Do you believe that empathy is a trait that is learned/taught?
Or do you believe that one develops it naturally as we grow (so long as that process is not disrupted by neurodevelopmental, phycological, or other external factors?)
Similarly, do you think it’s possible to teach yourself to better understand, or maybe even better experience empathy, if said issues were to occur?
~poor/abnormal posture ~trouble with left, right, and other directions ~disinterest in sports/physical activity ~rituals with no outcome ~large or unique vocabulary ~lack of organization ~intense compassion/empathy ~intense anger or no anger at all ~connections with animals ~difficulty understanding pop culture, styles, trends, etc
Friendly reminder that the reason you feel so much better is because of your meds, don’t stop taking them unless you talk to your doctor first, you really do need them, I promise.
Around June I stopped taking my eye medication because I hadn’t had a problem with my eyes in months. I got really lazy about doing it; then I stopped them altogether.
Turns out, the reason I stopped having problems with my eyes was because I was religiously taking my medication. Whodathunk. Now I have to work to get back to the place I was before I decided I was “better” (I wasn’t!).
If you thought this post was just about anti-depressants or lithium, it could be! For me, this post is about eyedrops, for you it might be about antibiotics, or it might be about zoloft. Whatever it is, please consider talking to your doctor before making a sudden shift to stop taking it. It’s not bad to be on medication. It’s not bad to need it.
…and on a related note, do not let anyone tell you that because you start feeling worse if you don’t take your medication, that means you’re “addicted”. That is not how addiction works.
this is probably petty but i HATE when other autistics go “oh actually autistic people don’t have social deficits! we’re great at connecting with each other, just not neurotypicals :)” because
thats not true for me. i have trouble socializing with other autistic people as well. 2 of my natural social deficit traits are disinterest in peers/friendship and difficulty not taking over the conversation when i DO talk and bothof those are still there even when i’m talking to other autistic people. plus i also have social anxiety from being bullied for my autism and that doesn’t go away in autistic-to-autistic conversations either
MOST people i talk to are neurotypical. MOST people i talk to are not going to be easy at all to socialize with. it’s almost like…. for convenience’s sake… you could say… i have social deficits.
yes i could call them Special Brain Traits but i don’t want to. socializing is HARD and WEIRD and UPSETTING and i am bad at it. why is it wrong to label that??? i don’t think it’s bad that i have social deficits. my socializing abilities don’t define me or my worth anyway
A guide for those who are seeking diagnosis, are questioning if they’re Autistic, are newly diagnosed or just wish to learn more.
Caveat: Not all autistics can mask. Not all autistics want to mask. Masking is very damaging to our mental health.
This post is to give ideas of how it may look, but I encourage those who do mask to reduce the amount of time they do.
What Autistic Masking Can Look Like (examples and not an exhaustive list):
Practicing conversations in your head frequently.
Replaying successful interactions in your head in order to learn exactly what went right.
Forcing eye contact despite it being extremely uncomfortable or even painful.
Watching how others do things before doing them yourself. This can be a child standing to the side during recess and watching, or an adult researching how to order at a restaurant etc.
Taking on accents or mannerisms from movies, TV or real life people.
Learning conversation from books, movies, TV or by eaves dropping.
Practicing facial expressions. This can be subconsciously done when watching TV (copying the expressions of characters to practice) or in front of a mirror to ensure what you look like.
Over exaggerating facial expressions. Because the expressions are not natural, they can be over done to try to ensure they’re interpreted.
Forcing speech even when exhausted.
Practicing vocal tone or over enunciation of words.
Taking on the interests of friends and family rather than your own interests.
Forcing social interaction despite feeling exhausted, confused or even ill.
Being afraid of deep conversation because you don’t actually have deep answers, as everything is superficially pasted onto who you are.
Feeling alien when in a group, despite fitting in.
People thinking you’re odd when tired because you are no longer able to give facial expressions, vocal tone or hold conversation.
There are many ways masking can occur, and these are just basic ideas. But many autistics don’t realise how much they do mask.
Unmasking is hard, and loss of friendships can occur. But mental health improves when you can be your autistic self.
If you’re a stranger and you want to offer me unsolicited advice, the fee for that will be £50. Mutuals, friends, romantic partners and family members may be eligible for a reduced rate but will still be charged.
Someone else gave me unsolicited advice and I kind of went off, woops.
Seriously tho, what is this obsession with Having To Improve everything you do as a hobby/for fun that so many people seem to have and then want to project on to you? I just want to fuck around and have fun, I spent so many years Being Good at stuff and feeling shit if I wasn’t, it’s actually pretty fucking healthy for me to have hobbies and fun things I do that I’m kinda shitty at but have fun with anyway tbh. Anyway sorry rant over just this kind of “you have to be improving all the time or what’s the point” attitude pisses me off
If you’re a stranger and you want to offer me unsolicited advice, the fee for that will be £50. Mutuals, friends, romantic partners and family members may be eligible for a reduced rate but will still be charged.
I had a video call with a colleague today to go through some feedback and she was talking me through it and I said “uh huh” to indicate that I was listening and she was like “sorry what” bc she thought I asked a question and I had to explain I just said uh huh bc I was acknowledging what she was saying but I couldn’t figure out how to say it for a while bc i didn’t want to say “uh huh” again in case she didn’t understand again but I couldn’t think of a good way to put it and I eventually badly explained it and she was like “cool, I couldn’t see you” (bc she was sharing her screen) so the rest of the time she was talking I didn’t say uh huh/make noises to acknowledge her like I usually would in case I confused her again so I just nodded except she couldn’t see me nodding most stressful part of my day I swear
I saw this tweet about how things don’t always “occur” to adhd people and I thought I could relate to it as well, although I’m autistic and not adhd.
For example - if I have a headache, it simply won’t occur to me to take pain meds. I know I have a headache. I want the pain to stop. I am aware of the existence of pain meds. But the idea never occurs to me to take them until someone else suggests it.
The example they gave in the tweet was that if someone says hello to them, it may not occur to them to say hello back and yep… I do that as well.
I just never realized that other people may not do these things.
This is called executive dysfunction and it’s very common for both adhd and autistic people! <3
I was under the impression that executive dysfunction was being unable to transition between tasks. Like that feeling when you’re trying to get up and make some food, but your brain won’t let you no matter how hard you try. Is that something different?
They are both forms of executive dysfunction! Executive dysfunction simply means one of your executive functions isn’t working. The executive functions are:
Emotional control
Task initiation
Working memory
Self-monitoring (interoception, something a lot of autistics struggle with)
Flexibility
Organization
Planning & time management
Self control
What you’re experiencing and what you already considered executive dysfunction are both issues with task initiation, and I think what you’re experiencing is also an issue with planning.
The reason ADHD and autism are so similar is that the executive functions are impacted; among other symptoms and traits, they are both executive functioning disorders. Which is why you experience this thing that a lot of ADHDers experience, and why ADHD and autism have such a high comorbidity rate.
“The focus on cis white male presentations of autism creates a massive diagnosis barrier for marginalised people. Our actions are viewed differently depending on our race / gender etc. We need better representation in media and we need academics to understand and embed cultural nuance, not seek to further restrict diagnosis.” (@girl_unleeshed on Twitter)
Here’s the second comic I worked on for Autism Acceptance month! This comic is a collaboration with Leesha (@girl_unleeshed). Please check out her Twitter to read more of her awesome and thoughtful writing!
[ID: A four page comic about how stereotypes affect autism diagnosis. The comic has a muted colour palette of primarily oranges, pinks and greens.
Page 1: Our narrator (Leesha) appears at the top of the page and asks “If I asked you to describe an autistic person, what would they look like? Maybe you’d describe someone like Sheldon Cooper? Rainman?” Next to the question is a picture of Sheldon from the big bang theory.
The next panel shows a man (who may or may not be Simon Baron-Cohen) infront of a blackboard. His speech bubble is a graph with a ratio of 1:3 girls to boys. Text says “The media and many autistic academics would have you believe autism is a ‘boys condition’”
Below is a pile of books and articles with post it notes that show question marks and strikethroughs. One of the books is “The essential difference” by Simon Baron-Cohen.
To the right, Leesha pops out of the corner saying “The reality is, of course, very different.”
Page 2: Block of text: “It’s hard to know the true numbers of autistic people and one of the reasons is because marginalised people are significantly underdiagnosed. A lot of us are missed during doctors appointments and school years, instead actively seeking diagnosis / self diagnosing as adults after years of distress”
Next to this is a Black woman in box braids, looking confused, with question marks above her head.
Below are two graphs showing autism diagnosis from 2008-2018. The first shows a general upward trend, the second shows exponential growth of “female” diagnosis.
Text reads: “In recent years, there has been a rise in calls to recognise “female autism”, often characterised by high levels of masking and social skills”
Three smiling faces, one waves an enby flag. Text reads “Even this step forward misses the reality of autism presentation, as it puts a binary gender expectation on a group of people who express gender diversity at a higher rate than the general population"
Page 3: Leesha holds a book says “Gender and racial stereotypes play a big part in how people view (or dismiss) our autism.”
The book shows James (white) and Joel (Black). James is in his classroom angry with a scared teacher behind him. “The flickering lights in James’ class give him a meltdown and he kicks his teacher. The school recommends an autism screening.” Green stamp: autistic
Joel is in his classroom and looks distressed, his teacher looks angry. “To keep calm, Joel uses a fidget spinner. He has a meltdown when it’s taken away and he is reported for exclusion.” Red stamp: aggressive
The next page shows Michael and Aiko. Michael lines up toy dinosaurs. “Michael likes to play alone, lining dinosaurs up by size.He loves to share facts with adults but they worry about his social skills. Green stamp: autistic
Aiko plays with a doll. “Aiko likes to play alone with a doll, repeatedly dressing /undressing it. Adults marvel at how polite and nurturing she is. Red stamp: good girl
Page 4: Book shows Luke and Zeinab
Luke sits with a psychiatrist. “Luke has always excelled in school, but he is overwhelmed with university and stops attending. After a referral to a psychiatrist, he is diagnosed with autism. Green stamp: autistic
Zeinab sits with a psychiatrist. “Zeinab is is pursuing a private diagnosis. She is misdiagnosed with BPD and anxiety because she makes eye contact and tells a joke” Red stamp: not autistic
Leesha returns, holding a book and saying: “Rather than help us seek timely diagnosis and invest in meaningful support services, there have been claims of overdiagnosis and moves to restrict the already narrow diagnostic criteria on the new DSM 5”
Zeinab, Joel and Aiko hug and smile, text reads “There are autistic people in every demographic. Late / self diagnosis doesn’t make us less autistic or mean we are faking it. In fact, it’s often a symptom of the harmful stereotypes that permeate society from our medical fields to our media and beyond.” End ID.]
my whole life I have been hearing the same bullshit about how autistic people are intractable and inflexible and don’t understand other people or adapt to new situations
me and every other single autistic person I know have been spending our whole lives desperately trying to navigate and understand neurotypical social norms and adapt to a world that doesn’t want us
meanwhile neurotypical people have to deal with some totally minor social anomaly like avoidance of eye contact or someone responding “not great” to “how are you?” and completely flip out, shut down
they consistently make zero effort to adapt to or understand autistic social patterns and we’re the only inflexible ones? okay
this is a good and important post and ties into something that i get really frustrated about a lot: considering how autistic people are supposed to be the “unempathic” ones, neurotypical people are pretty fucking garbage at empathy. not just empathy for autistic people, but for ANY OTHER NEUROTYPICALS THAT DON’T SHARE THEIR MINDSET, ACTUALLY
you know what autistic people aren’t good at, socially? nonverbal communication, figurative language, eye contact, and theory of mind. you know what neurotypical people aren’t good at? reading autistic body language, communicating with autistic people without adding their own baggage to what we’re saying, and understanding how autistic people’s minds work. every damn person, autistic and allistic, is subject to the typical mind fallacy because when you don’t know everything about most people you’re interacting with, it’s a useful heuristic to roughly predict how they’re going to respond to your behaviour. the main “"empathy”“ advantages that allistic/neurotypical people have are 1) developing theory of mind earlier and 2) assuming that everyone thinks/behaves/communicates pretty similarly to how they do is likely to work significantly better a significantly greater amount of the time.
there was a storified twitter thread i encountered a while back that i wish i could find because i wouldn’t have to paraphrase it, that covered a lot of the problems i’ve found in how the word “empathy” is used in informal psychology. basically, the concepts that people (including psych professionals, ffs!) use the word “empathy” to describe in terms of mental illness and neurodivergence are so separate and wide-ranging that the word is effectively meaningless and statements like “autistic people lack empathy” are demonstrably self-contradicting. empathy can cover:
theory of mind — the partial inverse of universally applied typical mind fallacy, understanding that other people are separate and different from oneself and have different points of view
the ability to read other people’s nonverbal communication
the ability to recognise other people’s mindframes
the ability to theoretically simulate other people’s thoughts, emotions, and/or behaviour
the ability to mirror other people’s thoughts, emotions, and/or behaviour with one’s own
the ability to be affected by other people’s emotions
the ability to care about other people’s emotions and feel compassion.
points (a) through (e) are naturally developmentally delayed in autistic people but can be taught and, once learned, consciously simulated. personal experience and anecdotal evidence from many autistic people i’ve encountered who are aware of their specific deficits have proven to me that autistic people are often better and more careful than allistics at consciously simulating other people’s mindsets because they know they’ll make mistakes if they don’t consciously consider others’ points of view.
point (f) — ability to be affected by other people’s emotions — is dependent on an autist’s ability to recognise the emotions someone else is communicating through their words or behaviour (which i consider partially separate from e.g. being distressed by someone yelling because it’s loud, without knowing what the yelling signifies — i say “partially” because when one doesn’t know what a behaviour means, one tends to evaluate it based on known behaviour/emotion matchups). autistic people tend to react very strongly to others’ emotions when they recognise them, but these reactions may be different than what people expect because autistic people process and express emotions differently than allistics. one reason autists are so easily upset or traumatised by things allistics think are of relatively little consequence, independent of sensory aspects, is because autistic people are typically really emotionally sensitive in many ways — though emotional sensitivity is complicated by high comorbidity with alexithymia, which can dull specific emotions or make them inaccessible.
similarly, with regard to point (g), autistic people are prone to over-empathise when they care about the emotions of someone or something. this can be both adaptive and instinctive. in the first case, many autists who become aware of their inability to recognise their own hurtful behaviour and other people’s pain become hypervigilant of the feelings of those around them, treading very carefully in interactions and meticulously doing their best to avoid causing harm. in the second case, autists can be prone to a sort of emotional all-or-nothing deal in a lot of ways: if they have emotions toward someone/thing at all, it’s either fairly moderate or TO THE FRIKKEN MOON AND BACK. when autistic people care more than a little, they tend to care deeply; when they love, they love deeply, while they simultaneously might not necessarily know how to express it. this happens with special interests and it happens with feeling absurd levels of compassion even for inanimate objects.
IN CONCLUSION THAT’S WHY THE DSM DIAGNOSTIC CRITERIA FOR AUTISTIC SPECTRUM DISORDERS ARE SPECIFIC AND DON’T GO ON ABOUT VAGUE BULLCRAP LIKE ✨✨ EMPATHY ✨✨
Be sure to read past the abstract section to the introduction for details on what has been termed the “double-empathy problem” in regard to the disconnect in understanding and communication between autistic and allistic people. There are also a lot (a LOT) of related studies that have been performed since I originally posted this in 2016 linked in the references at the bottom.
i feel like so many allistic people who consider themselves allies to autistic people are actually seriously lacking in both autism acceptance and even basic awareness of what autism means. like so many people call themselves allies but only seem to know about autism from like. autistic memes online, which tend to either fall into the “so relatable” category or the “autism rules! hate autism moms™!” category, or like the interminable discourse about irredeemable media and cringe special interests.
anyway, if you’re allistic and you want to be an ally to autistic people, actually learn about autism beyond like. flapping and encyclopedic knowledge of steven’s universe. seriously consider whether you know anything about echolalia and pronoun reversal, or uneven cognitive profiles, or types of AAC, or common commorbidities (such as eating disorders, epilepsy, and GI disorders), or intellectual disability, or why ABA therapy is abusive (not just that it is, but why), or “wandering”/“elopement”, or inability to read other people’s emotions, or the fusiform face area, or perseveration and cognitive rigidity, or scripting, or sensory accommodations, or self injurious behavior, or selective mutism, or processing speed, or routines, or common misdiagnoses. like. don’t pretend you accept us and support us without even knowing who we are.
pronoun reversal: using second or third person to refer to yourself, often goes hand in hand with echolalia
fusiform face area: a part of the brain that is dedicated to recognizing faces. may be underactive or used for other purposes in autistic people. part of why so many of us can’t recognize people
perseveration and cognitive rigidity: getting stuck on certain ideas or rules and concepts, unable to move on or look at alternatives
routines can be part of perseveration, for example i always have to have my coffee from the same cup and use the same spoon. if i can’t find my spoon, i start to fall apart and it ruins the rest of my day.
AAC: alternative and augmentative communication, aka ways of communicating that aren’t talking verbally. please look this one up to see the full range of what it can mean
uneven cognitive profiles: having very high skills in some areas and very low skills in other areas
processing speed: is one of those areas that’s often much lower in autistic people. same with language comprehension being lower than visual reasoning.
selective mutism: becoming unable to speak when overwhelmed. not the same thing as being always nonverbal. also happens in anxiety disorders.
wandering/elopement: leaving the place you’re supposed to be (for kids), getting lost. not the same thing as premeditatedly running away from home (please stop mixing them up. that’s why i included this in the list. an autistic seven year old who wanders away from a school field trip because they got overwhelmed and didn’t know how to ask to go home is not intentionally trying to run away forever). i used to do this because it didn’t occur to me to tell people when i wanted to leave when i was overwhelmed, and would just walk away from my grandparents’ house or my sister’s soccer games and my parents would have no idea where i was when they noticed i was gone.
anyway, this is just a couple of things to get people started. please don’t make this post the be all and end all of learning about what autism actually entails! autism is a really broad label for a lot of different experiences. you can’t be an ally if you have no knowledge beyond “flappy hands and talks funny”
Sleep tip for the neurodivergent: While I agree that putting my phone away for an hour before bed is not ever gonna happen, I do intentionally have a slowdown period. Like how you can’t go from sprinting on a treadmill to a sudden standstill, your brain does need to calm down before bed.
For me, this means no loud noises or “fast” activities in the hour before sleep. I crawl into bed with my pets and read fanfic/ebooks or troll through Tumblr before listening to some lady on YT gently tell me to relax when actively trying to fall asleep.
No fast or loud activities means no TikTok/YouTube shorts/videos that require energy from me, especially in quick bursts. No TV shows or movies either. I also avoid strenuous activity and don’t do any house chores that aren’t part of my bedtime routine. My little autistic brain loves being primed for things so once my bedtime routine goes into motion and I crawl into bed, as long as I don’t get too sucked into what I’m doing, sleep is easy.
I recently talked to someone with ADHD and she has been sleeping like a mess and never goes to bed at normal hours. Part of it was that she hasn’t been giving her brain any ability to slow down to sleep. Please be gentle to your brain.
no Offense but autistic people invented the word “stim” and the backbone of the entire “stim community” so if you hate/dislike/think autistic people are “weird” or use autistic as an insult you’re banned from enjoying anything stim related
Ableists seem to think that autistic people are being rude when we go non-verbal, so I thought I’d make this post explaining exactly why we may not be able to answer you
Firstly, autistic people are more sensitive to background noises. You might be able to tune out loud music, you may be able to ignore large crowds. We struggle with that, we take it all in, and that takes up a heck of a lot of our focus
Secondly, we may not always process what you’re saying fast enough. We hear the words you’re saying, but our brains don’t always match the words to their proper meanings instantly. If we can’t properly understand what you’re saying, we’re not likely to give much of an answer
Thirdly, it depends on the way you talk to us. Yelling can cause sensory overload or meltdowns. If our minds are processing the fact that you just yelled at, a response is going to be hard
Fourthly, it can be hard for us to put our thoughts into words sometimes. We may have something we want to say, and we know in our minds what we want to say. This is why some of us may use extra unnecessary details when describing stuff, or we may use the wrong words in conversation
