Self Understanding and autism

How do you get to know yourself?

That question may sound funny to older folks, we have experienced so much in our lives, if we don’t know ourselves by now, will we ever?

One of the things that happens when we learn of our very late autism diagnosis is that absolutely everything is seen in a different perspective.

We suddenly understand a lot of “whys” from the past. We can see how our autism worked behind the scenes in so many ways to cause struggles and how autism may be working in us today. We learn we have been conditioned to hide our autism, to think of ourselves as inept, perhaps think of ourselves as a loser, a bad person, a problem or a trial to others. Many of us hide from every day life and sensory input that can be overwhelming.

Many of us force ourselves to do “normal” things in order to please others (and we suffer from stress, distress, exhaustion, and multiple anxieties and dismay with constant pressure to “do it right” “stop messing up” and constant criticism when we fail to perform as others expect us to.

Many people who are recently diagnosed have felt lost and confused when they obtained diagnosis. “now what”??? “how do I stop masking”??? “how do I find myself beneath these assumed traits (from a lifetime of trying to fit in). ???

Don’t feel pressured to “take off the mask”. Some articles and discussions in today’s media give the impression that we must openly and defiantly be bold in declaring our autism and putting a new bold front forward. That may be fine for some. But for others, the comfort of staying quietly on the sidelines can be a comfort and a refuge. Social masking is not done only by autistic people.
Much of society in general conforms to expected “norms” in every day life. To get a job or get things done anywhere we are in public, we wear a persona, dress in socially accepted “uniforms”, wear socially accepted or culturally accepted hair styles, makeup, shoes, jewelry, and do socially acceptable things… we learn how to use “inside voices”, we learn to be toilet trained, we learn basic hygiene, we use social manners, say please and thank you, wait for our turn in line, etc.

Masking is useful to everybody in most societies at some level.

You can find your own comfort level about how far you are willing to cross social boundaries with clothing, manners, self decoration, behavior, or if what you are doing currently or have been doing all your life is right for you. You don’t “have to” take off any more of your “mask” than you want to!

Many of us begin to have better self understanding and can see patterns we developed as self defense in very early childhood (once we learn of our autism). Many older people ( born before 1980) were brought up with corporal punishment or verbal abuse as part of our every day lives, essentially the “old fashioned” form of coercive therapy, where you are punished for stepping out of line and doing anything that displeases the “powers that be” whether it was parents, your minister, your boss, the neighbors, unknown others. We may have learned to fear displeasing others at physical or mental/ emotional cost to ourselves. WE may have learned to please and appease others at any cost to ourselves to assure ourselves of emotional or physical safety, sometimes even before we could speak (see also trauma and autism for better understanding) .

We may have become self protective through aggression, becoming oppositional, defiant, resistant, or we may have developed other techniques for emotional and physical survival and self defense. WE may not be at all aware of these behaviors or their root causes until we understand our autism and how it worked behind the scenes, altering our understanding and our responses to the demands of others and the demands of every day life.


We may have developed unhealthy habits or turned to over eating, drinking, drugs, or becoming compulsive in many ways to help us through our days .


Seeing through the eyes of being autistic, we begin to recognize so many things of the past can be adjusted and changed, that we can step by step make changes in our own lives to make every day living easier and better, healthier and more in tune with our own abilities and disabilities.

This is the best part of self discovery and self understanding. We are not tied to the ways we have lived most all of our lives. We can change things to help ourselves move forward once we have this new understanding of how our autism affected absolutely everything in our pasts and affects everything every day in our daily lives today. WE can find and use self accommodations to make our lives better.

There are so many ways we can adapt our lives to our autism once we learn about our own neurology.

We might be overwhelmed by sensory input, or we might seek sensory input (or both in different ways and different parts of our daily living). We might struggle with physical limitations such as problems with balance, depth perception, hearing, vision, or gait.
As we begin to understand how our neurology gives us extra struggles (and also strengths in many cases) we can stop trying to live up to other’s expectations for us.

We can forgive ourselves for failing to meet others’ demands and find ways of doing things to help ourselves live better lives. We can stop forcing ourselves to suffer “every day” experiences that cause us distress just to please others.

For example it is almost impossible for me to watch tv, go to the movies, watch a ball game, go to a concert, go to the mall, ride a train or a bus, participate in anything where there are large groups of people gathered.
I used to try to do these things to appease and please others who enjoyed those experiences, but for me it was struggle ending in shutdowns, being sick to my stomach, headaches and deep anxiety. It was anything but enjoyable but I forced myself to endure sensory overwhelm in so many ways before I learned of my autism.

I have been able to find other activities and experiences more congenial to me and my autism, substituting dinner out at a restaurant for carry out to be eaten at a quiet location somewhere else. I can go to a museum instead of an art fair, I can go for a hike in the woods or at the lake shore instead of participating in a mass event such as a 5K run or a swim meet, a bike rally, etc. You get the point.
There are thousands of ways we can adapt our activities and our surroundings, the choices we make in our lifestyles and our clothing and “personal style”, and many small things we can do for ourselves daily to help us be more comfortable on every level. One small change at a time as problems, distress, discomfort, etc can become over a while, a new and better, more comfortable and peaceful way to move forward in your life.

Learn about your own worst struggles instead of forcing yourself to accommodate the demands of others no matter the cost in suffering for yourself. Find ways to change the things that give you the worst problems, learn about your own neurology and give yourself a break. Make self care a priority. If you need rest, find a way to get it! Adjust anything in your daily life that you can to make every day healthier and easier as time goes on.
If you find it a struggle and distressing or overwhelming, find “work arounds” to use instead.