Getting away with being weird as a child but not afterwards

Post Reply New Topic

I first noticed I was standing out around 5th grade. Junior high was probably the worst period of my life as far as being bullied.

As and adult I became a musician (until it stopped paying the bills) and many musicians value "weirdness" so it worked to my advantage. I also lived (for many years) in Austin, Texas and the town slogan is "Keep Austin Weird". I couldn't have stood out in that town even if I had wanted to. There are many unique and eccentric people there. It was heaven.

I've had that problem since I started secondary school in 2005. It's most likely down to:

a). No-one knows much about ASDs (lack of prominent autistic individuals in the media).
b). The teenage mentality (they, as Alan Partridge put it, 'don't like outsiders...like to stick to [their] own').
c). Adult ignorance (dismissing it as 'bad behaviour').

And now I'm concerned, now that Brexit has occurred, it might get worse from there...

Yep here in the UK we change schools at 11 and I got separated from my friends. The next 5 years til I left that school were complete and utter hell being ignored all day every day.

Things were "ok" as far as I can remember (doesn't mean they were ok, just means I couldn't tell if they weren't) until about 6th grade. Things got really bad until about senior year of school when I realized that I actually was some how different and it was why I didn't have friends. So I sought out different people and was friends with them... on a limited basis. Turns out after all my pining for friends, I have a low tolerance for them. As an adult I get by. I got married have kids, but no real friends. There are few people who "know" or have it "figured out" who put up with me. I guess I might call them friends. The other moms don't like me either. Neither do my coworkers. Best I can tell is that I'm weird and slightly creepy I guess. Oh well.

Yup, got away with being a weird little professor, parents thought I was like einstein who hated his rigid schoolsystem because it held him back, but i just didn't pay attention nor engaged at all. Adults all thought I was beyond my years and didn't socialize because I was so above all my classmates, but it was the opposite! My classmates knew me for the naive weird person who just liked to memorize facts but didn't have any real strengths nor any true wit and intelligence. They all lauded the actual students who succeeded with their smarts instead of spouting info about the name of each president.

Someone on Reddit said that maybe somewhere in this world, there must be people who have always been mature and look back on high school positively, but these people must have boring internal lives. I think that sounds like sourgraping.

I can relate.

I got a pass as a child for some of my weirdness, but not always. It is much harder as an adult. Probably because society expects us to behave in a standard way, lol. Like, what's standard and who tf defined it?!

Being a little professor as a kid: "You are going places kid, so what if you don't have any friends, you're too advanced for them".

Being one as an adult: "Oh god will you just shaddup?!"

One night (not too long ago actually) I was out by myself having a mental breakdown. I started hitting the wall so my hands started bleeding. At one point I screamed "Kill me then" but in Swedish. It was not directed to anyone, I just had a mental breakdown.

I thought I was alone because it was night-time but suddenly two children around 10 yo came bicycling and asked me how I was doing. I just said I am sick leave me alone. They said no and wanted to talk but I did not want to talk to them about my problems. I just said One day you will understand. And then I ended the discussion and walked away.


I used to see it as being a child is an obligation and that life ends around the age of 16. Yes, I can still laugh and have a good time but it is very rarely. When being a child everything was "new" and exciting. Now everything is not exciting anymore but boring and sad.

Because children view everything from a non-judgemental angle it was possible for even the weird children to be accepted. When the child gets older it adopts has distinguish normal from abnormal and thus becoming more judgemental to everything that differs from the norm.

...I wasn't real popular as a child:-(...

_________________
Renal kidney failure, congestive heart failure, COPD. Can't really get up from a floor position unhelped anymore:-(.
One of the walking wounded ~ SMASHED DOWN by life and age, now prevented from even expressing myself! SOB.
" Oh, no! First you have to PROVE you deserve to go away to college! " ~ My mother, 1978 (the heyday of Andy Gibb and Player). I would still like to go.
My life destroyed by Thorazine and Mellaril - and rape - and the Psychiatric/Industrial Complex. SOB:-(! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !!

OK. Not many children were real popular.