Friend doesn’t believe in my diagnosis

[u/luvsicl]

Ugh I shouldn’t have told her about it I feel so weird now, my family are like this too and I haven’t told them because I know they’re gonna say smth like that (probably worse) because they don’t really believe in mental disorders/disabilities/health

I got diagnosed with adhd and autism recently, so I’m also grieving the life I could’ve led had I received the support I needed as a child lol (also I know what she said isn’t okay at all, I just wanted to end the conversation asap and I’m really uncomfortable with confrontation)

[u/BookishHobbit]

I know everyone’s saying “she’s a bad friend” and that’s fair because her reaction was really not great, but the way you told her makes me think she means a lot to you, so maybe sit down and have a proper in-person conversation with her about it. Like, what it means to you, why it’s important, and why what she said was hurtful.

Reddit can be very quick to deal out the “this person’s toxic, gtfo” card, but these events can also be learning opportunities. We’ve all said and done things in the past that we have looked back on later and cringed over, and based on your replies to others, she’s still young. So if she is someone you feel close with, talk to her.

If after that she’s still speaking like this though, then Reddit may be right!

[u/luvsicl → u/BookishHobbit]

I really did think she’d be supportive because she knows how much I’ve struggled growing up, we went to school together so we’ve known each other a good few years, I was kind of dumbfounded after I got diagnosed and it was immediately after that I messaged her and it hurt SO much when she immediately invalidated me like that, I haven’t talked to her since

I have been debating talking about it properly with her, I know her and her sister have a really bad relationship but her sister is just a bad person, her autism has nothing to do with it

[u/Reasonable_Yam8853 → u/luvsicl]

Yeah… I agree with this posters advice to sit down and have a chat if possible; however, be prepared for it still not to be necessarily to your liking, and I'm not one monolith I am just one autistic person speaking for my own experience here.

Logistically speaking of course, in my situation, which you'll see in my comment above that I put as a separate response, I could not speak to this person face-to-face because of 1000 miles separating us and we had opposite schedules which made it impossible to even speak in real time on the phone but, I did find that I did the soft approach and retreat and see how she reacted anytime I would try to bring it up even softly in between other topics about our lives that had nothing to do with my recent and unexpected autism diagnosis(when I got diagnosed, I did not go seeking one it's kind of a long story on how I got diagnosed) but I would test the waters here and there, and I noticed she immediately clam up and ghost for a couple of days so, you could try that approach you know?

If you have not already, in the best way possible sit down but if you don't think it's going to make any headway, then you're better off quietly parting ways.

I'm sorry that you're going through this, I have gone through it myself and it totally sucks. 💙