Hi Allison:
When I first wrote this thread, the inner turmoil was rampant. Then it was not.
Sure, everyone wanting to help often comes to the same conclusions as you did. But if 18 years of seeking the right support system from the healthcare system is not enough, and those conclusions are not in my hand, ie I lived 13 of the 18 years faking they were, until I fell into the abyss, that left me alone for 5 years trying to find something that gives, because all forms of reason tell me, I am asked to do the impossible.
So far, that explains why I am stuck today. What happened is for the first time in my 18 years, I discovered there was a growing number of folks who have almost the exact life progression, it is a particular predisposition where folks who grew not looking ASD enough (on account of massive changes of exposure on account of our digital age) who:
- read faces to an insane degree (we see what people would have expressed as they edit)
- make jokes (we read the room and tailor the experience to everyone)
- “greet people” (as I was told by someone in HackerJuno why they are not hiring those who cannot wear all hats)
- but also were always too different that they just fit the usual weirdo label (and so many of us have developed all these ASD-grade defense mechanisms to cope with the inhumanity we faced).
Everyone in society tells us here is what works, only we are literally the edge-case that don’t work as expected.
As 5 years of doing as asked, left me working less and less as expected:
- it forces me to do ASD-grade study of the reality (we are not more/less intelligent, but we have unconventional ways to think, reality, not better or worst, but highly perceptive on account of our design and circumstance)
- it matters only if you are willing to give me the benefit of the doubt (most people won’t, hence my life likely best less lived, I hope it ends every day, that it happens because I cannot do it myself).
- it made me see gaps that justify my problems.
- it made me realize that my problems are affecting those who society is failing to not mislabel 24/7/365 (as if that was ever semantically correct, but it is typical).
Note — I discovered Quora was the only place in our so called inclusive social media where folks who shared my life’s predisposition end up after suffering from the collective UX in all other places, but that does not solve the root problem obviously, only that I was not insane, stubborn, or faking my untenable reality everyone kindly says is just around the corner.
So no, sorry, it does not help, it is gratefully appreciated, and I thank you, but everytime I do that I leave the interaction doing my best to see that those who try to help are equally given my best effort to make them feel appreciated, but to be honest, all I am getting to make my life work for 5 years is lather, rinse, repeat, where the problem is I have no water (metaphorically) and the soap is killing me, and still piling up on every turn.
We have a society that is inaccessible to those who are ASD but we so call “lucky” to be considered “high functioning” — I wrote code since I was 5 years (silly shit, but that is all I did because I had no friends).
I have learning disabilities, and I have PTSD from society’s so called brush-off attitude towards what they see when I am in a room:
- Retard
- Annoying
- Angry
- Depressing
- Stubborn
- Incoherent
- Incompetent
- Deceitful
ASD leaves each one of those permanently etched in my thoughts, that the next time the same pattern begins unfolding, all I want to do is beg for people to understand me, not what they think I would have when they rudely interrupt me, with anger, that I never even get a say.
So I really thank you Allison, from my heart, but the problem is not solved, it will never be solved. It was a problem before I was diagnosed, I wore out trying to survive it, it is still a problem now, only I have less people around me who while they also fall into this social trap, they realize and correct because they love me — tomorrow, there will be even less (and that is my latest PTSD, on account of events).
We are being treated by doctors who are primed to the inevitability where they lash out at our predisposition, traumatize us, rinse, repeat — and there is no water.
We are surviving in a society that has deemed it appropriate to lash out at our predisposition, traumatize us, rinse, repeat — and there is no water.
We are made to look somehow, but all it takes is for people to try to see what is actually there, not what they are primed to judge before they even let seen what is meant to have followed — we are not “fixable” we can fake it for so long, every single interaction is a bullying experience, that I cannot find the right words to express my worth, it is the tip of the iceberg, it is a result, not a symptom of something I need to work on.
I leave this thread learning that I aspire from society more than it has to offer, that I might be better of not speaking to those who are prejudiced, not that they are at fault, because fault is pointless if I still live a miserable life in the end.
Please appreciate that this might look somehow on account of your experience from all the people you are so good natured in trying to help, promise me that you would not infer here please 
— thank you, deeply!
I try to capture my thoughts in Why Suicide still comes second to 5 years of painful, perpetual, death-by-popular-appeal!
