hiding away at family gatherings

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Never done it full-on before but this time I can't take it. I'm up here on a laptop hiding away from people I love and don't get to see all that often, especially not all together. I used to put so much energy into being there for these things but I'm just hiding now, no energy to even try to keep up the appearance of not hiding. Euugh I'm disgusted with myself. Part of me is saying come the eff on, you can go downstairs and sit there. But I've gotten dizzy and fainted from that before and not even realized why until later. Just so much stress from every direction on every sense and every emotion. Hughnh. Hopefully I'm just going through a bad period, I never saw myself as behaving in this manner detailed in the diagnostic criteria I read somewhere, but here you have it I guess. Can only take so much I guess.

Is there any place downstairs in the living room you can sit down and try to relax?

Well that's where everyone is. So I'm upstairs.

I know the way I'm talking you'd think there were snipers in the house or something. This is embarrassing. Get ahold of yourself, Self! I'm just fatigued beyond belief. I noticed my 5-yr-old cousin hiding away earlier but that's what 5-year-olds do. What makes it so that NTs outgrow this and many with ASD's don't, or cover it up only to have it reappear like this?

Thank you very much for the suggestion in any case.

What I generally do is stand by the door so that i have a clear escape route if things get too much, even well before I knew about AS I had this strategy...yes, they will always think you are standoffish and rude for not joining the group but if they actually understood the whole AS thing they would accept it.

It may just be that you are trying to push yourself into a role that you cannot fulfill, so stop trying and instead adapt it in a way you can

You can't tell them to try to be a little more... less whatever specifically wears you down, can you?

Even if you can't or if it wouldn't help to tell them, because it's the very presence of so many people and their personalities or something, it's okay to take a break. But you know, rather than calling it hiding away, you should think of it as taking a break.

You wrote that you love them and used a lot of your energy to be with them, so this is the moment it shows you are not a superhuman but the same as your relatives and all of us. All people need to take breaks because at some point, they can no longer fight off exhaustion.

Some people take a number of small breaks during a family gathering, get up to stretch their limbs, change conversational partners, go outside to get a bit of fresh air, excuse themselves to go to the bathroom, ask to be shown around new stuff in the house, help getting dishes from the kitchen...

I guess being mostly normal can help you taking small, regenerative breaks in places a person who's not as normal doesn't experience as relaxing. They get more chances to regenerate little by little to avoid their energy levels going down hill too fast, whereas people on the spectrum don't necessarily get these chances due to the very nature of their ASD. It's not a big deal.

Breaks serve best to regenerate, hiding away isn't for that. Don't focus on negatives thoughts and do what helps you relax.

I've given up and pretty much told all my relatives in one way or another about my diagnosis. But I feel like they won't understand why I'm suddenly "acting out" like I've let myself be ruled by the diagnosis. It isn't that, it's that I really have just burnt out on certain things and can actually recognize it now.

Yes good point. I am pushing myself to do something I just can't do. NT males can do what I consider girly/bonding talk better than I can, far far better, and I don't even... euugghh what is my point here. I'm just fatigued and posting on an internet message board about my own extended family, which is weird and making me feel ashamed and JJJJJJJJEEEEEEEZ I think I'll be editing this later.

I had a big family party about 3 or 4 weeks ago, and it was held in my garden. I was planning on going out for the day, but I felt unsociable if I done that, because a relative that organised it had told everyone about 5 months before the planned date, and told everyone to keep this very day free. I also felt guilty for not being there. When everyone had arrived, I got a little anxious, and paced about indoors for a while, (everyone else was outside). My 10-year-old cousin came in with me, and although he is NT, is also felt a little overwhelmed (you know how some kids can be). But after about 45 minutes, I soon got used to the idea of lots of people being in my garden, and so we got a drink and went outside, and I gradually grew quite confident with showing my face. I sat with the relatives who are closer to me and I see every day/week, so it wasn't that bad.

I don't like hiding in my room when there's a lot of people at my house, because I've figured the longer you intentionally hide away the more awkward and even scary it is to even want to go downstairs.

There was a family party at my house yesterday.....I spent a bit of time in the yard playing games or watching other people play games. Then I left....I couldn't take it. There were too many people, too much movement, too much noise, and it was too hot. I was overwhelmed and if I'd stayed, I would have experienced shutdown/meltdown.

I think that out of the four hours or so everyone was spending time together, I was present for maybe one of those hours (in pieces of 20min, 15 min). For the other three, I was inside, playing on the office computer with the door closed.

I also struggle with shame and worrying about how the people I care about will respond to my lack of ability to socialize as much/in the same way as they can--but I think that acknowledging your limits and taking care of yourself are good things, and intellectually I don't think it's anything to be ashamed of.

anyways, just thought I'd post to say: I can relate, and you're not alone with this sort of thing.

Yeah family gatherings are on my list of things I really just cannot even handle, I mean partially because my entire family seems dysfunctional and it can bring back not so great memories from childhood. Like my grandparents fighting about alcohol related things....like my parents. Yeah last time I saw my grandparents(though only one is blood related) my grandma got a divorce and married again before I was born so this grandpa is not blood related. Anyways there was a benifit at this bar for a friend of the family who has cancer I or something and my grandpa had a DUI I guess and was not drinking and my grandma was so eventually for whatever reason I got annoyed or something and left......so my grandma proceeded to get wasted(not just a little tipsy, she was wasted). and we(my mom, moms boyfriend and my aunt) gave her a ride home and she flipped out on my grandpa and he ended up driving away rather quickly........So I am not really sure how to approach them if I visit them again.

Other than that PTSD makes things like that uncomfortable because everyone wants you involved, and to be enjoying yourself ect.....but you can't and they don't understand and its hard to explain to them. Like I tried explaining it to my sister last night and she did not seem to get that the severity of PTSD is not based on what experiance causes it we both where at school the day of the lockdown(I am sure I've mentioned this whole story more than once here and just am not up for telling it again). but she did not get PTSD and I did and so she can't understand why it caused that.

Bringing a way to escape to any gathering seems important. For me - both my laptop and my kindle go. I tend to only pull out the kindle, and not physically leave unless I really need to, but a distraction is a really important thing to have.

I find both having somewhere to physically leave if necessary, and a distraction that doesn't cause you to physically leave should be considered necessities for any large group things. Last time I went to one of those without a way to to physically leave, I ended up having a major rage meltdown, and had multiple people there decide that I'm just sub-human because of that one instance.

I did this yesterday. Well, first I stayed downstairs with everyone, then I just hid up in my room playing on my computer, and then I escaped to my friend's house.

Something like this happened to me around 1.5 months ago. Not the exact same, but a dinner was held at the house, and guests came over..... and..... everyone, I mean, everyone talked during dinner, except me. I didn't even say a word. I really wanted to take part somehow, but it was almost like it was impossible for me to talk at the time.

And yes, I did hide away in my bedroom at situations like you mentioned. Sometimes, I hope that there is alcohol so that it isn't so difficult.

when my extended family actually got along, we had frequent family gatherings. part of my problem is I always wanted to talk about one thing which would wear everyone out, including talking too much and when everyone lost interest in what I had to say, I went to my room and talked to myself. I always hated conversing with relatives. social cues were always lost on me and I'd end up saying something akward which disrupted the conversation in the room. would rather have conversations with myself where I didn't feel weird or have anyone disagreeing with me.

I think it is perfectly fine for you to opt out of the family gathering.

In fact, I think it would be wrong of you taking part in it if you really don't want to.

If anyone has a problem with that or inquires after you, ask one or two family members that you really trust to say that you're feeling a bit overwhelmed today, that you wish them well, but that you really don't feel up to visiting people today.

I think we really ought to stop taking other people's wishes as our obligations.

Let everyone be as happy as they can in their own way.