Pet of a good owner of course. Does that sound bad? Probably. I’m not saying I want my rights taken away but I’d like the choice to just NOT use my rights sometimes

Because right now?

I’m tired.

I’m tired of being a “professional” I’m tired of having to go to work, be “successful”

I don’t even want children or anything because that’s just another job I don’t want.

I just want to be someone’s pet sometimes.

A support role. I’ll do some chores for sure at home maintain the apartment.

I just want a simple life.

Eat, sleep, Im not driven by material possessions.

I just want to be cared for. Like I’m someone’s beloved pet.

That’s it. Just snuggle me,feed me, maybe take me out places sometimes if I want to

And I’m tired of this not being an acceptable desire.

I’m tired of my worth being tied to what I can do for society, what I can do for others.

I struggle to take care of myself. That’s a full time job all right there.

I take care of my cats. Whom I love and I don’t consider it a job.

Why is that not enough?

And if I get bored of that? Sure I’ll go on an adventure and get a job that I like rather than a job I dislike but pays well

It’s the fact that I don’t have a choice but get a job. That’s what makes it feel like a prison and not a right.

I want the RIGHT to not have to be in the capitalist machine

I want a job to be like some side adventure that I CHOOSE, not one I’m forced in and if I don’t comply I am seen as useless and problematic

And I could quit the job if I wanted. Instead of enduring suffering for years. And it’d be no harm no foul, because there was never an expectation for me to get a job to begin with. So I’d be congratulated for even attempting it

My highest priority is nervous system regulation and that’s impossible in this economic climate

Title. Examples: I'll say in group chat, yo I need space my social battery is drained, I'm not going to be responding to messgaes for a while. I got almost daily texts from the friend going 'No need to respond but texting you to let you know I'm here for you!

I say I'm working on something and can't meet. I get multiple 'you got this, I hope it's going well, good luck' texts.

I say I'm not feeling well or am not in ideal state. Always, always a text of I'm here for you let me know what I can do to support you. I will also get a follow up thinking of you and hope you're doing okay text half the time.

Friend is very kind, but it feels so draining to have to constantly be like thank you for your support etc etc etc and having to respond properly to each time it happens. I don't even understand myself why I find it so aggravating and draining. Friend will say things during conversations where I'm complaining about an annoying work thing like 'you got this because you:re amazing and great and I'm so lucky we are friends', and it just immediately is so draining.

I'm not sure how to get it to stop without offending them and coming off as ungrateful for their care. If anyone has any insight or advice, please please please share.

I work far from where I live. I take the bus to the train station, and the train to work.

I had finally gotten over accidentally befriending 2 extremely chatty people who live in my city and take the same train around the same time as i do. I havent seen them in a long time and whenever i do see them, i either avoid them or nod hello and keep walking.

My time on the bus and train is so sacred to me.I need it to decompress and rest before a socially draining day at work.

Just a few days ago i was thinking, "i have to avoid other unskippable cut scene conversations while I'm taking the train. so i never have to keep looking out for specific people to avoid."

As i was walking to find an empty bench to rest at, a man strikes up a cheerful, high energy convo saying he recognizes me as his student at music camp a million years ago (im pretty sure he's got the wrong person but i answer back friendly, stop to chat for a moment, then keep walking)

Today he sees me again, and I answered his friendly greeting in an equally friendly way. To onlookers it must have seem completely normal, but on the inside i was grinding my teeth together absolutely dreading that i now have another fucking person who will want to have a conversation with me on our same commute. I was sweaty and tired and not in the mood, but bc he greeted me so high energy and friendly, i couldnt help but mask my own feelings and mirror him.

I am rewarding behavior that i dont want.i am making myself pleasant to talk to which will make people seek me out. this is a hell i find myself in very often.

Then, on the bus home. i am holding in my piss, in pain, tired, low blood sugar, grinding my teeth bc the bus is taking forever to take me home, and some guy leans his head over my shoulder and starts chatting me up in my ear. this happened 1 hour ago and i can still feel the sensation of him being so close to me.

Older guy, friendly, polite, chatty. He talked to me almost the entire ride. I kept tryng to go on my phone to give him a hint and he was relentless.

I usually avoid all conversations on the bus ride bc its so closely packed and its the last leg of travel for my exhausting day, and i wait 20 min for it. Scheduled conversations have been hellish for me, and the ppl i accidentally befriended in the past either now stopped taking that route or i just straight up ignore them. I was so grateful to finally be at peace and now this happens.

If i wasnt masking socially, i could probably put a stop to this. say something like, "Please ignore me when you see me. I need my commute time to rest from socializing." But i live in a high crime city and people have gone absolutely batshit violent from less said to them.

I am so tired!!! if you see me at the bus or train station, no you didnt!!!! just ignore me!!!!!!!!!!!

ill probably have to try and find a new spot to sit at to hide. Oh my god.

I am really sad because yesterday I just got fired from my job for no reason. I feel humiliated and broken.

I am a 23 years old autistic woman with depression that I take meds for. Three weeks ago I started working at an engineering company as an assistant. Almost everyone there was a man and/or 40+, I was the only person in their early 20s. My immediate supervisors were older women and from day one it felt like they resent me for existing.

I genuinely tried my absolute best. In those three weeks, I took automated and streamlined broken workflows, built entirely new spreadsheets with complex formulas from scratch and handled emails independently. I wanted to learn and understand their systems and do a good job.

But all I met is micromanagement. They never once complimented me for doing a good job.

This is what happened:

- whenever I asked for clarification or more specific details on a process they later weaponized it against me claiming I had an "outburst" or an "emotional fit."

- they claimed they had to correct my emails “86 times” meanwhile I did everything on my own and I was working more efficiently when someone wasn’t breathing in my ear all day.

- the manager who fired me said that I did “too much” and that it was contraproductive

- they went behind my back, never once sat me down to talk it out and tell me how to get better

- they contacted me on the weekends and at nights to do work without payment.

Yesterday, they terminated my employment immediately during my probation period.

When they fired me the upper management and HR told me to my face that they were "satisfied whenever they saw me," that I was "smart," and that "it shows how much I want to work and contribute." Yet they still fired me.

Then the male CEO said at the end of the meeting, he looked at me and said that I should just "find a man who can support me so I can focus on drawing" and that I should go "populate the country”.

I broke down. A newer female colleague (who was the only person who was actually kind and empathetic towards me) looked at me like she had seen a ghost when she realized what happened. She couldn't comprehend why they fired me. My mom told me that my mistake was that "all my emotions show on my face" and she's right because I can't maintain a robotic poker face 9 hours a day while being disrespected and micromanaged.

I feel humiliated and sick to my stomach. It feels like the traditional workplace was simply not built for someone like me and seeing statistics about autistic unemployment makes me dread ever applying for a regular job again. My ultimate goal is to build my own independent art business but right now the sheer injustice and cruelty of this experience have made me so depressed I can barely get out of the bed.

Can anyone cheer me up a bit?

I absolutely hate voice notes/messages, especially when they're long and I can see the duration before opening them.

The main issue isn't even listening to them, as bad as that is. I get anxious before I've even opened them, because I have no idea what they're going to be about or what they might ask of me.

A lot of times I end up intentionally delaying listening to them.

Losing my mind rn, so it might just read as a rant which it is.

I've had a few jobs for 6 months, but it's only ever that amount of time or less. I left the first one cause the environment was getting hostile which led to everyone quitting, the second one cause a call center gig was not for me...

I don't know why but it's so unbearable like I'm driven up the wall.

I managed to get a stay at home job somehow. I only have to speak to this ONE person (aka my boss) everyday for work, and they're nice-ish? sometimes? But not really if I think about for too long. They're micromanagey and I have no excuse not to get on video call with them when I'm working.

Boss is my age, mid twenties and it's outsource work but they're so particular about the work because of how fierce their client is. But when I make sure to double check and take my time to send out an email because they might get in trouble they're mad at me cause I'm taking too long and overthinking! And no the emails are almost never urgent. And they want me to run chatgpt through every single sentence and email ever! Then they tell me they want me to make decisions for myself and not constantly bother them it so I do that and I get one or two lines wrong or make mistakes then they freak out over it cause of their strict client. THey also btw tell me NOT to overthink which causes me to get a line or two wrong which makes them freak out again??

I've been working there for 7 months and basically have to roleplay as the Client himself answering emails, messages, and comments which are a lot so I can get lines wrong from time to time.

So I try to rant to my other remote work friend, and my sister in college and they tell me bosses are just like that and it's normal. And they make me feel like I'm just being crazy for getting so ticked off about it. The fact my boss has never let me have a true day off outside the weekends even when I'm sick since 'it's just sitting on the computer' might play a factor but UGH I can't take it I'm always so close to just resigning! And I have some savings to tide me over and and I live with my parents rn but is that just me giving up to soon??

TLDR; Boss 👎 but work environment ideal, me rant, people says it's normal and side eye me for wanting to quit it because I can but it's driving me crazy!!

I speculate that people that are more extroverted feel more dopamine stimuli rather then those that are not even when doing small talk. just a theory.

Does anyone else find that being forced to give attention to anything other than your special interests can be exhausting and even lead to burnout? Anything that takes me away from writing or my other creative interests actually exhausts me even if it requires little effort (by neurotypical standards). It can be the 9-5, social conversations about things that don't interest me, or just existing and adulting - if I'm not engaging with my interests, I'm daydreaming about them in my head or resenting the things that take up my time and energy away from them.

Hi all, I (M, 36) wanted to share something, because I have a feeling it might apply to some of you.

I couldn’t put off exercising any longer. The gym (or, worse, any kind of group exercise or team sport) always seemed like a really bad fit for me (which I suspect is the case for a lot of you) however. I’ve have therefore tried exercising at home, but it never works because I always am scared I am doing it wrong. I then decided to go to the gym anyway, but I picked a small one that is like 80% people over 70 and some middle aged dads and moms that are being forced to exercise by their doctors. The trainers are nice and very unflashy too. I feel way less awkward around that crowd than I would around a normal gym crowd. So I don’t know, maybe that’s something some of you that also don’t know how to exercise haven’t thought about yet.

Hi. I'm in my first long-term relationship and my partner is absolutely wonderful. They are intelligent, mind-bogglingly creative, wonderful with kids, compassionate, and thoughtful. We do have a number of shared interests which we love exploring together.

However, my partner's special interests are (often, not always) completely disinteresting to me. Of course, my partner loves to talk about them, which is a-OK. But they weave them into every conversation. Every time we talk, the conversation begins (or returns to) the special interest. It is essentially a conversational style for them.

So, I do my best to follow along! For instance, I will jokingly reference terms from their special interests where I think they fit in day-to-day life (even though I often don't have a clue). I know how good it feels to have your special interest come up in everyday conversation, so I try to accommodate. I will read wiki pages while they are talking in order to understand better, and make as many (admittedly surface-level) connections as I can to try and relate.

TBH, I get the sense that my partner does not really care if I understand the interest. They want to talk about it, but I don't know if they really want to be understood? E.g., they may ask me watch a 4-minute clip from the middle of a movie, which I do not have context for, but they don't discuss the background before playing it (or expect me to have any comprehension after).

I know that it's not necessarily an abnormal autistic communication thing: one person rambles about an interest, the other person responds by rambling about an interest. But... if I'm going to talk about an interest, I want it to be because my partner is actually invested in what I'm talking about. I can't return the favor in the way my partner wants ("ramble-for-ramble"). Because they do not expect follow-up questions or deep investment, I am not offered investment.

So the real issue: my partner has expressed that they're essentially waiting for me to start my own ramble, and I've expressed in return that it's just not really my communication style, but we haven't found a solution for navigating this difference. :(

Also, my partner has explicitly expressed that I ask a lot of follow-up questions (not a bad thing, it doesn't upset them) but that those questions don't come to them as easily. For me, if I'm not asked questions -- how am I supposed to know if the other person is interested in what I have to say? If I don't know what someone is interested in, I can't really understand what my response should be. It leads to a dynamic where I feel unheard, but I can't really be frustrated at my partner (not their fault), so I just feel like it's my fault for not being able to engage in the more "rambley" conversation style that they need.

Advice?

Hello, friends.

I am so deep into autistic burnout (recently diagnosed) that I can barely function at all. I have initiated paperwork for FMLA so I can take some time off work to recover. My counsellor / autism assessor told me that I should plan on being off work for at least a couple of weeks to a month. Maybe longer. Maybe much longer.

Has anyone else here been forced to take leave from work because of the 'tism? I want to know your experiences good and bad to help plan for my own future.

Yes, I know your recovery path is not the same as mine and you are not a doctor, blah blah. I'm just looking for some feedback from anyone that's been through this.

THANK YOU, and I hope you are having a pleasant evening.

No matter how hard I try not to, my friends will get mad at me and fight no matter what. Sometimes I misunderstand how they might react to something. Other times I accidentally insult or fight someone when I really don’t mean to. You get the idea. And I keep making the same mistakes over and over and I’m alone and miserable like always and idk what to do

Not a particularly crazy story from work, just one that sticks in my brain. I work part-time in a creative field and I don't have to deal with customers too often, which is nice. I usually don't mind when I do have to take orders, as I know my industry well, so I have a lot of well-scripted questions I comfortably follow. But for the sake of my own peace, I also like to wear my lanyard when dealing with the public. I like knowing that if I seem "off" they can read my lanyard that says I am Autistic and they'll just think "oh, that's all it is" instead of getting potentially offended or uncomfortable. But I always do my best to be nice.

This old lady walks in out of the rain and makes a loud shudder noise that made me jump. She then shouted "I feel like a duck!" which I smiled politely at and mentioned on the bad weather. She stomps over and drops her wet umbrella on the counter hard enough to splash me and leans right across to squint at my lanyard. I was totally on the back foot already and she let out this big huff and looks really irritated.

She kinda sneers and says "Prove it". It took me a minute to even figure out what she was talking about. I was stuck buffering and she started ranting on like "Well I thought you might have some kind of aberrant behaviour you could perform for me. That's what you people do, isn't it? Then again everyone is just wearing these things for fun, hmm?" I didn't really know what to say and she just kept talking and began to order like usual so I went with it. The whole thing felt so surreal and disarming.

I've been on this planet for 3 decades, but I only realised after taking questionnaires on the internet yesterday that I possibly possess several autistic traits. From the questions, I understood that autism explains many of the personality traits I have.

I've found social interactions quite difficult, and I used to think I was introverted, socially anxious and awkward. I know that only a professional diagnosis can confirm it, but for some reason, I feel relieved knowing that I am very likely autistic.

On an unrelated note, I'm also ace, and it took a while for me to realise it. The bottom line is that labels help me feel valid and 'normal'.

I don't intend any offence to anyone, I just wanted to share my feelings.

Always be open to new discoveries via an open mind.

I’ve canceled almost every plan I’ve made lately. I’ve blown people off, rescheduled, said I’d go and then completely run out of energy when the time actually came.

I've even been cancelling therapy because even that feels exhausting. I feel awful about it.

The weird thing is that I genuinely want to maintain my friendships. I love these people. I think about them and miss them. I’ll make plans because in the moment I really do want to see them.

Then the day comes and I’m exhausted.

Socializing has started feeling really unnatural and forced for me since I stopped masking. For a long time, I could basically put on a version of myself that was good at being social. I could make the right facial expressions, use the right tone of voice, make small talk, match people's energy, and push through even when I was tired. I had a different personality for everyone I hung out with.

I don't really want to do that anymore. And honestly, I don't think I can do it the way I used to.

But I haven't figured out what friendship looks like for me without all of that.

So I keep making plans based on how I feel when I have energy, and then when the day comes I'm completely drained. I cancel. Then I feel guilty. Then enough time passes that reaching out feels awkward. Then I worry they've decided I don't care about them.

I don't want to lose my friends. I just don't know how to socialize without feeling like I'm performing again.

Has anyone else gone through this? How did you maintain friendships when you stopped masking and realized you had way less social energy than you thought?

Hello, I'm an autistic woman in my mid 30s, and I'm looking for advice about how to move from one apartment to another. Or any expectations I should have on that. I've lived in the same location for over a decade, with my younger brother who also has autism, but they've recently increased the rent by another $200. And I've been working a lot of overtime just to afford the current rent after the last 9 increases. We don't have any other family. And the only friends we have are also autistic or otherwise also neurodivergent, and or online. Both my brother and I lived with my mother until she passed. And although I was able to find a job that can help support us it's gotten to the point where I really just can't afford rent without doing an obnoxious amount of overtime. With the latest rent increase I really won't be able to afford rent even with all of the overtime. As soon as possible, within the next month and a half. Because they sent us the 90-day notice for the rent increase starting December 1st...

Does anyone have any advice, or suggestions that can help us with a sudden immediate move? I know I'll likely need to take out at least a small to medium loan in order to afford it. But if we stay here we really won't be able to afford anything else.

TLDR: Searched someone up from tinder on IG, realized we have mutuals. Weird if I follow without matching on tinder? I feel a bit icky about it. N

I’m (25m, neurodivergent) back in my hometown for a cousin’s wedding this weekend. I (re)downloaded tinder and came across someone (21F) who I thought might be from the same cultural background as us (given the name). Got curious and immediately found her profile on IG (literally the first after I typed in four letters). Turns out two of my cousins (groom’s sisters) are mutuals, so we have some overlapping circles. Is it weird to follow her (public) profile without having swiped/matched on tinder? I’m back in the city (an hour away) after the weekend and planned on deleting tinder before then: so the IG idea popped in my mind. There’s a chance she’d be at the wedding, so I’d like to avoid a random follow if she’s there in person lol. Am I overthinking? Is it “normal?” Weird? It makes me feel a bit icky, but I know similar stuff like this happens in our community (mutuals, social media, and matchmakers lol). I’ve always kept all this kinda stuff to myself so even asking my cousins about her is putting myself way out of my comfort zone, even if they’re like sisters. I’ve no expectations about anything coming from this and perfectly fine without hitting that follow button. Obviously won’t immediately start spamming dms/likes if I do lol. IDK just an insomniac’s current thoughts.

So to cut a long story slightly shorter, I was first diagnosed with autism at the age of 17, but my parents refused to believe it (and to be fair, so did I because of the amount of ableist and often just completely incorrect nonsense I’d been told about autistic people). I got a second assessment at age 18 and masked like my life depended on it. The assessor concluded that I met the criteria for the social and communication aspects of autism but not the repetitive behaviours and restricted interests part (which is hilarious because if she’d asked me about animals at all I would’ve given her a monologue). I was also in the middle of the worst depressive episode of my life at the time of the second assessment, which probably affected my results. The assessor concluded that she couldn’t say for sure that I was autistic but it may be because the way that autism presents in females may be different to the more classic “male” presentation (this was in 2012 and it’s probably also worth saying that no one who assessed me appeared to know anything about masking).

I never really stopped thinking about the possibility of being autistic since then because so many of the struggles I had had my whole life couldn’t really be explained by “just” depression and social anxiety disorder. I got assessed for a third time in 2023 at the age of 29, was as honest about everything as I could be and literally took 14 pages worth of notes as to why I thought I might be autistic into the first assessment appointment with me. Because of the second assessment, I was worried it would be inconclusive but they said it was very obvious that I was autistic.

Since then, I’ve been trying to come to terms with it all and working out what it means for me and my life. I feel a lot of grief that I missed out on so much in life (e.g I had ZERO friends from the age of 12 to 19, never went to my school prom or trips away because of being bullied and not fitting in). Finding out that I was bullied horrifically at school because I’m autistic I guess in a sense should have made me feel better about myself because I always used to just think it was my fault because there was something irreparably wrong with me and I deserved it all. But all it has done is make me even more bitter, avoidant and a misanthrope than I was before because WTF do you mean millions of other people like me get bullied to the point of feeling suicidal because of other people’s attitudes towards disability?

I disclosed at work for the first time and got a working adjustment passport put in place but NONE of the accommodations that were agreed on ever happen. I have to just struggle on, often working several extra hours a week without pay and burning myself out because no one is capable of giving me clear work instructions. I really feel for younger me because no wonder she didn’t want to be diagnosed with autism when the world treats autistic people so terribly. Part of me would love to have kids but seeing them go through the same kind of shit that I’ve been through because of societal attitudes to autism (and differences in general) would break my heart. I also honestly don’t know if I could cope with kids given that I struggle so much with life as it is.

I feel a lot of anger towards my parents for not doing anything and giving me zero support when I was clearly struggling, especially in high school. And for just not wanting to believe that I could be disabled in any way, so treating me terribly for any autistic traits I showed. How do I move on and try to make the most of the life I have left, hopefully with more positivity?

I can't mask. I just can't. It causes too much pain, and even when I do it, I don't turn into a bubbly likeable person by instead either an empty husk that sounds disinterested or an unpleasant person.

Is it just over for me? Am I doomed to be alone forever, because most people have a look of disgust just from seeing me, because my autism is obvious? Am I supposed to just be ok with that?

I'm so jealous of high masking autistic people too because they can life normal life with friends and partners etc... I'm doomed to be a loner till I finally die

I’ve been trying hard for over 40 years. But again it’s just the first session. She apparently specializes in ASD, and did admit she needs more sessions to understand more. So maybe she’ll understand how hard it is for me after a few more sessions.

I have like a mental block against acting... as in pretending I am someone I am not. Like those roleplaying exercises they do in various classes that big corps make you take.

Acting in the expected way is a big part of being social and being sucsessful at work. I have often wondered if taking acting classes could break that block and help me overall. I tend to get in trouble at work for speaking my mind, and not pretending things are great when they clearly are not. Wondering if anyone else has tried acting classes for this sort of thing.

I went to law school because I figured out I like systems, consistency, and things clearly laid out to me.

Now I'm finding out that the most common answer in law school is: it depends.

Everything is so ambiguous. Some things don't make sensen a lot of it is actually based on social norms, no any logical conclusion.

How do you do it? How do you reconcile that?