I'm not even sure I know what asd is anymore

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It's been a long time since I visited.

I have an ASD lvl 2 diagnosis and have done so for 7 years or so. I feel like I'm just a bit done with it. I receive quite a lot of disability support through gov programs, but I'm finding more and more I just don't want to see my experience through a pathology lens, but just want to live. And yet, without the supports I don't know how I'll go, but to retain the supports I need to continue to engage with the system via the pathology lens. I don't know how else to explain it.

I feel like it doesn't help other people to understand. I'm friendly and sociable person, but struggle with social communication in terms of massive impact on me. It utterly exhausts me and only small amounts flatten me, but people can't see that I'm struggling. I can parse human interaction sufficiently that people can't tell how hard it is for me, and I feel like I do understand people even if I'm slow to process.

I don't know what I'm saying, but I'm just wondering if others have ever felt the same. Like now I understand what I need I mostly just want to get on with life and not have anyone know.

Until I have a brain crash picking kids up from school or something I guess, and then I need people to know. *sigh*

I think I just feel almost normal enough to just mask, pass and get on with life. And I'm tired of it being a thing. I don't even know if I believe it's a thing. People talk about autism in terms of "profound social difficulties and black and white thinking", but my biggest challenges are executive dysfunction and sensory issues, as well as fatigue (from masking) and brain fog.

Just needed to vent.

This is why it is generally better not to let people know. If you tell someone you have cancer, they will probably have a fair idea of what you may be dealing with. With Aspergers most people do not understand and are prone to consider that you might be exaggerating something. It can be worse by calling it ASD as images of classical autism (a child with a malformed or damaged brain rocking back and forth) can make people think you are exaggerating.

I found it less trouble to just deal with whatever idiosyncratic issue is at hand. For example, physically jumping when startled by a loud noise can be explained as having a high startle response. One can even use humor such as, "I tend to do that ever since I was shot".

What if:

I am just like everyone else.

But I am also profoundly different.

I often think of the deaf community or the blind community. On one hand they want to be treated like everyone else but there is no denying the real disability.

I am ok being “different” or “unique” sometimes - at others I just want to belong or fit in. There have been a lot of hurts in the past and I don’t want to repeat them - or fall in the abyss of painful memories. Masking means I can fit in sometimes but I fear being rejected if the mask slips. My therapist says no-one really fits in not before heaven.

Autism does not necessarily have to mean pathology. It is possible to accept ones autism without defining it as a negative or a total negative. People do this for parts of who they are. Being short, being left handed are things that create disadvantages but are not pathologized and not generally misunderstood and will always be there. But Autism being in the DSM is pathologized and is misunderstood. While it is difficult to change how society views things, we can change how we view things.

As far as disclosing that is an individual choice that should be based on who one interacts with. Problem is that it is very hard to predict how people are going to react. In my 10 years here I read about such a wide variation of reactions.

Thank you so much for your replies. It helps a lot actually. I was really scared everyone would jump on me, but i feel so "heard"