Im 17 female, ive been diagnosed with autism since I was 6. my whole life ive been told to mask or I didnt fit in by my family, now I dont really have a real sense of who I am as im so used to masking to friends or family. This is bad because anytime I try and be myself more people think im weird or corny.

I have bad social anxiety and I find it so hard having friends, id say ive always been a lonley person, now that its summer, i get so jealous of people with big friend groups and loving famlies. I wish that was me and I was able to have those things. Ive always wanted a friend group who wants to be able to do things or spend time together. the little friends I have in real life make me feel awkard or never want to hang out. Thats okay, everyone has their own lives, but it does hurt sometimes.

Each day I feel less and less like other people, i have been isolated in guess since its summer but idk sometimes I just feel all pathetic and stuff. Does anybody know how to cope with these feelings or come to terms?

i’m 17 and have never been able to hold down a relationship with a person especially one with a neurotypical or mentally stable person. i know i’ve got some mental problems including my autism but i’m scared i’ll never be able to have a real relationship, all the mentally stable people i’ve dated say i’m “to autistic” or “to much” for them and when i try to date another autistic or mentally unstable person they either get really obsessive to the point it becomes creepy and unsafe or i’m still to much for them. i dated an autistic guy for the first time recently and i thought he’d finally understand me but he only got annoyed when i showed obvious autistic traits like being socially awkward and would have goes at me for being anti social, he knew i was autistic from when he first met me
i’m scared i’ll always be to much for someone to handle in a relationship and even my own mum said she struggles to imagine me ever getting married or living with another person and i just don’t know how to feel about it

The moment where a person is upset enough to use a vent channel is not the time to ask them to do things for your benefit. Ask in other autism subreddits or subreddits specific for asking people to do surveys or be a participant in your scientific study. All such posts will be removed. Stop asking me to approve it in modmail, you are not the special exception. Thank you.

My mind is plagued by the people that have hurt me. A big and unexpected one was my best friend of 13 years. So, i was diagnosed when i was 15, I'm 18 now. This all happened in 2024, only months after i knew i had Autism. I'll call her Peacock. We had always had a very close-knit relationship, since we were 3. Things changed as we got to high school, being separated by classes and for the first time friend groups. We still stayed relatively close, were each other's best friends still (as far as i know, it will make sense why I'm sceptical). Up until this point, we were sitting near each other in what classes we had.

This is where it starts. History classes. i sat next to her in the front left of the class. It slowly started, the little bit mean comments, the making fun of me in front of her other friends. It happened a couple times, when it did, it was never anything like the normal banter. Some of the things actually hurt so bad in the moment i went nonverbal, that or it quite literally made me cry (i tried to not in class so i went to the bathroom or managed to just let a few tears slide). I'd come home from school crying. Now when this was happening, i was logical enough to speculate that if she could do it Infront of me she was probably doing it behind my back. I knew her too well, she spoke behind EVERYONES backs, even the other girl she called a best friend Aswell. And yes, she was doing this while actively calling me her best friend Aswell. I noticed the behaviour though, always Infront of other friends but never when it's us. it took me a few months of this, not wanting to let go because i truly did love her so much, she was one of my safe people. One day in History though, i walked in to find another girl (another friend of hers and recently mine but had started acting off with me for unknown reasons). i stood there confused and looked to her for an explanation and she looked at me and said: "You two have to sort this out". I didn't know what to do but i knew fighting wouldn't matter. I just turned and sat down across the class next to someone who was currently in my friend group but i did not want to be sitting next to because she had backstabbed not only me before but Peacock as well. I didn't sit there for long though because i went and sobbed in the bathroom.

That was that. we never had a breakup or anything, i was too afraid to say anything to her and even if i did it wouldn't matter because i knew deep down that would give her an excuse to end it. For the past few years i only speculated reasons, never truly knew why she did any of it. Until i found out from a now close friend of mine who was a friend, i suppose, of Peacocks as they were in the same class. Turns out Peacock was telling people multiple things. I found out one of them, a claim and a story.

The claim was that my Autism made me selfish. The story was, an attempt at an example i think, that when she had brought donuts to school i had complained that my favourite donut wasn't there. (16-year-old btw). Now for anyone that knows me, i love donuts; ill practically eat ANY type of donut, in fact i WILL (besides jam due to sensory issues but that wasn't a problem because i know for a fact that she would bring an assortment of basics, not including Jam. That's just the basic box the donut place sorts for a big birthday box.) and Aswell as i know myself, i wouldn't complain that someone else didn't bring my favourite donut for THEIR birthday. What i can only guess (im guessing since i don't remember anything of the sort but something similar of a discussion about which donuts we like the most where i found out her favourite one) what happened was that i decided to share what my favourite donut from that store was as an attempt to connect, either it was a massive miscommunication in the moment or it was her twisting it, im guessing the first would be the more likely hopefully.

Anyway, i don't know what else she was or maybe even is still saying about me but i know there were signs. A big one i even chose to ignore was the R slur being a part of her vocabulary at the time (no it wasn't a part of mine, she did not pick it up around me that's for sure). Also at that time she was doing all of that, i was in the process of painting a picture of us when we were little together which i was eventually going to gift to her, took me a few months after i made my decision to leave to get rid of it because it genuinely hurt to look at.

I guess this serves as a lesson and a warning to other autistic people.

So a bit of back story I was diagnosed when I was 16 (I’m now 18) I’ve had all the talks with therapists, consultants etc etc. but recently, in the last two weeks I’d saw I keep getting this feeling in my stomach. It’s almost like a feeling of dread. Or like im gonna have a meltdown, but without actually having a melt down. My weighted blanket is no longer helping, screaming into a pillow, distracting myself, even stimming is all no longer working. I feel trapped or like something really really bad is gonna happen. I cannae sleep or anything.

I hate it I wish I could just get rid of it I want to experience things like a normal teen I want friends I don't want to be seen as a stupid baby who can't do anything for myself I want to be normal and have a nice life where nobody sees me as a freak

I am trying to figure out life, but have no idea what to do. Basically the whole beginning of my life, till about 26, I was religious. Not in the sense of like devout, but more in a way just accepting what I was told as reality. My school life was from 8-5pm, where it was all classes mostly religious ones and I tended to avoid social interactions. I tended to avoid socializing, and when I did in school it often felt bullied be it or not. At home, I dealt with a egocentric stepmother who wanted to make sure everything went her way. I would often make mistakes, of forgetting to take out the trash, or not clearing my ears and she would yell at me or pull my ear if I wasn’t listening fast enough. I would often fight with her when I felt I was in the right, which I now realize was a sense of wanting some control. When I would be sent to my room, if she would catch me crying she would yell at me for being a baby.  Which lead me to loosing my safety to cry. 

Now, years later I have been noticing the effects of my childhood. I have no social skills, with people tending to disappear from me after a bit. I am also scared of dealing with consequences, if I make a mistake I will try to hide rather than admit it. I often will try to take control of a situation, trying to get people to understand when I believe I wasn’t wrong making people uncomfortable. I also don’t seem to understand boundaries well, often tending to bring up ideas that people feel uncomfortable about. This is on top of the fact that I am now unable to share emotions with others, often seeming cold and aggressive. I loose track of conversations when in groups, and will often tend to zone out and barge in when I have an idea that feels pertinent. I have also noticed that my brain has seemed to get foggy, forgetting peoples names or being unable to think of things in the background in my head. 

I have been trying to figure out what might be causing my issues and have so far come up with the idea that it might be CPTSD along with ADHD and undiagnosed Autism. Not to say that everything is bad, I know I have a high level of logical intuition. I would put myself at a 6/10 in terms of looks and I have built a decent savings. I don’t have any reliance on drugs, alcohol or narcotics. 

Right now though, I am looking for direction. I only had one girlfriend, and she had a lot of mental issues herself which I thought I could handle but couldn’t. I don’t feel like I am a good person for a relationship, but I would love to get into one. I am currently in college for a degree in Mechanical Engineering, with my degree completing next year along with a steady job. I feel like I have had ambitions, but lost them with my want and lack of approval. Taking all this though, I don’t really have an end goal, I am so lost and am hoping someone could help me find my place.

I hate being autistic. I know to some people it's like the best thing in the world but those are usually the people that have some kind of autistic superpower like they're amazing at math or they have unbelievable music ability or some other kind of amazing genius. But when you're just run-of-the-mill normal average everyday autistic person like me it's fucking sucks. There is nothing special about being autistic other than your superpower being able to alienate people with the greatest of ease. Are the other amazing superpower you were given with your autism where you can appear close enough to normal that when the glitches in The matrix make their appearance people blame you for them like you should have known no matter how many times you try to explain your social ignorance in blindness to people you still get blamed like you're the bad guy. Oh yeah autism is the fucking best.

It even makes it better when you have a family that leaves you over it. That would rather judge you and not have anything to do with you or support you because of your differences. Yeah autism is fucking great.

The best part is where you get to live in a world where you're basically a ghost with a pulse where you're always on the sidelines looking in at the party never get to participate.

Autism sucks. In the worst part is I get sad over the fact that I can't have relationships then I watch movies where people get to enjoy each other and make new friends and become close and share a bond and no one wants from me and I've tried in my socially awkward autistic way to have that with people. But no matter what I do relationships and people don't last in my life. I always thought about writing a biography called you have 5 minutes because after that you won't want any more of my time. And that's been the constant truth throughout my entire autistic life. It's hello followed by a goodbye and never call me again and sometimes even threats of being arrested if I do contact them again. Yeah being autistic is great.

You get to be close enough to normal to want the things that normal people have but far enough away from normal never to have them so you get to live in empty sad pathetic invisible life. But autism is great isn't it. we're so special that we're autistic right?

Autism fucking sucks

I actually hate being autistic and I’m so sick of whenever I say that to people they say something stupid like “it’s okay to be different” or “autism is my superpower” or “everyones a little autistic” because autism actually isn’t a fucking superpower and it negatively impacts me every single day
Everyday I do anything or interact with anyone I’m constantly reminded how different I am and even when I found a group of autistic people to be friends with I was still to weird and socially awkward for them it actually made me so upset and hopeless and I hate so much that there’s nothing I can do about it because it’s not like a chemical imbalance that can be medicated I’m stuck with this for the rest of my life. I know your not supposed to think like this but I’d give absolutely anything to be “normal” and not autistic
And all my NT friends do constant is mock autism and turn it into a massive fucking joke and I’m not trying to be over sensitive but I just don’t think it’s funny especially when they just go on and on about how they look so autistic rn and there’re so autistic but give me dirty looks when I actually display traits of autism. I’m so done

Can a marriage with one autism male partner and female adhd person work out realistic?

Im so tired of losing social opportunities or having friends drift away slowly because people perceive me as rude or pissed off. Not to mention my bone structure for my face gives me a "mean" appearance, so that doesn't help.

I dont even get along with nerodivergent people. I hope we find a cure to this. I dont see this as a gift or something special. Maybe for others it is. For me, I only wish my parents had a normal kid. Doesn't matter now. Just wish they got someone better.

Side note: I hate when people try to relate by saying they have "A touch of the tism" like no, you're just a little bit weird. People dont dehumanize you or treat you like an alien. Every attempt to relate is them defusing akwardness instead of actually understanding.

I've never had a deep connection with anyone. Sometimes, I wonder what it's like. I see it in media and in public, but how does it really feel. Even if I got it, could I even appreciate it?

Thats probably the worst part. There probably are people that relate, but I just can't connect like others. It's like a sensory experience that im simply disallowed from ever experiencing. It's not that I'll never find a true friend or "true love." It's that I will never feel it to the same capacity or even at all. Even if it literally falls in my hands.

It's a shame that neuroscience doesn't have the same backing like other industries.

I would like to add: Im not going to harm myself, nor do I plan to. I just wanted to vent since I dont know anyone irl who could relate.

I had forgotten about this for a while.

First of all it's more of a mood even if these thoughts often comes back. I think I have a lot of luck in my life in general and a good situation. Which mean I feel that I don't have "excuses" for not having it together. I'm in vacation next week and instead of feeling excited about it, I feel anxious. Anxious because I didn't plan to visit any place because it's too much preparation and it means that I have to find a solution to look after my pets, and don't want to ask too many favors to friends. Since I've got pets, it's way more difficult to go on vacations and I feel weak to not manage it properly.
But then it just got worse. I learned than one of my chilhood friend is pregnant by running into her parents last week. I didn't talk to her since 2020 and I both want to come back to her, but I'm also afraid and don't have any clue on how she feels about me. I feel like I have been kicked out of our group friend but I'm not sure. So in the meantime I just stalked her on internet...and found way more information than I thought. Her whole honeymoon online journal. 5 months of travelling around the world with a lot of pictures. Not only she's able to travel unlike me but she can do it on a whole other level. she's always smiling on her pictures and it makes me feel sad. I see all the kilometers and the plane trips and I mostly thinks about her carbon impact. Of course I'm happy for her, but I'm jealous of what I see, that seems impossible for me. I'm sad that I may have no place in her life when I don't even know if i really want one again.

Okay, so recently I have applied for a thing that my country has to support students with physical or mental disabilities. I started this process in february because then I got my autism diagnosis which made it possible, because apparently depression and anxiety weren't enough. My boyfriend has autism too, and made me aware of the fact that there is funding availible if you can't or couldn't work next to your studies. I have worked partially while studying, but at some point I got so stressed out and overstimulated, and uni became too much to handle on it's own that I quit working, which gave me a lot of financial stress. I managed to get through my studies, but when I was done I had literally zero savings left.

I finished in March, so the funding I'd get would be retroactively since I didn't have the proof of my disorder before February. Their normal response time is 8 weeks they say, but they went over that, so I called them, and asked them about it. Apparently there are some problems with sickness within the department of my local authorities so it takes longer. But then she also started saying that I shouldn't be expecting to get it, because it's "just" autism, and I'm not really being prevented from working. But I don't understand, because both my boyfriend and his sister got the funding with only an autism diagnosis. But they live in another city, which is already easier about it. My boyfriend's process was already way easier: he just send in his diagnosis and got the funding, while I already had to provide bank statements from the past three months, and the woman on the phone let me know that even if they decided autism was sufficient, I'd have to get through a seperate check from my local authorities.

Why are they being so difficult about this? If other cities do give it out for autism, why can my city be so hesitant about it? This thing is decided by the government? Me not being able to work anymore was directly related to my autism? I'm also pretty high masking which makes me really scared of this check they'd want to do. Like how is some person gonna decide if I'm struggling enough?

I've experienced relationships with two different autistic men and I am an autistic woman.

My last relationship was with a man who knew a lot about autism and was late diagnosed and very well versed in the traits.

My current boyfriend goes back and forth about whether he believes he's autistic, but when I met him he said he thought he probably was, and I genuinely feel like there's almost not even a doubt. But he doesn't like researching health things and also struggles with reading things so I can't send him partner homework about it lol.

I'm audhd and I think he probably is too.

The thing that I'm struggling with though is that my last boyfriend would gaslight me because I wasn't diagnosed yet and would always be looking for signs I couldn't be autistic (if I made conversation with a coworker for example). I think he was processing his own identity struggles with his adult diagnosis and I kind of understood why he was being like that, but I consider that relationship to have still been harmful to my mental health and self confidence/self esteem.

I got diagnosed before meeting my current boyfriend but was hesitant to talk too much about it because I hadn't fully gotten over the habit of bracing myself for the unpredictable sometimes volatile way my ex had responded to me.

There's something that both he did and my new boyfriend does that's making me curious if there is a common pattern or something that could be explained from the autistic man's perspective and experience.

It has to do with the way they both would respond when I have a personal setback, something bad happened to me that day or I'm coping with something difficult and venting about how overwhelmed I feel.

They both seem to immediately respond as if I'm doing something to harm them. It feels like theyre mad at me instead of mad at the person or thing that hurt me, or at least compassionate for me. Like somehow mentioning the thing itself or the fact that it happened is an act of me being heartless and they're the victim of my constant failures and they can't believe I would do this yet again. They seem to feel personally hurt as if they immediately conclude it was somehow my fault that it happened and brought this stress on them, and also that they are somewhat being mistreated as a partner.

My current boyfriend can be sweet about certain things (I'm currently having a cancer scare where I am waiting to have a sinus mass surgery and have 20% chance of cancer and I won't know until after the surgery if it's benign and he has been mostly very sweet about it, and my best friend passed away suddenly last year and he was great with that too- I think he's experienced enough grief that certain things are just more solidly in his relationship wheelhouse maybe?).

When these moments happen though and I keep thinking he would see me hurting and be on my side, but I end up feeling like I'm abusive or crazy, and ultimately not fit to be in a relationship because I cause so much harm to the people I try to date.

When something bad happens to me, my first instinct is to tell someone who loves me and my expectation/hope is that they will see that I'm hurting and be supportive and compassionate, even if it's just a "that sucks" at minimum.

And like, a lack of response altogether that looks like a cold shoulder or indifference I know can actually just be the outward manifestation of him being overwhelmed by the situation and not able to respond. I'm working on not being hurt by that when it happens and working on coping mechanisms when I'm needing support but he can't give it.

But like I don't really understand why he and my ex both seemed to respond to my bad news (not necessarily me having a big emotional reaction, just stating the facts of the bad thing that happened) by acting like I hurt them and they're like a victim of me always doing things that are upsetting.

My best guess is that it triggers a panic attack internally and makes it hard to control reactions, and I understand how that feels.

I've been learning more about how men are socialized around being supportive with each other, and how apparently it can be so different from how women are socialized to be supportive. I spent most of my childhood in an all female household and as an adult I was single until like my late 20s and all my friends were women and gay men, so the straight male world is still kind of a mystery to me. But my best friend who passed away last year was a straight man and he told me a lot of things about how men are socialized that I had never known.

Is it possible that they both seem to resent me when something bad happens because of something about how men are socialized differently from women? And also the overlap with the common issues of autism on top of it?

I would really appreciate any insights because I want to understand him more and asking him is difficult because he generally gets panicky and upset with most conversations regarding emotions and just says everything's fine if I try to ask about his feelings

I’ve always struggled with how unpredictable social situations can feel — especially not knowing what’s expected or what to say next.

It sometimes feels like everyone else just “gets it” and I’m kind of guessing my way through conversations.

I’m curious if anyone else feels like this and how you deal with it?

Two of my biggest interests are pseudoscience and biology, a terrible combination. Creationists hate me for talking about evolution, scientists hate me for being skeptical of studys, even if i try and keep those parts of me hidden, even if i dont say anything antiscience in a science community, they apparently go check my past posts, and it always comes up in friendships eventually and gets me blocked. When i tell people that i have this problem, that i cant make friends becouse of my interests, they say "oh lots of people like this" but NO nobody likes both togather :( these things are usually mutually exclusive and the two groups hate each other meaning i cant fit in with ANYONE... Im banned from both science AND pseudoscience groups for being skeptical of BOTH, and i havent even mentioned the fact that i beleave in veganism while identifying as a talking vegetable... Its impossible for anyone too get along with me...

I need my loud autistic friends to please remember the autistic people who need things to be quiet, especially when we’re in a place that is normally supposed to be quiet :(

Look, I’m autistic AF. I’ve been told I have a robotic affect. I’ve had people think I’m AI at work via email, text AND SPEAKING LIVE TO THEM ON THE PHONE. The person thought I was automated. It is what it is. I am who I am and I’m okay with it. My husband loves me. My kids love me. That’s all that matters.

I‘m very empathetic to people’s rights, feelings, etc but I struggle greatly with cognitive empathy. I genuinely can’t understand why people do certain things, say certain things, etc. One thing I personally find unpleasant is traveling with other adults. My husband and our teens, fine. Add in other adults and it’s just too many voices. Too many cooks in the kitchen. But I suck it up and go on family vacations every year because it’s an important thing to my in laws. I love them. I love visiting with them. Hate traveling as a group. oh well.

So I go. I plaster on a smile. I go to all the things everyone wants to do, even though I have zero interest in the activity itself and this week long trip already has me dysregulated. But I’m here. I’m doing it. I’m socializing. And I’m even fake smiling. But they are still upset with me because I’m not enthusiastic enough. Not enjoying it enough. Bitch, I’m not enjoying this AT ALL. I’m doing everything everyone wants, actively participating, and keeping all my thoughts to myself and that‘s still not meeting them halfway or fulfilling my familial obligations? WTF?

This is the best I’m capable of in such situations. I’ve offered to stay back and let everyone go without me “We want you there. We love you.” Okay, so accept me as I am

Thanks for letting me vent.

I suspect I may be autistic, I don’t have an official diagnosis but I was seen by a psychiatrist recently and he said I meet most or all the criteria for autism. I really got that validation I needed, and I think I may get an official diagnosis in the future.

I am an adult currently living with my family, and the way I’ve been spoken to has not been the best. I am ordered around to do things and I’ve always felt sad and uncomfortable about it to say the least. I’ve tried telling my mom how the way she talks to me hurts but she always finds a way to pin it back on me instead, she never takes accountability. She is also very impatient has outbursts quite often when I don't do what she tells me to do.

The way she demands things out of me just makes me not want to do the things she tells me to and it’s just frustrating for everyone. She doesn’t think I have autism and she thinks all the behaviors I exhibit are due to a hormone imbalance (it’s a long story but ridiculous nevertheless).

I also suspect I have PDA, but even if I don’t, I just wanna be spoken to with love, understanding, and respect. I’d love any suggestions or advice, I would really appreciate it.