Thinking about functioning labels and how useless they are. I'm what they like to call "high functioning," but I have left every single job I've ever had (with the exception of TA in college) because of reasons related to being autistic. Every one was painful on a daily basis.

Working retail? Endless social demands, micromanaged and talked down to by corporate, uncomfortable uniform, constant noise and bright lights. I hung on for almost a year.

Call center doing market research? My speed and accuracy was excellent, but the hot desking, cliquey management, and arbitrary micromanagement drove me out in six months.

The corporate customer service job worked a little longer because they let me work from home. But I still quit after two years because I again couldn't handle the social demands and subterfuge of a corporate environment.

Also it turns out your boss really doesn't like it when your "upsell" procedure is to list the pros and cons of the thing you're trying to upsell with an eye to honesty.

I had my first major burnout after that job. Six months later, having learned nothing apparently, I got another customer facing job at a tech company. Lasted three years; it would have been two if the pandemic hadn't forced them to let me WFH.

At each job, I hit a breaking point where I could no longer sustain the effort required to perform well. Working these jobs required me to metaphorically overclock my mental hardware, inevitably causing that hardware to break down.

This is what they wanna call "high functioning." I call it "functioning just well enough that nobody believes you when you say everyday life is literal torture."