Member-only story
It Makes Sense I’m Autistic
How to try to navigate having a disability no one cares to see
When I found out that I was autistic a lot clicked into place. My best friend of years is autistic as well. Her husband is as well. My friend would apologize for her bluntness or different things that just came natural for me to understand. She’d sometimes have those moments where her cup for stimuli would be overfilled and I knew she just needed quiet and to empty some of her cup to be able to continue.
I knew this because I lived it. At first I blamed it on introversion. Finding out I’m an introvert made the most sense to me. I’m told I’m a people person but being around crowds depletes me. I go back into myself to recharge like a battery and choose long stretches of quiet to kind of get back to myself.
But there were other things I was made fun of at a young age. That I didn’t fit in with any school system. That I had a sensitivity to clothes, tags, sounds, noises, smells, and the worst thing I’d be bullied for was my “pickiness” with food. It got so bad that as an adult I choose not to eat around others because I’m afraid how I eat will be perceived as weird.
I have a strange thing with textures of food that has always been me. The visceral reaction of me trying something that wasn’t the right texture would be…
