As I said in the Intro, I’m autistic, and I have survived a lot of trauma, from childhood abuse to a fairly recent sudden death in my family.
However, what’s traumatic to an autistic is often not to a neurotypical, which often leads to misunderstandings. Which adds to our confusion and can further add to trauma.
A Few Examples from My Own Experiences that can be Traumatic to an Autistic
One day, when I was in fifth grade, for the first time ever, I worked on a learning center assignment-I think it was a reading one-mostly on my own. When I finished and she saw that I had done well on it, my learning center teacher, *Mrs. Sally said to me,
“You know I’d like to see you doing more of that. Working independently.”
At that time, I didn’t understand that Mrs. Sally was praising what she saw as a major point of progress for me. At that time, what I “heard” was,
“You’ve been wronging me, your homeroom teacher, para, and family being way too dependent on us! From now on, you’d better do all of the work yourself or else!”
Though I didn’t dare say that to Mrs. Sally or anyone else. I didn’t want to risk upsetting Mrs. Sally and, at the very least, thought that I would get accused of being rude.
Instead, that became the main starting point of my radical independence. From then on, I vowed to do everything possible myself. Unless I knew from the start that the situation/task was going to take more than one person to solve/get done, or I could no longer handle it on my own. And that has led to a lot of frustration for many people because I don’t speak up enough. And of me being further distrustful of others.
Today, I’m still one of the most independent people I know. I especially resent the fact that I’m still living with my mother at almost 40. Even though it’s mainly because I’ve just started recovering from an almost 20-year-long shopping addiction. I’m very glad to say that thanks to finally receiving some treatment that actually understands the nature of addiction and how abuse tends to tie in with it, I’m at a point at which I almost wish I didn’t have to spend another dollar in my life.
At least I’m very glad that I have my own car and a job. And instead of trying to go with what I think everyone else expects of me and almost inevitably failing, I’ve started being more assertive about the things I want to do, starting with this blog and other efforts I plan to make to reach others about autism awareness.
One of the main things I’ve started to work on, however, is not just assuming mistrust of new people. Which is still very difficult for me, as I’ve always had a lot of difficulty telling who’s safe and who isn’t. I do know some things from experience and study, such as that love bombing and an expectation of upfront commitment are usually bad signs. I’ve even trained myself to recognize scammer scripts and/or excessive marketing-like script talk. Like the probable trafficker (who I will likely mention in more detail in a future post), I ran into in a QT restroom, insisting that the guy she was with had puppies in his truck, even though she was dressed like she was heading to a cocktail party.
Lately, I’ve been finding myself flashing back to a lot of interactions from my past. Only to discover way too late that, most of the time, the other person actually was trying to be helpful to me. Like Mrs. Sally, they just weren’t doing so in a way that I easily recognized as a supportive effort at that time.
Another example is when one of my old volunteer coordinators told me not to answer random questions on random Facebook posts. The cheap-looking ones that claim to be about traditional Christianity or that say that you’re entered for a chance to win money, etc. Although I always backed out immediately if I saw the latter message.
But it was also the way she said it that embarrassed and put me off. Instead of privately messaging me, she just said, “Lacy, don’t answer these!” right in the public comments below one that I’d already answered. After that, I unfriended her permanently with a self-vow to block her if she tried anything else with me.
At that time, I thought that she was trying to treat me like a five-year-old, publicly humiliate me, and tell me who I should and shouldn’t respond to. However, I’ve since realized that she was probably acting out of genuine care for me; it was just that she was very panicked and afraid that I would fall into a very bad trap if someone didn’t speak up to me like that.
On the other hand, I don’t exactly regret unfriending her. That wasn’t the first time she had done something like that to me. So if I was going to bring that out in her all the time, then as far as I’m concerned, it just wasn’t worth keeping her on anyway.
Why us Autistics/Neurodivergents may be Especially Vulnerable to Processing Various Experiences as Traumatic
The majority of us have heightened nervous systems and heightened sensory issues, which are usually not understood, let alone accommodated, by the mainstream neurotypical population. Many of us also have heightened sensitivity to rejection-that is, believing that any actual or perceived rejection is a reflection on our whole existence.
Couple all of the above with the constant social confusion and misunderstanding on both our and the other person’s part, not recognizing the need to process it, and it’s no wonder that our anxiety levels are through the roof all the time!
Now, combine all of the above with domestic violence in the home and/or bullying in other settings, such as schools. Then our anxiety levels will almost never come down to a resting rate! This likely makes us extra vulnerable to PTSD and other dissociative issues, such as derealization. My experiences of both of which I will be discussing in the next article.
Lacy Pierce