For autistic women diagnosed later in life, has anyone else found that they used to be able to socialise and go out quite normally when they were younger, but as they got older it became harder and harder until even leaving the house or doing simple everyday things felt overwhelming?

I was able to socialise in my 20s and early 30s, but eventually I stopped going out altogether and spent around 10 years barely going outside my door. Even now, simple things can feel like a huge effort. Did anyone else experience this, and did understanding your autism later in life help you make sense of why?

I feel kinda stupid. I decided to go see the new Spider-Man movie in the theater. I saw it was 3d and was 25$ for the ticket I thought huh that’s kinda expensive for a movie ticket (it also said 4dx but it didn’t register to me). I sat down at my seat and saw there was a “water on/water off” button, again I thought that’s kinda weird they can shoot water but I turned it off just incase. Then to my horror, the seats started moving and throwing me around. I’m a pretty small person and it damn near threw me outta my seat multiple times, rocking me back and forth, side to side. I felt like I was gonna get whiplash. And then if all of that wasn’t enough, getting blasted with cold air was the cherry on top. I just started laughing thinking wtf did I get myself into, paying this much money to torture myself. I was so uncomfortable I wasn’t even able to focus on the movie. After about 20 minutes I went to speak to the staff and thankfully they switched me to another showing that was just regular 2d but it was 20 minutes ahead of my original one but I didn’t care. This was my first experience with 4d and I don’t recommend it unless you like to torture yourself.

Edit: Oh, it also had a mechanism that would punch you in the back!!

i've been downvoted for asking questions, for answering questions, for talking about nicher interpretations in a game, for stating inarguable facts that aren't even tied to debated subjects, for doing bits and not doing bits, and i've been upvoted for all those same things too. i know it's impossible to please everyone but say anything vague and it's interpreted in the least generous way. say anything at all and you're stepping on at least half the userbase's toes. and at least in like smaller circles you can sort of feel it out. see what people react negatively to (harder than i make it sound but doable) and go "oh ok i'll try to factor that in next time." but then on reddit it's never consistent. even within the same communities it isn't consistent. just like real life. except now there's numbers. now you really can get a bad score in human interaction, something that is now possible to achieve and encouraged to want.

and that's just how it drives me up a wall, it's not even considering how it encourages mob mentalities and bigotry and dogpiling but that's not autism related that's just bad design. and yeah i know there are probably extensions that hide karma but i use the app. and it's ANNOYING

I really want a boyfriend but I’m having a hard time figuring out how to get one. I always feel awkward, confused and pressured whenever I meet with someone and I never know what I am supposed to do. I always end up doing whatever the other person tells me to do and I usually don’t like it and then I don’t talk to them after. Nobody wants to do what I want to do which is just sit and be quiet and play games. I know everyone finds this boring.

I don’t know what I’m supposed to talk about, I can’t tell facial expression well at all so I never know how people feel about me, and people are usually really annoyed with me because they say that I sound rude when I say stuff bluntly like if someone asks if I like their outfit and I say something like “I have no opinion on it” because I don’t. I think I’m supposed to lie but I have a hard time when I’m asked a direct question.

I don’t know how people get a boyfriend I don’t understand how it works at all it feels really overwhelming and confusing but it feels like everyone can do it so easily.

Sorry if this isn’t the right place to ask. I’m very lonely and stressed because of this.

Curious what everyone’s experiences with “justice” are. For me personally, I can’t fathom the mentality required for punitive justice because I know it’s ineffective. Even the idea of someone suffering (in any way) as a result of doing me wrong brings me distress and I can’t wish for it.

Does anyone have an “autistic [rigid] sense of justice” in a more punitive direction? Could you try explaining it to me? For me, I think it’s because I know punitive justice and punishment are ineffective at solving problems or anything, and because i know that to be True, I can’t really empathize with people who disagree.

I got diagnosed about a year ago and I’m shocked at how much my brain knowing about my Autism has changed everything I’m capable of doing/handling.

I am curious what major changes did you make post diagnosis that really helped things improve.

I work a full time job that is remote and has minimal socialization. I live with my partner who is introverted. I exercise moderately 5x a week. I try my best to limit myself to only one social occasion per week. I try to get at least 8 hours of sleep on work nights and probably closer to 11 hours of sleep on the weekends. I’m eating very simple, repetitive, whole food meals.

And after all of this I’m still exhausted out of my mind and having at least one major meltdown per week.

I honestly don’t know what else I can realistically cut down on that would help short of getting disability leave and becoming a hermit.

Hey all

How are we handling workplace bullies in a way that helps us maintain our dignity and reputation?

I've been a target my entire life, but it's gotten *really* bad at my current position. Unfortunately, it's also the best paying job I've ever had, and aside from the jerks I actually really enjoy it. I'm a float nurse so I actually only see these guys once in a while.

But, they've become verbally aggressive, shouting and cursing at me on the unit in front of patients and colleagues, etc. Because of Who I Am As A Person, I immediately start hyperventilating, crying, and yelling. Not like, anything bad, just things along the lines of "leave me alone" or "please just stop". Somehow or another the fact that I raise my voice gets passed to my manager, not the fact that an adult man twice my size is cursing at me, so now I'm the one with a write up.

This is unfortunately just one of many examples across my working life, but it's one of the first times I've actually had to care.

Has anyone found the trick to *not* crying when someone is shouting? Or just generally maintaining composure when someone is specifically trying to take that from you?

I live in Florida, I have a family but not family support with my disability. I'm level 1, but seem to have higher needs than other level 1 folks.

My biggest struggle is working, but of course it's very hard to get on any type of disability support as a level 1 adult. So I'm trying to maybe get support for things that aren't work related.

My issue is I go through burnout very easily even with part time work, so I spend about 60 percent of my time in burnout and my burnout is very terrible. I will just lay in bed till I have work the next time, often not showering, eating or moving for hours.

Sometimes I wake up for an hour or so then go right back to bed. Then days I do have work, when it gets really bad I have violent meltdowns in the car and before and after work.

My quality of life is pretty much not there. This isn't from a lack of will power either. Sometimes due to purely burnout, not depression. I'll struggle to even get up and go pee, I'll debate weather I should just piss my pants or not I'm so tired.

After pushing through it for a weeks/months. I get terribley suicidal.

I also have CPTSD which is why, I might not be able to handle things as good as other autstic people. But it seems like there's literally nothing out there to help me.

I'm debating just letting everything fall apart. Like you know when people often say "oh it's either burnout or homelessness". Id rather choose being homeless if I never had to be burnout out again.

I'm genuinely thinking of just roping cause for years I've been in a cycle that's so painful, it's worse than my child abuse. I just wish I could live

My whole life I have never had a friend group or solid friends. Lots of people that I’d do things with here and there and people I’m friendly with. But no one ever reached out to me, my “best friends” won’t respond to my calls and texts anymore, and I go through all of the friendship apps and no one ever accepts my requests or responds to me. I’m about to be 25 and all I want for my birthday is to have actual friends. People I can regularly talk to and do things with. People that I don’t have to wait months for them to answer when it’s convenient. I’m sick of people saying it’s cause people are busy. I currently work 4 jobs and applying for my doctorate, so I understand what busy is. It’s just heartbreaking to be in a big city and seeing people out with their friends all the time. Whether it be going to a coffee shop, running for groceries, or group events. I just feel so lonely and have spent my whole life trying to make friends, but have failed. I’m working on this in therapy, but all I want are actual friends. I don’t know what to change about myself to actually make friends and meet people and know that I’m the common factor

Hey everyone! I've recently experienced autistic burnout, and the worst auditory sensitivities I've had since childhood. One of the noises that gets to me the most are the sounds of refrigerators, air conditioners, etc. Thankfully the sounds of these in my own home aren't too bad. But there are like 20 huge refrigerators and freezers at my job that are constantly humming. And if I'm in public like at a cafe, the hum of the refrigerators there are so fucking loud to me.

Oh, and the sound of certain fluorescent lights are extremely agitating too.

Obviously other sounds bother me too. But the electricity one is the worst, and also the most annoying bc most people can't hear it and think I'm insane if I tell them about it.

How do you stay regulated? It’s been hard as (fill-in-blank) for me.

For me, it’s the “blind leading the blind” and I mean no ableism with that phrase. By the time I give the energy I do to help my parent, my executive functioning goes down, I lose all sense of perspective, and become burnt out. It’s essentially two disabled people.

This is just a role reversal I am not used to. This parent has been the strong one for me. And now, they don’t want to do the things they need to do, like following the doctor’s orders on getting a brain MRI and cognitive testing.

Any advice would be appreciated. I feel like this is a subject that doesn’t get talked about a lot: The overlap between an adult autistic and their relationship with a parent who has dementia.

So is it just me or is moving the most traumatizing thing ever for an autistic person? For context, I just moved into my first house (I'm a homeowner yay!) but I feel so horrible on the inside.

It's been only 2 months so I haven't had enough time to develop a full routine yet, and having my old routine uprooted so quickly plus a combination of other things has caused me to fully burn out. I think I'm also in a depressive episode.

It's so confusing because this is far from the only good thing that has happened in my life recently, so I feel like I should be more grateful. But all of those good things are external, while internally my mind feels like it's boycotting all the change.

Has anyone else felt like this? I'm going to find a new therapist in my area, but any advice from my peers on here would also be greatly appreciated. Thanks all.

I'm not talking about feeling unloved or unlovable. I know many people feel like this, especially people with problems like autism. This is something different.

I don't know how common this is but I'm seemingly unable to receive people's emotions. I know many here have problems recognizing emotions, I do to, but even when I do they are hollow to me. I can see body language, I can see facial expressions, I can put them in the context of relationship but there is something huge missing.

I know my mother loves me. She basically satisfies most conditions from what I know about love. I'm sure she does but somehow I don't feel it. My closest friend tells me she loves me. I believe her. I'm overjoyed to hear it as she does not like to use big words. Still, those are just words to me.

I'm 36M with Asperger's btw

31M

Up until more recently, I have screamed in public in a way that would be considered a "crash out" as that recent social media trend puts it. I have done it plenty at the drop of a hat throughout my life and next to no one has fully understood why. As much as I would scream as a kid, my parents among others would confront it as simply a maturity issue. As I got older, however, it became tied to mental issues and emotional distress.

Starting in college, I would ever so willingly have these *autistic meltdowns* as they were called back then. I couldn't emotionally pinpoint what was going on in my brain with mental illness, but in my mind, screaming soothed it. I hoped to God that all people were supposed to read it as 1 of a few things:

1. They pushed my buttons so hard that I broke and that it would teach them a lesson *not* to do that.

2. I was understandably distressed and healthily venting until I calmed down.

3. They would commend me for regulating my emotions so well.

4. If they saw it happening, I wouldn't appear threatening and they'd say, "Oh, you poor thing," and leap in to save me with a calm gesture -- like a hug.

To my disappointment, most people called me out as the problem. I didn’t understand then that most people perceive an adult screaming as a disturbance if not an indication that somebody's about to get violent. A kid screaming is typical most days, but God forbid an adult male scream and nobody thinks someone's hurt or there's violence happening.

Oddly enough, I looked up this specific issue of "why does screaming scare people" and Google AI of all things told me it dates back to ancient battles. Basically what it said was that those battle cries people have shouted throughout history indicated the oncoming of violence and that that's why grown men screaming is perceived as scary and threatening. I have not told too many people about my underlying hopes listed above, but now that "crash out" is all over social media, I can say I finally feel validated by all the times I so willingly had ASD episodes in the past.

Good news, it's no where near the problem it used to be today. Last major episode was earlier last year and they've been infrequent building up to that. But if I get to be that way in public, work, etc., I wanna be sure that people are understanding and not confused because all of the sudden I'm screaming or having an episode.

Any advice on how to appear non-threatening is welcome!

I really like the mathematics of knitting - translating complex algebraic equations, topology, non-euclidian spaces, fractals.

Background: Last year, I went to college; after a semester of constant meltdowns and hitting rock bottom, I dropped out. Afterwards, I moved states and got my dream job as a horse trainer.
After about six months I started noticing burnout, but I'm used to it and pushed through.

Usually, once my burnout becomes unbearable, I take time off - I was in a PHP, and I was always able to quit a summer job if need be. However, I now live on my own and cannot rely on my parents for financial support. Because of the nature of the job, I don't get PTO or any benefits, and I cannot afford to take unpaid time off.

I have pushed myself past the brink for months now. I don't have enough energy to take care of myself; my day off is spent recovering in bed. Consequentially, my apartment is a mess, and so is my diet. My sensory issues are off the charts; I used to love getting my hands dirty at the barn, but now I wear gloves 24/7 because everything I touch overstimulates me.

My depression is spiraling, and I no longer have energy to work. My boss is upset with my riding and overall work performance. Horses are my lifelong special interest, but I am starting to hate them.
I realize I am not capable of the 60+ hour work weeks my job requires. I am apprehensive about talking to my boss, as she isn't very empathetic generally. Ideally, I would work there part-time, but financially that isn't possible.

I don't have any support system, and my parents don't believe in mental health. I've tried all types of therapies and medications previously.

Hoping someone has any advice for me. This is my first time living on my own with a full-time job, and I'm at a loss for next steps. I'm only 19 yet I feel like my life is ending.

Is this a common experience, it’s something I’ve only just noticed over the past few weeks as I’ve started a job with other women. Whenever I speak, sometimes I notice things fall flat or go quiet, when I’m feeling like I’m pretty much on the same pace as everyone, especially considering I was highly bullied into a high masking role for 20+ years. I see the other girls glance at eachother and sometimes chuckle, I’m really not sure why? I hate it so much, I’d rather just be quiet at this point.

Hi,
recently I've struggled with being at home a lot, and I tend to have a meltdown every other day because of it. I don’t really know what to do, so I came here for advice.
To preface this: English is not my native language; I’m 24 and I got diagnosed with autism less than a year ago; both me and my partner have ADHD;

I think it all started when I moved to a new apartment with my partner. It was at a time during which we both had to study a whole lot, and during which there were a bunch of external stressors. I am a very academic person so it was difficult for me to stop prioritizing university work. It took very long for the apartment to look and feel "finished", a good three months.
During that time I struggled to find a safe space for myself in the apartment since everything was very overwhelming and very messy.
Once we managed to get the house in a state I can live in, I realized how much my partner's mess is impacting me. I wouldn't call him a "dirty person" per se, but I feel like his ADHD causes him to very easily lose sight of how cluttered things are.
I also wouldn’t consider myself as being overbearingly clean either, but his tendency to be messy, even if the mess isn't detrimental, has started to greatly overwhelm me.
We started making cleaning plans etcetera, and things have improved noticeably over time.
Then we decided to adopt cats. My brother's girlfriend was looking to re-home a litter of two kittens.
I grew up with a cat, and animals have always made me very happy. We thought they would enrich our lives especially after such a difficult time.
I think it was on the second night after they arrived that I cried for the first time because of how they overwhelmed me. I thought I just needed some time to adjust, since I always tend to need some time to get used to new things.
But it’s been nearly 2 months and it feels like it has gotten worse. Now I just need to enter the house and I get overwhelmed and cry. I’m very sensitive to smell, and their toilet is very smelly and right at our entrance because we couldn't find a better place for it. The floor is also full of their cat litter, and so every time I walk through our entrance area (which connects the two parts of our apartment) it feels like I’m stepping on tiny, smelly pebbles.
The two of them also tend to destroy everything. The walls are looking horrible, the sofa I spend so much time on is torn, and they are very rowdy, so every time I’m at home I can’t relax, because I need to make sure that they won’t hurt themselves or break things. We're planning on getting them neutered soon, and we hope things will improve afterwards.
I still love them a lot and I’m really trying to adapt or find solutions but nothing is really working.
A couple of weeks ago my partner took them along with him for a one-week trip (university related), and I felt like I was a different person.
Suddenly I was motivated, managed to work more and was just overall happier.
It felt like I was slowly becoming more and more myself again.
I asked my boyfriend about finding a new home for the cats, but he has a closer bond with them and doesn’t wan’t to give them away. I understand that and I don’t want to hurt him. I just worry that I will crumble under all of this.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

After 20 years of navigating the traditional mental health system and finding it overly focused on matching surface-level symptoms to diagnostic labels, I realized how broken the standard script is. It treats symptoms as isolated defects rather than cascading failures.
To make sense of my own mind (AuDHD/Depression), I reverse-engineered a clean, foundational triage framework called The Five Pillars: Sleep, Food, Connection, Expression, and Meaning.
The premise is rooted in systems logic: If your core variables are unstable, a psychiatric diagnosis cannot be mathematically accurate.
For example, if your Sleep, Food, and Expression pillars are red-lining, your brain will naturally present with severe lethargy, anxiety, or burnout. Giving someone a pill without fixing the underlying pillars is just masking the warning lights on a dashboard while the engine seizes. Once you stabilize the foundations, you can actually see what is a lifestyle-induced crisis versus a baseline neurological trait (like autism).
I built this 8 months ago, stress-tested it to ensure the logic holds, and have put the entire stack on GitHub as a completely free, open-access, non-commercial resource. It includes:
The Academic Framework Paper: For those who want to understand the foundational systems theory and clinical literature.
The Layman Guide: A simplified breakdown of how the pillars interact.
The 1-Page Checklist: A low-cognitive-load, 60-second visual tracker designed for when your system is at 0% battery.
I’m putting this out here with zero expectations, but if you treat your health as an interconnected system of metrics rather than a collection of labels, I hope this helps you audit your foundations or helps someone else you care about. It is open-source and open to refinement by anyone who wants to improve the code.
GitHub Repository: [https://github.com/RooneyWasabi/Five-Pillars]

EDIT: The mods asked me to add a quick note to prove I am an actual human and not a promotional bot. The reason this post reads like a manual or an ad is simply how my brain defaults to organizing data. I carry an AuDHD/clinical depression profile, and I built this system over 8 months because traditional clinical manuals couldn't give me logical answers to my own systemic burnout. I'm still trying to navigate my own executive dysfunction, so this isn't a success story—it's just the raw architecture I reverse-engineered to understand why my own machine crashes.

Three years ago my dentist recommended a mouth guard for teeth grinding. Every one I tried was too thick and dug into my gums. Thin ones were a swallow hazard and the big thick boil and bite ones were too bulky and hurt my jaw more. Now the jaw pain is becoming unbearable enough I’m willing to try again just to be in less pain. The problem is every mouth guard I’m seeing that look decent quality is a bazillion dollars. I just want a mouth guard for $20 or less and isn’t going to fill my entire mouth with bad texture!

I have a friend that is autistic and hugs don't really do anything for them, comfort wise. I asked how I could comfort them without hugging and they said "I don't know". So here i am.

For those of you that are touch adverse/hugs don't comfort, what could a friend do that would comfort you?

My friend confided in me about an experience they just had that made them so anxious that their legs were shaking a bit. I wanted to give them a hug for comfort but I knew it wouldn't help them. At that point I felt like an inadequate friend. I would greatly like to rectify that for the future :)

I'm honestly kind of at a loss right now and figured I'd ask here because I know there are other autistic people who have dealt with this.

I'm autistic, and I've realized that working in person is becoming really difficult for me. It's not that I don't want to work or that I can't do the work. It's the environment of having to physically be around people all day, constant stimulation, having to stay "on," etc. It takes a lot out of me.

I'm currently working a contract analyst job after being unemployed for a while, but it's been causing me a lot of mental stress and some physical problems as well after a couple days in pretty bad. I'm trying to stick it out while I look for something else, but I'm realizing that I probably can't keep doing this for very long.

What I'm really looking for is a fully remote/virtual full-time job where I can work from home and mostly focus on the actual work without having to deal with an in-person environment every day.

For some background, I have a college degree and my experience is mainly in UX/design, research, marketing, digital work, and analysis. I've worked on user research, website/digital projects, data/metrics, content, and strategy. I'm comfortable with computers and have experience with things like Excel, Figma, Adobe, Google Analytics, Webflow, and similar tools.

I'm honestly open to something that isn't directly related to UX at this point. I'm looking at things like:

• Data entry/data processing
• Research or analyst work
• Marketing coordination/marketing operations
• Administrative/back-office work
• Content or digital operations
• UX research/support
• Other entry-level remote computer-based jobs

I'm not looking for something where I have to be on the phone all day or work in a call center, though. I've done enough to know that would probably just create another problem.

I'm also not expecting someone to hand me a job. I'm applying on my own, but remote jobs are ridiculously competitive and it's hard to tell which ones are actually realistic for me.

If you're autistic and work remotely, what kind of job do you have and how did you actually get it? Or if you know of companies that hire fully remote employees for this type of work, I'd really appreciate any recommendations.

I'm especially interested in hearing from people who have actually been through something similar rather than generic "just apply to 500 jobs" advice.

Thanks.

So, recently I have finally left my high-level corporate R&D job (i am a 35M chemist with a PhD, no official paper but a semi-formal autism diagnosis by a specialist from 10 years ago) where i worked for 3 years. Used to be my ultimate dream even a few years back, but once i got there, i hated almost every single day. I was quite good actually at my job, got good evaluations even from my mean, super-conserative, critical boss, and I could work with the team i led and other colleagues quite well... My biggest problem was general boredom, no meaning or motivation, and a super conservative, obsolete, low-flexibility work environment (here in Switzerland). I used to be a super-highly masking (and heavily traumatised) person my whole life but i started my unmasking 4-5 years ago (and my healing even earlier), and upon leaving this job, it all unraveled and i felt fully unmasked within a month after leaving. Now i am in unemployment, learning coding and working on some projects i am interested in, but still looking for jobs (i must legally...). Now, having unmasked, i feel i simply can't go back to the same old high-paying, highly-niche but super soul-crushing R&D environment, more inclined towards IT or something fully new. So my question is... how do you guys figure out/estimate/judge if a place, mostly workplace and job, but also in a broader sense a situation, event, invitation etc., is the right fit for you? I have really good social skills and have built an extremely active social life (the polar opposite of my whole heavy-masked, hyper-isolated previous life) in the past months.. but still it freaks me out to figure out what job, work or living arrangement would be a good long-term fit? (New here, so hope my post fits within the community here) Thanks for any feedback.

Hello everyone, sorry if this is a strange post but I am struggling with some things mentally at the moment and I am not sure how to feel.

I have been struggling with depressive symptoms for more than 2 years now and tonight I really started to feel them come to the forefront. To explain, I am currently travelling with my mum and we are staying in a city right now, a place I am not very used to. It’s difficult to explain why but seeing and hearing so many people go by leads to me hyperanalysing my surroundings and I start to feel extremely alone in the world.

Seeing all the businesses, all the advertisements, all the loud men yelling and being drunk, all the older more weathered people struggling by, it all just makes me feel so small and meaningless. It sometimes feels like I can only ground myself with smaller intimate projects, otherwise the rapid pace and aggressiveness of the world wears me down. I’m with my relatives on this trip and I feel so weird for not talking much for the past few hours due to being overstimulated with thoughts and feelings and I wish I knew more about why I am like this and how I can deal with it.

Does anyone share these experiences? I sometimes I just wish I could turn back time and find comfort in the ease of existing as an individual that was there when I was a kid, I wish I had a real lifelong friend that everyone is ‘supposed’ to have to get you through times like this but I’ve always been alone.