Coming out of the aspie closet

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Hello all,

I have been toying with the idea of coming out of the closet as an autistic person for a while now.

Certain friends and family members know that I'm autistic but its something I keep mostly to myself for fear of judgment from others. I still feel that telling someone that you are autisic, often creates more questions than answers, but I think I would like to tell a few more people in my life.

I am getting to the point where I cannot easily explain away my eccentricities and struggles with life in general.

I am apart of a libertarian community group and no one currently knows that I'm on the spectrum. I fear that if I come out as autistic that my friends in this group will recoil in disgust and/or confusion. I am also concerned that there may be some criticism towards my parents on account of my upbringing, examples would be vaccines, diet, environmental chemicals etc.

Now I do not know what exactly causes autism but my best guess is that its highly generic, since many people in my family have autisic traits. It could very well be true that there are environmental contributors that contribute to the expression of autism, but that is yet to be determined.

Anyway, I don't want to be inundated with comments and unsolicited advice on how to "cure" my condition. I can't stand hearing that horse sh*t, I was born autistic and I will die autistic and there is no pill, supplement or surgery that will ever change that.

So, how do you think I should go about coming out of the closet? Do any of you have experience with a similar situation? And if so how did you go about it?


Thank you for reading my long post, and I look forward to reading everyone's responses.

CFL

Giving yourself a label when dealing with people may not be as useful as you anticipate. I have found using humor to describe a particularly noticeable trait is more useful. For example, the tendency to be a "little professor" can be explained by saying, "I'm sorry, I'm the type of person who tells you how to build a watch when all you asked was what time was it."

I do this sort of thing all the time. As time goes on, I get better at it. Of course, being undiagnosed, there would be less motivation for me to "disclose" something that is only speculative anyway.

Coming out would just lead to misunderstanding. People in general don't understand autism. You will probably get people telling what day they were born and expecting you to tell them what day of the week that was.

Even some autistic people are nervous around other autistic people.

If you can pass just keep getting better at it.

I am not sure exactly what "coming out of the closet" as an autistic would mean. I express my traits openly to a high degree by trying to "mask" as little as possible. On the other hand I don't disclose my diagnosis to people outside my close circle of family and friends. I guess you could argue whether I am in the closet or not. I think a lot of people, professionals included, have a firm and wrong belief what autism is. If I tell them that I am autistic they would probably get the wrong impression of me, instead of a better understanding. When I discuss autism with people that don't know that I am autistic myself they often end up mainsplaining me about how autistic people think and the reasons they (autistics) behave the way they do.