How do you feel about "invisible" autistics?

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I feel we need more context to answer this question. From the replies so far, it seems some people are talking about how they feel "mild" autism deprives more severe autistics from being recognized as people who need and deserve help. It's like they resent someone who they perceive as succeeding in the NT world as people who will harm those who cannot succeed by depriving them of recognition or resources.

Other responders seem to view those who appear "successful" in the NT world as role models who need support to maintain the honor of autistics as people who are different, but not sick/crippled/impaired by their neurodiversity, but rather, perhaps, by co-morbidities that prevent use of their strengths.

I'm newly diagnosed, at age 63. I suffered burn-out that was mis-labeled as NT depression. Before I burned out, I was successful in school and professionally, but didn't do so well personally. Living in predominantly male environments, my quirks were blamed on my being female.

My mother noticed I was clumsy, "walked like a drunken sailor," so she sent me to ballet lessons twice a week. My father noticed I was very literal, so always said when he was kidding about something. They and my NT sister thought my tantrums puzzlingly extreme, but they always blew over. Because I was at the top of my school classes, even the teachers forgave occasional in-school melt-downs.

My physician-father couldn't find a physical reason for my claimed stomach aches and over-sensitivity to light, so my parents made made me suck it up. By the time I was fourteen, everybody gave up on their notion that my obsession with horses would disappear on its own as I entered adolescence, and got me one.

With a horse to ride, I was oblivious to the fact I was never invited to parties or dances; and I did have one NT friend with whom I could discuss literature. I was too physically strong for other girls to bully, and the boys in the Honors classes, the only boys I knew, gave up harassing me when I first pretended to be, and then became, blind to sexual interpretations of even the most blatant actions.

Because my sister was worryingly popular with boys, my parents were relieved I didn't ever date until senior year of high school, and then only with a junior in college.

I became so strong in coping mechanisms for my inability to understand social subtexts, that I didn't even know I had a problem. And I thought I was a good communicator, blaming problems resulting from my literalness and inability to read between lines on the poor communications skills of others.

Finally, I learned about interpersonal relations from books, mostly historical novels and science fiction. I had no idea that there was a lot left out of these sources.

None of my Aspie traits interfered with exercise of my intellectual talents, directed first at the study of comparative ethics and then at the law. By the time I joined a big law firm, my intellectual talents were viewed as sufficiently great to excuse my social blunders, which I did not then recognize except when formally taken to task. Even then, most of the time I thought I was in the right.

In sum, my deficits were recognized by NTs, but mis-attributed to femaleness, bitchiness, coldness, haughtiness, inflexibility, NT horse-craziness, and various other NT character flaws or idiosyncracies. Like my annoying idiosyncracy of always keeping my overhead, fluorescent office light off. Luckily for me, my employers thought my intellectual strengths compensated.

So were my autistic weaknesses invisible? No. But they were invisible as autism.

If you are valuable enough to an employer, your social deficiencies will often be overlooked.
One of the hot topics in sports is how much can be overlooked before you become unemployable--look how much just the Yankees got for trading a player with a lot of baggage (domestic abuse)

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/ro ... olumn.html
Chapman told police he poked her on the left shoulder with two fingers and that she fell to floor and started yelling.
Poking, choking – whatever he did, he raised a hand to a woman and did something physical to her.

I think I may be considered an invisible. I am only now getting diagnosed (age 43).

A lot of people who know me are surprised when they hear it for the first time. That probably reflects their lack of understanding about autism more than my position on the spectrum.

I can tell you that the effort to appear normal and the frustration when I failed built up to the point that I became stressed, full of anxiety and extremely short tempered. Moreno as I got older.

Many times in my life, especially over the last 5 or 6 years I have thought I was close to losing my mind. Imagine trying to deal with hypersensitivity across all 5 senses without knowing why you are hypersensitive! I could feel myself slipping more and more, becoming angrier and more prone to meltdowns, more anxious, more stressed less and less able to cope with traits like hypersensitivity.

It finally led to a complete shutdown. I lost my business and have spent the last year trying to figure out what I should do for income. Lots of ideas but I just couldn't seem to get started.

I came across personal accounts of autism via reddit. At first I thought it was amusing how the traits described me so perfectly. Amusing but I didn't think I actually had it.

As I read up on autism and began to understand it more and more I slowly became convinced and began seriously considering it as an explanation for my lifelong struggle.

The anxiety and my lifelong insomnia (which by now had reached the point of sleeping 4 to 5 hours a day in segments of 2 to 3 hours) led me to a psychiatrist. Though it took a year of what I called my sabbatical for me to actually make the appointment.

By the time I saw the psychiatrist I felt confident enough that autism not only explained my struggle but also was a major source of the anger(meltdowns), stress and anxiety. Insomnia was another source and some personal history was a 3rd source, but as far as I am concerned the autism related struggles were the primary source.

Or more accurately, the struggles with a nameless invisible force in my life which the label of autism seems to fit perfectly.

I have no doubt that if I was diagnosed younger I would still have struggled but I would have at least known why.

So when I went to the psychiatrist I went to talk about the autism + insomnia + anxiety.

At first they were skeptical, in part due to a lack of experience dealing with undiagnosed adults.

Once I made my case in full, their position reversed and I have the start of my diagnosis as someone on the spectrum.

What does this knowledge change for me?

First: it cannot be overstated the value of knowing that you are not losing your mind and your struggles have a real and defined source.

My anxiety levels dropped. My meltdowns reduced or became easier to diffuse. My stress levels dropped. Not because the struggle became easier, but because I finally knew exactly what I was struggling against.

In terms of income, I understand better what kind of work to avoid (things that would put me in situations where overwhelm was too easy) and I am finally starting to move slowly forward on business ideas that play to my strengths and minimize exposure to situations that rely to heavily on my areas of weakness.

I am fortunate enough to have saved some money over the years so I have the luxury of time to carefully move forward.

What does the knowledge not change?

The struggle is no easier. I just know what and why and as a result am better able to cope and adapt.

I get no government handouts as where I live such things are unavailable. Nor would I want them unless the survival of my family depended on it.

I am still an invisible autistic. Though a little less so. A lot of things I hid I don't feel the need to hide.

As Fnord (I think?) expressed: Being a poser is a concern and I went/am going through a phase of back and forth belief/doubt in the diagnosis. Ultimately however, despite the bouts of doubts, I am confident the diagnosis is correct.

In my case at least, I don't see this as an excuse to behave poorly. Instead it's a way to understand why I have struggles in certain situations and allow me to avoid them in the first place or ease into them rather than jump in and meltdown.

It also makes me much more self aware so I spot the meltdowns coming and am better able to disengage politely and walk away to avoid them rather than continue engaging and exploding.

I don't feel it excuses bad behavior or absolves me of responsibility. Rather it gives me the needed knowledge to act more responsibly.

Disclaimer: it's late, I am tired, so I may ramble a bit in this post and my grammar and spelling may not be up to my normal standard.

Edit: as I wrote this "yourkiddingme3" posted. Perfect explanation. My traits were noticed by NT's but attributed to non autism things like being smart, shy, an as*hole etc.

When I told some of my friends my diagnosis after I got one a couple of years ago, they really didn't believe it, and then listed some of my good qualities like that someone undoes Aspergers. I have learned to fit in "enough" to look pretty normal in general situations, but my awkward social skills still come out at times. What people don't see is the anxiety, depression, and obsessions going on inside of me. How much anxiety I feel if I am forced to change my schedule or pattern of activity over something. Once people get to know me better, I am pretty sure they can see the weirdness in me.

Some of these people have milder autistic traits than the more obviously autistic people or the autistic people who have more problems in daily functioning.
Some are smarter, which gives them more cognitive abilities to work around problems and create their own solutions.
Some have better self-regulation, which gives them more control over their mental states.
Some worked harder and continue to work harder at certain aspects of themselves.
Some are luckier in life, the luck from having better parents, being born into richer families, lucking into the right opportunities, there are many ways to be lucky, but luck alone is not enough.
Some have less other problems, other mental disorders that may be an even more important cause of functioning problems than autism in certain individuals.

I think, also worth noting is the fact that these things can be invisible even to people that know you well.

Nobody on this planet knows me better than my husband. He says that it's obvious that I have autism now, but this is only after I self-diagnosed. It wasn't on anyone's radar beforehand. He just though I had my 'quirks'. He thought I was being deliberately pedantic on occasion, or overdramatic for no reason.

Even now, knowing my situation as he does, he doesn't see what goes on inside my mind.

Take, for example, an occasion last week. We were at a birthday party with our daughter. All of the kids crowded into a narrow room, with all of the parents. Everyone was milling around, pushing and shoving, all having their conversations. My sense of being overwhelmed was sky high, but I was keeping it together because the event was about my daughter and her friend, the birthday girl. My daughter reacts as I do, so it's important to me to be sensitive to her needs and help her to 'escape' if she needs to, but first I try to get her involved. I tried to get her to join in with the party, but she was overwhelmed and starting to act up. I made eye contact with my husband to initiate a 'what next?' conversation, because I was struggling and couldn't think how to even get out of the room. He saw me look at him, asked 'Are you ok?' in a general, casual way and I responded with 'Yeah, thanks, just struggling with being in here'. He hadn't expected that response - he immediately responded with 'Oh! I didn't know. You're handling it well, I couldn't even tell!'

By the time that we got out of the room it was perhaps a bit more obvious. I was on edge. I asked him to take our daughter into the next room on his own whilst I waited outside to try and 'calm down'. I felt tearful because I feel myself getting less patient when I'm panicked in a crowd like that. But, if my husband hadn't have been in that room with me then I don't think anyone would have noticed, and if he'd not been there to rely on then I would have been right there in the next room with my daughter again, rather than waiting outside and trying to get my headspace right.

All that, and if he hadn't casually asked 'Are you ok?' without actually thinking anything was wrong, even he would never have noticed.

Yoy might not be able to see, what kind of struggle, they had in order to succeed - or...they haven´t been affected in the typical way - thus making it invisible.

I understand the luck factor all too well. I've always been on the wrong side of it.

I'd first like to ask, who do you mean? People you know in real life? People on WP that you assume "don't have problems" just because you see posts about working or marriages or being parents or knowing what to say in a social situation?

How do you know what troubles they actually live with but they hide from most people because you can't just "let it all hang out" aside from nearest and dearest? How do you know what it took for them to arrive at a place where they make something look easy but it's really been a journey?

I just think the OP is assuming a lot. I don't know who they know that makes them post this question, but it sounds like a faulty premise based on assumption. And if anyone claiming to be autistic also claims it doesn't affect them much -- well I don't think I've run across that on here. I've seen people describe how they've overcome things or found workarounds, or that living for half a century and striving to find a way to function has helped them cope better on the outside, but a lot of those people still have stress on the inside.

I like C2V's post, summing up how you just never actually know what someone's really going through on the inside.

Hello. I know two other autistic kids in person and you can tell something is off; you can tell they have autism. For me, I feel people don't notice unless they know me well. I feel people can tell I have anxiety for sure. Some people know I have a disability in my school because I have an IEP and see me get accommodations and go to the special services department or whatever. But my own family doesn't believe I have autism, though I got diagnosed a few months ago. I believe it has caused a lot of my other mental illness like my learning disability and parts of my social anxiety. Other than that. I know even if people can't just look at me and see I have autism based on how I act, I still struggle a lot internally. I don't want to be thought of as "less worthy" for services to help cope with autism than people who aren't "invisible".

I'm very much one of these "invisible" aspies. Really, you wouldn't know it. A friend of mine who works with autistic people for a living didn't know or even suspect it until I told him. I'm that good at passing.

But I struggle with it every day. People can't really see that struggle unless they've known me intimately for years and years... to everyone else, it just seems like I'm having a lousy day or that I'm a bit absent-minded, or a bit inconsiderate. The amount of conscious and unconscious effort this all takes isn't something they can know.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this... I guess I just wanted to share my perspective.

I can pass as NT alot of the time, and I am fortunate in only suffering from some aspects of autisim which are not immediatly apparent. I am also fortunate to be in all other ways healthy, not suffering from any coexisting disabilities. Because a large amount of people in society acociate austism with those who are non-verbal and or suffer from multipul coexisting issues, I do not fit the preconcieved picture in most peoples minds when they think of someone with autism. I have worked very hard to get to the point at which I am now, socially; it took me almost 30 years to get to the point in my life where I am today.

I understand how my "invisible condition" might contribute to people's miss-guided interpretation of what an autistic person is/speaks like/acts like/looks like, but this is not going to stop me from being open about my neuro diversity when I feel comfortable doing so. It is a spectrum, and part of educateing the world about neurodiversity is exposure to the range of diversity which the spectrum encompasses. Invisable minority is a hard thing to live with, no matter what the type; mental capacity disabilities, pchycological disorders, sexual non conformance, gender non conformance. Its all the same.

If only society did not feel the need to put us all into labeled boxes.

i think most people will easily notice that there's something different about me, but i doubt anyone would suspect autism at first, because my adhd-related traits are much more visible. my psychiatrist himself nearly discarded right away the idea of asd when i first suggested it, and his own son has asperger's

to be honest it's hard even for me to tell how much i'm affected by asd-specific things, because i don't see an element of asd in everything in my life, but i do see an element of adhd in everything in my life. even with superficial communication issues, for instance. i'm much better at communicating through text than by any other means, but still i'm actually much better at talking face-to-face than on the phone (unexpected calls that i don't have a mental script for are a nightmare, even with people i'm already perfectly familiar with in person). people get very confused by these inconsistencies (and i have plenty of them), and they typically find it hard to believe that i'm not faking or being lazy when a limitation of mine gets to be a problem

another reason why it's difficult for me to measure the impact of asd in my life as a whole is that i'm one of those people who are "intellectually gifted and naturally curious (often to obsessive degrees)". but i honestly don't know if this makes me better off (for being able to figure things out), or if i might actually be better off instead if i were a little closer to average. because the problem is that i can understand virtually anything i set out to, but most of the time it doesn't mean i can actually do it or practice it myself. or i can, but at a cost. i have the mixed blessing of being very good at appearing competent at what i'm not, even without trying

i'm capable of traveling around the world on my own and fitting in just fine in many situations, despite my often noticeable eccentricities. but that's only because i spend months at a time in my room with practically zero real-life social contact, and because i only ever interact with people in short and superficial bursts. i decline any invitations, but i doubt people usually realize that i decline all invitations

i'm systematic about not letting people know what i'm doing at any moment when i'm not right in front of them. i'm systematic about figuring out what makes any kind of desirable behavior appear effortless. i'm constantly collecting mental observations on patterns of human behavior, and i've been doing it my entire life. specific thoughts and observations of that nature are among my earliest memories. i'm exceptionally good at "reading people" because of that (even if i'm not very good at reading situations)

when people see me or talk to me, they probably assume that my day or my life is similar to theirs, when in fact it's radically and fundamentally different. that's essential to my way of life as it is, or at least as it used to be. and it's exhausting. it's a problem i've been working on intensely for years. it takes more time and effort to unlearn things than it takes to learn them. i'm past the point when "further improving myself" became a paradox. i've improved myself too much. it's a strange thought, but... i guess it's a thing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LWZk4jPGEg

so i know better than anyone not to make too many assumptions based on appearances

(heh, i guess i'm more aware of the extent of the impact of asd on my life now than before i started typing this! and this is a case in point, really. because i typically figure things out as i say them, even when i sound perfectly confident at it, as if it's something i've known for a while already. it usually isn't)