#growing up weird

[kitshomeforwaywardsouls]

Finding out that other people, especially children, can tell when someone else is neurodivergent because they can subconsciously pick up on our idiosyncrasies and can tell you’re different and weird is so morbidly funny to me.

Like what the fuck do you mean everyone knew I was autistic and NOBODY bothered to tell me 😭

(here’s more info on that btw)

[nightndaydreaming]

Fun fact about me:

In 7th grade, I carved HI in the back of my hand with a mechanical pencil. I’m 28 and it’s still there

[miss-assembled]

[larphis]

Sometimes I’m sad that I don’t have many friends because I am quite the demanding creature and then I remember that Socrates’ ass was so insufferable to those around him - because he kept coming up with paradoxons and pointless philosophical thought experiments - that even the artsy kids were fed up with him which ultimately led to a poet demanding his death due to supposed blasphemy and his only few friends fought tooth and nail to get him out of it only for him to be so petty that he’d rather chose death than to bail out “if they all rather wanted to see him dead anyways”.

And that’s the point where I usually end up realizing that my own extra neurodivergent ass should be grateful because I have those kind of friends who would definetly defend me when being sentenced to death.

However, I am also the kind of person who most definitely would choose death out of spite, so perhaps the size of my friend group is reasonable to my character <3

[wild-at-mind]

Was talking to my partner last night about that thing my mum used to very well meaningingly do...she knew I had a lot of trouble making friends so whenever she heard about another kid about my age who was having trouble making friends she would try and arrange for us to hang out. I feel like the problem with this strategy is that kids who have trouble making friends are usually very, very awkward, and do not possess to social skills to alleviate the awkwardness of someone else. So you end up with two kids who are both being awkward at the same time and neither is able to help the other feel less awkward. I joked to my partner that you would have to introduce the kid who was not good at making friends to kid who was really amazing at making friends, which obviously in real life is not very workable (the concept of ‘pity friends’ is a not great thing for anyone). My mum is very kind and caring, and I know it must be hard for any caring parent to see your child fail socially over and over and be horribly upset about it. She did what she could. But kids in this position are more likely to stay in any friendships they do make even if those friendships are actually very unhealthy and are harming them. That’s what happened to me, she introduced me to someone when I was 12 who turned out to be very controlling and cut off my ability to make friends with anyone else. I will never know if without this person I might have formed actual friendship connections in my teens. They did a lot of harm to me and it’s really difficult to talk about that because they were my peer and also had been through some horrible things. I just clung on tighter because I saw how the world shat on my friend from a great height, like it does all kids who have experienced traumatic family breakdown. And yet in the end, my presence probably only made things worse. It doesnt do any good to harm yourself to try and save someone else, no matter how much you care about them. I really did care about him and I wanted to help and I couldn’t because the problems were vast and societal. I broke contact with him finally when we were adults, I assume this affected my mental health very much but I don’t know because I have no context for what my adolescent development would have been without him in my life. He used to say that needing people was weak, and so I believed it. (He obviously needed me at more than a few times but that’s neither here nor there.) But in reality, we all need people. We need friends and social connections that give us reciprocity and love. I do have friends now but sometimes I feel like I form connections too strong with some people who aren’t reciprocating. I may have mentioned this on here before but we talk about unrequited romantic feelings but not about onesidedness in platonic feelings, and I wish we did. When I’m in low times there are certain friendships that I mourn (absolutely not the one described above fyi!!) even if it’s been years, or I’m still in them and the other person thinks it’s fine but I feel so lonely for more closeness with them. I’m sure someone would helpfully tell me this is all normal but when you talk to people about this stuff, you can tell they don’t feel anything even slightly similar and are bemused. I don’t know what the solution is except to go on about it in writing so that’s what I do. And I don’t know how to help kids make stronger friendships or help a kid with no self esteem choose between being friendless but sticking up for themselves, or being in a damaging and harmful friendship.

[someonelovesyou2007]

Does anyone get this feeling? The feeling that no matter how much you try, you will never find a true friend, and no one will fill that void of loneliness in your heart.

[sunnshineyelllo]

Completely unrealistic. I don't believe it, I'll need inscrutable proof.

me? being someone’s type? unrealistic

[xxxjasontoddxxx]

I don't know if some people understand how alienating/lonely it can be to have autism.

That's not to say I'm not grateful for my online community and friends, but it's incredibly different from having friends irl you can hang out with and get real human social interaction with.

The rest of the post is under the cut because it's quite a long vent post. It's... A lot. Sorry in advance if you decide to read on.

Autistic children, statistically speaking, have a more difficult time forming and maintaining relationships with their peers, which often carries into adulthood. This is a statistic that does, unfortunately, apply to me. I have always been the "weird kid," have always been singled out or excluded, even by many adults in my life, because I exhibited traits they saw as "undesirable."

As a child, I went from being loud, curious, friendly, talkative, and outgoing to being withdrawn, "shy," anxious, and quiet within the span of just a few years during elementary/primary school. This was a direct result of other children's and even adults' reactions towards me. I got called annoying/obnoxious, weird, and "too much" by other kids and by teachers. The adults in my life, who were supposed to guide me, absolutely failed me. So I became quiet and reserved, and mostly kept to myself.

Because I became so quiet and withdrawn, all of my signs and symptoms went overlooked. I didn't even consider the fact that I could be autistic until I was 18 and off at college for the first time, during a global pandemic nonetheless. I checked all of the boxes, from childhood through adulthood: social difficulties/hard time understanding social cues or adhering to social norms, sensory sensitivity, heavily masking my emotions and actions to better "fit in" with people, obsessive interests, stimming, trouble with emotional regulation, meltdowns (which were almost always written off as "temper tantrums"), insomnia, difficulty with eye contact, executive dysfunction, and the list goes on and on and on.

Point being, the autism was completely overlooked because I was quiet and a good student. I behaved in class, I wasn't loud or annoying anymore, so no one paid me any mind. I was now "a joy to have in class." (If you know, you know.)

Another side effect of being rejected by my peers was learning to mask and hide the "real" me in favor of a more palatable version of myself, one who other kids would want to be friends with. And it worked, for years and years, until I stopped masking. I made friends as a kid, and we hung out and played, but any time I got comfortable with them and thought I could be myself a little more, my interests were deemed too weird/strange/boring for them, and I went back to hiding. One thing that always bothered me was that my interests were either too childish or too grown up, no matter what group I was in. I understood and was discussing politics by age 10, but who would talk to a 10 year old about the state of the nation? Certainly not other 10 year olds. Certainly not adults. A lot of my interests were like this, especially in terms of fiction. After all, who wants to discuss Shakespeare and Mary Shelley with the weird little kid who stares too much?

I spent—and still spend—a lot of time daydreaming. I would create vast, fantastical worlds, which I would often use to "escape" from reality. When I started consuming fiction, these worlds in my mind became fictional settings, and my adventures turned into adventures not for myself, but for the characters already part of the works of fiction.

By the time I hit middle school, it started to become popular to be in "fandoms," something I was actively taking part in for years already. But these fandoms were a place I could finally access online when I got my first smartphone. They were a place I could exist without judgement for my interests, where I wasn't "weird," I was a "fan(girl/boy)," where you could be a "superwholockian/hunter/fannibal," etc. I could be me.

And yeah, Tumblr.com was absolutely beautiful back in the day. It was fun and special, and it was mine. I had a community, a place where I could finally, finally be myself.

But... I was still lonely. I still felt this huge, aching, empty hole in my chest, no matter how many friends I made online. My real life friends (and I use this term loosely) were still ignoring me when I spoke to them, rolling their eyes at me, calling me annoying and weird when I tried to show them something I found interesting, only to turn around and show me the exact thing I had been trying to show them two weeks later.

And I couldn't help but think, is this how you're supposed to treat friends? Is this what people my age are supposed to do? All of the adults seemed to think so. So, it kept happening, and nothing changed.

And then, I met another "weird" kid. A girl my age who stared for too long, who jumped around when she was excited, who didn't like being touched but still wanted to hold my hand in the hallway, who liked the things I liked. We connected instantly, and it was like I'd met my other half. We spent more time hanging out at the park and talking about our cool new finds on Tumblr than we did in our own homes. I went from quiet and withdrawn to the bubbly, excited kid that I used to be, and she loved me for it. She loved how I talked for hours about something she wasn't particularly interested in, but would listen anyway because I was passionate about it. And I did the same for her. It felt like everything finally clicked.

That girl moved away during the summer and got a new phone number. But she changed how I thought about friendships, and it made me resentful and bitter towards the people I called friends for the way they treated me. I stopped talking to my friends, and I moved on and made new friends in high school, who... Ended up treating me the same way as the ones from junior high.

So I was back to thinking... Is this all there is? People who call me their friend, but don't actually care to include me or listen to what I have to say? Was that girl I met a fluke? Are there no more people like her? Like me?

And that vicious cycle of meeting new friends irl, thinking we click, and eventually getting ignored, excluded, and moving on, has continued even after high school, into my adulthood. All of my meaningful (in person/irl) friendships have crashed and burned in some way or another, or have simply faded out. And the fading out hurts more than anything. To watch someone you think of as a friend, maybe even your best friend, because they're your only friend, slowly stop hanging out with you, watching them meet new people and cancel plans with you to hang out with them, having them slowly stop responding to your texts, until you get to "we should hang out soon!" "yeah, definitely!" or radio silence.

After a while, it makes you wonder if there's something really, fundamentally wrong with you. Why else would everyone always leave? Why else would keeping friends be so hard? It makes you fear meeting online friends in person, because the very essence of you taints the relationships you form.

This is a pain I have never recovered from. I'm not sure if I ever will. My emotional and social development have been stunted by my experiences with my peers and their lack of compassion for me. To this day, I only have one (1!!!) friend I know offline, and she moved to Ireland at the end of December. So in reality, I have... No friends.

And I love my online friends—of course I love you—but it's different from being able to go to someone's house when you need comfort, or when you just want to exist with another person.

I don't have that anymore. And it hurts.

[lemonadeslice]

🦋 every single choice will affect your fate, and the fate of those around you 🦋

(redraw of these)

[nightndaydreaming]

Growing up I wasn’t allowed to cut my hair. I wasn’t allowed to wear pants until middle school and even then my mom would pick my clothes out. I have visceral memories of putting clothes in my backpack and changing in the bathroom when I got to school.

As a parent, my kids beg me to pick out their clothes because “I know what looks good”.

Maybe my mom just had shitty fashion taste 😎

[sunnshineyelllo]

Heh heh heh, whooo, that's a doozy. Growing up the weird annoying kid really sticks with you for life.

i knew from a young age i was weird and off putting and unlovable

[dysregulated-emotions]

Part 3

"Hi, it's me - I'm the problem, it's me"

"I never leave well enough alone, and trouble's gonna follow where I go...

Sounds weird, but it was a mix of these two lyrics/songs that caught me.

I am - and have always been - my own worst enemy. I get in my own way. I make mountains out of mole hills, blow situations wildly out of proportion, and create mass chaos for myself and everyone around me. Because I grew up "weird" I never learned how to regulate my emotions. I never knew what to do with my Big Feelings.

My therapist is delighted. We're making progress, getting down to brass tacks. I'm singing "All Too Well" in the shower and thinking about the last time my dad was my dad, when he dropped me off at college, before the Munchausen's took over. I'm screaming "Look What You Made Me Do" at the version of my stepmom I remember from when I was 17. My new mantra slowly turns into "I keep my side of the street clean".

I develop shingles (at age 38 WTF) and I'm miserable for 2 straight weeks. My husband comes home one day, sees me bopping along (loudly) to Mean, and doesn't say a word. Later on he tells me, "Of course it's annoying to hear the same songs on repeat like you've been doing. But that was the happiest I've seen you in weeks and I wasn't about to stop it."

I think that's the moment when I decided to let myself have this.

[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 4] [Part 5] [Part 6]

[aardvaark]

what you have to understand about sophie devereaux is that despite how she might first come across, she is deeply uncool. she is a theater kid and she’s also really, really bad at theater. she mentions her high school angst while beating the shit out of an assassin. she loves crime so so much. she thinks of life in terms of noir movie tropes. she struggles in all relationships that aren’t for grifting purposes. as a teenage girl she had a poster of a flight hijacker over her bed.

[coconutcoconutcoconut]

i'm doing a bunch of drawings of the main 4 (sometimes also alluka) camping in lukso province like slightly post-canon.... these are the ones that didn't really require much emotional sincerity to make lol (the other ones are hopefully gonna get finished later)

[sunnshineyelllo]

So, so often. Every time I figure out that people who I thought really liked me as a whole, imperfect human really only wanted a convenient warm wet hole, every time "friends" quit talking to me or making plans until they need a last minute babysitter, all the empty platitudes from strangers only driving home my lack of any real, genuine connections....

I constantly feel like the most unwanted thing in existence

[pipskippy]

characters i have drawn just soooo many times i love you forever thena!!!!!!