I’m Stupid.

*Self-harm / suicide / swearing*

Since I no longer want to open my mouth and speak to anyone ever again, I want to express myself in this way… I’m an idiot… ‘a dick’… stupid… useless. The last two days have proven that.

Unfortunately, either due to my mental health or my autism, my memory sucks and I can’t focus or retain information like I used to. I’m also stumbling over my words or going blank in conversation. It started in the Post Office yesterday, when I didn’t catch what the person said to me, then I realised and ended up almost quickly barking a response to her, simply because I felt stupid for not hearing. To be fair, they do still hide behind plastic screens, which do make it harder to hear. But I couldn’t get out of there quick enough.

Then I had a difficult wellbeing group. I left in a slightly delicate state, due to the masking and how exhausting it is… plus anxiety of speaking out… plus the subject… plus sensory overload the whole time due to someone in the group…plus someone mentioning they want to kill themselves, just at the end of the session, which is rather triggering for others…. and then I was in a rush to get the bus….

I got on the bus… same bus driver I didn’t like the previous week, as he drives very fast and is rather arrogant/cocky in my opinion. Whether it was because I thought he remembered me, or because my mind was absent and thinking I was catching the other bus, where the fare is capped at £2 – and if you say you want a single, they’ll cut you off and say £2 before you even finish saying where to… I asked for a single. So of course, he asked a single to where, as if I was stupid… I managed to bumble something about ‘oh yeah you’re not part of the scheme are you…’, in the meantime he’s obviously getting impatient with my stupidity.

So, I say the name of the road I want to go to… apparently that’s not enough for him…. he needs to know whereabouts it is, so he knows the zone…. mate, if you don’t know the roads you’re driving along, maybe you shouldn’t be driving a bus. Unfortunately, my mind went blank at that moment because he was so short and sharp, that it shocked me, but at the same time it felt he was rushing me.

The trouble is, I look like a fully capable person… because I mask. He wouldn’t know I had a hidden disability. To be honest he’s the sort, that even if he knew, it wouldn’t make him any nicer or more patient. I’ve seen enough to know that about him. But I appear neurotypical, so I’m simply viewed as an idiot. Oh and he called me ‘love’, despite probably being younger than me… that also wound me up.

He pulled away very quickly, leaving me flopping into my seat. I was very upset. I nearly had a full meltdown in front of people. I wanted to punch the seats in front of me, or the window. I wanted to find something in my bag or use my nails and harm myself. The urge was overwhelming. I used some of the wellness tools I’ve discovered, to try and calm down. I was virtually crying. I wrote out how I felt. It was only a short bus ride really…. and in crisis mode I decided to leave a note behind, to tell the driver that people like him are the reason I couldn’t leave the house and catch a bus for months on end…. that I’m autistic and the anxiety of getting on the bus is something he couldn’t imagine. I don’t really remember what I said totally, but I said I’d use the other bus company from now on, as even they’re less abrupt than he was.

I feel really shit having left that, but it was that, have a meltdown, or confront the driver (which I wouldn’t have the balls to do). He’ll probably never have seen it anyway. It was so distressing for me… firstly because I hate that my mind is failing me at the moment and there’s nothing I can do about it…. but also because I had come so far to be able to get on buses again on my own… now because of him, I don’t want to catch them anymore…. I’m scared to get on those buses again…. he’s undone so much hard work.

I went home and harmed myself. Probably been at least a couple of months since I hurt myself. Things had been deteriorating for me for a couple of weeks… with the gerbil dying, and a family member now seeming to have unfriended me on Facebook, plus thinking about my friend who killed herself. My CCO’s been off ill, so just had to muddle through for the last month. It was inevitable I would relapse. I didn’t want to start again, because when I do, I can’t stop. Also, once I’ve relapsed it affects my mood even more and makes me more secretive and fragile…. so people don’t know how I’m feeling and why, so often end up upsetting me and not understanding why. Like just now.

Someone told me something, and within five minutes I had forgotten it and made myself look like a total idiot, yet again… they laughed, called me a dick and said, ‘you haven’t forgotten already have you!?’… I hid under a blanket and asked them to not call me a dick… and quietly cried, as it triggered off how stupid I felt yesterday, and the self-harm urges again. I don’t think they realised anything was wrong, as I don’t want to talk about yesterday.

And now I’ve fallen out with someone else, because I don’t want to talk about it all tonight…. so bugger it all. I’m done talking…. I should just go mute. Less trouble that way, and people might be able to see I have a problem, rather than thinking I’m ‘normal’, therefore should be performing better than I’m capable of right now. I feel I should wear the sunflower lanyard, with a note on it saying, ‘I’m autistic and currently a stupid idiot as a result. Sorry’. I do feel I need to warn people that I’m thick, have a shit memory and can’t process things as fast anymore. But really all I want is to be alone. To not go out. Not talk to people. At all. Just isolate myself forever, as I’m clearly too stupid for this fast-paced ‘perfect’ world. And to top it all off, I have to perform for family tomorrow. Fat chance of that being possible right now. Had to take a pill last night. Probably have to do the same tonight too.

Anyway, I’ll shut up now, as I feel stupid even talking on here.

The “Neurotypical” Illusion.

*Talk of suicide*

In 2021, I experienced a breakdown, as a result of an issue that started before the lockdowns of 2020. This led to me choosing the date I would leave this world. It was to be the second anniversary of the suicide of my one remaining friend. It felt like my only option. I couldn’t get the resolution I needed… the situation was spiralling out of control. Everything I feared was manifesting. I was isolated, cornered, severely misunderstood. Doors were slammed in my face and there was no way for me to find peace. I couldn’t continue living with things in the state they were in. I just wanted the pain to stop. I wanted my mind to stop. I needed peace. And as nobody would help me find that peace in life, I was forced to seek that peace in death.

My doctor referred me to the crisis team, where I was put with shared care under the CMHT, until assigned a care co-ordinator (CCO). In the last 18 months I have done a lot of work. I’ve had to have a support worker to try and help me leave the house, as anxiety and depression have stopped me going out. I also didn’t trust myself to leave the house, as that’s what I’d intended to do when I was going to end my life. I’m just finishing some exposure work now, where I’ve managed to get back to catching buses. It’s been exhausting work but it’s nice to have that independence back.

I also did CAT (cognitive analytical therapy), where I created a CAT map – a physical representation of the inner workings of my mind. It helped me identify patterns that keep repeating in relationships. I now know my triggers are being unheard, misunderstood and rejected. And I know how I react to these triggers and how that can sometimes feed the problem. I learnt a lot. It hasn’t changed a huge amount in my life, but I at least have a means to explain things better now.

A lot of time has been spent looking at how to resolve the issue that led to my suicide bid in the first place. It’s been an obstacle to my recovery. It still is, but I’m doing my best to stay strong and fight for what I need.

The thing that’s helped me is realising I may be on the autism spectrum. They screen for it now in the CMHT. I had never considered it and rejected the suggestion at first. But I did my own research and my whole life makes a lot more sense as a result. From lifelong physical issues to picky eating, sensory / emotional overload, my meltdowns. To always feeling like an outsider, different, misunderstood. I have a lot more self-compassion now I know why I am the way I am, and why things happened how they did.

I can now see why issues with friends came up. They thought I was ‘neurotypical’ like them. So, they held me to that standard. They expected me to just move on from things without discussing them. They expected me to accept things I physically could not accept. I was even accused of giving one of them an ultimatum I never gave. This is due to a difference in perception. From a neurotypical perspective it might have appeared that way. From my perspective I was simply communicating my discomfort and distress, and I had difficulty being able to live with things the way they were.

I realise that, now I’m facing another situation. I’m in a position where there are literally only two outcomes for me – positive closure or suicide. It is totally understandable to me, as someone who has pretended to be neurotypical for 30 years, that neurotypicals would see that as an ultimatum… manipulative… stubborn… “threatening suicide” to “get my way”. I wish that were so. That would mean I actually had other choices but chose to have ‘ending my life’ as the only other option. I get how outsiders would view this. But they don’t know what it’s like inside a neurodivergent mind like mine. There are honestly no other outcomes that I can actually live with. It is a highly emotive situation. It involves loss and endings.

Endings are incredibly hard for me. People from my past never gave me good endings. Most gave me no ending at all and just cut me out or ghosted me. Until the mental health team, I had never had a good ending to anything in my life. CAT therapy took into account my difficulties with endings. My therapist wrote a letter and read it to me, and I read one back to her. I shared my fear of her instantly forgetting me. She reassured me she wouldn’t. She said she learnt a lot from me, would miss our sessions and will probably wonder how I’m doing in the future. As a result of the reassurances that she gave and the positive ending she provided, I’m at the point I no longer care if I’ve been forgotten.

Similarly, my care co-ordinator recently left. She gave me a positive ending. She let me share my sentiments and returned them. She said she would miss me, and she wished me well. She said in real life we’d probably have been friends. She even gave me a hug goodbye. Then after our last phone call I got off the phone and cried… simply because I’d never really been told goodbye before. It was so new to me, to have a positive ending, to be wished well and hear goodbye on good terms. I feel this will be so healing for me – down the line the pain of losing her will be less because of the ending.

I’m currently in need of a similar positive ending with someone else. I never wanted the ending, especially under the circumstances involved. But given how much negativity was involved, I need a positive resolution and closure so I can move on. They may fear that by giving me what I ask for, it will increase my emotional attachment – it is in fact the opposite. I now know it would reduce the emotional attachment I feel. It would free me. I need to feel they don’t hate me, like I’ve felt they do. Every time my requests are rejected it confirms that they do hate me. That they don’t care if I live or die. Because in my head I cannot live with things in the state they are in. I can’t go on. So, if they refuse to say goodbye and wish me well, they want me to die.

I can’t help the black and white thinking. A lot of the time I see more colour than most people do. But when it’s something so emotionally painful and personal for me, I struggle to see colours. It’s not a case that people can help me to see a third option. Any options they see are neurotypical options, made for neurotypical minds who do not have to live with the outcome of this … minds that can let go. I know without a positive ending on this one issue, I won’t be here. It’s a certainty. It’s no threat, and I honestly do not want that to be the outcome. But it’s the only other outcome for me. I wish I could get neurotypical people to see inside my head and understand my position on this. Because they will probably mischaracterise me as dramatic, manipulative, controlling or whatever other words they think apply to me. When in reality I just face an impossible choice… to get to say goodbye to someone I don’t want to lose, or to die. I have to put my life in the hands of someone else’s decision – I can’t make them do what I need… so really, I have no control.

But this will never end until it’s resolved. So that’s why my head goes to suicide, because I’ve had three years of torment with this. Not one moment of peace from it, while the people involved have had that peace and space from it and me. My head and my heart can only take so much of it. I’ve kept fighting because I’ve always known without a positive outcome, I would die. And I didn’t want to die. So, I’ve fought for my life for three years. I will keep fighting for it until I no longer can. Every day I’ve lived with this burden, has traumatised me more and more. I don’t know how much more of it I can take. But I fight because it’s all I’ve got.

At the start I compromised a lot. I asked for 5% of what I needed and had it rejected. Now what I’m asking for seems a lot bigger, but I honestly cannot compromise on it anymore. I know that will make me seem unreasonable to neurotypicals… but I’ve faced ‘unreasonable’ myself the whole time, and people unwilling to co-operate or compromise with me. The fact is neurotypical people find it easier to compromise. It’s easier to see other options and to accommodate the needs of autistic / neurodivergent people.

The one thing that bothers me is this idea that autistic folk are the problem and need to adjust to fit into a neurotypical world. We have to change. I don’t accept this. The world should change to include us and accommodate our needs and limitations. And that’s what I’m going to fight for.

All my life I masked so that I might be accepted by my peers. Throughout school and college, I changed and over the years I hid my true self more and more. This is probably the cause of a lot of my mental health issues. It probably led to many misunderstandings in friendships, as I appeared ‘neurotypical’ so people expected things from me that I could not fulfil. I didn’t know back then that I may be autistic. I knew I was different, but I tried not to be too different. Whenever I shared too much of myself or let the mask down a bit, people abandoned me.

Similarly, I shared how I felt about somebody and doing so apparently made them ‘uncomfortable’. My masking has always been about making other people more comfortable, at the expense of my own comfort. It’s always been about making sure that other people feel okay – valued, appreciated and above all, comfortable. So, to hear that when I let my walls down and revealed a part of the true me, it made someone uncomfortable…that was the hardest thing to face. Experiences like this teach me to maintain the mask at all times or I will be rejected for who I am and how I truly feel.

My mask made people believe I was stronger than I was. More confident and friendly than I felt inside. More able than I was… ‘insightful’, so not needing as much support. It may have made me seem more aloof – like I didn’t need anyone. Perhaps that I didn’t feel negative emotions when I did. Apparently at school when I was bullied and had people throw things at me, I never reacted at all. It was as if they weren’t doing anything to me. I don’t understand why I did this. But I probably felt it was better to not show how I really felt, otherwise I’d never be accepted. I also struggled with smiling as a child. I rarely did at school. I’d constantly have people telling me to smile. All these little things that show society expects people to not be autistic. To change and ‘be more normal’. No. Society needs to change. I’m done changing for other people.

I’m a highly sensitive person. I care a lot about people but feel too scared to share that with them, because nobody likes me caring about them. But that is who I am. I may not share my care with people again now. I will more than likely avoid people altogether, because I’m too tired and drained to wear a mask for society anymore. And if caring about people makes them uncomfortable or makes them reject and hurt me, then it’s better to be completely alone. This is the struggle I face in my life. I don’t fit in here. All I want is people to accept my feelings and to validate me and tell me it’s okay to be who I am in my heart. To feel how I feel and to express that. And then for them to not reject or abandon me when I do let my walls down. Is that too much to ask?