Erroneous Judgments

We all view one another through lenses that warp what we see. Those lenses are created in many ways. It could be that the viewer has experienced trauma that has caused their view of everything to be impacted. Or perhaps you were assigned a role in the family (such as black sheep or drama queen) and no matter how hard you try to get people to change their view of you (as in, “Yeah, I was a drama queen when I was 6, but now I’m 58.”), their assumptions are practically hard-wired after all these years, and they can’t help but interpret everything that you do by way of that role that you never asked for. Perhaps it’s something as simple as the fact that you look like someone they used to know.

The most frustrating lens issue I encounter is when people believe they know you well, but they actually don’t. These people think they have a lot of information, but in truth, they’ve filled in the Grand Canyon-sized gaps with their experiences with you in the past rather than with your life in the present. They most likely mean well, but they don’t realize that their knowledge of a situation is mostly illusory.

For example, I was recently told by two people that I have been nothing but angry and depressed since my autism diagnosis, and that I’m going into a dark place, being defensive, and ruining relationships. I’m told that I’m angry at everyone because they’re not responding the way I want them to.

These are people who haven’t seen me face to face in nearly a decade. We’ve only had a handful of telephone conversations during that time. They have never met my husband, my dogs, or my friends. They have never stepped foot in my current house, and couldn’t even tell you the color of the car I drive. If someone asked them to describe my daily routine, they’d be completely unable to do so. And yet they’re concerned about the dark place that I’m in. It’s as if they see me as some sort of a cartoon character that is totally devoid of complexity or nuance. Gone to the dark side, I have. Need help, I do. (Note to self: think twice about giving them medical power of attorney, if you wish to avoid institutionalization.)

So let’s take their judgments point by point from my perspective.

Angry and Depressed Since My Diagnosis:

I’d actually find their opinions funny if they weren’t so absurd. First of all, yes, I’ve struggled with depression my entire life, and they know this. What they can’t see is that ever since I left Florida, my depression has taken up a heck of a lot less space in my life than my joy and my contentment have. That’s the God’s honest truth. Yes, I have good days and bad days, and perhaps I reach out for solace and support more during the bad ones, but that doesn’t mean that I’ve condemned myself to a life as Eeyore’s identical twin.

I have the full range of emotions, even those that our culture has deemed to be negative. Yes I get angry, depressed, sad, irritated, stressed out and confused. But I also experience love, admiration, joy, contentment, enthusiasm and curiosity. Frankly, I’d be more concerned about people who don’t have access to their “negative” emotions, because they’re still inside of them, believe you me. They just stuff them down and they then come out in strange and unpredictable ways.

I was actually rather shocked at my critics’ sweeping assessment of my mental health. I can’t imagine where it’s coming from. The only slices of my life they see are from Facebook, this blog, and the things I choose to share with them during the 0.0001 percent of my life when we’re phoning or texting. One of them, as a teen, accused me of having a “Joyless, f**ked up existence,” and since I was still living in Florida, that was probably true, but I’m wondering if they’re filling in the information gaps with the life I had back then. I have no idea.

On Facebook, I mostly post images of nature, political rants, environmental concerns, pictures of my dogs, travel experiences, and pictures of the fun things I do with Dear Husband. Yes, I am freakin’ angry about the political state of this planet, and really scared and frustrated about the fact that nothing seems to be happening to mitigate Global Climate Change, but who doesn’t feel that way? The rest, the more intimate stuff, is mostly positive or at least relatively innocuous.

I must admit that I do a fair bit of ranting on this blog. No doubt about it. When I first started blogging, I intended to steer clear of politics, but who was I kidding? I find it nearly impossible to keep my opinions to myself. And the political scene has been pretty insane since 2016, so talking about it is akin to harvesting low hanging fruit. And when you pump out as much content as I do, low hanging fruit is highly appealing.

Another thing about these blog posts is that if the topic is not time sensitive, I tend to write these things about 2 weeks before I post them. That gives me time to edit and also solidify my thoughts on any given subject. That, and having so many posts waiting in queue means that if I go on vacation, have a health issue, or some sort of emergency comes up, I can get away with not blogging for a brief period. So, if I seem despondent or frustrated in a blog post, worry not, dear reader. It’s a safe bet that I’m in a different head space in real time.

Being Defensive:

There’s a fine line between explaining oneself and being defensive. I’m frequently misunderstood, so I tend to do quite a bit of explaining. And in my opinion, people who claim someone is defensive can only think that if they are accusing someone of something that might cause that person to feel the need to defend themselves. If I am explaining myself and someone else turns it into a fight, I have no control over that.

Another thing I do on this blog is get vulnerable in the extreme. I will talk about things here that most people would hesitate to bring up to their best friends. I’ve never had a filter, so vulnerability for me doesn’t feel quite as vulnerable as it might for the average person, and the older I get, the less I seem to care about what people think of me. (That’s one of the upsides to aging.)

But I do tend to push even my expansive boundaries. I do that for an important reason: people take comfort in feeling less alone. Everyone wants to be seen, heard, and related to. When someone contacts me and says that one of my posts really resonated with them, and/or it made them feel slightly less uncomfortable in their own skin, that makes my entire decade. I think of these posts as little messages in bottles. I set them adrift and hope they’ll wash up on a shore where encouragement is desperately needed. Sometimes they float around for about a decade before reaching their home port. But sooner or later they seem to get there. It’s really amazing.

So I will continue to speak for people who may not be willing to speak for themselves. I’ll also speak up to increase understanding of who I am and why I feel the way I feel. That’s not being defensive. That’s explaining.

Ruining Relationships:

The fact that these two people are concerned about me makes me think that they believe I’ve taken a turn for the worst. And the only radical change in my life that I’ve had recently is my autism diagnosis. Overall, it has been the best thing that has ever happened to me, in terms of gaining self-knowledge. That’s why I tend to blog about it so much.

It also has given me a great deal of insight about others. One thing I’ve discovered is that people don’t like it when you deviate from the role that they’ve assigned to you. It rattles their cage. They feel forced to reframe every interaction they’ve ever had with you in light of this new perspective, and frankly, not everyone has the energy to do that. I get it. People don’t like change, as a general rule.

Whenever I’ve taken a sharp turn on my life’s path, I’ve lost a few friends, and gained a few others. It happened when I went away to college. It happened when I moved from Florida to Washington State and, for the first time, threw off the yoke of poverty. It happened when I got married. (That one took me by surprise.) And it is certainly happening now that I identify as an Autistic American.

The only relationship that I can think of that has been “ruined” of late is the relative of mine that was so shaken by this diagnosis of mine that they haven’t spoken to me in 10 months. It hurts. It makes me sad. But it is not my doing. In fact, I’ve explained several times to one of my critics that this silent treatment thing only goes one way. I’ve made it a point to tell Muty McMuteface on multiple occasions that if she ever wants to talk to me, I would like that. I intend to remind her of that periodically. That’s all I can do. So if my two critics think I took any part in the “ruin” of that relationship (especially since they don’t speak to her either!), there’s nothing I’ll be able to do to disabuse them of that notion.

A few other relationships experienced growing pains due to my diagnosis, but things have since settled down. Throwing a heaping helping of paradigm shift at people will sure show you who your friends are, and who you can count on. It’s sort of like a colon cleanse. It purges you of a lot of toxins.

Angry at people for not responding the way I want them to:

The more I’ve learned about my autism, the less confused I have become about who I am. I used to waste a great deal of energy wondering what was wrong with me, and why I couldn’t be like everyone else. It’s quite liberating to find out that there is nothing wrong with me. I just have a different processing system. I have different weaknesses, but I also have different strengths. I’m not sick. I don’t need to be cured. I’d just like to be understood. (See explaining, above.)

Now that more puzzle pieces are in place, I can see how much I mask my autism. That (combined with the natural aging process and my weird work schedule) is why I am so exhausted all the time. In an effort to seem normal, I have been in a perpetual wrestling match with who I am for almost 60 years. I’m no longer willing to do that, but it is a lifelong habit that will take some practice to set aside. Sometimes I’m clumsy in my execution, but that’s to be expected.

And yes, I sometimes get irritated with the fact that I now see the microaggressions that people aim at autistic people on a daily basis. I took those microaggressions in when I didn’t know about my autism. I owned them. I assumed they were proof that I was weird and unrelatable. Now those microaggressions seem to bounce off me and turn into disappointment that people can be so unconsciously or consciously cruel.

That only makes me want to explain myself more, in the hopes that someone will either get it, or relate to it and gain comfort from it. So, yeah, it bugs me when people don’t respond the way I want them to, especially since the need for predictability is a huge factor in my autism. But you know what? That’s life.

So, pardon my dust. I’m under construction. And because of that, you may want to wear a hard hat around me, just to be on the safe side. If that makes me seem angry or depressed or destructive or defensive, all I can say is that that’s your interpretation, based on extremely minimal information.

My life is messy and ever-evolving, and my construction site may be in a bit more disarray than most people’s, due to massive renovation, but the bottom line is that I’m doing just fine. You may not like what I’m building here. That’s okay. While I am willing to explain my design if you’re interested, how you choose to respond to it is completely up to you. Namaste.

The ultimate form of recycling: Buy my book, read it, and then donate it to your local public library or your neighborhood little free library! http://amzn.to/2mlPVh5