Accepting my own condition
It's time for me to finally talk about this. After finally working up the courage to speak about this to a close friend group thanks to what month this is, I finally feel comfortable enough to announce this publicly.
I am on the Autistic spectrum.
I've been afraid to speak about this because, not going into too gruesome of details, I was often alienated or at worst picked on because of my 'quirks'. Even to this day, I still feel leery about really speaking publicly about this because the internet has a rather... 'Checkered history' when it comes to people on the spectrum.
However, I think it's time I start speaking about this openly. I've been wanting to push myself out of my comfort zone for a while now, and with it being Autism Acceptance month, I figured now was as good a time as any.
As said, I am on the spectrum. In my case, it manifests as extreme anxiety in social situations and has a noticeable effect on how I communicate. I also have difficulties learning things the conventional way, most of the time. I was often held back a few times in school because of this. I'm going to go into this individually:
The social anxiety is the worst. I often find it hard to speak up when being talked to, often not saying more than I have to. It also makes it extremely hard for me to refer to people by their titles or names. If I'm typing I don't really have this problem, but I don't know why it is, but I really have to force myself to actually speak someone's name or title. (I definitely know this for a fact because it annoys my mom to no end that I have a hard time calling her mom. There's no malice behind it, I swear. It just feels like my voice hits a brick wall when I have to say someone's name or title.)
I suppose that's also a part of 'affecting how I communicate'. I am a much, MUCH better typer than I am at speaking. I have a soft and somewhat higher-pitched voice than most guys; I have no idea if that's part of me being on the spectrum or if that's just how my vocal cords unfortunately developed. In either case, it does not help me any. I'm extremely mic shy, having tried to speak in some online pubs before only to be mocked because of how I sound. This, of course, did not help my social anxieties in the slightest.
As a byproduct, I also tend to mumble random things that pop into my head if I start to drift off into my own head or if I'm feeling even slightly drowsy. Thankfully, if I slightly focus enough I can keep myself from doing stuff like that, but it's hard to keep on guard like that 24/7. As you can imagine, this also does not help my mic shyness one bit.
When it comes to learning things, I have rather extreme difficulties learning things by the book. When I was in school I was held back at least two-three times. Ironically, despite the fact that I'm much better at writing now than I am speaking, one of my greatest difficulties growing up was learning to read, write and spell. The internet definitely helped me thanks to it becoming the primary way we communicate these days, but until I first logged onto it, my grasp of the written language was very... 'Loose' to put it one way.
I definitely learn a lot better doing compared to reading or the like. And even then, it takes me several attempts to really get something down pact. Heck, despite apparently getting a 4.0 in my final year of high school, I could not tell you what I learned from it, especially anything relating to advanced math and algebra, to save my life.
Those were the main things I was planning on talking about. Now that those are out there, I suppose there are other things I'd like to address, in no particular order:
My 'special interest': I really do not like this term or the connotations that come with it. It feels like 'oh, so THAT'S why he likes 'x'' instead of it just being a facet of my personality. If I really had to say what it was though, I will say it'd probably be dragons. But again; even if I weren't on the spectrum, I'd like to think that'd I'd still like dragons because let's face it, they're kind of just a really amazing mythological creature with a lot of lore behind them. A close second would probably be the 90s, but that's more likely because I'm a nostalgic old fool who was born then and grew up really liking the aesthetic.
I have a bad habit of not letting things go and stewing on them longer than I should. What should be minor setbacks or failures to me always feel like a massive deal. There are days were something minor I did in the past that had no real repercussions on anyone, in the long run, will pop back into my head and refuse to leave. As you can imagine, it makes it hard to stay motivated on almost anything.
Lastly, as always, fuck Autism Speaks. Their scare tactics and spreading misinformation about what I have to line their own pockets is a major reason I've been so afraid to ever publicly announce this. Well over half the negative or harmful stereotypes people have with the spectrum originated from there.
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I'd like to thank a few people for finally helping me work up the courage to publicly admit this. Suede, whose own announcement on publicly admitting to being on the spectrum helped push me to think about this, the people on Kind Words, for taking their time out to help encourage a stranger not to be afraid, and the people on GoldenGriffiness' Discord server, who's acceptance of me finally announcing this finally gave me the confidence to speak publicly about this.
