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Autism: Friendship 1 (an anecdote)

I've been reading Untypical by Pete Wharmby, and something really resonated with me about autism and friendship:

"They may not be as 'constant' as your other friends: they may come and go at random, are often silent and might be away for a long time, rather like a pet cat. This is not a sign they hate you or don't value you. It's almost certainly because the way friendship works is different for us."

This hit home hard, because just recently I had a sudden debacle with a close friend concerning my supposed absence from her life. She was extremely upset because in her eyes, I rarely respond and have no interest in talking to her anymore. The entire rant I received read as, in my opinion, "You're a bad friend and you should feel bad. You are the reason why I feel like we're barely friends anymore, because you never talk to me." It stung. I didn't know we had any issues, I've always kept an open door to communicate, I thought we were fine up until I received that message.

While she's not neurotypical, she's not autistic (that I'm aware of) and doesn't quite understand autism at a base level. The majority of my family and a good handful of my friends don't either. I've been very vocal about my autism and ADHD to try changing that. So I did the only thing I felt like I could do:

I waited over 24 hours to respond to avoid being overly emotional, and saying things that could be misinterpreted. When I did finally respond, I did my best to reply as gently and openly but firmly as I could (paraphrased, of course):

"Thank you for letting me know how you feel, but I wish you would have told me before these feelings exploded. If there's a reason why you didn't tell me, please let me know. I understand your frustration and will work on changing what I can, but I can't read minds and feel incredibly blindsided. I'm generally incredibly unaware of how people feel unless they tell me. The way you wrote to me sounds like you feel everything crumbling between us is my fault, and I'm a horrible, awful friend. I feel this is unfair that I'm being punished for something I was unaware of doing in the first place."

While we have a long way to go to repair whatever cracks are in our relationship, it brought some very good learning opportunities. Could I have been talking more? Yes. Should she have said this was frustrating her well before her anger boiled over? Absolutely. Are we equally at fault? I think so. A little communication would have gone a long ways here.

Autistic people can have a very hard time reading emotions on other people, especially when everything is just words on a screen. It just doesn't compute. This situation would have been far different if she had just told me "Hey, you're doing something that frustrates me. Can we set up a time in the near future to talk about it?" and I would have been very receptive. Welcoming, even.

I often go quiet for days at a time, as my social batteries drain fairly quickly. Seeing 20+ unread messages on Discord or 10+ notifications on my phone stresses me out, and honestly makes me avoid the phone altogether, but then people assume I'm ignoring them. I really don't mean to ignore anyone. I just come and go sometimes, like a cat, but my love doesn't change because of it.

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Fabric Softener

I was taught a few things about doing my own laundry, but one thing was ingrained in my head: You use laundry detergent and fabric softener. It is The Way. But!! When you use fabric softener or dryer sheets, they can make your clothes feel softer and reduce static. They can also leave waxy residues over time. Not only that, it can also reduce the absorbency of towels and other fabrics, and can leave residue on your washing machine or dryer. It can also mess with the fire retardant chemicals that are meant to prevent the fabric from being flammable. That's no good! So what can you do instead??

Enter distilled white vinegar! Distilled white vinegar is an incredibly versatile tool that happens to be used for more than just cooking. It can be used to remove stains and odors, whiten clothing, remove mild mold and mildew, and can get rid of the residue that fabric softener and dryer sheets can leave on clothes! It can also be used to clean your washing machine on occasion to power through hard water and other buildups. The amount you need to use varies depending on your specific need, the types of fabrics you're washing, and the chemicals you're using with it.

A word of caution: Many sources recommend that you do not use it every time you wash your clothes, as it can harm certain fabrics and break down rubber gaskets in your washing machine, incurring expensive repairs. For instance, if you're washing something with elastic like gym clothes, it can break down the elastic and remove the stretchiness of it. You should also take care to not combine it with chlorine bleach, as this creates chlorine gas which can be dangerous and outright fatal. Don't combine it with hydrogen peroxide either, as it creates peracetic acid (which is irritating and corrosive). Do your research before combining any sorts of substances just to be sure!!

If you want extra fluffing and drying action, you can also put dryer balls in your dryer. They come in different varieties including but not limited to wool, plastic, and rubber. They each have their pros and cons, and I see wool balls recommended quite a lot, but do some research before settling on one type just to make sure it suits your needs. Regardless, they help knock the wrinkles out of your laundry and helps it dry faster, cutting down on drying times.

I hope this information helps! As always, if you have any advice requests, handy tips, or corrections, please let me know.

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Sources: [The Spruce] / [Better Homes and Gardens] / [Healthline] / [Maytag]

Find me elsewhere: Ko-fi

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About, Intro, Expectations

Howdy! This is my first post on Tumblr! I intend to use this blog to spread resources, awareness, anecdotes, and all sorts of other helpful information regarding life (and subsequently navigating it while being neurodivergent). While I don't have a mascot or consistent theme for visuals quite yet, I'm choosing to start posting anyway and figure that out later.

About me: I'm neurodivergent (AuDHD, anxiety, a few other flavors) and I'm LGBTQ+. I'm a tech enthusiast and enjoy reading, watching YouTube, listening to podcasts, and watching anime and other good shows.

Why I'm making this: I had a rough childhood and left home completely unprepared to be an adult. I had no discipline, no expectations, no idea what life would expect of me and zero clue about how things worked. It felt like everything was stacked against me, and it became unbearable because I had nobody to ask. I was floundering. I'm fairly stable now because I've learned to adapt and grow as a person, but I think it's very unfair that a lot of people are going to end up in the exact same position as I once was in. I've taught several friends how to do basic tasks, and it's frustrating to find out how much people just don't know. Nobody deserves to flounder and feel hopeless, no one deserves to feel like a failure because frankly nobody talks about these things early enough. I don't care about balancing a checkbook, but creating a secure password for my online accounts? Searching for somewhere to live and how to tell I'm not being ripped off or worse? What my rights are in the workplace? That's the kind of thing I want to talk about, just things that would have been helpful when I was starting out. Of course, I'll talk about a lot more, but it's a start. I want this to be a handy guide for folks who have questions or just no idea where to start learning.

I have no plans to paywall any information because I'm not a guru, I'm just some guy who happens to obsess about finding answers, living well, and not getting screwed over.

Bit of an aside, and I'm not sure why I feel this is necessary, but I'm based in the USA so of course my tips and views will be skewed accordingly. What works for me may not work for you, use your best judgement. Please don't steal or repost my work, hyperlink to it instead. If you need to take unedited snippets, please contact me first. Nothing I say should be taken as gospel, do your own research first. I may get things wrong, and I'm open to corrections. I will also be tagging my posts so they can be sorted by category and more easily parsed.

That being said, let's do this!