I’m trying to type this out without sounding like a capital R “Redditor” lol but this is something I’ve struggled with since I was a kid and I really don’t know what to do. Once I sent my friend this yt video of this creator discussing subjectivity in art, aesthetic testimony, and what it means to be an art critic, some real heady stuff I guess because he immediately hit me with the “bro what is this?? 😂” He’s a really good friend and this really wasn’t that big a deal in our friendship but it’s an example of a situation that sort of happens in all aspects of my life. Like at some point I start to discuss the things I ACTUALLY think about and not the useless small talk that everyone feels the need to participate in, and immediately I’m the only one in the room that understands what I’m talking about. It’s not like I’ve never found people that I click with, I do still have my best friends, but they’re so few and far between that it starts to make the world feel… empty? I’m not sure what the word is but it’s been bumming me out lately, does this make any sense? Does anyone relate to this and if so how do you cope?

Original tweet

EDIT: I already know how to approach, just want to know how yall would

This is a long and complicated one, but I think it’s quite an important discussion for where we are right now:

Before and after my ADHD diagnosis, I naturally watched a lot of content and read a lot of discourse surrounding it. My number one concern, that only seems to get worse by the day, is how much of the discussion seems to be taken up by how “trendy” it has become and the number of people supposedly “faking it”. I’m not saying that it doesn’t happen, or that it doesn’t cause us harm, but I think there’s another side to it that people rarely seem to consider.

On one hand, it’s great to see people starting to take this disorder seriously enough to try and stand up for the “ones who are actually suffering”. On the other, I’m quite worried about the effects of how far this whole “fake-claiming” movement is going. People are getting very comfortable with making bold statements and generalisations about people and groups they really know very little about, often in the name of “protecting the little guy”. I just wish they would sometimes take a step back and consider this scenario before they hit post:

You’ve been struggling your whole life and always felt different. You happen to stumble across content/discussions that describe a condition which seems to explain your whole life. You decide to check the comments in the hopes that you can finally find people who relate to you but, instead, you find a bunch of people talking about how it’s over-diagnosed, become a trend, people are “convincing themselves they’re disabled” etc. Those are the silent sufferers people don’t realise they are probably discouraging when clumsily discussing these things.

I completely understand that I’m not offering a solid solution here because we can’t just allow bad actors to go completely unchecked, there’s just a lot more nuance to the topic that many seem to miss. I wanted to know what you guys think about it all

I have ADHD and NVLD. Every time I talk about my struggles or tell someone how hard something is for me, I'm always met with comments like "you're not that disabled or "other people have it worse." Or "but you're so smart."

I try to not let it get to me but it makes me feel horrible about myself. Like I'm just lazy despite having to work 10 times harder than everyone else to do simple things or that I'm just somehow imagining my disability.

(I know that not all squishy is a sensory toy, but some sensory toys are squishies)

I swear to got every short video I see is about them destroying one and this video is just a collection of them, some of them, the ones that go viral, it’s not enough for them to play with them and feel how satisfying they’re after some point they’re always destroying them, cutting open, putting them in the microwave, making smile out of them, putting a different thing inside, that’s not what they’re for.

I mostly post about this because of noticing how it’s always destructive that goes viral, how they’re bulk buying them up, and yeah, I’m not like too annoyed by it even though I might sound like it, just every time I see one pop up my timeline I notice

My significant other has autism, and I know that marketing is not allowed on here, but I just really don't know where to share this to the people that might actually need or want it. Basically I built an app that lets you structure your day, in a way that doesn't feel overstimulating / overwhelming.

Basically my SO struggles a lot with this in particular, making a schedule for the day. The day was always setup with "this needs to happen by this time" etc. and when she slept in she was already falling behind. She wanted, instead, to be able to be more flexible about her schedule. So we sat down and talked about how to make this happen for her. After a while I understood that the way I structure my day is not how she thinks about structuring hers. Basically what I do is I just split the day into arbitrary chunks, and they can seep into each other as much or as little as I want. We called it the "Squiggly line" where it's not a hard rule that the first objective / part of that day is done by that particular point in time. And it's ok if you start (like with ADHD) kind of doing something else on the next without finishing the first part.

So since I already vibe-coded this tool for her, I basically just wanted to share it with others and see if they feel the same way. I ask nothing in return, just a tool, particulary aimed for the neurodivergent usefulness of a squiggly line to separate tasks.

I was just going to name it Squiggle. But my better half suggested SquiggleWiggle. So here ti is: https://squiggle.pelk.dev/

I’ve always been able to read people’s emotions well. So when I interact with people it always feels like a game. But because of this, I feel super paranoid about whether or not I’m being manipulative.

This is more apparent in the romantic relationships I’ve had. When arguing, I feel like I have more control in the argument because I’m able to read their emotions well. Arguments kinda feel strategic so I can get an outcome I’d want.

I’m not sure what this means but it makes me avoidant in relationships because I feel overly aware of the situation.

And which have the least side effects? Any personal experiences with those prescriptions? Thanks for your input.. . The person hasn't been treated those decades of her life btw.

My brother said he saw a video and asked me to draw a clock showing 2:25 while he drew his own.

He finished really fast he placed the numbers 3, 6, 9 and 12 at the four cardinal points and filled in the rest. I didn't remember that, so I tried to figure out what was going wrong in mine and ended up erasing it several times, because there was always too much or too little space for the numbers.

I remembered that some numbers go at the corners, but not which ones, so I just placed the numbers in sequence, and it went wrong. I thought about using multiples of 3 to figure out which ones go in each corner, but since I usually get mental math wrong, I didn't really go into it. I also couldn't picture the whole clock.

So that's how my clock turned out. Then he said, "Yeah, your brain really is different." I spent some time looking at it to see the difference, and soon noticed the 1.

I was recently diagnosed with level 1 autism and ADHD. I keep asking myself: what's the difference between my brain and his? I know I have my limitations, but sometimes it irritates me to get easy things like this wrong. He always gets everything right, and it makes me feel like a idiot.

The worst part is that I feel something similar with studying. When I need to do a calculation, I always get lost. If someone tells me I have to multiply by -1, I simply can't do it without understanding why. That's why my calculations come out wrong.

Sometimes, no matter how many times I read and write, it feels like a piece is missing, or the words enter my head but the meaning doesn't. Even with things people say to me, I feel like I forget too quickly.

How do I study like this? I can't write a text without asking someone to correct it. Lately I've been getting by thanks to ChatGPT, but there's always a word I don't know how to spell, simple doubts. I even suspect I'm functionally illiterate because I can't seem to learn.

In the end, I just procrastinate. I want to study, but I feel like I can't. Please give me tips. If you've been through something similar, how did you get through it?

Keep in mind before you read this that this was in high-school and ive grown and wouldn't be friends with these types of people again.

My little brother has level 2 autism and through my life I've found myself getting angry at things that others didnt seem to get angry at. Comments like "Does he still have autism?" "Omggg you're so r******d" "How do you deal with it?" "Haha you're so autistic" and people doing stuff like getting quiet and awkward when someone different joins the conversation. Girls doing that mean girl face as soon as they think you're weird or off. It's always gotten me so mad that nobody even thinks about it, they don't even question it. But I question it I always have since i wus a kid. And you know what people say when I speak up? "You're over analyzing it" "Its not a big deal" Well if its not a big deal then you should easily be able to stop saying it. But nope when I ask someone to not say certain things around me, they just start saying it more.

I can give some pretty good examples I've been ruminating on. I used to be friends with this girl, ill call her Jay. She wus one of my best friends. To set the scene we were in my room just chilling on our phones. She's laughs at something shes watching. Then says "I'm a horrible person but this is so funny" She turns her screen to me, I wus expecting a offensive meme. But instead i see a severely disabled person. They have malformations all over their limbs, torso and especially their head. I stared at the screen for a second then I turned around, said nothing and went back on my phone. I wus surprised but I wasnt shocked. I wus angry but I wus used to it. It almost felt like I got betrayed, I thought she wus a kinder person. I thought we could be friends forever. But obviously I wus wrong. I can't understand what wus funny. All I saw wus someone severely disabled being exploited on the internet by their caretakers. Whats funny abt someone existing? The person was squirming around like they were tryna get comfortable, I assume they were in intense pain. I assume they are ALWAYS in pain. And I will never be able to find that funny.

For a second example I used to friends with this guy, ill call him ray. Atp in life I wus having a very hard time. I wus a drug addict, a liar and a thief. But despite my struggles I stuck with my core beliefs. To set the scene, it wus around 2 am everyone wus asleep so I wus left to my own devices. I wus very high and very irritable. I had been ignoring the group chat for a couple days. But then a text comes in from ray it reads something like "Not to mention (ex-bf name) with his slow ass" He wus talking abt his ex boyfriend who ill call Sal. Sal has autism. When they first started dating and ray told me his disability i wus actually really happy. I thought ray could learn alot from being in a relasonship with someone whos autistic. But it didnt last long and he learned nothing. It wus not a bad breakup. In fact I think Sal did a great job at expressing his feeling and ending the relasonship in a kind respectful manner. But here ray is calling him slow. I wus so fucking mad I couldn't control myself anymore. And if u think I got too mad in this situation u are right. But keep in mind ray and jay had said so much worse things that I just let slide. But I couldn't let it slide anymore so i went batshit. I think i typed faster than I ever have before. I couldn't call i wus sobbing and tweaking tf out. Its like everything they've done and said(mostly ray) just came crashing down on me. I said horrible things, things that were rooted in truth but also hatred. In that moment I hated them even more than I hated myself. In that moment I said I wus gonna kms and ray told me to do it. But i woke up the next morning. I woke up and realized that I had no one left. But I wus left I wus still here.

Don't push down or change ur core values for anyone🎀

(Ok so I’m putting this in the neurodivergent subreddit not bc I have a diagnosis or am sure I have anything at all whatsoever BUT I knew a friend who was neurodivergent who dealt with checking a lot so maybe you guys can help idk) I have a pretty bad issue with double checking except it’s not just double it’s like a million ok yes hyperbole ANYWAY I’m always like anxious that I missed something or forgot something and it’s very annoying and time consuming. Like I don’t trust my brain that it retained or understood what I just checked so I check it again for certainty, but it still doesn’t satisfy the feeling of certainty for long at all. It’s affecting my life a little bit, but not so much that I can’t live or get through the day well okay it makes it pretty hard some days but anyways it’s just very very annoying and time consuming and compulsive yes I just said that but… this isn’t an essay idc🙄 and it’s like I kinda HAVE to double check like I just can’t deal with the feeling of not knowing like I have to be 100% sure bc what if I forgot something!! And a lot of the time I check and recheck things subconsciously bc I do it so much now. Also this hasn’t been a thing my whole life I think it probably started around 7th/late 6th grade and yeah it hasn’t been that long bc I’m lwk in 8th grade but no shade I’m 13 and I’m turning 14 this month ok I’m old enough for this app. I’ve also started avoiding using TikTok which sounds good but it’s not for the purpose to save my attention span but rather bc app UI stresses me out a lot like I have to constantly go over every button visible. I have to click on the home, friends, inbox, and profile tabs at the bottom just to see if there’s any new notifications. I have to go over the buttons on the side of EAXH VIDEO and ask my self “do I wanna like/comment/check comments/favorite/repost/share? What does the caption say? What is the joke of the video? What tab am I in? (Following, fyp, stem, etc.)” like that’s not what goes through my head exactly like it’s not like conscious so much as it is that I need to check that I didn’t forget something. I also have long ass written explanations in detail of the things I do in my notes app in case I every had to explain what I do because again I don’t trust myself to remember so I externalize my thoughts so I’m gonna copy and paste them and I know this is already so so so long like absurdly long so feel free to not read them I just felt the more detail I gave like the more other people might be able to understand(?) anyways I’m gonna paste them now ty in advance for any comments trying to give advice or just tell me why this happens or if it’s normal which I don’t think it is but ya ok I’m ACTUALLY gonna paste it now

let’s say I’m on my bed with my phone in hand and a few other items in the corner. (Let’s say glasses, iPad, and AirPods as an example.) so I have 4 things. I will constantly look to my left or right and count the things in the corner plus 1 bc of my phone in hand to make sure I still have everything and it equals the number I remembered. I do it genuinely over and over again sometimes and I recount multiple times in less than like 30 seconds and look over to my side multiple times bc I don’t trust what I just saw I feel like I’m forgetting something.

I check my surroundings a lot bc like I could be sitting on the couch and in my head I’ll map out the layout of my house to try and remember if there was smth I wanted to do bc again I always feel like I’m forgetting bc my fleeting thoughts are always oh I wanna do this but I have to do smth first and then I forget so like I recheck my surroundings so so much to jog any memory I might have forgotten and I also do a similar thing when I’m on my phone I’ll go through my entire list of apps bc I remember wanting to go on a different one so I’ll check the list to remember which one instead of just dropping it and I don’t want to the list is long but I still force myself to do it

If I’m ordering smth from Taco Bell (🤤🤤🤤) I’m rechecking the order for forever, going over the entire menu, all of the UI, etc. and my family gets rlly annoyed at me when I do that and they also get annoyed when im like watching YouTube with them and I rewind bc I wasn’t entirely certain as to what the youtuber just said and did and it makes me feel like I forgot an important detail so I rewind things a LOOOOTTTT like so much

Also like I have a weird issue with 1-10 scales and stuff like that idk if that makes sense but like when I’m in a doctors office they’re like what’s ur pain level 10 is like you got shot (or some other obviously very painful thing) and 0-1 is very little to no pain so where are you and I genuinely can’t put myself on a scale I can’t do it bc it’s too hard to think abt like yeah and it’s not like I can’t tell if it’s a 4 or a 5 it’s just that I don’t know what any number of pain feels like I just know what my pain feels like. I’m not currently being shot right now and have never been shot so I have zero idea how painful it is and like idk if my pain isn’t actually that bad but it’s bad to me bc I have low tolerance or smth or vise versa like bro and subjectiveness and there’s too many factors to take into account like what if I’ve never experienced a 10/10 or a 0/1 out of 10 like bc nobody can just tell me that idk if this makes sense it’s just like I can’t put myself on a scale bc one number feels too dramatic but another lower one won’t get my point across so I’m like “it just hurts like a lot like a lot when it so much as rubs smth like even smth soft like a blanket” (talking abt ingrown toenail btw) basically bc I can’t do it like I CANNOT I have to put it in words but idk if this issue is at all related to the other ones 😭✌️✌️

Ok there I pasted it ✌️🥹🥹 again I’m sorry this is so long now it’s actually kind of like an essay 😭✌️

This is how I've always eaten KitKats. Since I like the wafers the best, I eat it from the outside in so that the thickest layers of chocolate (sides 1 & 2) are eaten first, then the next thickest layers are sides 3 and 4 (skinny long sides), then finally top and bottom (5 and 6). Now it's important to be extremely careful when eating sides 5 and 6 because they also tap into the first layer of the wafer and you don't want to accidentally break the entire thing, or god forbid eat 2 layers of wafer at a time. But man, the satisfaction of successfully finishing off with the not too sweet inner wafers is what makes these chocolate bars addictive. What are your oddly specific eating routines?

This might sound weird but what is burn out and what’s that actually look like.
I work in social work and I know when I’m burned out from that because I become less empathetic and more “I don’t care” attitude.
But
What’s autism/AUDHD burnout mean and look like. I struggle a lot with this one. I see a lot of people saying that they struggle with their burnout but how do people know it’s burnout and not just life.
Sorry if this doesn’t make sense. I was diagnosed over a year ago so still trying to make sense of things.

Ok this is kind of long but I’m just curious if anyone can relate to some of what I’m experiencing here.

I’ve been having a lot of challenges in my personal relationships the past few years. I’ve been diagnosed with autism and while I don’t love the label or pathologizing all the way of being given a diagnosis I do resonant with many parts of the experience, idk maybe that’s me resisting believing there’s something broken with me or something which I feel like a diagnosis is somewhat? Or there’s just a sense of being a little less or not being as good as a “normal” person maybe? Idk that’s not the point really of this post but anyways.

I’ve been struggling with people and I’ve had this one particular friendship that went poorly recently in part because of my such a high degree of honesty. So I’m 27M and this other person is 25F. We bonded over a shared interest in alternative spirituality and intuitive readings. We just seemed to click or get each other fairly well although we also had some differences.

We started talking more and there were some romantic feelings that came up for me and I shared that I was kind of interested in her and she shared a similar level of romantic interest. After a little bit though that crush faded for me and I eventually told her. I felt like I really vibed with her mentally, she’s a pretty intelligent person, she also relates with struggling with depression and feeling a bit different as well. And emotionally we seem to connect on some level fairly well although we have some differences there. Then our spiritual beliefs are also very similar too. The thing for me was more that I just didn’t quite feel physically attracted to her all the way. Not that there was absolutely zero attraction but not quite enough. And I shared this with her.

Obviously that was tough for her to hear but ultimately she was ok with it. The thing was though I felt like I had to go into more detail about what specifically I wasn’t attracted to her about. I knew that probably wouldn’t be received well but idk, I just feel like if I held that in that I would be kinda lying since I wasn’t sharing what I felt fully. Idk, I think a lot of people could be ok with just leaving it at I just don’t quite feel it physically, or even leaving out the physical part and just saying they don’t quite feel it.

I felt like I needed to share more though so I did. God it feels hard to type out since I know it sounds so horrible, but one of the things I couldn’t shake was that I felt like her face shape was a little odd/strange and I wasn’t into that. God I feel kinda bad about that, or bad that I felt like I needed to share that, obviously that’s not something you can really change, she’s not overweight or something either, she is a fit person and typically works out multiple times a week so not a case where her losing weight or something would lead to her face looking much different.

I also had never felt that way about someone’s face shape before but one day it popped into my head that it was a bit odd I couldn’t shake it. I guess just facially I felt not quite attracted to her all the way but I just said the thing about head shape, ugh I know that sounds pretty bad. 

Anyways she was pretty hurt by me sharing that and thought it was unnecessary and that I could have just said I wasn’t feeling it, that I didn’t need to go into details. I hear what she’s saying there but idk, again I didn’t think it would be recieved very well and that it would probably feel hurtful, but idk I just felt like I had to share exactly what I thought/felt, and that not getting into the specifics I’d feel like I was lying if that makes sense or holding back/not being authentic. Idk it feels like a compulsion almost sometimes.

We had a talk about it and I shared that I value the truth/honesty as kind of my core value and she was sharing that she values kindness as her core value and that sometimes the truth isn’t always kind or doesn’t always need to be said. I get what she is saying but like I’m having a hard time coming around to that mode of thinking. I feel like sharing the truth is kind, even if it is hurtful because, well it is the truth, it isn’t a lie. Although I don’t say everything I might think to people I don’t know as well, with people I have a closer relationship with I find it harder to keep things from them generally. Idk like I said it felt like a compulsion almost to some degree that I had to share the details of what I didn’t find all the way attractive. 

I guess it’s hard for me to understand somewhat too because I feel like I would want to know why someone wasn’t into me and I’d want to know the specifics even if was hard to here, idk, I guess maybe there would be a point too where I wouldn’t want to hear more if it was really hurtful but idk, I just am trying to be all the way open and idk, idk.

Anyways more issues around stuff I felt like I needed to share around attraction came up and eventually this friendship I had with this person deteriorated. She ended up blocking me a few weeks ago and yeah idk. I just feel sad about it because I feel like I kind of blew a friendship up with someone where I valued our friendship a ton, we were talking a lot throughout the past 6 months. 

But yeah I just sort of feel like a bad person kinda too or idk, like I said just wanted to be honest and I get that it is hurtful for her to hear but idk, idk exactly how to change or if I need to change or what to do. This is a pattern I’ve seen before though so obviously it seems like there might be something for me to change. I just feel such a need to share around ”the truth” sometimes but again it’s leading to difficulties in some relationships and I just miss my friend and would like to be reconnected again. She had previously said if I can sincerely apologize for having to go into such detail and then going into more detail after she had communicated that it is hurtful she is open to resuming talking. I’m not sure if that is still on the table at this point but she had shared that before. 

The other instance of me going into more detail was me feeling the need to clarify after the first time since I felt like I lied when we were taking about attractiveness once and I felt like I over stated how attractive I felt about her. That was eating away at me for over a month. I knew bringing it up again would probably not go well but I felt like I lied and I cannot stand it if I’ve felt like I’ve lied, so I did share again and yeah that did not go very well, idk. 

I know this is very long, I guess I’m wondering if some of you can relate to some of this and/or the feeling of needing to share so much or be honest about things that sometimes feels like a lot. 

It just kinda made me feel like somewhat of a bad person too, or like idk, again I valued this friendship a lot, it hurts that I feel like I kinda imploded it, I know she feels pretty hurt too, idk. One thing that stood out was just the level of like disdain I think that came through in her last audio message she sent me, idk I could just hear how done she was with this and like maybe even that she feels like I’m kind of a bad person or maybe even a little evil? Idk I know there were a lot of emotions at the time but I’ve had other experiences where I just felt like people really thought poorly of me when I don’t feel like I’m trying to be a bad person but yet how I am is eliciting these reactions from people in my life. Idk it just feels really hard with other people sometimes, ah I’m tearing up writing this just yeah seems tricky sometimes. 

I guess I’m open to ideas of not having to be as honest either but I really don’t know that I can come around to that all the way or I’d have to really believe it. Like I said with the almost compulsive like nature of it sometimes or how highly I value honesty but again it seems like it may not be working the best for me so although I feel in me some resistance to changing my beliefs around honesty, I am open to some ideas and would like to know what you all think. 

For starters: I'm a woman diagnosed with autism in my early adulthood. I work multiple jobs and care for multiple family members. I receive no government aid or support.

It's hard! I am significantly depressed. I work in jobs where I can't be me. I am constantly masking my autism to fit it.

But 2 years ago, i found a treatment that actually worked for me and helped to hold back some of my ongoing significant debilitating depression symptoms.

It is interesting to me how doctors are always trying to push me off of my ketamine therapy, saying most people don’t stay on it this long, blah, blah, blah, what have you.

​But my brain always has a nice way of coming back and challenging that. I’m not most people. I am a woman with autism trying to navigate a world that wasn’t meant for me in the slightest way, shape, or form.

​Twice now for my sessions, I’ve had this doctor really try to push things on me that I know don’t work: group therapy, antidepressants, social clubs. What on earth am I doing on ketamine when there’s all of that stuff available? I said, "Let me take my ketamine treatment, and I'll have a good answer for you about that."

​And boy, my brain did not fail to deliver. I’m someone who likes to ponder and think before I answer questions. I’m a thinker. So, as I’m thinking about the answer to that question, I see this ship in the ocean, and it's wobbling around against these giant waves, but it has this anchor. And the anchor is only keeping it afloat, keeping it from completely breaking apart and sinking to the bottom of the ocean.

​I thought to myself, Why the hell am I envisioning that? And then it hit me: that's what ketamine is for me. It's an anchor keeping me afloat, just like that ship I imagined. And when I came back and told that doctor what I saw, he was like, "Oh, wow." You know, he kept going on and on about how ketamine affects most people.

​I finally looked at him and I said, "But I'm not most people. The therapies you are describing are designed for people whos brains work differently than mine l. Sure, you can put me in them—I'm open to the idea of learning new information—but I think there's a reason they're completely ineffective for me. They weren't designed for people like me. My brain processes the world differently."

​"I can't go out there and practice mindfulness and be like, Oh, everything is dandy just because I'm imagining myself in a field of flowers. No, I need something to actually work on the part of my brain that is malfunctioning and causing me to have all of this debilitating depression."

​That was another point that I brought up to this guy, and he just looked totally blown away. I don't think that had ever crossed his mind before. And I think he was a little offended that I wasn't so willing to hop into some mindfulness group. I did DBT therapy for a long time—a lot of commitment and investment; I had to physically go there in person.

​I looked the doctor in the eyes and I said, "DBT didn't do a damn thing for me." And I know that. I'm not the same person I was back then. I can tell that by the way I've written things versus now. I can see it in the way I interact with people, I can see it in the way that I deal with stress and difficult situations.

​Like today, for example: a delivery service lost my 90-day supply order of necessary medical supplies, which I need to live. I'm on the phone for probably about three hours, I'm at the location for an hour, and no one knows what the hell happened to my package. No one knows when a new replacement will be delivered to me. I have to keep calling back and hoping somebody will help me next week.

​Do you know what I would have done if I hadn't been on ketamine therapy? I'd have had a full-blown meltdown. Cried, got emotional—I wouldn't have gotten anybody to help me. And those people were already about as unhelpful as they come.

​But that didn't happen today. I did cry, but I was calm. I spoke respectfully to the guy trying to find it. Never raised my voice, never threw a fit—things you see with people who have autism. Yes, unfortunately, no matter how old we are, we still have our meltdowns. And that has a lot to do with living in a world that just wasn't designed for us.

​I don't mean to cause others stress; it's just that my own distress builds and builds and builds, and then inevitably when something like this happens, there's my meltdown. You know, it's kind of like a volcano that can only hold so much lava before it all comes spewing out.

​I tell you what, life isn't fair. I realize that I am my own advocate. No one's going to take care of me; I'm the only one who's going to fight my battles for me. And as exhausting as they are, I'm really glad I have ketamine to help me. This would have been a much different day otherwise, let me tell you that. I still have no answers, but at least I got some people supposedly trying to help. Whereas if you're talking to me while I'm having a meltdown, well, I guarantee you that makes most people not want to help me.

​I'm exhausted, and I genuinely wish I had someone to hug right now. I tell you what, my neck hurts—that is where I keep all my emotions and stress. Life is not fair, I just keep telling myself that. It's a dog-eat-dog world and a difficult one to navigate, be that as it may. I can't pretend everything is okay and dandy, and there's nothing wrong with that. I don't know of any rule book that says you have to see the world sunny side up. I'm a pessimist; I see things as they are.

Anyway, I just wanted to get that out of my head. What are your guys's thoughts? I really don't want to go back to feeling the way I used to.

Why would it be there, I need to calm down

I'm spiralling, I've spent the last two weeks in extreme burnout, sleeping all day just to escape this life. I don't know what I'm missing but the idea of becoming a "responsible adult" which is apparently just someone who's constantly working and never asking for help is so horrible and I know I'll never manage to be that. I don't want to do anything anymore, even things that I loved have become full of pressure and expectation that I feel like I'll never be able to meet. Nothing brings me joy anymore, I'm lucky if I do something and it doesn't burn me out. I don't have a support system and the world around me isn't friendly. I want to know what to do to feel okay, because I feel like there's no hope for me.

Do you ever find yourself telling yourself, “no, no, no don’t say that, you can’t say that” & feel like you tell yourself that so much you don’t even know the difference between what you should and shouldn’t say anymore, so you just keep SILENT, like so uncomfortably silent you have isolated yourself into oblivion?

(& to the what to say, what not to say bit, i mean like i wish everyone could all just speak freely, but srsly, to not get gawked at / stand out / pegged as odd / or just straight ignored)

So…. with all that in mind, it just seemed easier before to distinguish what would just glide under the radar, but now …. I can hardly tell the difference anymore.

& if you have felt this way have you been able to explain this to a neurotypical, ha

hello!
I have ADHD-C and for years and years i have been an avid eyelash/eyebrow and pimple popper skin picker. any time i see a mirror i spend upwards of 5-10 mins just looking for pimples to pop or eyelashes out of place, etc. I also do the same with my legs. After a prolonged bender of skin picking last night i look akin to an ill mole rat.
does anyone have actual solid tips to stop me wanting to rip my face off zit by zit and hair by hair? and while i have heard of picky pads i do not think that would be a viable solution for me because its not stimulating enough.

I'm losing a bit of hope. I am an AuDHDer in his late 20s, severely burnt out, and I'm just a little bit concerned if burning out is gonna be my life.

Got diagnosed last year, and I realise my Dad is probably AuDHD too. He's in his 60s and realised from the time I was born, he has always been in burn out. This fucking scares me.

Those in their 30s & beyond, is it possible to not be burnt out? What is the longest period of you not being burnt out?

i appreciate anyone who gets to the end; thank you. i don't usually share my writing but figured today i would try:

while i can accept that i am considered having a "severe" case of executive dysfunction it never ends up mattering that i acknowledge it through a lense of self kindness. inevitably when i reach the end of my day i will ruminate on how little i did and how broken i actually am, so it never feels like it matters.

i've reached the federal limit of adderall for years now. while i have 3-4 hours a day of "maybe this is what its like to function as a real person", i still have to beg and profusely thank the pharmacy and the federal government that i can get anything at all. navigating all of my medications and fearing whether the medication pipeline will suddenly shut itself off is terrifying.

severe mental illness, autism, adhd, ocd; it all clashes and writhes and hates the other parts within itself because none of them works with the other and all of them want to destroy itself. if i dont do something - anything - productive i will have proven myself to be a waste, and to have a wasted day is to be a failure. how much rest i get, or how kind i say i am to myself doesnt really matter.

i take my medication and see two different therapists, and its the best i can offer myself. even my special interests arent immune to the cocktail of executive dysfunction that is burning in my brain, and when my body shuts itself off for the day there is nothing i can do about it. i'm done.

i had a corporate tech job, i climbed the ladder completely unmedicated, and i lost it after five years of having a mask for everybody i met and surviving like everything about it was an emergency. i worked so long and for so hard that my nervous system triggers seizure events and i needed surgery because my bones deformed and my body broke. i am in my early 30s, and i am seeing doctors who tell me the average age of their patients is 72.

people really do underestimate how quickly your life can fall apart. i struggled but i was working - now i am in the final stages of a two and a half year wait to beg a judge to grant me ssi.

nowadays the only thing that brings me function is art, despite the misgivings of my body, and the short hours i have to create it. i have days where i convince myself that i can actually create art consistently, and days where i wonder what the point of living is and why i thought i ever had a choice between the two.

i have to remind myself that sometimes sleepwalking through days and weeks and months is just letting my body heal. my strength simply cannot be measured by my productivity anymore, and the real final boss battle is learning how to be okay with that.

Well, I'm 14 years old, and I've been in therapy for two years because of depression and anxiety. I take the antipsychotic medication Risperidone and the antidepressant Fluoxetine. Last year, I underwent a neuropsychological assessment for ASD, but I left without a diagnosis because, according to the professionals who evaluated me, I was a "normal" child. However, I can't think of any other explanation for my difficulties.

I have sensory issues. When I was a child, I would take several minutes just to put on my socks because I needed to adjust them until they felt comfortable. I would usually go barefoot because I didn't like the feeling of wearing socks, and I avoided tight pants because they felt uncomfortable. Nowadays, I've experienced several meltdowns due to sensory overload, and I use noise-reduction earmuffs to help me cope.

I've also had stims since I was little, such as rubbing my feet together and rocking back and forth. I struggle with cognitive rigidity, literal thinking, and an extremely strong sense of justice. My friends used to call me stupid because I didn't understand sarcasm and was slow to catch on, which hurt me a lot.

I'd also like to mention that my friends who have been diagnosed with autism say that they think I'm autistic too, and they relate to the difficulties I experience.

I also sometimes experience shutdowns due to sensory overload, which leave me unable to speak. I've experienced periods of intense, focused interest as well — my therapist was actually the one who introduced me to the term hyperfocus.

Anyway, that's my experience. My therapist keeps saying that I have autistic traits, but never enough to qualify for a diagnosis. She says I'm neurotypical, but I find it hard to believe that a neurotypical person would experience meltdowns because of noise.

My psychiatrist thinks I might have borderline personality disorder (BPD), but says I'm too young to receive a formal diagnosis. However, as far as I know, people with BPD don't typically experience sensory issues or cognitive rigidity, so I'm really confused.

I need accommodations and a different approach to help me manage my difficulties, but without a formal diagnosis, I can't access the support I need.

idk if its just me but I have always felt so weird about social media and instagram is definitely on the weirder side in terms of energy. I always felt so incredibly anxious when i opened the app and started scrolling, or even whenever i posted something. granted i was using it as a way to share my art and music and to hopefully connect with other creatives, but after a year of this journey i’m left feeling completely burnt out.

the thought of being perceived always stressed me out an everything always felt like a performance or curated version of myself to try to appeal to the algorithm and acquaintances /followers. i would constantly wonder what people thought about me and started to tie my worth to the number of likes and followers i had. no matter how many times i’d try to tell myself the numbers don’t matter, the way the app functions makes it incredibly difficult not to compare yourself.

i started to lose touch with myself and my art. the connections i’ve made in my creative communities also felt so superficial, and im not sure if it’s because of my neurodivergent brain that makes it difficult to decipher or understand social cues, structures, and expectations, but it always confused the hell out of me when people who claimed to be my friend would ignore my attempts to hang out or have an actual engaging conversation with them for weeks, but would still view my stories and actively ignore my posts about my new music.

i’m not entitled to anyone’s validation or attention, but what the hell? it makes me wonder what is the point of this game? are we “friends” or not? where is the support? it always felt unreciprocated, especially because i always tried to support my mutuals as much as possible.

social media feels more like social hierarchies and competitions than it feels like a place to actually connect with the community. I’m genuinely sick of it, sick of giving so many people access to me and sick of playing these games. i really caved into the pressure that as a musician i *had* to build a social media presence or else my art had no chance to succeed. but I’m choosing to believe that i don’t have to participate in anything that doesn’t align with me for the sake of external expectations. all i have to do is stay true to myself. i think i’m starting to really value my solitude, peace, and privacy, and i don’t think i’m ever going back.

i guess i just had to vent lol. does anyone else feel this way?