tendency to trust and that has led to me being taken advantage of a lot, which has a knock on effect of making me be very cautious of people and their intent, which leaves me feeling very lonely and unloved as I struggle to make connections

I have difficulties making connections because I generally scare everyone away with how “heavily burdened” my soul feels and that leads to struggling to regulate and being force to have to mask up and live with the tiring burden of wanting to “fit in”

I am unemployed, I have been looking for employment and struggle to find many jobs to apply to because of a lack of confidence in my skills and feeling very self-conscious because I am in student debt that I cannot pay and I am forced to stay with my parents which also makes and leaves me with guilt as it is a household that is hanging on by the generosity of family.

::: spoiler might come across as graphics ( ie suicidal

It makes me feel very stuck in life as I struggle to move forward and I am not so young anymore so the aging feels like noose with time being the hangman. The thought does come to my mind of suicide, but life has given me reason enough to fear death as I have lived through experiences ( dodging a knife swung at me, not acting out rage and it scarying me that i was euphorically angry, survive almost drowning, had a near miss of a metal rugby tog hitting my eye) that have made me realise I don’t really want to die

I do have a suicide prevention buddy, that I try and keep in contact with and only really ask for help when it gets really bad as they rightfully don’t engage with my ramblings unless it is very serious. They are very busy, but still find time ti try and be someone to offer assistance and try pass on job opportunities if they find something they they think is applicable

:::

Just overall life sucks and I do not know what to do with myself as all roads feel like a dead end

I mean, I’m not sure, what type of responses you expect, but I do always chuckle when someone posts here with “Not sure if autism” and then you open the post and it’s just a huge wall of text. Obviously not enough for a diagnosis, or even just telling whether someone really is on the spectrum, but it is quite a common sight.

What you actually wrote doesn’t sound of place either. Feeling like you don’t fit in and the whole depression thing isn’t inherent to the autistic experience, but still quite common, because others will view us as different or weird.

You could try out hobbies that tend to attract neurodivergent folks, like for example chess, board games, technology and books. Maybe you’ll find a sense of belonging there…

So long story short

I am writing to say hi and hopefully I can find answers lurking in the shadows by everyone here.

Long story:

I guess I believed that I didn’t have this and have struggled a lot over time with the thought of always thinking what I might have and why I felt so different from neural typical people

I haven’t had a formal diagnosis, but I have been unofficial diagnosed with ADHD,anxiety and depression and a nurse off had mentioned that I might have Asperger’s but again no formal diagnosis.

I think I might also display signs CPTSD symptoms and I tend to have a proverbial forest of these lists of traumas albeit it small but are so…persistent that it is quite extensive in the sense that I could write a short story trying to explain myself with how I am feeling with this.

I think because my younger brother is mentally challenged to the point where he cannot look after himself, I think I have been hesitant to claim being neural divergent in fears that I might be thinking I am “broken”

But I have been, I guess, exploring, trying to understand what I might have because I have been forced to really try and make progress in my life after being “paralysed” by not feeling I am making any progress in my life.

I have always been something of a black sheep, generally have been of strong opinion and I am observant enough that I am decent at reading people to the point where I can call out other people’s bs to a reasonable degree.

I believe I am strong willed in the sense that I am not too easily swayed, but tend to fold with a “second inner self” that is on watch once I have experienced something bad. I also feel like I can be caught up in a collective “energy” too

My life is one of wearing masks and figuring out the right “persona” to put on for the right “performance”

I also struggle with interpersonal relationships as I have a tendency to overshare and be verbose in both my words and actions.

I have a bad tendency to trust and that has led to me being taken advantage of a lot, which has a knock on effect of making me be very cautious of people and their intent, which leaves me feeling very lonely and unloved as I struggle to make connections

I have difficulties making connections because I generally scare everyone away with how “heavily burdened” my soul feels and that leads to struggling to regulate and being force to have to mask up and live with the tiring burden of wanting to “fit in”

I am unemployed, I have been looking for employment and struggle to find many jobs to apply to because of a lack of confidence in my skills and feeling very self-conscious because I am in student debt that I cannot pay and I am forced to stay with my parents which also makes and leaves me with guilt as it is a household that is hanging on by the generosity of family.

::: spoiler might come across as graphics ( ie suicidal

It makes me feel very stuck in life as I struggle to move forward and I am not so young anymore so the aging feels like noose with time being the hangman. The thought does come to my mind of suicide, but life has given me reason enough to fear death as I have lived through experiences ( dodging a knife swung at me, not acting out rage and it scarying me that i was euphorically angry, survive almost drowning, had a near miss of a metal rugby tog hitting my eye) that have made me realise I don’t really want to die

I do have a suicide prevention buddy, that I try and keep in contact with and only really ask for help when it gets really bad as they rightfully don’t engage with my ramblings unless it is very serious. They are very busy, but still find time ti try and be someone to offer assistance and try pass on job opportunities if they find something they they think is applicable

:::

Just overall life sucks and I do not know what to do with myself as all roads feel like a dead end

It’s a weird space, not knowing what you are. It takes time to make sense of it and you should treat it like a long term project. Reaching out to people like this group is useful but try and do that in person if possible. It’s important to have allies. Diversity in your social circle builds resilience so that you always have someone to turn to. I think being lonely and misunderstood is common. Things that have helped me:

• medication
• sleep, food routine
• meditation
• education and work
• sport and outdoor activities (also a good way of meeting kind people)
• cultivating compassion for myself and others

Thank you for your advice

Although I find it difficult to work on most of the suggestions put forward I can at least work on some of them at least - take small steps

I have tried some of the things you have mentioned before in the past, but I usually backslide because I have difficulty keeping it consistent, for at my best about 3 months, but that is because I did not have support to keep me going or something happened that disrupted it enough that threw me off my rhythm and then I fall into bad habits again

I know in another group mention that a friend recommended me a church counselor for mental health counseling and although it is not perfect I do have an appointment in about 2 weeks.

You don’t have to follow other people’s advice. Everyone has to find their own path to recovery because everyone has their own unique set of challenges. The important thing is to try something and see if it works. If it doesn’t, think about why, gradually you will home in on the things that work for you. There has been long stretches of time when I have been incapable of self care and I still work on it. For me the critical element was self awareness. Whatever small amount I have cultivated has been extremely liberating. It used to be inconceivable to laugh at myself and I look back on that time and barely recognise myself, it feels surreal sometimes. Diagnosed ADHD at 47, by the way.

It is just a lot of going through rejection, isolation and feeling like what I say doesn’t get taken seriously (in regards to when I went to the hospital - they stopped trying to diagnose and just started giving meds and I got very frustrated after 6 months of that and how they were stopped looking for the cause and decided that treating the brain chemicals was more important)

I only recently got told I most likely have neural divergent patterns because usually people do not really bother to get to know me or I am manipulated by people thinking I am too soft.

So basically I have like decades of built up issues because I don’t have a means to get it out of my system, so yeah it is like a stewing pot that is always too full and bubbles over when I try to “serve” up information - it can get messy. If anything I have gotten more coherent compared to how I used to be, was told I don’t need therapy, I need an exorcist before - from a normal person.

Thank you for the advice.

I do have a thing with video games and I can be very invested in shows that can make me emotional from tying a moment to a scene. I do try to get involved in groups, but unless it is small I get socially exhausted and then I have difficulty getting the motivation to get back into it.

I tried to get a something in software dev (but after getting my diploma) realised that that kind of work environment is not a good fit because I am not a great at coding and felt stronger on the information systems side but lacked confidence and the ability to “stretch the truth” to even know that I am capable because of bad interviews (my part largely ) giving me the impression that I am not qualified for the role - I have been more open to the idea of the embellishment concept, but I haven’t had much luck to test it. I kind of abadoned that career path and try my hand and looking at TEFL but that is also an over-saturated market that I do not have experience in.

I sort of like books, but it is something I really need to enjoy from the start and then I can “lock in”, chess I feel out of my depth in as I know it is a game that rewards large scale pattern knowledge and it is a bit too involved for me.

Well, much like the other person, I can only share my experience and you’ll have to decide whether it feels right for you.

It is just a lot of going through rejection, isolation and feeling like what I say doesn’t get taken seriously (in regards to when I went to the hospital

Yeah, at this point, I believe, that is a pretty universal frustration. I could tell you my own share of being told I’m simulating, while having three illnesses, which really shouldn’t have been too hard to detect. It is just perhaps more frustrating to folks on the spectrum, because we have a stronger sense of justice. But yeah, you can try to bring that up as a conversation topic with regular folks, too. They might not have quite the same frustration as you, but still typically their own story to tell.

So basically I have like decades of built up issues because I don’t have a means to get it out of my system, so yeah it is like a stewing pot that is always too full and bubbles over when I try to “serve” up information - it can get messy.

I would say stuff like that to myself, as sort of rationalization for why I’m having a different experience to everyone else.
But yeah, since I’ve accepted that I’m very likely on the spectrum (I don’t have a diagnosis, but I score quite high on internet self-tests), it is starting to feel more and more silly that I tried to come up with these explanations, because well, I guess, I am just different.

To me, that has made it easier to work with being different. I recognize that if I put people on blast with information, they will naturally get overwhelmed. Meanwhile, I have a friend at work, who I assume to also be on the spectrum + ADHD, and I can blast her with information and she really appreciates it, because she is always interested in my infodumps and does not get overwhelmed.

Well, and for everyone else, I can microdose the infodumps and then they do appreciate them, too. Like, you can put me up to talk about a topic and I can easily fill half an hour. People wouldn’t want me to fill half an hour in a normal conversation, but in a dedicated talk, it’s greatly appreciated.
I do actually work as a software engineer and sharing information between colleagues is one of the biggest challenges we have, so it’s quite a useful skill to have, especially also for training new folks and such. I’m not 100% sure what you have in mind with “information systems”, but any interpretation I can come up with would have the same challenge and the infodumping would be a strength.

That’s kind of the thing in general. I wouldn’t be too self-conscious about being different, when it comes to employment. Any employer worth their salt will recognize that being different is a strength, if applied in the right context. They might not have the right context where your strength is useful, so you will still need to search around for the right employer, but if you can find your place, you can likely be invaluable for that employer.

One last thing: This doesn’t work too well for me personally, but perhaps journaling or writing a diary might help you to get your frustration out of your system and to order your thoughts somewhat. It kind of feels like telling another person, I find, so I do try to do it every now and then, especially for topics where I don’t have anyone to tell it to…

Thank you for the reply

Yeah the strong sense of justice thing i get because I have been in the situations where I feel angry at it and is almost character defining

I don’t know if that is a result of childhood trauma mixing with later life trauma and from that just becoming a state of existence

I like that aspect of being able to talk, but unfortunately the person who I could talk to for hours was an ex, and that is messy because there are still feelings there and because of that I cannot communicate with them when they are hopping between relationships

Otherwise, people just shut down, make assumptions or move away.

So I have just been very avoidant and keep everything in because when I share a lot of the time it is met with silence or disinterest.

I don’t know if I mentioned it before but in the country where I live there is about 33% unemployment which enforce quotas require race and gender based distribution. Unfortunately by legal definitions, I am in the least desirable demographic.

Without a form of nepotism, one has to be, jn my case, generally exceptional to make it past such filters and even then expect to be stuck at lower end of the ladder because the upper end has its quotas already filled.

It is just a fact of life here that connections equal job mobility or one must start one’s own income stream.

If not, then sucks to suck.

The thing that worked the longest, but collapsed was a regime of

-exercise -read a book -Journaling -meditation -affirmations -mindfulness -self-care

But without support to help me keep going when times are tough I just backslide

From that, I disliked the reading as it felt forced and the Journaling ended up being something I would be stuck ruminating on and that felt unhealthy

Affirmations and mindfulness, I guess helped but felt fake and forced

Meditation was alright when in the right headspace but generally became annoying

Exercise was probably the most positive,but my room is too small now to really do the regiment I was doing and my headspace is really messed up that I keep myself locked in a room because I rationalize no reason to leave it - which I is wrong but struggle to cognitively understand why my being refuses to just go out - probably some deep seeded traumas I have not got around to.

Self care is inconsistent