AM I ON THE SPECTRUM?

I don’t identify as being on the spectrum, but to me there are clear signs that I might be and I recognise that I might be neurodivergent. I first began to question this when I discovered PDA and started implementing strategies for my undiagnosed son. It was like a switch went off inside me and I had realised how rigid and inflexible I had been over parenting him and could see no other way other than “the right way to parent”. However, as the switch went off, my ability to see and feel what was going on for my son became intensely real. In understanding him I was starting to understand myself, and I could empathise and resonate with him to a deep deep level based on my own experiences and emotions growing up. I saw my own demand avoidance, and the internal struggles I always had with having to do things and my need for control and the anxiety and panic that came without it. When I started to see myself in what I was understanding in my son, it felt like a massive wall came down and that I could stop trying to be what I thought I needed to be, and just be me! It felt like a massive relief.

I don’t remember a huge amount from when I was young that would either support or reject the idea that I might be on the spectrum but there are a few things that I do. I remember, and my mum recalls “the knicker saga”, where I would find wearing knickers intolerably uncomfortable unless they were one particular type from one particular shop. There was one time that I was complaining about them so much that my mum must have become really frustrated with me and told me to “just take them off then”…… and so I did, in the middle of the street. Another thing my mum tells me is that I was terrible to get to sleep at night. I don’t remember this myself or at what stage if at all this got better, but I do remember as an older child and adult always struggling to switch off and would lie awake for hours on end. I would occupy myself with vivid and intense role play in my head entering myself as a character into a TV show I was enjoying and each night while I was trying to go to sleep I would continue the story from where I left off the previous night.. I also have a vague memory of a few times I became so overwhelmed and upset that I just cried and cried for what felt like hours lying face down on the floor. The feeling was intense and I felt distraught over whatever it was at the time, but all of a sudden I would stop and have no recollection over what I was upset about, get up and carry on as normal. Was this a meltdown? I have certainly had meltdowns behind closed doors as an adult, although I am only just starting to recognise them for what they were. Becoming so overwhelmed and stressed that I would lose control completely, get angry and scream and shout and cry. I also recognise that I have and have had shutdown’s which is an alternative response to meltdowns. I have to sit quietly and do nothing and just switch off. I can’t tolerate being asked things or doing things during this time and almost zone out from the world until I am recovered.

Eye Contact is also something I struggled with massively, although I am not sure if it was noticed by others. I found it intolerable to make eye contact as it used to make me feel so uncomfortable and tense and so I used to avoid it. As I grew up especially towards leaving school we were told about the importance of making eye contact in interviews and so I would practise forcing myself to make eye contact to come across better. These days I don’t find it so hard but then I have had years of practise now. I am now the other way where I am never too sure if the amount of eye contact I am making is too much or a bit weird…

When it came to friendships and social situations, again I can’t remember much from young childhood. I do know that I have always had friends, but I think it was usually one special friend at a time rather than a group. I remember always feeling intense emotions in those friendships even into adulthood, almost obsessive perhaps but it didn’t feel in a bad way from where I stood. I loved my friends so much, but I know I found it very difficult and felt very rejected if and when they didn’t want to play with me anymore, or if they wanted other friends too. I remember one occasion where my “best friend” in primary school at the time, who I played quite intense role play with every lunchtime, orchestrated an intervention from two other girls from our class to come and invite her to play I think to get her out of playing with me. Perhaps she’d had enough but I never understood it when people stopped wanting to play with me. In secondary school, I never really felt that I fitted into any of the social groups. I found them weird and not like me at all. I was friendly with almost everyone but never felt like I fitted in really with any of the groups. Again I tended to have one or two very close friends at a time. I still feel like this into adulthood. The usual social gatherings that people do I find intensely draining especially the social chit chat over what I consider to be nonsense. I feel like I have to pretend to be something I am not, and it feels fake. However, around people I have known for a long time and who know me for who I really am, I really really enjoy spending time with them and sharing our weirdness together. I don’t necessarily avoid social situations with others, but with those where I can’t be my true self, they exhaust me and require huge effort. I am much better one to one with people I don’t know so well. Parties were also a thing I hated (well before I discovered alcohol anyway). The idea of entering a group situation and meeting people I might not know made me feel so anxious. I hated small talk and would stand out of the way to avoid it and having to speak to someone new at all costs. Alcohol for me was a tool for being able to access social situations more easily. We all know that alcohol reduces inhibitions which made it easier for me to socialise and speak to people. I don’t feel that I need it now in order to be sociable, but then I do take anxiety medication now which probably alleviates some of the barriers I might normally feel.

Obsessions is something that I know I experience and once I get an idea or interest in my head I go at it obsessively all day everyday. I talk about it all the time and it gets in the way of me doing normal day to day stuff, even though I know I need to feed my kids for example …lol (They do always get fed albeit it sometimes later than it should be as i just HAVE to finish and can’t stop what I am doing) These obsessions are intense and carried out to the very best of my ability and I love creating and collecting information and logging data about them. I don’t think they have ever been about anything too abstract, but they definitely do take over my life, and then after a period of time, sometimes weeks, sometimes months or years, “poof” its out the window and I am onto something new.

One of the questions I always ask myself when considering whether I am on the spectrum, is “if I am on the spectrum, how did I make it through school without support or being noticed?” I know that in females masking is common but could I really have masked so well all that time? I remember finding primary school easy and enjoyable, although mum will say that I was a nightmare to get in on time. I never really got into trouble. I was a people pleaser and wanted to be the teachers pet. Overly helpful and overly compliant (I think). Secondary school was a huge step up. I did find it all very overwhelming with the amount of work and effort that was required and the homework. It always felt too much and that I was just scraping by. Not academically so much , but scraping by in terms of my energy to sustain keeping up the level of effort required. I always remember doing the absolute minimum in terms of homework, often catching up in a rush last minute in tutor time or at the start of a lesson. Somehow I managed to wing it all the way to year 11 and come out with 9 G.C.S.E’s. A-levels was where the wheels started to fall off. I think I was exhausted from school, and there felt like a lot of pressure to continue. I desperately wanted to be a vet and so I needed to do certain A-Levels but it soon became apparent that I couldn’t keep up the increased effort that was needed, especially as the work was challenging my academic ability as well. I remember dropping a subject, and then really really struggling to attend and not being able to face going into school. I think it had all got too much and I wanted to get off the A-Level train. I distracted myself and found respite in friends, alcohol and weed, and although I did complete my A-Levels I did not do as well as perhaps I should have. I was however thrilled to say goodbye to education and enter the world of work.

Supporting my children and learning about autism and PDA has been a journey of self discovery too, and I am finding that I am much more self aware and understanding of myself and my needs and I do felt like I fit into the SEN world much better than the “real one”. However I am well aware that my own experiences have not been as challenging as my children’s or others who identify or are diagnosed as being on the spectrum and it is for this reason that I question whether I really am or not. The online tests I have done multiple times suggest that I am on the spectrum and borderline as to whether I am PDA or not. (See below). I don’t think it really matters to me whether I am or I am not, and I don’t see that having a formal assessment or diagnosis will benefit me so it is not something I am looking to pursue. I’m fairly happy in the knowledge and self awareness that I have, and that as an adult I can now be truly myself having found my tribe.