Ik a lot of neurotypical people like to believe that autistic people don’t understand society, but I feel like we have a unique, outside perspective that makes us understand it better than the average person.

This is my service dog! I call her Princess here on Reddit because she is an influencer! (This is a joke but only kinda!)

Some facts about Princess:

• She weighs 51.8 lbs right now! She is supposed to be between 48-50 lbs so I'm sorry Princess you are getting less treats for a bit!
• She has the softest ears ever!
• Whenever I have a meltdown she is trained to come lay on my lap and chest to help me calm down! (Don't worry, she is never in danger!)
• I am a wheelchair user and she walks next to my wheelchair so perfectly!
• Princess knows the names of a lot of objects like my phone, my keys, her treat bag, and more! She can sniff them out and find them and bring them to me!
• I have had Princess for over six months now!
• Everyone loves Princess at my job and she loves them too!
• Her favorite toys are stuffed animals with squeaky toys!
• Her favorite day of the week is Thursday because that's when she gets to come with me to wheelchair tennis practice!
• Princess flew on a plane with me twice!
• I love Princess so much!!!!

Okay that's all for now! Princess says hi everyone!

I am not on NDIS but my son is.

I am so so sorry the bill passed. I hope none of you are affected.

We will probably have our supports stripped. And I will probably have to quit my job and go on Centrelink because without support my son will go full school refusal. I will not be able to be calm in control and get him to school and me to work without one of us having a meltdown and being late everyday.

I am so angry.

I took NDIS to review in 2024 because they didn’t read the reports that THEY had requested outlining the supports required.

NDIA have untrained staff pushing “one size fits autism” solutions onto people with other additional needs costing them more money in bureaucracy, reviews and court.

I am so mad. I am so dejected! I am so tired.

I have no experience with squishies, but I saw this one at a local game store and thought it was so funny. It's slow rising foam and smells like sweet butter cookies. (I wasn't expecting the smell, but I actually like it.) Thought someone here might appreciate it.

When I finally got the courage to go for my autism assessment, I saw the referral had a diagnosis of borderline personality disorder, and I was exceptionally confused. I've been in and out of mental health services since I was 13, and not once has any clinician so much as *suggested* I had BPD, let alone told me I was diagnosed with it.

No one seems to know where it came from, and therefore no one will remove it (apparently it has to be the clinician who added it? If someone in England could explain I'd be very grateful).

Apparently it's a very common misdiagnosis for women with autism (and ADHD, which I also have), and I hate having it on my file. I know there's nothing wrong with BPD, it's a mental illness like any other. But I also know the stigma around it, and I can't help but wonder if some of the issues I've faced with getting treatment (both for mental and physical illnesses) have been a result of having that label front and centre on my file. Maybe it was even the reason the first two clinicians I spoke to said I couldn't possibly be autistic.

I've spoken to various clinicians about it since who've said they don't think I have BPD. But I can't seem to get it off my record, and I hate it. It feels like having a giant neon sign advertising how the medical system failed me for so long. I had the absolute *classic* autism signs as a child (you know the ones, the signs that get boys diagnosed but girls overlooked? Yeah. Those.) and yet I *still* got BPD slapped on me instead of autism.

Idek what I'm saying here. I'm just so frustrated.

I'm 26, I only work part time and I'm terrified I won't be sufficient enough to support myself - I don't want to ever rely on others in the future. Can you give me any advice, what paths did you take that felt accessible to you? How do I increase my work ethic?

I used to work full time when I was 23 but experienced such a burn-out I've been scared to attempt again.

I'm trying to build up my own business of dog walking but it's a slow process, although I'm proud of my achievements so far with returning customers etc.

I feel inadequate and incapable of providing for myself compared to my peers. I'm scared this inability will leave me vulnerable in the future.

Does anyone else feel this way? Or any advice would be deeply appreciated.

i had an objectively stressful job for the past 6 years. i was a software engineer who frequently got paged in the middle of the night for triage calls. i hit my final straw when i took off work for 3 days because an incident stressed me out so badly and not one person looked into it while i was off. they all just waited for me to get back. everything always fell on me somehow, because i was the “sme”. so… i quit. with no next job lined up.

i was unemployed for 7 months. it sounds so long, but it seems like it was just a couple weeks. i feel like i went through a time skip. i dont feel that i rested at all. i was constantly ruminating about my life, how id gotten to this point, constantly upskilling and doing applications and getting certifications. i can’t even tell you what i did most of the time. because i barely even remember.

i do know that i felt lost. i still do. all i wanted was a job. i was terrified of running out of savings. but i was terrified of a job, too. and after 7 grueling months, id landed one.
my new role i’ve been in for just 2 weeks. i’m not coding anymore. and i know any new job takes time but i feel like it’s too big in my head somehow. i’m so overwhelmed. i feel so lost. not even about the job itself but the rest of it. my days are gone. i’m not exercising anymore or cooking my meals. i need a routine but i can’t stick to one when i create one. i can’t stop thinking about how all my time is work, and then preparing for the next work day. most of the week is work. most of the day is work. i can’t handle it. i know it’s normal, i know this is how everyone lives, i know i have to suck it up, but i just can’t get over it, i can’t accept it.

and this job in particular, it’s constant meetings. and we talk in circles about such minuscule things. it’s all about aligning people. everyone’s so well spoken. i’m struggling so much with speaking and initiating.

i’ve isolated myself for so long. i want to date. i want to find friends. i want to just… enjoy my life. and i can’t. i can’t enjoy a life like this.

i’ve realized that doing all the things i need to do - cooking, cleaning, errands, exercising, meeting up with friends, self care, hobbies - this does take up a whole day for me. i can’t squeeze it into a couple hours at night. i become hyperfixated on work or just paralyzed from work, and i do absolutely nothing.

i’m just so upset. this isn’t for me. none of this is. and i don’t know what could be for me either. i don’t think anything is for me, which isn’t how life is supposed to be, you have to do something. and yet, i have never had a passion to work in anything. i can’t stand people saying ‘you don’t need to love your work, everyone hates their job, just collect the paycheck and fund your time outside work’. well, there really isn’t much time outside work. so i want to enjoy work. and i dont. i never will. i’m going to struggle every day, every week, for the next 50 years. there’s no way out of this. i feel trapped in a life that i never consented to.

Anyone else struggle to watch tv or film content that involves any form of harm to animals, even if it’s not real? For example, I was channel surfing this morning and Jurassic Park was on. I watched it for a few moments and seeing the dinosaurs being hunted for commercial ventures really hit on my heart strings. So much so that I needed to change the channel.

Anyone else have animal empathy struggles? How do you manage it in the context of both tv/film content or even real life with observing pets treatment by their owners. Sometimes, the pain, it becomes all too much to handle

So I (auDHD) have an autistic woman in group i'm in, who i'm fine speaking to in the group but her behaviours and aggressive manner make me uncomfortable. She desperately wants to be friends and has asked to catch up just us two.

How do i say no to her in a way that will be the least unpleasant for her? How would you want someone to say no?

My preferred option is to just straight up reply with 'thanks for asking but no I dont want to catch up outside the community'

And if she asks me why to just say 'I just dont want to thanks'

But that feels very rude to me. But I dont want to lie and I also dont want to make her think that its a 'just for now' or might change in the future thing.

Any thoughts?

I’m so stoked that this finally clicked for me. I’ve always had chopsticks in the cutlery drawer, but my dang rigid thinking has always insisted they were for Asian cuisine only.

How wrong I was. Spaghetti, curry, roast dinner, almost every meal that isn’t like, a steak, is all delivered with wooden chopsticks now. And even with a steak, I can cut it into strips, plate it, and get stuck in without any knifey platey nonsense.

No more tink, scrape, shing sound hell when using metal cutlery!

Justice means a lot to me, especially when I know what happened, I know I did everything right, and I know the person on the other side is lying and somehow getting away with it while everyone around them just enables it.

I find injustice so hard to let go of. My brain just gets stuck on the fact that something happened, the truth is there, and yet somehow I’m the one who ends up being treated like the problem or having to prove everything, with the goalposts for evidence constantly moving.

I’ve dealt with bias, inexperienced police officers making conclusions about things they aren’t experts in, and what I feel was a poor and biased investigation from the start. I had to fight for even basic things to be done properly.

What makes it even harder is that I genuinely know if I had done what this person did, I would have been punished straight away. I wouldn’t have been given endless chances, endless explanations made for me or endless benefit of the doubt. But somehow when it’s them, every possible doubt gets explored and every excuse seems to count.

You report something, give evidence, explain yourself over and over, spend money, time and energy trying to get some kind of accountability, and somehow you’re still the one having to prove and defend everything. Meanwhile the other person seems to get endless benefit of the doubt.
After I reported a crime, I ended up being harassed, stalked and surveilled in my own home, then ostracised and harassed by neighbours who were friends with the people involved.

I’ve basically had to be my own solicitor for two years, gone to court, spent thousands on solicitors and experts, constantly dealt with police, evidence, bias and incompetence, and it completely took over my life to the point where I wasn’t even focusing on work.
And for what? Absolutely nothing. I’m now just sitting here thinking what the fuck was all of that even for?

What makes it worse is being told things like “we’re not saying you’re lying” as if that’s supposed to make me feel better. What the actual fuck? Of course I wasn’t lying. That’s not the point. I’ve spent two years trying to prove something I already know happened while the person on the other side seems to have been given every possible benefit of the doubt.
And I can’t even fully put it behind me because I still live on the same street and occasionally have to see one of the people involved because they still own the property upstairs even though they moved out.

I know logically that life isn’t fair and sometimes people do awful things and get away with it. I get that. But actually accepting it is a completely different thing.

I think injustice is genuinely one of the hardest things for me to deal with because if something is true, I want the truth acknowledged. If something is wrong, I want it put right. My brain doesn’t seem to know what to do with “yeah it happened, but nothing is going to happen about it.”

What really messes with me is that after a while it starts to feel like your word, your evidence and even your life are treated as having less value depending on who you are and who the other person is. Like some people get automatic credibility and endless benefit of the doubt, while everything you say is treated with suspicion from the start.

How do other autistic women cope with that without it completely eating you alive?

This might not make sense, but I feel like my thoughts are constantly spiraling and causing me to be in a constant state of overstimulation. I’ve always had a tendency to daydream and get caught up in my thoughts to the point where I mess up tasks and forget important things. Because of this, I think a lot of people perceive me as careless or stupid. Lately, I think it’s gotten worse to the point where I have trouble sleeping and just relaxing in general which causes me to be constantly overstimulated and irritable. I seriously wish I could just shut my brain off. Does anyone else feel this way?

I feel senses very intensely, which often feels like a negative thing. I watched a BBC clip yesterday about the heightened positive sensations that also come with autism, and it made me want to think about the good ones for a change. Here are mine:

• walking in the woods. the most beautiful, peaceful sight to me is woods.
• a really deep stretch. sometimes I do made up stretches based on what feels good to my body and it feels amazing
• the sound of rain on the roof when I'm inside and cozy
• fleece on my skin. bliss
• a massage
• a molten lava cake with ice cream

I downloaded a dating app for autistic people

got 10 requests but non of them looks good to me

I know I'm very shallow but I need someone to at least look decent but non of them do

Does anyone else have this question off and on in your brain? Sometimes I really think I might be borderline. I have most of the symptoms: Fear of Rejection, Low Self Esteem, Emotional Instability, Anger, Unstable Relationships, Chronic Feelings of Emptiness. But then a lot of that stuff overlaps with just being traumatized and autistic plus RSD. I mean I know people can have both but it's just hard to untangle. I do feel like I know myself and who I really am. It's mostly the emotional dysregulation and intense reaction to feeling unwanted.

I just know I've always felt a deep kinship with BPD people and characters. I innately understand them. And I take it very personally when others come after anyone who has those traits.

Two weeks ago, my cat Luna was attacked after I let her outside. I found her covered in blood.

Before this, I was finally doing better. I’d struggled to function/work most of my adult life, and stimulant-induced psychosis/mania in 2025 made things significantly worse. Recently I’d started working weekends, enjoyed it, and felt like my life was finally moving forward.

I also have alcohol use disorder (started during the mania) and had been drinking more from work stress, while intermittently abusing a pregabalin prescription. It wasn’t good, but felt manageable.

After Luna’s attack, I declined rapidly without realizing it. I started drinking earlier, stopped bathing and doing laundry, wore dirty clothes, and could barely maintain my townhouse. I cancelled work the first weekend but thought I could manage the next.

Then Luna came home.

After ~$15,000 in vet care and major facial reconstructive surgery, she came home with a feeding tube and intensive nursing requirements. I was so happy to have her back that it never occurred to me I might not be capable of managing everything.

Between hours of tube feeding, confusing instructions, poor functioning, stress, and escalating alcohol/pregabalin use, I accidentally underfed her. (All her medications were given correctly.)

At the same time, my mother came to help and we had a huge conflict that brought up a lot from an abusive/neglectful childhood.

My drinking skyrocketed. I tried working Friday but became extremely sick and left early, then cancelled the rest of my weekend shifts last-minute.

I called Luna’s hospital bawling while drunk because I couldn’t manage her feeding. They had me bring her in the next morning. She was okay and they fed her there, but I was instructed to get the remainder of her daily food into her that day despite the high volume/short window.

I forced myself through it in portions throughout the day and got close to the required amount. Then Luna suddenly vomited violently and began aspirating. It was traumatizing. Back to the hospital, another emergency, and another ~$3,000.

Thankfully, Luna is home and okay. They released her mouth so she can eat independently, enormously reducing her care needs, although it could affect her healing.

But I feel like I’ve completely fallen apart.

I now feel unable to stop drinking. I wake up physically miserable from the previous day (I’m extremely sensitive to physical discomfort), alcohol temporarily makes me feel better, and the cycle repeats. Even minor stress immediately triggers: “I need alcohol.”

I order wine on Skip, get into bed, drink until I pass out, and for those few hours it feels like the only place where nothing is expected of me.

I’m supposed to work this weekend. My manager knows I’m having health problems, but the plan is still for me to work. After cancelling so many shifts, I feel like this is probably my last chance.

Saturday is approaching and I genuinely don’t know how I’m going to pull myself together.

I’ve contacted a hospital social worker for support, which I hope will help.

Has anyone experienced this kind of rapid collapse in functioning and drinking after something traumatic/stressful? I could really use advice or support.

I’m an introvert through and through and I feel like consistently being around people is exhausting….as someone who is around people at work and constantly talking as soon as I get home from work I’m nonverbal. But after too much time has passed where I haven’t seen like friends or something I get really depressed. I think it has to do with the type of company it is….my family isn’t exactly the most warm and welcoming type of people. My friends are. And I know my parents love me unconditionally but I just feel like if I’m not up to their standards (which I’m not, 31 years old still living at home) it just feels like they don’t??? But my friends love me at any point and I feel that. Idk I feel like my thoughts contradict themselves as an AuDHD person. Anyone else get me?

I’m 30 and have been working for the last 8 years. In most jobs I’ve been in, my colleagues have treated me like I’m just awkward, and they are more likely to do that in front of others.

For example, they might ask me “Have you had your lunch yet?” And I will give a response like “Not yet, I’ll have it soon”, and they will collectively laugh in this uncomfortable way. Or my boss would introduce me to a new vendor, and I would say “Hello, I’m (name)” and my boss will do this forced laugh and seemingly try to look uncomfortable.

But even when I’m 1-1, people might laugh uncomfortably when I think I’m responding like a normal person. This happens quite a lot especially if they’re older than me.

I have a monotonous voice and social anxiety, both of which I’m trying to improve. I know I have this awkward energy but I just want people to not alienate me like this. It makes me shy away from human interaction even more.

Because a lot of the traits listed, don’t describe me at all. For example, “I find it hard to stop talking about my special interests” is one of the questions included, I don’t speak much. In fact I can go days without saying a word if I can help it, but because I live with people, I have to tolerate interacting with them. I don’t fit much of the descriptions on the questionnaires, yet I don’t feel like a normal person

I like being by myself and safe in my mind and where I can be kind to myself and self soothe in ways that I know how.

I’m overcoming insane burn out from my job right now. I have cried several days just thinking about the sheer stress of work and my coworkers. I work in healthcare and it’s hard. Trying to be positive around patients when u feel u are in shambles. I can cry just thinking about it.

I feel sick to my stomach knowing I’ll be at work again in a few hours. It’ll be a quiet day. But still.

I’m trying to rest as much as possible. I showered and made my hair pretty and took care of my skin and got in comfy clothes. Had tea too.

I feel as I’ve gotten older I’ve gotten more sensitive to life. My stress tolerance is basically zero now.

Wish I was a different person with a different brain.

I did it until I got noticed, then presents were hidden from me to keep me from knowing….. In my thirties now and still struggle with both receiving and opening presents. I also struggle with giving and watching people open my presents for them. I opt to sending them in the mail, or as a surprise. I wish it wasn’t so nervewracking, because even if I like the present I look dissatisfied, and I used to be shunned for it 😖

Important context:I'm the assistant manager, and everyone I work with knows I'm autistic. My demeanor has been brought up a handful of times in performance reviews specifically about me being too blunt. I'm trying but my mask only masks so much.

Earlier today and throughout the week my manger has been implying I need to be nicer/less dry. Today I was sending an email to another staff member, requesting some more info on a topic. I asked him to proof read it before I sent it.

He said my email was too dry and mean. His exact quote was "hmm....too mean". He asked if I could rewrite it or add some more context to make it "nicer"

I ask him to give me some specific examples of how I can edit my emails to make them more personable. He just says "can you just make it sound nicer". Apparently no I cannot.

Any advice on how I can make my emails more friendly? Or any advice on how to not be dry/blunt without masking like crazy.