How I Was Treated Like Trash for Being an Autistic Person

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Hi. This is a post I've been wanting to get off of my chest for a while now, as it concerns my life up to this point, how I feel it flat out sucked at times, and where do I go from here; how will I heal from all that's been forced upon me growing up and be able to be a functioning member of society?

To begin, I was diagnosed autistic at the age of 2. This was only a few years after the Wakefield study, and that combined with having religiously psychotic parents makes me feel like I rolled some really crap dice. Not just religious psychosis but folks obsessed with alternative medicine and diets as a means of trying to "fix" me. Gluten and casein were treated as boogeymen leading to me receiving some bland and boring food growing up, even at the school level, and I was made to believe my behavioural issues were the result of that instead of just having crap parents who knew nothing about autism.

I was unvaccinated growing up and sicknesses were treated with homoeopathic medicine, essential oils, and prayer. I remember being really sick as a dog, many times, to the point of hallucination and crying because the sugar pills and plant juice weren't helping. I feel it made my ADHD worse and gave me some kind of genuine brain damage.

It also didn't help that I was dragged around to autism centres wherein my folks would, as they say, "LeArN fRoM tHe PrOfFeSiOnaLS" because they weren't able to think for themselves, and actually make their own goddamn judgements; not just to that but also church and social situations wherein I clearly was extremely anxious and overwhelmed in, and they just didn't care. I was forced to all of these things against my consent, against my will, because they thought that I wasn't able to be trusted on my own.

From a young age, I just felt as if my life weren't my own. I felt overlooked and like I just had to go along with whatever bullcrap was forced upon me. Everything from religious education like CCD, communion, and other Catholic sacraments, to being dragged around the mall as my sister got to try on clothes at Victoria's Secret, Gilly Hicks, and other places, but I wasn't even allowed my DS or even a quarter for the gumball machine. It taught me to dissociate very early on as a means of just, like, enduring it, and I will never ever get over the time lost to it.

Not only that, it was made worse because whatever interests I had, they were treated as obsessions to be used against me as punishment for "misbehaviour." Like, if I were to refuse to go to church, I would be punished by having the things that I loved taken away, like, my computer, my internet access, regardless. I became an atheist at the age of 13 and my father took it as incentive to clamp down harder on me by forcing me into youth group and church-sponsored track and field, further taking away my stuff if I didn't go.

They would make me work my tail off to earn my own things and then take them away anyways if I didn't subscribe to their god insane idea of who they wanted me to be. I let it be known that computers were my special interest, and they used it against me as a punishment in an attempt to get me to do what they wanted instead of what I wanted. The punishment never ever EVER fit the crime yet they would effectively bully me around into trying to be "more neurotypical."

This also ignores the fact that I had essentially a younger brother forced upon me when I was 6, and he was effectively treated as "the golden child" who could do little wrong, but if I "gAvE a ReAcTiOn" to him pissing me off, I was the one punished for it, and would be told to "iGnOrE hiM aNd FiGuRe OuT hOW To AcT bEtTeR aNd bE tHe OLdEr OnE" without any guidance on specifically how. It was used as a crutch to deny me my privacy and my autonomy. Oh and having my older sister effectively be a third parent to me? That's nice. (It totally isn't.)

All the while, it caused me to have mental health issues. I was suffering from severe OCD and it resulted in very specific ritualistic thoughts, behaviours, and methods of acting in trying to quell the mayhem that went on in my mind. I suffered from severe executive dysfunction and burnout that lasts even to this day because of it.

At the age of 15 a friend of mine began learning how to code and it caused me to experience severe emotional distress of being left behind skill-wise because I wasn't allowed enough time to learn as him! Are you kidding me? When I voiced these concerns to my folks, crying in church about it, they took me to the hospital as if I were insane, forced me on incredibly strong medications like risperidone and Prozac, and forced me into therapy sessions wherein nothing would get done, and then I would be criticised for "not applying what I had learnt."

Because I didn't need it.

I just needed the freedom to explore my special interests and not have them pathologised, and used against me; not being restricted, drugged, punished, and forced into therapy to be gaslit into thinking that I was in the wrong.

These clinics that they took me to were built for KIDS. I was 15 or 16 at the time! And the practitioners in them should not have been allowed to practice. They reinforced my folks gluten gaslighting and treatment of me as a science experiment. I had no motivation to do anything other than play video games with the limited time I had and when I wasn't allowed to be on my own computer that I paid for myself, I was further dragged around to do things that weren't in my special interests. Up until I was 17 years old. Hikes, more forced family outings, being made to help out on every errand, monitored with my phone and computer usage all the time with no privacy, made to be a slave, with no social life of my own due to the severe social anxiety at their hands. I now have to deal with years worth of memories of lost time and opportunities that I am never getting back.

I was on the meds for 4 years of my life. It RUINED my brain. It worsened my OCD and other mental illness and caused me to have some rather delusional thoughts about the world, about relationships, what I wanted to do in life or lack thereof, about a bunch of stuff. It literally made me dumber, and I was made to think it was MY fault.

The ritualistic thinking, the need to confess, the irresponsible use of my money on hobbies that never ever ever came to fruition, the tendency to hoard digital and physical data and goods somewhat pertinent to my interests, like retro computers and whatnot, but then again, nothing ever came of it. Even now I have a bunch of ESP32 devices on my desk that are sitting unused, because of the sheer burnout and whatnot, and executive dysfunction, because I was drugged in a way that specifically limits it.

So come college, despite all of this, I somehow get into a really good computer science programme. But that's when I had to meet people who have been coding since they were like 7 or 8 and have a tonne of prior experience on their resume whilst I had... nothing, all because I came from a background of just total abject anti-intellectualism and severe burnout and mental illness. The concepts came tougher to me than anyone else, and the grades I had in college reflected it. It gave me reason to resent my folks for setting me behind, not just that but the education system in general. In public school I was on an IEP for no goddamn reason which made me feel all the more othered in addition to everything else I had to experience, like it was on an institutional level.

I've not had any internship experience due to the sheer burnout and nervous system wracking and executive dysfunction from how drugged and mistreated I was, and now with this job market, I probably never will. Yes I did graduate, thank god, but no, I've not been able to find a job. Why waste energy on a market that doesn't even want me because I don't have the life experience I SHOULD HAVE HAD, HAD IT BEEN NOT FOR MY MEDDLING FOLKS.

A year ago, my mother got cancer. When the news was announced, I didn't feel anything. In fact, I kinda saw it coming with her continued consumption of alternative medicine and MLM products despite my repeated warnings about such that she shrugged off time and time and again. I'm not sorry, that crap is really dumb. I really do feel as if I was never heard, and as such will never ever be able to have a genuine relationship with my folks ever again.

They weren't willing to alter their lives to accommodate my medical needs, now I'm not willing to alter mine to accommodate theirs. Fair trade-off no?

It came to a head when I finally at the age of 23 I had an intense quarter life crisis. After all these years I mustered the idea to go thru my Google Photos and Drive, and get rid of all the photos I took where I was dragged around and treated like a slave, effectively, instead of being able to do what I wanted and having the motivation to do what I wanted to do and put myself first. And in reaction, I texted my mom these words:

"I hope you don't stay in remission. You made your hospice bed, now you get to die in it."

I could go more into every appalling detail of what has happened growing up, but yadda yadda yadda all this talk about the past and what has already happened, what do I want to do NOW?

Find a cure for my burnout. Get this referral to rehab psychiatry through and seen by someone who actually knows what the hell they're talking about. I'm already waiting on like 2 months to get this referral through, AND THEY STILL. HAVE NOT. CONTACTED ME. OR MY CLINIC BACK.

But back to what I want to do NOW, once that's done, get my career, skills, and sense of motivation and drive in order. Fix my messed up brain chemistry. Make as much money as I can, get the hell out of this house and go no contact, because right now I have to be beholden to the same stupid folks that did me wrong all these years.

It really does makes me resentful, and that I had to wake up and realise all of this at a time wherein the American dream is pretty much dead at this point; I don't know what to do!

It's crap like this that makes me FURIOUS at platitudes like "wE'rE aLL oN oUr OwN pAtH" and "cOmPaRiSoN iS tHe ThiEf Of JoY" and other DUMB stuff. I LITERALLY TOLD MY FOLKS WHAT I WANTED TO DO IN LIFE, AND THEY PROCEEDED TO DRUG AND KEEP ME FROM IT. I-- HOW DOES ANYONE JUSTIFY THAT-- OH MY GOD.

Yeah, this all has me thoroughly calcified and scarred for life, and I want to begin a new one about now. If I sound crazy, it's because I am. I literally had to uncover old documents from like 20 years ago that detail and contextualise a lot of the stuff about how I really do feel like I was treated like a SCIENCE EXPERIMENT, and they detail some pretty APPALLING recommendations.

*sigh* Anyways, yes, get my brain chemistry back in order so I can finally give up the video games and put use to all the ESP32 and RISC-V boards that I've yet to make some use of. Let me know what you thought of what was presented here, if I should make more content like this, and... hasta la proxima I guess.

I think you should write a book about your experience.

I've written several (unpublished) books about my social experiences with different people who have come and gone in my life, although I never specified any diagnoses in them. It's just entirely down to the reader to decide what could be "wrong" with me. My stories have a Diary Of A Wimpy Kid feel to them, being so I was a huge fan of those books and the movies and it inspired me to write similar about my own social experiences or misadventures. To me Greg is an undiagnosed Aspie, even though the writer never states this.

I can relate to some of this actually. Growing up in the 1980s and 90s, my family knew something was weird about me, but I don't think anyone knew what autism was then. Still, they made every effort to beat most of it out of me so to speak. I got relentlessly scolded for not making eye contact and stimming. I was put on the Feingold diet for a time, but I don't remember it. At about age 4 I was diagnosed with ADD (which I believe is not right).

I was in special ED from the time I was 5 until about the time I was 11. With this, I can kind of see why but also this really wasn't where I needed to be. Still, I recall getting on well with my other classmates mostly. I was put in mainstream classes in 5th grade. JR High was sheer hell, daily beatings and bullying were the order of the day, I still have occasional nightmares about it even at age 45.

I went through the whole Catholic experience, by about age 11-12 I decided that it was a bunch of nonsense. Still, I was FORCED to go to CCD and church. OMG I HATED IT! it was boring and just not pleasant experience. Religion to me is silly and just weird.

On top of the church thing, I was hardly ever allowed to truly do what I wanted or even steered in a direction of something I may have wanted but NO!! !! ! I was very content just watching my TV shows and playing videos games, being left alone. Which I had very limited time to do.

I was forced into sports, which I was awful at and of course led to more bullying. Gym class was public humiliation 101 and I was forced to do swim team, karate and track. It about killed me inside, I had enough BS with kids my age at school, and I had endured more of it outside of school.I would have just been so much better off if I had not had to do all that.

If I didn't do said things, then yes, I would get my video games and TV time taken away. I mean, I wasn't bothering anyone or doing anything wrong. To me, dealing with school was enough.

Then after high school I was forced to go to community college, I wanted to take a gap year or 2 but when your 18 and still living at home, you only have so much say over things. What I truly wanted to go into was quickly shot down and I was forced to go into business management. Which I had no feelings for.

Even still, if I had been allowed to go to school full time and finish, instead of having to work full time and go part time, I would have been better off. Which led to burnout and me deciding to not continue school. I ended up getting the job I still have today at age 24, so I could move out of the house and be on my own terms.

I'm going through therapy now and peeling back the proverbial onion on why I am where I am. I'm not 100% there but for once, I feel like I am starting to live life on my own terms for the first time although there are still limitations.

All I can do now is try to live my life for me as hard as it is.

24 is still young for someone with a degree. The job market is so screwed up in most places that you shouldn't worry about "not being enough" to get a job.

Good luck on fixing your mental health.

I find if it helps if I build things. The past few years I've been learning to play golf! It has helped a lot.