Don't know who I am anymore?

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I feel like I don't know who I am anymore because I pretend to be some else than me all day long - so much that I'm starting to doubt whether that's really me or not.

I mean, I start to feel like I'm pretending to be someone else no matter what I do.

How do you know who you really are if you're never yourself around other people? I mean, isn't who you are around other people what's defining your personality?


Socialization is all a conscruction for me. But if who you are is who you are socially, then I don't know who I am, since almost all of my socialization is constructed.

I feel like I am seperated from this world. It's too superficial for me to feel it. I do it because I'm supposed to and I know it's best for me, but I don't feel it.

The thing is, if I was truly my (autistic self) I might not be able to be truly independent the way I am now. So in order to be independent I'm never really myself except sometimes, but it is rare. The independece aspect forces me to pretend to be someone I'm not. So who am I.

I sometimes feel the same way, but everyone acts differently in social situations, when they are with other people everyone wears a mask. I feel I have lost my identity since moving away from home because who I am is tied up in my house and family and I cant be completely myself outside of that.

I suppose who you are is probably what you are like where you are most comfortable

I don't really understand, do you mean that you don't know who you are inside your mind or you don't know who you are in terms of others perception of you? everyone acts, unfortunately which can be confusing but everyone acts differently in different situations I have had friends who are completely different with me than they are with another friend.

Hi franknfurter,

I think there are more aspects to it.

First of all, is who you are who you act like the most, or is it who you really think you are, even if you don't act like it most of the time? Isn't it your actions what counts as who you are instead of some idea you have in your head of who you are? I feel like the idea I have in my head is more the real me than the actions I take on.

Also, I feel like I participate in this world artificially. It's a too superficial world for me to be genuinely acting in it. Social interactions are really superficial, everyone just does what's best for them, people don't care about others because they do, the care about others only because they care about themselves. I play along in this social game, but I don't feel it as true because it is too superficial.

I feel that who you really are is the version of you that comes out around only those with whom you feel most comfortable, whether that's family members, closest friends, your pets or even just in your own company.

At the moment I can relate to your plight because the only people actually in my life right now are all strictly acquaintances and other people I don't really have a choice to have around me, and I "put a face on it" for that strata of person. But many people do this; it's sort of a protective thing even NTs do, having a different, less open persona for people who don't know them very well or not at all. It's called the circles of intimacy and it's quite accepted that you will be a slightly different level of truly yourself depending on who you are with and how close a bond you share with them.

The people I can be myself around and trust, are geographically far away, so, the real me only comes out in e-mails to them, and quite honestly, how I am at home talking to my cat!

But it's kind of killing my soul to always have the "For strangers only" persona on, and never get to be the me I am at home.

If you have someone, anyone at all, who you trust, the way you are with them is probably the actual you.

.

they are very interesting questions, ones that I really don't know the answer to, I think who I am is what I am like In my mind although my parents see that me no one else does. everything is relative in the end that's how I think, what is superficial when we don't really know what's real in the first place?

I care for my family because I love them, and I suppose not wanting to lose them is selfish but I also care about their welfare and if people upset them I don't think that is selfish. I think a lot of social interaction is superficial because no one says what they really feel a lot of the time, you wonder what people are really thinking In relation to what they say.

It's a theatrical life for me. Every day life is a live stage performance. When I wake up in the morning, my house is "the green room". I prepare and put on my costume and my mask. Then I rehearse my lines over and over and wait for my cue. Once I step out of my front door. The show is live and from this point on. I am expected to act like someone else and not blow my lines. acting and pretending to be someone else is very very exhausting work and once my performance is over and I can leave the stage and go back to the green room. I feel like a fish who has been put back in to the water. The moral of this story is. If you keep living a fake life. It won't me long before you forget who you are.

It's a common AS theme to feel biologically disconnected from the outside world, but I think the perceived loss of your identity comes into play as a side effect of this phenomenon on social interaction. Socially, you may be an outlier, but this concept can be scaled down to cells on a slide; the one at the edge isn't observed as often, but each cell's juxtaposition determines the identity of the rest, particularly if they came from elsewhere. Likewise, your identity is inclusive of everyone who's had any effect on you, the more friends you come in contact with, the more you'll notice yourself accounting for their statements and actions. Since I realized this, my own self image has been more independently formed, but I've also felt more aware of it when I'm around people who affect me.

I'm like LupaLuna. I put on a show every time I leave my apartment. Interestingly, today I'm being evaluated. Over the years I've learned to suppress the real me so well that I appear normal to the naked eye. It takes a while of being around me to see the real me, but that could take an hour to a few days.

Last edited by redrobin62 on 15 Oct 2013, 7:02 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I have this feeling. I'm not really living the life I was meant to live.

But you have to be independent, and to accomplish this you basically have to adopt an NT personality, which is not yourself.

You have to become more social than you are to live a somewhat normal life.

Can you feel any genuine feelings when you suppress the real you to that extent?

I seem to be unable to.

I used to be able to feel, but these days it's just a blank. I try not to put on show anymore because I feel that I have almost lost myself. But sometimes you have to (like robin says.)

Many an aborigine's mistaken for a tree, 'til you near him on the motorway.

I went through this a few years ago.

I've gone through a similar but shorter experience recently.

It's not unusual for autistic adults to realize they don't know who they are, and have to pick up the pieces afterward. I'm not sure how many do, but I've at least heard of similar statements by others.

it took me 45 years to begin to have any sense of myself as an individual.

i think NTs struggle with this too. i just think many of them never really identify it because they are more naturally social and adapted to group-think. but i think a lot of mid-life crises are related to this question. e.g. suddenly on some level you realize you've been living out a "script" given to you and it isn't giving you the results you actually want (meaning, happiness, whatever).

it may have taken me a long time to get here, but now that i am at this point in my life, i'm quite enjoying it.

I have no idea what a mid-life crisis is supposed to feel like. I'm in my mid 40s.