I Just Told My Partner Of Over A Year That I've Been Looking Into Both An Autism And An ADHD Diagnosis.

I lost my god-damned job this morning. Hated that place, but still cried. They let me work two weeks before they told me at the end of my shift today.

Haven't been home in two months but had to pack up my shit and bring back as much of it as I could. This sucks ass. I hate it here.

I never want to work again.

Especially for a place like Wal-Mart.

Haven't seen anyone mention the fact that sanrio is kinda racist... That's another reason to be "bitter"

I think a lot about how we as a culture have turned “forever” into the only acceptable definition of success.

Like… if you open a coffee shop and run it for a while and it makes you happy but then stuff gets too expensive and stressful and you want to do something else so you close it, it’s a “failed” business. If you write a book or two, then decide that you don’t actually want to keep doing that, you’re a “failed” writer. If you marry someone, and that marriage is good for a while, and then stops working and you get divorced, it’s a “failed” marriage.

The only acceptable “win condition” is “you keep doing that thing forever”. A friendship that lasts for a few years but then its time is done and you move on is considered less valuable or not a “real” friendship. A hobby that you do for a while and then are done with is a “phase” - or, alternatively, a “pity” that you don’t do that thing any more. A fandom is “dying” because people have had a lot of fun with it but are now moving on to other things.

I just think that something can be good, and also end, and that thing was still good. And it’s okay to be sad that it ended, too. But the idea that anything that ends is automatically less than this hypothetical eternal state of success… I don’t think that’s doing us any good at all.

This. Exactly this. I literally couldn't find my diary for like a year because of this. Then I forgot I had one until I needed to rant again.

If you have adhd AND autism, you know that although the symptoms can be VERY similar, they can also clash and then team up to piss you off.

Example:

ADHD: causes me to be a bit disorganized

Autism: craves order and structure

You see where this is going.

I'm bad at looking for things, but I have like five minutes to find it before I start losing my mind. I literally put my work clothes in a specific spot to avoid this, but I don't have my own room so it happened anyway because people like to move my stuff while I'm sleeping. It's always in an obvious spot, but that's the last place I would thing to check because IT'S TOO OBVIOUS.

Special Interest Blabbering?

What do you do when you want to just talk for hours and hours about a special interest and no one wants to listen? Like you just want to sit them down and tell them every little thing about it, but the clearly don’t care and would get annoyed quickly. What do you do?

Being raised in an abused family will often leave you with the abusive system of social hierarchy in your subconscious mind, and you might not even realize you're following its rules in the life after abuse.

The system is created to rationalize and enable abuse, to the point that it's difficult for anything but abuse to go on within the system. It puts all of the people in your life in 2 possible roles: First role are the people with authority over you, who can use you, hurt you, and you have to tolerate it, you have to see it as them 'just taking their frustrations out on you' and 'not knowing any better', and not take it personally. You can't act against them because they always have some hold over you, or just scare you too much to retaliate. The second role are people who have less power than you, or depend on you in some way, and they're the ones who are acceptable for you to demand things from, take your frustrations out on, expect things from them, criticize them or complain how they're not doing enough for you. For some people, who have are used to being at the very bottom of the hierarchy, don't have anyone with less power than them, and will therefore expect always to be the one others are hurting, with nobody to take it out on but themselves.

The reason we learn this is because it happens in the abusive homes, and often other parts of society, to the point where we think it's normal. Parent getting yelled at by the boss, then yelling at home at their spouse, then spouse yelling at the children, and children yelling at each other. In each of these stages, one person is getting their need to feel 'superior to someone' met by dehumanizing and using someone they can do it to, without suffering any consequences. And we accepted this is just how life is, how is one supposed to live without having someone to vent their frustration on? And the solution they propose is 'don't take it personally, this person still loves you they're just having a bad day'. But it's not just one bad day. And there is no love, only dehumanizing you in order to feel superior.

In abusive systems like this, attention, love, caretaking or fulfilling someone's needs is scarce, and will only ever come from those lower on the abusive hierarchy. This means that the less abusive spouse, and the children, will end up giving love and care to the worst abuser, they'll have to fulfill this person's needs and wants, when it should be reverse. Families exists so children could be taken care of. The competition for attention and care can be so fierce that anyone getting attention can make other members of the family angry or jealous, because there's so little of it to go around, and the people giving attention will be taken for granted and used as resources. Dehumanized, only there to fulfill a need.

This is not how normal, healthy communities work. In a normal, healthy setting, everyone is getting their needs met, and we don't fight to feel 'superior to others', we understand that we're all equal, nobody better or more important than another, and each of us special to someone. There's value in humans that isn't shown when all you can do is try to avoid being the target of someone's anger, or trying to prove that you're a good enough resource and you don't deserve to be punished for not doing enough. No human should ever be somebody's target for letting out frustrations. Nobody deserves that.

How to tell if you're still unconsciously living by this system? See if you check any of these points:

people who willingly give you care, attention, love, and fulfill your needs, are people who you give no attention, they're boring and you know you can take them for granted

people you seek attention from are people who are in higher authority than you, popular or special in some way, and who repeatedly ignore/neglect you or are emotionally unavailable and unwilling to care for you

you don't feel guilty or ashamed for yelling or berating someone in your life who annoys you or is in your way, even if they didn't do it on purpose. you feel it's completely their fault for not thinking of you first.

you feel immensely stressed if you accidentally annoy or slight someone who you want attention from, you obsess over how will they see you now and how you must have ruined your chances to be loved or admired by them

you long for more success and better social standing, not only for the money but to feel like you're on top and allowed to tell other people off and never have any consequences for it

you look down on people who are doing worse than you, you feel inclined to tell them it's their fault because if they had tried harder, like you did, they would have made it

you don't feel guilty or ashamed of manipulating people to get what you want, especially if they present no threat to you and there's no consequences for it. You feel inside that they deserve it

you refuse to admit or acknowledge if you're being manipulated or used, because it would feel too humiliating and unbearable to withstand it, you instead pretend it didn't happen

you don't think it's a big deal to cut off anyone who isn't of any use of you, and you don't consider their feelings on the matter

being cut off by someone whose attention you want puts you in a lot of pain and humiliation and you feel like you need to keep it secret or pretend it didn't happen, it damages your sense of self to be aware of it, and you feel it's your fault it happened

you're ready to defend and make excuses for people who are above you in social standing, if they hurt you or anyone else, you feel connected to them and want to reach their status, and for this status to be protected from criticism

you feel that people who are 'below' you in society are at fault both for being hurt, and for hurting anyone else, their motives must always be malicious and you don't think any measure of sanction is too much for them

you find it very normal to vent your frustrations at people who, in your mind, should tolerate this and understand it's just a way of life

If you were at the bottom of the hierarchy in your upbringing, it's likely you don't align with most of these, because you had nobody "under" you to take for granted, or use in any way, and instead you became the resource and the world became the unreachable, scary, and filled with pain for you. If, instead, you were in the middle of it, and were constantly relying on someone to take your frustrations, fulfill your needs, while you're also doing that for somebody else, you could potentially get caught in the loophole and continue living this way, as if its the normal way of life, without realizing it.

This is not a normal way to live. In the system, there is no love, no true connection, no humanity and no respect for any human being. There's only chase for power while stepping all over people who care for you. It's not humane, not sustainable, and the system inevitably crashes once those who provide care and love, withdraw because they realize they've been abused, exploited and got only hatred in return. System relies on abuse and fake feeling of superiority in order to run, and the result is only the abuse of human beings. Nobody is still superior to anyone, but everyone in the system gets a share of being abused, exploited, manipulated and dehumanized.

Cuddle me but don’t touch me?

I know I can’t be the only one here who normally loathes physical contact, but would kill for a cuddle at like 4 a.m. It feels so intense, and you can sort of feel it in the pit of your chest. That feeling of desperately needing someone to hold you as close and tight as they can. Occasionally, it’s enough to push me to tears, Why does this happen? Is it that need for pressure that most neurodivergent people experience? Is it a hidden loneliness that only shows when I’m alone and sleepy? Am I touch-starved? Or is this something else entirely?

Original comic by Rasenth

I feel like my brain is just broken beyond repair.

Nobody knows what wrong with it. All we know is that something is wrong.

Whatever it is is irreparable. All I can do is learn to live with it, but I don't want to. It's not fair.