If someone says autistic people have to adjust

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If I hadn't made up my mind to make some positive adjustments in my life, I still might have been sitting alone in the house all day.

I think it goes both ways. We need to adjust a little to society and typical people need to adjust to having us being a part of society. I also think all this should have happened decades ago instead of people being locked up in asylums.

This is what I would say to those who say "You should be more well-adjusted" to me:

The world at large must remain adjusted for the average. However, I don't see any reason not to select associates based on their willingness to be considerate. Even NTs have various quirks, like tolerance for perfume.
"The essence of modern management is to make individual strengths productive, and individual weaknesses irrelevant." - Peter Drucker

"autistic people have to adjust", is not a false statement.

But the speaker does not have any clue how calloused and ignorant the speaker is

The speaker does not know how much constant work it takes to "adjust"

A homophobic precious lil "person" had the nerve to tell me, "you have a hard time dealing with reality"

Correct

But homophobia is "reality"

It is much easier for someone cisgender and homophobic to deal with "reality" than for someone trans


San Diego 2006 was so homophobic

I understand your point. But it is one thing to be believed in and respected for what you can do and to be held to realistic expectations that give you dignity. It is quite another thing to be expected to "adjust" in ways that are impossible for you to do and being held to those expectations and to be bullied when you can't. And I know that for me personally, what I have found is that the people who tend to tell me that I need to "adjust" tell me this when they want me to be okay with being abused or bullied or treated badly. And it can be for things that are not very blatant. For example, I often get told that I need to "adjust" because I am having a conversation where I am pointing out the facts and logical sequence of events but the person I am talking to is arguing from an emotional or social point of view and is actually trying to change the facts of the incident in order to prove a point. And the person might change the same facts several times. Yet I am told that I need to "adjust" and that I need to understand how that person is right because the way the facts really are do not make that person feel good or look good. And if the person is considered a higher social status than I am, than the facts don't matter. I am not willing to "adjust" to that sort of thing.

I can't go grocery shopping at the grocery store because the store only plays one kind of music 24/7. I have no way of "adjusting" to that. It would be fair if the store provided a couple of hours a week of silent shopping but no, I have to "adjust."

When I am talking to someone, if what they say makes no sense to me, I have to "adjust" and figure out what they mean but they are not required to adjust what they say so that I can understand and I get yelled at or bullied for not understanding and for responding incorrectly. If I say something that they don't understand, I have to "adjust" and figure out how to say it so that they understand it. If I don't I will be yelled at or bullied for them not being able to understand me.

That is precisely why I am on a totally different boat than you. I don't have any problem with noises, yet my first ex thought that I did, and she constantly was asking me if it was too loud and was avoiding to taking me to certain places because of it, and this pissed me off a big deal. I don't want people to accommodate to some needs of mine I don't even have.

I guess this might not be a good example because, in my case, going to a noisy place won't be "adjusting". Okay let me give you a better example. So my last girlfriend was burning a candle in her room, I made a comment that it stank, and she weren't burning it any more. So in this case it wasn't her reading something that doesn't apply to me, it was my actually not liking it (as evident by my making that comment); HOWEVER, I was upset that she stopped burning it, and kept insisting that she burns it again, so that I can adjust. So it was me wanting to adjust, not her. Why? Because the unpleasantness of the smell was little, but the unpleasantness of being treated differently was big, so I was rather smell that smell than to be treated differently. And it didn't matter that the girl was saying she is fine without the candle, I was saying "no, you put the candle back on so that I can prove a point to you" until she finally did.

I suspect there are also other areas where I am similarly not on the same page with other aspies. I read some other thread about Sweden being the best country for aspies to live in -- because in Sweden it is considered inappropriate to approach strangers -- and then they made it a contrast saying how in Italy it would be so horrible for aspies since Italians are ready to embrace you. Now, I don't know either Swedish or Italian culture, but *IF* what they said is true, then I would say Italy is the best place for me to live. I find it super-frustrating that nobody approaches me here in America, so why would I make it even worse by going to Sweden? Why not solve that problem by going to Italy? Sure, in Italy it won't mean much if they approach me since they approach everyone; but at least I can lie to myself that they actually like me. Its so much better than being alone. Yet other aspies apparently disagree with me.

Thats why I think that our society has accomodated too much to YOUR kind of aspies, and thats why MY kind of aspies suffer.

I understand what you are saying. But there is a big difference. If I don't like the smell of a candle, I don't ask someone to blow it out. If I simply don't like a kind of music, I don't ask that people turn it off. But if a kind of music makes me have a massive neurological meltdown or makes my body go into shock which certain types of music do, I cannot be in earshot of that music even if it is not loud. Or if the smell of someone's perfume makes me sick to the point of passing out, I can't be around it. it's one thing to just tolerate something you might find unpleasant, everyone on the planet has to do that sometimes. It's very different when you have a neurological response to something and your brain or body have a violent physiological response that you cannot control. It's like if someone is allergic to peanuts or to shellfish. Exposure to those things will literally kill them even if it's just a little tiny bit. They can't "adjust" to that. If they don't have an epi pen, they will die. I tolerate unpleasant things all the time, everyone does whether Aspie or not. The things that I am talking about are the things that can hurt or endanger my life that I neurologically cannot tolerate or adjust to.

Not all Aspies have sensory sensitivities. Not all Aspies have the same severity in communication deficits or in the different traits. If accommodations that I would need do not apply to you than you would not need them. Someone assuming that you might need them and treating you as if you do is a very different issue than being asked to "adjust" to things that you cannot adjust to. What I am talking about is similar to asking someone with a nut allergy to be able to work on a nut farm or in a nut packing plant without an epi pen and simply "adjust."

I understand what you are saying. So I guess ideally people should treat you and me differently. Normally thats not too much to ask, but I guess with Asperger it is, since NT-s assume that all aspies are the same, when they aren't. So, due to the fact that people are now convinced (rightfully) that you need accommodations, they ended up accommodating me as well, and thats bad.

Now, here is why I am making a big deal about it. While I don't have problems with noises or whatnot, the one *HUGE* problem I *DO* have is extreme isolation. When I ask on facebook why don't people interact with me, I often hear "well they don't know how to talk to an aspie". Well, who says that you have to talk to an aspie in some special way, just talk to me like you would to a normal person! In fact I don't want to be treated differently I want to feel normal for once!

So you see why I am so frustrated? I just feel like people *assume* I will pass out if they do something or other thats normal, so to keep me from *presumably* passing out they just avoid me. But guess what: I won't pass out, I am dealing just fine with noises and smells and what not. So, as they are trying to solve an IMAGINARY problem, they are leaving me with the REAL problem, the one about my missing out on normal interactions with people.

Everyone needs to adjust to some things in their lives; that's unavoidable since people are all more or less different from each other. However, there is such a thing as asking too much. People need to learn where the line goes, but the fact that for different people the line goes in different places is what makes the learning hard. The only way to learn is to communicate with people; you can't expect others to understand you without you making an effort. From what I've seen many NTs don't understand this, probably because they're not used to not being understood, so when someone doesn't immediately get what they're saying they tend to get angry, anxious etc. Not all NTs of course, but some.

I can definitely understand your frustration. I think it is very important for anyone, not just Aspies, that people get to know us as individuals and to allow us to tell them what we need. We also need to learn to hear what others specifically need as well. I have also had experiences like you describe when people have insisted on doing things for me that I did not need or want just because they assumed something about me. This kind of behavior is extremely frustrating and can even be dangerous.

A great example is that for me, specifically, every single time I have an MRI, I come out of it completely unresponsive. That is just me. There is nothing wrong with me, I just need a lot of time in a quiet and dark place to come back. But the MRI techs and doctors assume that I need them to overstimulate me back to full responsiveness and they will insist on yelling and pinching and everything else and even have even gone so far as to threaten to intubate me because that is what a normal person would need if he or she were completely unresponsive. But the more they stimulate me, the harder it is for me to come back. I keep trying to explain this to them and they will fight me about it every time. That is an extreme example of people making decisions for us according to what they think the norm is rather than listening to us and trusting that we know what we need better than they do. That is infuriating and frustrating. I totally hear you on that point.

But people do need to realize that just like every single other demographic, people on the Spectrum are very diverse and we are not a one size fits all. I won't repeat the tired saying we all know. Getting to know each person individually and respecting each person and trusting that we all know what we need is what works best.

Yes. I find it frustrating how most NTs I know expect me to make all the effort to understand and respond properly to a conversation and they are not required to make any effort at all. I can speak on the phone with some of my Aspie best friends for hours and hours at a time and never have a single communication problem. But with many NTs, I can't have a conversation for more than a few minutes without the frustration of misunderstanding. And most of the time it is because they mean something other than what the words they are saying mean. I am always expected to figure out and respond to what they mean no matter how different it is from what they actually say but they never hold themselves to the standard of using the words which correctly mean what they are trying to express. This kind of thing can make me have head banging meltdowns especially when they constantly criticize me or get upset at me for not understanding them. I can't adjust to this because I can't figure out what they are trying to say and they won't tell me what they are actually trying to say.

I agree with what you said about communication. But what makes communication different is that NT-s assume that, as an aspie, I don't have an insight and, therefore, none of what I say is to be trusted -- not even when I am talking about my own experiences! And that goes hand in hand as to why they aren't asking me to adjust: just like they don't think I have an insight, they don't think I have an agency either, and, therefore, they don't think I can adjust -- even if said adjustment is very simple.

I am not sure whether the communication difficulties I am describing are the same as the ones you are describing. It seems like you are talking about the situation when aspie has trouble understanding NT-s, but I am talking about the situation when NT has a trouble understanding an aspie. For example, at a Bible study, I understand what people are saying perfectly, but then they won't take time to try to understand what I am saying, they just assume I am going off topic. But I am not going off topic: I am trying to draw a connection between different topics. If you aren't going to draw any connections, then everything would be obvious so what is even the point of Bible study?

But once again, I really don't think its an example of others asking me to adjust, quite the opposite in fact. I feel that if someone else were to make exact same points I am making, they WOULD listen to that other person. They just aren't wanting to listen to ME, because my points are invalidated by my Asperger. So they aren't asking me to adjust to the normal expectations, rather they are asking me to shift AWAY from them.

Let me give you an example. So there was one time at a Bible study when the tables were turned: a girl was trying to interpret some chapter totally out of context, and I was trying to bring it back to context. In this case they were listening to that girl and not to me. But I thought they weren't liking it when I take things out of context? Apparently they only didn't like it when *I* was doing it, so its all about their attitude towards *me* as a person, rather than the things that are being said. So you can't really call it asking to adjust. They don't care whether I adjust or not: in fact they would outright dismiss whatever I do, all because its me.

Probably the only way in which they "do" ask me to adjust (I am not talking about Bible study but in general) is when they say that my monologue is too long. But even then, if you ask yourself WHY my monologue is so long, its because people tend to miss what I am saying, so I am trying to clarify myself so that they don't miss it, but then they complain that its too long. So maybe if people were to actually pay attention to things I say, I will learn to make my thoughts shorter. And if you ask WHY they don't pay attention, we are going back to their prejudice against Asperger. So their prejudice against my Asperger is what actually makes my Asperger worse. If only they were to truly treat me the way they treat others, a lot of my differences (including long monologues) would just go away.

And this brings me to the point about MRI you were talking about. At least in your case they are trying to treat you the same way they treat other patients. But in my case they don't want to treat me the way they treat others. Thats the difference. I would much rather be in your shoes than in mine; although, as they say, the grass is greener on the other side.

I would say : define the word "adjusting".

Is it : adapting to your surroundings so you fit in ? Taking over other people's (NT) behaviour ? Copying it ? Making sure you don't stand out in society ?

I see your point: you are basically trying to say that when I am telling others "please treat me like normal, I can adjust" what they hear me saying is that I am "forcing" them to treat me like normal, and people don't like to be forced to do things. But I guess its a no-win situation: if they decided not to treat me as normal, then I can either let them continue not treat me as normal (thus confirming their idea that I am not normal) or I can try to force them to treat me like normal (thus again proving I am not normal since normal people don't force others to do things) which makes it a no-win on my part.

I guess the best way to avoid this is not to be put into that box on the first place. For example, my former roommate also has Asperger, but he learned to pass as normal so that it won't even occur to anyone he has it unless he says so. And when/if he does say he has it, people's behavior isn't going to change towards him since he appears normal otherwise. On the other hand, in my case, my behavior is "not" normal. Sure, I never had an instance of not liking when it was too noisy, but the fact that I did so many other things that aren't normal, that it simply encouraged people to apply every "other" Asperger stereotype to me as well.

Still, however, the part where its other people's fault is that I am not given a chance to change my behavior. Once I acted abnormally, they made up their mind, and its too late. And thats where my envy towards people that are told they have to adjust comes in. When someone is told they have to adjust, the implication is that people's opinion of them would change, once they do adjust. Well, in my case I am not given such an opportunity. On the contrary I am told "please be who you are and don't concern yourself with what people think". Why am I told that? Because whoever is telling me that knows that people have their mind made up and its basically too late. So thats what pisses me off.

I've been told by some that I don't have to adjust and by others that I should. I know in some case scenarios I probably should but not all the time. I would hope that if I meet people to befriend or if I'm dating someone that they wouldn't feel the need of me "adjusting" to deal with them because that means that they don't fully accept me and that's not cool.