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What& #39;s the impact of communication issues on #autistic people over time?
A thread where I explore my own experience. Please share and add to it as you wish. /1 #thread #autism
A thread where I explore my own experience. Please share and add to it as you wish. /1 #thread #autism
#Autistic people seem to lack the instruction manual for social communication. Non-autistic folk seem to have this software pre-installed and, for the most part, negotiate communication with little drama. We #Autistic people tend to struggle. /2
As it& #39;s all very & #39;manual& #39; for us, social communication takes way more energy and leaves many of us exhausted. All the short cuts, automatic bits and cheats that non-autistic folk enjoy are all very much hard manual labour for us. I& #39;ll give you an example. /3
Someone says & #39;good morning& #39; to a non-autistic person and the response is automatic and probably sincere and warm. A & #39;good morning& #39; in response.
For an #autistic person, chances are things will go differently. /4
For an #autistic person, chances are things will go differently. /4
If our hypothetical #autistic person is having a good day and is feeling energetic, they may access one of their social scripts they have memorised for such occasions. However, this isn& #39;t guaranteed. A moment of doubt and everything spirals. /5
It can end up being an internal version of the conversation between Gandalf and Bilbo Baggins at the start of the Hobbit: "What do you mean good morning? Do you mean you wish me a good morning or that it is a good morning whether I like it or not?" /6 #autism
Of course real life flies by at quite a pace so by thd time our #autistic friend has decided how to respond without making themselves look presumptuous and foolish, the stranger is half a mile away. A combination of manual rather than auto, and over thinking, scuppers all. /7
But this situation is relatively low pressure and low stakes. This kind of thing happens for so many other social communications over the course of a day. An #autistic person may well experience many similar issues in a short span of time. /8
Sometimes the miscommunication is much more severe, but again ultimately a result of a lack of automatic meaning-recognition software and over-thinking to compensate. Conversations with bosses, partners, colleagues can be fraught with error. /9 #autism
But imagine (if you& #39;re not #autistic - if you are, you won& #39;t need to imagine at all) that this is a constant feature of your life. Every conversation you have has the potential to lead to painful miscommunication and divergence of purpose. /10
Eventually you& #39;re going to dread these moments. Eventually you will have a fatalistic sense that any conversation is inevitably going to lead to conflict. Eventually you become traumatised by the repetitive failure and subsequent fallout. /11 #autism
This won& #39;t be obvious, high alert trauma, I don& #39;t think. In my experience is very low level most of the time but it *is* chronic, and it gets worse and worse as time passes. As you get older and the failures pile up, it gets more severe. This is my world. /12 #autism
Every conversation is approached with caution. Everyone who starts a conversation with you is a potential source of pain and unhappiness. The fact we #autistic people seem to generally lack that social handbook of & #39;how to do it& #39; has long lasting effects. /13
Some #autistic people won& #39;t experience this, of course. It& #39;s no monolith. But many will, I think, recognise the feeling.
I have ended up hyper defensive and reluctant. I can still easily speak in public but my ability to & #39;chat& #39;, even with close friends, is deteriorating. /14
I have ended up hyper defensive and reluctant. I can still easily speak in public but my ability to & #39;chat& #39;, even with close friends, is deteriorating. /14
A lifetime of communication problems leads to a lifetime of chronic anxiety and fear around socialising, which exacerbates existing isolation problems many #autistic people have to deal with. /15
Unfortunately I have few answers for this. There& #39;s no easy fix. But being more self assured in our diagnosis and knowing that these errors are likely and even inevitable might help make it feel less serious. /16 #autism
Similarly treating miscommunication lightly, being unafraid of admitting to a non-autistic person that we are unsure of their purpose, would go a long way to removing some of the pressure. /17 #autism
But this relies heavily on awareness and acceptance - the two big issues in autism advocacy that people like me push for day in, day out. Help by sharing my stuff and that of others to help shift things. /18 #autism
People to follow for more info:
@AnnMemmott
@KieranRose7
@milton_damian
@SNeurotypicals
@NeuroRebel
@emkburke
@lilririah
@AnnMemmott
@KieranRose7
@milton_damian
@SNeurotypicals
@NeuroRebel
@emkburke
@lilririah
