Man I Wish People Understood How Much It Sucks Ass To Be Neurodivergent And Trying To Find The Middle

man I wish people understood how much it sucks ass to be neurodivergent and trying to find the middle ground where people like/tolerate you. like, I'm either "boring" (trying to wait my turn in conversations, holding space for other people, taking a back seat to let others get some spotlight) or "too much" (too loud/talking too much, getting excited to share, trying to participate in group conversations/activities). No one really talks about how much of being neurodivergent is just sort of trying to make yourself palatable.

I feel like so much of my life has been spent trying to find this effortless sort of middle ground everyone else seems to automatically already know, and I'm always swinging too far one way or the other. I'm lucky to have neurodivergent friends who grok me, but goddamn I wish that I could just like, exist without the constant background script in my brain that's like "you're being too loud. You're not talking enough. you're being self-centered. you're being boring. you're wrong, you're wrong, you're wrong." I feel like I'm back in high school trying to make friends but stuck as the eternal "weird kid"

it's just... lonely and sucks bad.

Seeing all white ebackground ads as someone who relies on darkmode or sunglasses to look at phone is very unhelpful

my physical form is throwing error message after error message

Autistic people who grew up undiagnosed may act in ways that seem nonsensical for an autistic person. They aren't any less autistic.

Autistic people who grew up undiagnosed may give advice that's completely useless for autistic people because it's the same advice that's been given to them and they never figured out why it's useless.

Autistic people who grew up undiagnosed may refuse to take things literally and instead insist on finding hidden meanings in everything because they grew up being expected to pick up on hidden meanings and never figured out why that's unreasonable.

Autistic people who grew up undiagnosed may judge people for acting visibly autistic because they grew up being judged for acting the same way. And since they never acknowledged it as an autistic trait and instead were taught that it's misbehavior, they played along.