Sould we 'be ourselves' or hide?

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All my life, growing up, my Mum taught me to 'be myself'. Myself is a nice person who just so happens to have autism. Part of me being me is rocking, being quiet at times and being interested in languages.

On the other hand my psychologist is telling me not to be myself. He says it is bad if people see me rocking or flicking my fingers in front of my eyes. He tells me no one will want to be friends with me if I am like that.

I have tried both options. Being myself makes me no friends and yes, people look at me like I am weird or something.

Pretending to be 'normal' also makes me no friends and still people look at me like I am weird.

When I pretend and try to hide my AS symptoms, I end up getting uber-stressed and overwhelmed. I suffer from severe exhaustion some days just by trying to 'fit in'. Why can't my psychologist (who might I add claims to specialise in ASDs) understand this?

What's your opinion?

I think you have to love the you inside enough to let that person have true, long term, legitimate happiness in life. That doesn't mean that's easy. And it doesn't mean every minute of every day will be a pleasure.

I think your psychologist is trying to find a way for you to cope with the larger world out there, and a way to get your inner needs for community and friendship, love and support met. Perhaps there is a middle ground to be found here, where you can learn how to fit in at times, as needed, and also express the real you.

All my life, I never knew there was anything wrong with me. I learned to pretend to keep people from noticing my 'weird' too much. At 40 I realized that my whole life had become a sham, that I played a character named after me, and I didn't even know the me inside. I'm glad you know that person. I just re-discovered me and I'm answering this same question for myself.

Still haven't found the answer, so I'm curious what others might say here. Yet, what I have discovered is that I can manage my activities and environment so that I have the best chance of coping in society, I can make efforts not to be rude and offensive (because I really DON'T want to hurt people) and I will make mistakes (so I have to give myself room to make them, forgive myself and do my best to recover). I've found that when I'm more forgiving of my errors, everyone else is as well. (Usually...not always...but that's the way life is for everyone.)

I say, it's AND BOTH. It is disclosing in a medium step, giving yourself a chance to observe the person's reaction, maybe giving the other person some time, and letting the conversation go to other topics as part of taking the disclosure in stride.

So, it's a step by medium step.

And making friends is just hard and happens in entirely unpredictable way.

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I'd get a second opinion from another psychologist. Don't fire this one necessarily. But kind of set him or her on the bench so to speak, as if you were a football coach.

I have also experienced the stress between being yourself and "hiding".

Ultimately it all comes down to what you want out of life, and whether that can be achieved by indulging in AS comforts like "rocking", or whatever else they may be, or whether it can only be accomplished by attempting to only do things which will make people consider you as socially "acceptable".

It's the same principle that you'd find in a video game. You can goof around doing things which relax you and are comfortable for you, but it may not necessarily win you the game. Usually you have to do very specific things which the game requires you to do in order to advance, instead of fooling around, whether the things it requires are difficult or not. And that's just they way it is. In the end it is your choice, whether you want to play in level 1 forever or whether you want to finish the game. Hey, sometimes a level in a game is annoying as hell and not even fun, but it depends how much you want to get the satisfaction of passing it or not. Sometimes beating the challenge is fun enough to make up for it.

Also, in regard to "hiding" not getting you any friends, maybe you weren't trying hard enough to "fit in". I don't doubt for a second that you did try, but some things are just hard, and maybe you need to try again, or try even harder, as difficult as it seems. It all depends on what you really want to do.

Also, when your attempt to "hide" failed, were you trying to act "normal" with people who already considered you to be strange? They might not change their minds, but new people could be a different matter, especially if you think about them first and the kind of people they are, and the best way they would personally like to be approached. Might be hard, might not succeed straight away, but you can always try again. You'll be in this world for an unimaginably long time and there's probably no limit to the amount of attempts you can make to retry with different people. Plus, if you're already holding the view that it doesn't matter if people like you, then you won't feel so bad during the times you fail, you can easily use that to your advantage so that you don't feel "down" after rejections, and can keep trying again without being discouraged by them, until you eventually succeed and get what you want.

I wish to respectfully disagree with this. In my experience, paradoxically, it works better by trying less hard.

And being open to appreciate others, that seems to be the coin of the realm as far as friendship possibilities.

Again, even more paradoxically still, when a person has put in the effort to eventually acquire the wisdom that one method works better than another (such as "not trying harder"), and attempts to make use of that wisdom, that is evidence that they are trying hard to achieve a desired goal.

Working hard to achieve a certain goal can still involve "not working hard", if experience has shown that this is what will aid in achieving the goal. It's also true that "not trying hard" may actually be even harder for some than it is for others.

Last edited by Invader on 23 Sep 2010, 2:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I'd rather be myself than pretend to like what everybody else likes.

That seems like a real opening. I love the idea of talking and thinking (even a little bit!) in a different language. I'm not particularly good at languages, meaning I wasn't good at junior high Spanish, although I did okay when I returned to college in my late 30s and took a couple of university Spanish classes.

Depending on what languages you know, there might be clubs, English speakers trying to learn that language and/or native speakers trying to better learn English. And you can just be relatively open, 'I am autistic, as well as . . . [these other wonderful human traits! just one facet of who I am as a human being]

I don't think it's a question of being myself or pretending to be normal. I think that successful interactions with people are more about learning how to communicate in a way that others (friends, collegues,teachers, family, etc.) understand what your needs and wants. If they can understand the what and why then they are more likely to respond positively. It's a translation issue. Aspies communicate differently than NTs (verbally and non-verbally, so NTs don't understand and react badly. To get an NT to understand we have to translate what we do and say into something that an NT understands. It's not changing who I am, it's changing how I communicate with others so that I get what I need and want. My eccentricities are an inseparable part of who I am and I can't pretend to be other than I am. However I can change how I communicate with others. It's like learning a new language.

And I guess we need to address that. You might be more highly motivated to stim than I am. Do walks sometimes help? I sometimes stim by playing with a soft T-shirt in my bedroom and pretending football or movies. And maybe I can kind of 'save up' to do this. To me stimming is kind of a time and place thing.

If you wish to work you may have to put up a front.

ruveyn

I think sedjat brings up an excellent point. And yeah, it is a little like learning a new language. And we may not be able to get 100% fluent, but we may be able to get pretty good.

And I tell myself it's about engagement, not conformity. It's about engaging with the world to make it a better place. And it's about engaging in others in real ways both respectful to ourselves and others (and this is more a dialogue of medium steps, and not a few big 'clunk' steps, that is, it is a dynamic process).

I tend to agree. Not that I stim much in public (or have much success with friendship), but the best NT act I could do was very strained, stressed, nervous, 'manic,' and I think people tend to pick up that you are not "being yourself," which tends to put them off. (And as Willard used to say (too bad he's not posting anymore), in the end, you're probably not fooling them as well as you think, anyway.)

Of course, the problem is that many people are not prepared for what "being yourself" really looks like. (That always confused me when I was younger -- people would say "be yourself," and then that would be a disaster.)

It's a tough thing to work out, but I think the answer is different for different people. If someone can pass as calm and normal enough NT, without too much stress, then that's probably the best solution for them. If someone else can't pull off passing or, or can't without getting physically ill, then they probably ought to focus more on finding more accepting people.

As far as the psych making the blanket statement that 'covering' is the only solution -- I don't agree. Not everyone do that and stay healthy.

I think this is what it's going to be, different answers for different people. And it's okay to try new things, and it's okay to make mistakes. In facts, mistakes can give you information. And I tell myself, let a medium mistake just be a medium mistake.

I think this brings up a good point. I can 'pass' as normal given the right strategies, which includes enough time off being me--having a safe place to retreat and recover. I see this with my kids, too. When they were very small, they would go to day care and their day would go smoothly, and I would hear comments about how wonderful, how thoughtful how mature they were...and as soon as we hit the driveway the meltdowns would start. I often wondered who these children were everyone else got to experience.

My mother explained it to me...they feel safe enough at home to misbehave (her word); I see it as feeling safe enough at home to be yourself. I think 'passing' is a good skill to have, and can mean the difference between an independent life and one that has those with ASD making a living in their own way. BUT, I think there always needs to be a place to come home to that is safe enough to stim or to meltdown or to hole up and take care of that person on the inside. I'm not sure I have that now...but what people are saying here is helping me put the pieces together. Cool.

Not being yourself can be sickening. I've tried "acting normal" and total honesty about my condition and neither option worked out. At this point I am honest about my condition but am very careful to whom and what I disclose to them. The most obvious stuff I'm honest about b/c I can't hide it. Look for people who will ACCEPT YOU 4 YOU.