I hate being reminded that I have autism

Post Reply New Topic

It really bothers me when I try to talk to someone who knows that I have autism. Whenever I try to talk to them about something that bothers me I get these examples

“Well part of the problem is that you have autism so you sometimes engage in this or that behavior.”

“Well you have autism so you don’t know how to socialize.”

How do I assert myself when people when condescending remarks like that?

I don't really have a solution, but I can sympathize. Nothing shows my weaknesses or differences than trying to make small-talk. Even with someone who knows me and that I am autistic, it still ends up involving a lecture on how I should be doing things better or differently...and what's worse is, "you ought to know all of this by now."

Half the problem is that neurotypicals/allistics have no idea just how ridiculous a lot of their attitudes and behaviors are and the extent to which a lot of our supposed communication problems are down to how poorly they understand us, rather than the other way round.

That's why I'm glad my ASD isn't known at work. If they did know about me having ASD, it would most likely always be mentioned whenever I confide to the boss/supervisor/union rep about anything.

One time I was watching a documentary about a school for autistic adolescents, and one 12-year-old was just more or less being a typical obnoxious 12-year-old kid with dysfunctional family issues, and when he was called to the principal's office they put all his behavioural issues down to "lacking empathy because he had Asperger's syndrome".

Joe, I don’t have to worry about telling my colleagues I have autism. They are very accepting and they look at autism differently.

Mainly, I seem to run into this type of issue with people outside of work.

What I think is that nts are probably very insecure about being around anyone who are different.

It sounds like they're not making a proper effort to accommodate you. Instead they expect you to change your behavior for their comfort.

On the contrary, I wish my autism was more recognized. I have such a hard time with social skills, home life, chores, et cetera, that I wish people wouldn't scold me and tell me that I should know better and I'm too old for this and things like that. I wish they would give me a break, because of my being autistic. They expect so much from me that I can't process and understand.

Well I like people to accept that some of my quirks are part of me and not get on to me about it, but I don't like autism to keep being brought up to me like it defines me.