5 things late diagnosed autistic people think are “normal”

Comments · 725

• TV

  @TVeldhorst · 2 months ago

  Instead of NOT picking up social cues it's more like picking up ALL the social cues due to being hypervigilant while masking, including your own emotions, and having to constantly adjust and course correct to the situation. Which leads to stress, anxiety, over thinking and self doubt. It is exhausting.

  781

• NE

  @newworldlove7031 · 2 months ago

  Extreme heat & humidity kill me, plus the street noises and aggressive energy from strangers while food shopping. I love being alone, never lonely or bored!!

  552

• CA

  @Candyliz2003 · 2 months ago

  The night before an appointment, having company, A trip, going out with a friend -- I&apos;m lying in bed going over every aspect: my outfit, the drive, having cash, bringing food or water, should I bring a gift...<br>Because all of this is going on in my brain I don&apos;t get enough sleep!!!

  261

• FR

  @fredrik8685 · 2 months ago

  I hate being alone, but I love being by myself.

  206

• NA

  @Nabila2026AU · 2 months ago

  Getting stuck in the ‘why’ and ruminating forever is so real: turning all the data around like a sphere on an axis continuously

  282

• AN

  @anniewho4655 · 2 months ago

  One thing I have heard little about is humiliation trauma. This has got to be common for autistic people. I would love a deep dive into that.

  320

• PA

  @PatchworkDragon · 2 months ago

  I&apos;d like to see a video on how to be ok with unfulfilled potential/expectations, especially for those of us that started out &quot;gifted.&quot; &nbsp;People expected big things from me, and it&apos;s hard not to feel guilty about struggling to maintain even a fairly average life. &nbsp;(Especially as I can&apos;t get diagnosed and don&apos;t have an official &quot;reason&quot; not to be a world-changing success.)

  280

• CA

  @CalBart42 · 2 months ago

  I am sixty‑five, and only now do I finally understand the shape of my own mind. Only now do I have the word that explains the shyness, the exhaustion, the confusion, the lifelong sense of being slightly out of phase with the world.<br><br>Autism.<br><br>A simple word. A seismic truth.<br><br>And with that truth comes a grief so heavy I can barely hold it.<br><br>Because I look back at my life — the jobs I couldn’t keep, the workplaces that overwhelmed me, the supervisors who thought I was slow or strange or unreliable, the years spent masking until my nerves frayed — and I see it clearly now:<br><br>I was never broken. I was never lazy. I was never failing.<br><br>I was undiagnosed.<br><br>I was navigating a world built for different minds without a map, without language, without recognition.<br><br>And now, at sixty‑five, I stand in the wreckage of that misunderstanding. No savings. No super. No stable work history. Just decades of trying to survive systems that were never designed for me.<br><br>It is hard to express how this feels — this sudden clarity, this late revelation, this ache of knowing the cost of being unseen for so long.<br><br>It feels like waking up in a life that was half‑lived, half‑understood, half‑possible.<br><br>It feels like grief for the man I might have been if someone had recognised me earlier — the man who could have built a future, the man who could have rested, the man who could have belonged.<br><br>But I also feel something else, quiet and fragile, like a small flame in a long‑dark room.<br><br>I feel the beginning of self‑compassion.<br><br>Because now I know the truth: I did not fail. I endured. I survived a life that demanded too much from a nervous system that was already carrying the weight of difference.<br><br>I survived misunderstanding, misattunement, misinterpretation. I survived without the one word that would have made everything make sense.<br><br>And now, at sixty‑five, I finally have that word.<br><br>I finally have myself.<br><br>And even though the future feels uncertain, even though the practical fears are real, even though I cannot start again in the way I wish — I can start from here.<br><br>From truth. From clarity. From recognition. From the quiet, steady knowledge that I was never the problem.<br><br>I was simply waiting for the world to see me.

  79

• IN

  @Inverts4Introverts · 2 months ago

  <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GI38JMpLVA&amp;t=593">9:53</a> I dont want to be alone. I want to be left alone. So having someone with me but doing thier own thing is best.

  99

• FA

  @fancydeer · 2 months ago

  suddenly being &quot;done&quot; is something I really have never heard anyone else express before. I have never been able to explain this feeling beyond I have nothing else to give this situation, I have no desire to continue being involved, I have nothing to gain from it, I have no feelings positive or negative about the situation, I am simply *done*. Whether its a personal relationship, a job, something I&apos;m doing in life, etc. If I&apos;m done, that&apos;s it. I&apos;m over it and it&apos;s like it never existed for me, there is a void where that thing once existed.

  107

• LA

  @LaurenInJersey · 2 months ago

  I always knew I was different. Everything you say connects to me. I cancel everything the last minute. I know i have to do these things but I just can&apos;t. The wind is different for me. I could stand in the wind for hours. The feeling on my face and in my hair is calming as is being underwater. The silence is what I crave. Im by myself 99.99% of the time. I have no desire to be around anyone. I love my house, my books and music and my little dogs. I&apos;m sure it&apos;s not healthy but I&apos;m happiest there. Thank you so much for validating us. It&apos;s nice to know we&apos;re not alone. ❤

  140

• KM

  @kmc2663 · 2 months ago

  Knowing I have an appointment in 2 weeks keeps me looking at the phone calendar and sighing, already feeling burned out and depleted. The only immediate &quot;cure&quot; would be for them to cancel/ reschedule, which would really just put me right back into the cycle. It&apos;d feel good in the moment, though.

  156