Nihilist Cowboy

A Sick Man, A Spiteful Man, An Unattractive Man
2021-02-20 13:13:00 (UTC)

Accepting Autism

Accepting Autism

Over the last few days, I have been discussing my radical acceptance towards others. However, my acceptance towards other people has not translated into accepting myself. You see, self acceptance is much more difficult when compared to accepting others. While I can celebrate people overcoming adversities, I can despise myself for having the same adversities.

In the past few days, I have discussed my social failings and my odd ways of seeing the world. Growing up, I was the weird kid who had a hard time making friends so in adulthood I turned to making friends from around the world which as I said yesterday never exactly worked out in the way in which I wanted to whole thing to pan out.

There is another aspect of the story that has not yet been brought up. There is something about me only a select few know including my mom, a few friends, and a few coworkers. This could be a possible reason on why I am the way I am and why my life has been so hard especially in the realm of social life, friends, and relationships. Okay so here it goes: In 2016, I was diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Now before you cast judgement on me, just hear me out for a moment. Having autism does not mean that you are “slow,” have an intellectual disability, and regardless of what the media wants to make you believe, it is not a disorder that only effects children. I will say that at work I have looked for resources for some of our patients who have ASD, and while there are resources galore for children, once you turn 18 you are pretty much on your own. Your cute factor wears off and are now just a creepy adult. Since I was a child, the diagnostics have changed so much that I was missed, and there are probably millions of people who were either undiagnosed or were like me and diagnosed later in life. Most people with the disorder especially on the higher end such as myself do not have an intellectual disability or any other handicap. Many of us hold jobs that require a high level of skill and many have families and are “functioning members of society.”

By the time I was diagnosed, I already earned a bachelor’s degree, had relationships, was in a college fraternity, and worked several jobs. I knew growing up that there was something “wrong” about me, but I could never put my finger on it. By this time, I had a long line of social failings and professional shortcomings, but I did not know why.

By the time I was diagnosed in May 2016, I was still working as a part time building cleaner for $7.45 an hour even though I had finished with my undergrad degree the year before. My depression and anxiety were so bad that I could not do anything else. I would shut down if a random office worker were working late and decided to talk to the janitor. I would keep my head down, headphones on and avoided everyone. I thought I was too incompetent to work any other job other than cleaning buildings at night. After all, after graduation I applied for everything and to no avail did not get a post graduation job. I had a coworker who told me that I had so many similarities with her young son who was on the autism spectrum. I could not make eye contact, I was super clumsy, and just an all around weirdo. I met with my doctor and he referred to me a psychologist for me to get tested. The testing lasted 4 hours and consisted of multiple batteries of psychological testing.

My IQ was deemed to be in the “normal” range at 104, and I did not have any cognitive deficits except for my spatial reasoning being in the 30th percentile, which is common for someone on the spectrum. I was also diagnosed with panic disorder, generalized anxiety, and major depressive disorder, and was referred to a therapist and psychiatrist.

Over the next few months, I spent time with both my therapist and psychiatrist who both developed a treatment plan for me. My therapist was hard on me, she engrained in me that I was not a failure for having a college degree but making minimum wage and pushed me to do better. My doctor found a medication cocktail that started to elevate my mood.

After 3 months, I got my first job working in psych, a tech at a drug rehab for $9 an hour, and 6 months later I got my next tech job making $9.50 an hour, but with benefits so that was a plus, and eventually capped out at $12 dollars an hour a few months before I finished the masters program.

I mentioned that my spatial reasoning was a full standard deviation under where it was supposed to be when compared with others. This physical aspect of my disorder stunted my growth as much as the emotional issues. My coordination is about on par with a kindergartener. I was never able to play sports because of how clumsy and imbalanced I am. I was 10 years old before I could tie my shoes and to this day, I still cannot tie a balloon. I would get jealous over many of my peers; so many people from my hometown got jobs working in the oilfield and are making 100k a year or more and have never stepped foot on a college campus. They would be in their early 20s, own a home, have a hot wife, and it was all out of reach for me. I would get killed working out there. My clumsiness puts most technical and physical occupations outside of my reach. I got fired from my first job at 15 over this. With cleaning, the worst that could happen would be that I tripped over a vacuum cleaner, and that did happen quite a lot.

I could never work with my hands; while I always has this Big Tix persona, it was all a façade. I was LARPing being “manly.” It takes me over two hours to change a tire on a car, when I took apart granny’s house, it ended with me being injured several times including falling through a floor and smashing my finger with a sledgehammer on accident. I sometimes wish I could trade in all my college education to be able to work with my hands, to be “a real man” like my grandfather.

Bringing the subject back around to my emotional deficits, I have an extremely difficult time in judging people’s motives, and this is something that has got me into trouble. I am extremely trusting, so with many of these “online friendships” I let my guard down to let people inside only to be burned. I could seriously view someone on best friend level while they only see me as an acquaintance or stranger.

The last 5 years of psychotherapy and intense “fixing myself” has brought many positive aspects to my life. My paychecks have quintupled since my diagnosis, I can talk to people looking into their eyes, and I have exceptionally good working relationships with my boss, team members, and other coworkers. I found a profession that I love and could see myself being in this line of work for the next 30-40 years. I have even taught myself how to use some power tools even though I am not the best at it, I can use a chainsaw now and I taught myself how to cut down trees. I also taught myself how to use a drill to bolt pieces of wood together.

Unfortunately, I have not really found a way to cope with the aforementioned relationship issues. At this moment I am grieving the loss of a friendship from someone who I have never met and who lives a continent away. I trust too much and give people too much credit, and I let people in when I should not. The 13 year old Zach who just wants to be wanted is still there inside me trying to dictate my emotions.

As I said yesterday, I cannot expel people from my life due to always wanting to leave an “open door.” Just because the door is open doesn’t mean I have to be sitting on the porch waiting for someone to return who isn’t coming. That is what I decided I have to do in order to start accepting the fact yesterday. With two of these “friendships” I wiped our conversation histories from Snap and tonight I will archive any pictures that I have and purge whatever I have on my device to remind me of the person. I did my last “You will always be family to me” message which was opened but no response and that was it, that is all I can do. That is possibly the best thing I can do until I finally have the willpower to “close the door” by unfriending. I will always consider G and S the sisters I never had, but doesn’t mean I have to keep waiting around, wanting, hoping, and wishing that they would return.

I need learn to accept myself like I accept others. I must be able to get to the point where I am comfortable in my own skin, where it is okay that I don’t have the ability to work with my hands, and where it is perfectly fine to be the person who accepts and lets everyone in. I need to be able to reframe from “nobody wants to be my friend, and everybody leaves” to something else. I want to be able to embrace who I am, to know that just because I see the world in a different light doesn’t make me “creepy,” and screw all the people who want me to conform with the rest of the world.




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