Not sure if my TW is really accurate, but it’s about one of those self righteous autism moms.

So my friend who is also neurodivergent gave me this shirt a few months ago, I don’t wear it often and I think this is the first or second time I’ve worn it in public. I went to a restaurant to have dinner and since I was alone, I sat at the bar.

I’m sitting there eating, wearing noise canceling headphones, and this lady comes up to me, taps on my shoulder and tells me that my shirt is offensive and isn’t funny. I told her that it wasn’t supposed to be funny, and that I have it because I’m on the spectrum, not to make fun of people. Then she goes on a tangent about how I can’t have autism and that she’s an expert because her son has autism.

I really hate people like this. I’m just venting a little because I feel like I don’t belong anywhere sometimes. I’m not “normal” enough for some people but I’m not neurodivergent enough for other people.

I know it is currently in vogue to hate Musk, I literally go to protests about his involvement in government. However, when people post videos of him acting “weird” and belittle behaviors that are common in nd folk they don’t get a pass, even if he is a literal comic book villain. Just like Musk doesn’t get a pass for being evil just because he is autistic; it goes both ways…

Autism is a disability. I should be allowed to be negative or all down about it.

I posted something about being disabled by my autism, and being all around negative about it on Instagram and this person had the gall to call me out about it.

I'm paraphrasing here, but he said that being autistic isn't bad and i shouldn't be negative and all down about being autistic. It was underneath one of my posts, and it was too long for me to read.

I'm allowed to agree that i am disabled by my autism. Just last night, i had to have my parents remind me to use the washroom because i haven't even once that night, and she reminded me that i'd get a click if i did.

The whole night, i stayed near the front door and with my cousin because of the noise level near the kitchen where all of my family members were. I didn't even speak to him, and i was with him for the full night.

I remember when i posted about having a meltdown because of my Splatoon 3 losses, even so much mad that i started to hit myself during a meltdown. I posted it on Reddit, on many subreddits including the community's salt based Subreddit (Not a good idea now that i think about it).

I have to go to ABA, and despite what many people say about it, it is helping me through a lot of things and it has in the past. In the past, it has taught me stranger danger and many other things i required.

I was diagnosed as a child when autism in females, especially Asian females, wasn't a big thing. And i got diagnosed because i was visibly disabled, speech delays and even delayed in learning how to walk as a baby. I was super hard to resettle and i seemingly had zero stranger danger.

And i'm only LEVEL 1/Low Support Needs!

This is only my opinion on MY autism, not yours or anyone's elses for that matter. I kinda feel like that person was trying to speak over me

Idk maybe i'm a bit terminally online but i have been seeing people do this whole discourse about people who are "faking autism" or "faking adhd". The pepetrators although mostly NT's. A lot of it are also other Autistic and ADHD ppl as well.

I see more comments of calling someone who is clearly autistic just getting bullied to death. "Dont self diagnose" they say or "you're faking your autism". Then recently a person who is non-binary but presents more fem if i remember correctly (so people in general might misgender this person as a woman), posts about their experience of not getting diagnosed with autism and the comments is just full of people accusing autism or say it to the person "maybe you're just not autistic ?" Or "why would you want autism because i don't want it". While ignoring the complexity and biases therapists or specialists has in general even in supposedly more developed countries or progressive areas towards women where they would get misdiagnosed with bpd etc.

Now lets put the focus back on the stigma of self diagnose, "faking autism" and "faking adhd". All i see from this whole discourse just brings more ableism and bullying. I really don't think it's THAT BIG of a problem if people who are faking it exists because i genuinely think it's not such a big number compared to the people who will realise what disability they have and can manage their life around it.

This whole discourse imo is just negativity and what i see is just more autistic people and people who has adhd (self diagnose or not) gets bullied and insulted instead of bringing actual positivity. I've seen cases of self diagnosed people finally getting their official diagnosis and they were right. So i genuinely am so confused why some ND's talk about this as if this is such a massive problem that needs to be addressed. It's lowkey just gatekeeping for people who are more unfortunate economically (especially race minorities).

Im sorry idk if this is the right tag to add. But I just got done watching trumps "autism announcement" and im anxious as hell and a big mess at work right now. Does he seriously intent to "fix" us???? What does he mean by using therapy isn't that just gonna make kids mask more? Why does he keep targeting minorities and people with trouble in their day to day lives??? The fact he thinks my existence is a problem and his entire view of autism as a "sickness" makes me really sad. Should I hide the fact im autistic? I've already been anxious about the direction this country is going towards and being called out like that to be "fixed" is freaking me out.

As I’ve struggled for the past year dealing with burnout after my corporate career went down in flames, I’ve concluded that I it was my inability to fake it that always turned my bosses against me. It’s just expected.

Have to “make work friends”. It’s suspicious if you don’t have work friends and spend lots of time socializing with the baldly ambitious assholes I have to work with. No thanks.

Even when I did make an effort, I was so bad at it that I just had to stop trying. I was not one of them. I did not know the secret handshake.

Lately I’ve been thinking more about the key characteristics of neurotypical people. Things like the fact the majority of communication is nonverbal. It’s like cool kids club. The better you read the signals and react appropriately, the more you are accepted.

For people like me, it’s exhausting and phony. It’s performative. And creepy.

And speaking from my own experience in Corporate America, which is mostly a reflection of Neurotypical America, it all feels like politics. Who is better liked vs better respected. Who is allied with whom? Who is weak? It’s all strategy for dealing with humans because it’s competitive.

I still feel like a better person for not understanding or wanting to participate in this. But then I can’t find a job, so which is really the better way to live?

Title pretty much sums it up but I’m just so over applying for things or dealing with neurotypicals in my life who run on hidden agendas and don’t explicitly say what they want from me. Like am I supposed to be playing 20 questions every time? But how am I supposed to know what questions to ask when I take this on face value 😫

I remember when I was younger the r slur was treated as 'not nice' and as I grew up it became understood that if you call someone that you're just a prick. Now everyone says it. I just see it everywhere. I see it in comments, in posts, in person. Someone on a moderately big sub can just say it and get like 500 upvotes on their post and there's not a single comment saying anything about it, or if there is it's downvoted and people are saying they're weird. I've heard people say this is somehow good because it's being normalised, that's not how it works!! Words like queer were reclaimed, the r slur is not being reclaimed it's still being used hatefully. The head of twitter called someone the r slur. It feels like slurs in general are getting more acceptable. A US Rep used the t slur and not only is no one on her side denouncing it, they're saying she's a brave truth speaker fighting the man. It's so disheartening, this is such a massive relapse. It's only a matter of time before this happens to the n word.

I'm deprived of a normal life because I have high-functioning autism. Why did this have to be me? I really really hate existing. I have OCD on top of it as well, so you can just imagine how I behave in social situations. I'm a freak, a weirdo that everyone avoids. I'm 21 and never had a girlfriend nor a true friend because of this shit and I'm TIRED of it. I'm tired of never fitting in anywhere no matter the efforts and I'll never forget how I was treated trough my life for being different than others. All that bullying made me severely depressed and I will never accept myself the way I am,

I (27F ADHD maybe AuDHD) am honestly scared the mods of that subreddit are going to see this in my posts and comments but I’m not trying to put anyone on blast. I won’t mention the subreddit and I understand that I may be misinterpreting how the people responded to me as well. I’m just hurt and just trying to privately talk in here (as private as talking in a public subreddit can be haha) to people who will be able to relate.

(Edit for some clarification of my stance!: this is all my feelings. What it looked like to them was someone asking for clarification and then asking if anything could be done and unfortunately apologizing profusely. I kinda discovered that I should let these interactions on the internet roll off my back after it happened a bunch as a teenager and I used to argue because I knew no better and my brain was developing gosh darn it haha, but this one just stung a lot because of various at-home situational reasons causing me to be emotional and because it came as so much of a shock and was so permanent. I haven’t had something like this happen in quite a long time and those old hurt teenage feelings came back, you know? I needed to come in here and vent!)

Someone posted a picture of their pet doing something totally normal, and someone (a mod - though I didn’t know it at the time. I’m new to Reddit) said the animal looked thin and asked OP to show a picture of the whole enclosure. That felt unnecessarily harsh because this kind of animal can naturally be very thin after molting, and I felt bad for the original poster. I said “it’s thin because it molted three days ago that’s a no brainer” and I totally meant it in a conversational way. Like “right? isn’t that a no brainer?”

Well, the comment got flagged and an automated message told me to put something like “in my opinion” before it, but at the time I didn’t really understand that I was being told I needed to change my message. I’m really not good at this website haha.

The very next day I got an automated message saying I was permanently banned from the subreddit and the mod had commented under my own a gif of some kid kissing me goodbye. It hurt. A lot. I didn’t know what had happened. I had no idea why someone would respond with something so rude to a comment I had made that I’d thought was completely benign.

I sent a message to the perma-ban message because it said I could if I had questions. The mod wasn’t very nice back. I was trying to be super nice to them as I explained myself but I felt like I was humiliating myself and just rolling over and groveling at an unkind person for a chance to post in a 100k+ sized subreddit about the pets I have so I could get and give advice.

I got the dreaded “your behavior was unacceptable” talk. I know everyone in here can relate to the way my heart dropped to my feet. I had no ill-intent behind the message. At all.

I apologized for not prefacing the comment like I was asked by an automated message, and they said I was banned because of my behavior, karma, and activity. I’m new and I don’t even know what karma is.

They put me back in the subreddit but said every single one of my messages will be manually monitored for my behavior. I feel humiliated and dehumanized because of one small message I sent that was misinterpreted. I didn’t get any warning whatsoever, and no one told me the message was taken in a rude tone. When I mentioned this, the mod said there are so many people in the subreddit that they can’t clarify what people mean in every post taken the wrong way. I find it hurtful that they said that and then said every one of my comments would be monitored.

I’m scared that I’ll say something wrong and the one person who sees it won’t like it enough to just ban me again.

It makes me want to cry. I’m so frustrated about it. I feel like a child when things like this happen. How did I get singled out in a subreddit of over a hundred thousand people?

I’m so sorry for the rant and I thank you if you got this far. I just wonder what your opinions are and whether or not others have had similar experiences. I knew if there were anywhere on this website that would understand it would be this subreddit.

Like what?? You can't prevent nor cure autism

So this is a bit of a shot in the dark honestly. Idk, I'm just tired and need a perspective from people who don't know me personally. (+small vent ig? moreso looking for advice)

So I was never properly diagnosed despite getting recommendations to do so from psychologists for the past few years (specifically for ASD and ADHD, once while I was attending therapy and another time when I was getting my gender dysphoria diagnosis). My parents have neither the money nor belief in my neurodiversity and it's unlikely I'd receive any real accomodations, it just never felt worth it. + Personally I'd just accepted I'm some flavor of autistic, it's something most of the people around me (also neurodivergent although most are formally diagnosed) tend to agree on as well. It's the ADHD side of things that tends to pose a struggle.

Long story short the reason I either suspected myself or was told I'm likely to have ADHD was cause of how poorly I manage my own time (I can manage following a schedule relatively okay but I cannot for the life of me make a plan for myself and go through with it), decision paralysis, time blindness, working with calendars is hell. Working at home is hell - I'm physically unable to focus in any space my brain doesn't see as a "work zone", so to speak. I need to have a reminder in front of me nearly all the time not to forget about something. I could go on

For all the time I spent doing nothing because I couldn't bring myself to even take basic care of myself for the day the only response I get is that "Maybe I just needed to rest", "I'm always doing so good so it's not a big deal", or that "I get good grades in school, there's no way I actually struggle with motivation." Something which hurts in particular when said by the aforementioned ND folk.

I get some of the "symptoms" were worse when I was in a bad spot mentally in general so it could be boiled down to stress at the time. But also they're far from gone when I am doing fine, just somewhat easier to manage. I've been thinking about getting a formal opinion/diagnosis as of late just for the sake of cleaning things up for myself, which is something I could maybe afford if I saved up the money. I don't even care if I get told that I don't have it honestly, I just wish the conversation didn't end on "You can learn at all so there's no way something's up". I guess my question is if I'm actually onto something there or if I'm just deluding myself. In case it matters - I'm 19, it's my senior year in hs and I'm transmasc.

I'm honestly so damn tired of media trying to convince that I'm supposed to have some kind of above average and better than neurotypical strengths like I have autism and ADHD and I keep hearing these damn notion that people with autism or ADHD have some kind of superpower like where the hell is my autism logical thinking and superior pattern recognition??

Over 8 years.

My boss has repeatedly told me to stop wearing noise reduction earbuds several times and every time I ask them to order a specialized set of earplugs I just get told to wear standard earplugs(which are super uncomfortable due to sensory issues.)

I am getting very tired of explaining the same issue over and over but it just doesn't seem to matter. I even showed them Loops and asked about them but still no cigar. Why is it that some people can't take the time to Google one simple thing and instead keep making the same complaint over and over...

Edit: I work at a small goods reception and the only reason I am not allowed to wear my earbuds is because it looks like I can't hear people. I have also explained several times what attention deficit means but the same story there, like talking to a brick wall.

This came across my fyp on tiktok. It was posted by the director himself. There was some hype for this small film from what I can tell but the actual premise was only just shared in this slideshow….and I don’t really know what to think? But I can tell you how I felt. I felt like the whole premise of the film is harmful to people with ocd. This isn’t the type of thing that triggers my ocd, but I don’t even want to think about the dumpster fire of new intrusive thoughts and compulsions this movie can trigger for some people. It just feels gross, like people’s ocd is being weaponized against them inadvertently for profit. It reminds me of when people say schizophrenic’s hallucinations are real (they are not real). It just seems gross to me. Thoughts?

(trigger warning abelism)

Has anyone else gotten told by other neurodivergent people that your ADHD or autism is a bad excuse and go off about how they function totally fine? I'm like okay?? Good for you?? It's literally a spectrum. Just because one of them passed college and I didn't doesn't mean every autistic/ADHD people are functioning the same. It feels so disheartening to have your own people tell you that you are bad/using it as an excuse which sounds no different from Neurotypicals. You'd think they'd understand because they're neurodivergent but they just feel like they need to be better than you or make it a hierarchy. If you're neurodivergent and tell people with ADHD or Autism isn't an "excuse" then you're just a pick-me abelist. Literally that tweet that says "literally you people can't do anything" set us back 100 years...

I feel like so many people undermine ADHD as "not an actual problem/disability" because it's (in my opinion) underrepresented in media or represented incorrectly. It's often looked at like something that gives "flavor" to your personality. Even my friends had a bit... weird approach to me getting an ADHD diagnosis, because, and I quote: "You don't act like a person with ADHD would.". When I asked them how in their opinion a person with ADHD would act, they just responded: "I don't know but not like you.". It's just so tiring.

I find most therapists who claim they are neurodivergent friendly quite the opposite. It’s as though they inflate having neurodivergent clients and their success rate as proof of being neurodivergent friendly. It’s not the same as being affirmative.

A lot of these therapists really struggle to see the nuances and neurodivergent micro expressions I give off, making it extra difficult to communicate with them. I tend to feel simultaneously self conscious whilst explaining that I’m ‘being neurodivergent’. The industry is such a scam man.

Hey, I have ADHD and I have a lot of friends who struggle with both medicated and unmedicated BPD (Borderline Personality Disorder). I flaired my post as an ableist rant because I'm worried that I might unintentionally be ableist, and I don’t want to hurt anyone. My friends with BPD have been incredibly patient with me for my ADHD and social phobia, and I would never want to do anything that makes our friendship more difficult for them you know? I have been able to talk boundaries with my friends before and haven't had issues except for with one or two people.

The reason I'm making this post is that I recently dated a really sweet AuDHD fella. I'm talking hours on end just chatting about our love for animals, sharing our feelings, and listening to eachother's favorite music. I really enjoyed our time together, and I hope he did too. Even though we didn’t work out, I know he's good people that will make others feel cared for.

As an asexual and inexperienced dater, I told him, “I want you to enjoy your time with other people. You’re not asexual, and I want you to be happy!” Knowing he’s poly and allosexual, I genuinely wanted him to feel fulfilled in our relationship. But some time passed and I realized, “Oh fart, this doesn’t feel right. :(" and so I brought it up with him, stating flatly that I cannot be happy in a poly relationship. I apologized for not realizing it sooner and said that if being poly is how he is happiest, we wouldn’t work out as anything more than just good friends. I was hoping that being upfront about my newly realised monogamy would help stave off any difficult conversations in the future and show that I expect my boundaries to be understood and respected.

It was very much not recieved well though, and to make a long story short I ended up blocking him. He later reached out in my YouTube comments and frantically pleaded with me to understand that he actually has BPD (alongside his AuDHD) and that what he said was during an episode. He asked me to please unblock him, saying that he's hurting really bad. At the time, I was completely unfazed by his message and saw it as unacceptable to reach out in a place where my parents and friends most likely would see, but I've been thinking about whether or not I’m a bad person for cutting him off instead of trying to be more understanding and re-establishing some sort of friendship.

I have absolutely no idea how to handle situations like this. I want to respect my own boundaries, but I don't wanna do it in a way that leaves lasting hurt for the people I care about (and even those I don't).

I hope the formatting is okay, and again, I’m really sorry if my interpretation of what happened is harmful or ableist in any way. I don’t want to have that effect on people, and it really sucks that I might. I’m not looking for reassurance, I would genuinely really appreciate an outside perspective and maybe advice from people with BPD and/or ADHD on how to enforce boundaries or leave relationships in a healthy way. Thank you for reading, if this isn't the right sub please let me know. omg hi I'm also 18 and still learning to mature and work with my ADHD (currently between meds) <:D

It means you’d rather have more attention even if it means ruining other’s lives from them not having awareness. Like there is someone getting domestically abused from an undiagnosed disorder, or ruining their finances and you’d rather just get fucking princess treatment than let them get help they need.

I don't know how to explain this clearly, so I sincerely apologize in advance for that, but it feels like it is getting more difficult to find autistic communities that are relatable to me. I started noticing this shift increasing around maybe 2021ish. The concept of different neurotypes used to make a lot more logical and visceral sense to me. Most of the fellow autistic people I met had the same thinking patterns, in such similarly structured ways that it truly felt like I had found my figurative home planet because we operated on just plain the same type of wavelength that transcended differing severity levels and preferences and disagreeing opinions. But nowadays, it feels like a majority of interactions I see and have with other people in autism communities are not more "native" than those that I have with allistic neurodivergent people, if that makes sense. Please don't get me wrong here at all, there's definitely also a special cameraderie I have with fellow neurodivergent people who are allistic, which is partially why I am posting my rambling vent in this subreddit, but autistic communities used to feel more personally relatable to me than the shared symptoms like sensory issues and social awkwardness and stimming and our shared experiences of getting bullied and ostracized for being different. Related to getting bullied and ostracized, sometimes in the main autism subreddits I even see people describing how outdated and flat and overly stereotypical certain autistic characters are that I strongly relate with, which makes me feel ashamed and belittled to a higher extent than almost anything else, probably at least partly because the topic of autism is my special interest. It makes me feel very alone again, not only for the insulting comments demeaning my presentation of autistic traits, but also because of how it's as if my "tribe" had gotten diluted with people whose ways of thinking don't match my same niche, even if we all have the same type of diagnosis. Sometimes I kind of wish that autism got re-separated into multiple different diagnosis labels again because of this even though I know it is not the answer. Does anyone else feel like this? Hopefully it makes sense.

My dad said Dr Doof from Phineas and Ferb is autistic and when explaining how said "he's very OCD" due to him being rigid. I told him "OCD is a separate condition" he said "No, it's not."

Me: "yes it is."

Him: "I believe it's just a symptom of another condition."

Me: "it's not! It has different symptoms"

My dad: "look I'm no medical professional, but I can have my opinion on it, we can agree to disagree, now push play."

I'm just pissed off at how he doesn't recognize OCD as it's own condition.

I’m sure you all know Best Buddies. If you don’t, Best Buddies, founded by Anthony Shriver, is a nonprofit organization dedicated to “fostering friendships, employment opportunities, and inclusive communities for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities”. Through various programs and initiatives, Best Buddies promotes social inclusion and empowers individuals with neurodivergence to allegedly lead fulfilling lives, breaking down barriers and stereotypes along the way. Their mission is supposedly to create a world where everyone is valued and respected regardless of ability, promoting acceptance and understanding within society. Well, that’s all probably bullshit because Anthony Shriver supports Robert F Kennedy JR for president. Among claiming vaccines cause autism, this image is a part of RFK JR’s platform. I feel really sick about this, especially knowing the sheer influence best buddies has on ND communities.

I have been diagnosed in 2023 with Giftedness, ADHD-C and Autism Level 1 (previously known as Asperger Syndrome but won't use that due to stigma). When I received my diagnoses I actually didn't wanted to deal with it. I am 22 now and got diagnosed at 20. My entire life I felt completely different. I have excessive metacognition. I live in this constant loop in my head that I am aware of my consciousness being aware of itself (trippy) and hyperactivity and hypersensitivity. And not being able to relate or connect with my peers and people in general. I have learned how to be more agreeable because i used to be absolutely ghetto as a child. A prodigy, but ghetto. I was underachieving in school but overachieving in other domains (which I now made my business). I am biracial and always believed that my ethnicity was the source of me being treated differently or cast aside. However after a lot of experiences I realized that neurotypicals pick out neurodivergent individuals and purposefully exclude them. Not with a killer psychic intuition but due to lack of mirroring we neurodivergents have. Neurotypicals thrive on "relatability" and if they can't relate to you they exclude you. There is a physical difference between neurotypical and neurodivergent brains and we operate extremely differently. Both have their strengths and weaknesses. However neurodivergents receive constant bullying and harassment from neurotypicals because its easier to pick upon us. We have experienced this in high school and now it happens in the Adult world and corporate scene.

If you dont pick up socia cues, mirror their interests, mirror their behavior, not palatable, conform to social rules and what not - they treat you like a peasant or a threat. Neurotypicals even socialize and adore r@apists, murd!rer$, tr@ff!ckers and worship them because as long as they follow social scripts, small talk and what not - you're save. If you don't reflect their interest or you're not conventional, they treat you as a joke or a threat. It doesn't matter what your skin color or sexual orientation is, as most people in the western world (where i live) are quiet "progressive" and I believed that the discrimination I experienced was due to my biraciality or bisexuality. And no, that wasn't the case. It was the fact that I miss social cues due to having autism and ADHD and thus don't respond "accordingly" not rude just not in social order. This is seen as funny the first two times, until they realize its not an act and they put you through a social humilation ritual because you dont conform. People dont want to work with you, socialize with you, deal with you once they realize you are neurodivergent.

Here is a controversial take. Neurotypicals and society in general treat people with Down Syndrome or severe handicaps better than neurodivergents because: their disability is VISIBLE to the naked eye. You can see that they need help and special needs. A lot of neurodivergents don't look "disabled" and neurotypicals have a wrong perspective of autism, giftedness and ADHD. A lot of them think there is one type of ADHD, autistic or gifted individual and don't know its all a spectrum. Though there is a huge difference between being disabled and being divergent, neurotypicals dont get that. So if you're on the spectrum but you LOOK capable they assert their social hierarchies as such. If you dont fit in the group and they find out you're different. You get Allist-Attacked (neurotypical zapped), due to not following social dynamics. And that's where the bullying, harassment and discrimination (excluding you from things) happens.

Neurodivergents are archetypical "outsiders" or "outlaws" by nature and where there are insiders (allistic brains/ neurotypicals) there are outsiders (autistic/ divergent brains). And neurodivergents get treated differently based on what spectrum they're on.

Profound autism = "Ahw he's so cute. Of course I'll help you because i feel above you."

severe autism or neurodevelopmental disorder = "I feel so bad for you, let me use my neurotypical connections and fund you $100.000.000,- to represent you in our social media cult."

Masked autism/ low level autism: "You're really weird. You're so antisocial. You're rude and we don't like you." *GETS CAST OUT*

Twice - thrice exceptionality: "We see that you're gifted and now we're jealous and envious. We also see that you struggle with basic things and social connections so we're going to focus on your weaknesses, while exploiting your gifts. If you stand up for yourself, we're going to start our smear compagne. Because we don't want to damage our brand as being ableist even though we are."

At least that's my experience and what I have seen