I hate the word ‘cope’.
I’d like someone to explain what it means to them.
You just deal with it. You can’t just curl up in a ball and ‘not cope’. WTH does ‘cope’ mean?
Have no bad feelings, ever? That’s not possible for anyone over a certain IQ threshold. Bad feelings are really the only company we have to let us understand and appreciate good ones.
Right now, I am feeling quite lonely and wondering how 47 years of not knowing I am autistic has hindered me in making and keeping friends.
Reading, you realize that your microsecond differences in speaking/thinking/reacting by being too fast or too slow or both make people just like you less. Less than what? Just… less.
You can remember every birthday. Make things for their children. Try to be extroverted and outgoing to spend time with them. But on some level you just feel weird to them, so given a choice out of 5 other people to call to join for dinner, often 4 others have to be busy before you get an invite.
They aren’t doing it on purpose. They aren’t even really aware of it. They just know inciting or j causing Angela isn’t really a big motivator.
And… Angela got sick, and got tired, and has trouble leaving her house, now.
When you succumb to chronic illness, people fade away. You’re a reminder of mortality.
They don’t know how to be considerate of your limitations, without pity plus a level of mild, resentment is too harsh but I can’t think of a better word at the moment. If I mention ‘oh, I can’t do that/go there, I’ll hang back,’ it’s not me being honest and saying I’m ok sitting out for something, it’s interpreted as me being mean and shaming them or something.
And that goes into the neurotypical trend of inserting extra meaning where they is none.
All my autistic communication has been morphed by NT brains in to hidden meanings and who knows what… when I literally meant what I literally said.
So I’m seen as some passive aggressive weirdo based on a straw man of me. And it’s not like people openly talk to you about assumptions they aren’t even aware they made. They have a ‘feel’ about you and it’s gospel fact, and you will never know what negatives they feel. They just stop talking to you.
And you don’t push talking to them, being uncertain about it being aggressive or pushy or imposing. I never know if contact it ‘too much’ even before knowing I’m autistic. Knowing about autism just explains why I feel that way.
So, people forget me and I don’t feel comfortable reminding them I exist. I let Facebook remind them once a year on my birthday, and I make sure to at least remember their birthdays even if Facebook doesn’t tell me. And that’s it. That’s my contact with a lot of people I used to see weekly/monthly in my 20s-30s.
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