6 Obscure Signs you're Actually Autistic

The War on 'Autism Moms' Needs to STOP.: https://youtu.be/rKNEwlQCi7c 6 traits I’m always surprised to find are not actually in the DSM-5 diagnostic criteria for autism! Some of these are alluded to within the additional information in the DSM-5 e.g. for meltdowns it mentions “disruptive/challenging behaviors are more common in children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder than other disorders, including intellectual developmental disorder.” And there is quite a bit about masking – so all these doctors saying the no eye contact thing need to have a re-read 👀 “Many adults report using compensation strategies and coping mechanisms to mask their difficulties in public but suffer from the stress and effort of maintaining a socially acceptable facade.” If you’d like to know more about what masking can look and feel like, you might like this video: https://youtu.be/36-K-HW3syc And here are 9 Signs you’re Probably NOT Autistic (the non-invalidating version): https://youtu.be/0ZomGtlmfXE Hope you’ve had a good Thursday!! 💛 See you soo

Me, as a child, reading that autistic people can have black and white thinking: No, I don't think in black and white, I think in full colour! 😆

My perfectionism came from a sense of acceptance. I thought that if i didn't make a mistake, I wouldn't give anybody else a reason to reject me.

FYI, The idiom "Out of thin air" doesn't have a lengthy, historical etymology. It was just a phase that Shakespeare invented. You could say he just pulled it out of thin air.

"We can pick up skills. We can learn. We can grow." THANK YOU

that quote about perfectionism, the "even minor mistakes can have serious consequences" is something that shows up in my job as a web developer/programmer constantly. One little typo WILL break EVERYTHING! I've seen it happen, I'm not crazy!

I was describing what a meltdown feels like yesterday and said "there's not really any emotion like fear or anger, it's more a sort of primordial anguish - which is a phrase I shall be adding to my list of good names for rock bands"

"A lot of autistic traits are kind of like normal parts of the human experience but with the volume turned way up." I like that description a lot.

I went for a diagnosis after a major burnout (and previous years of research in autism). The day the phycologist gave me my official diagnosis she told me: "You don't need to change anything in the way you live your life, look at all you have accomplished so far". WTF! It's like she didn't even care the price I was paying to accomplish whatever she thought I accomplished.

Me when my doctor said I was “too empathetic” to be autistic and made me fill out an empathy quotient with the question “did you cut up worms for fun when you were younger?” (The correct answer was apparently yes….) don’t even get me started on the “library or party?” Question lol

I hadn't heard about autistic inertia, but that describes me very well. It's incredibly difficult for me to start doing things, but when I do, I just keep going.

My meltdowns had always had the form of a incontrolable crying. It's like... my eyes were throwing up their tears, I simply can't stop until everything is out.

1. Perfectionism 2. Meltdowns 3. Burnout 4. Motor skills (dyspraxia) 5. Inertia 6. Masking

I think the Borderline and Bipolar criteria including references to meltdowns is why female children/adults are more likely to be undiagnosed as autistic and misdiagnosed as one of those two. It fits perfectly into the "males stoic, females crazy," societal narrative, and dovetails with/bolsters the "gurlz cnt b autistic!!1!" narrative. It's harmful and frustrating and causes all sorts of unnecessary suffering for thousands of people

I feel like there is so much emphasis on the social aspect because that's the part that impacts NTs, not just the autistic person, so they notice it more. I might be being overly cynical though.

"even minor mistakes have serious consequences" - This feels like my response to the trauma of always getting it "wrong" in social situations but never knowing why

I wish people understood that it does not help me at all when I'm overwhelmed and already dysregulated, yelling at me, screaming at me, punishing me doesn't make me "stop acting like this" - it probably makes it WORSE and I get EVEN MORE overwhelmed and heightened.

when your special intrest is ✨⭐ yourself ⭐✨

I really love your breakdown of how meltdowns aren’t specified in the dsm for autism, but they are for BPD and bipolar. “Challenging behaviors” is THE vaguest way you could possibly describe autistic behavioral struggles.

Remember that Autism is a brain of extremes…so some of us are on the other extreme from dyspraxia…insanely great coordination (dance, sports, gymnastics , martial arts, circus arts etc).