Born this way: Achieved catharsis, not feeling any better.

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Hello there. Just a few thoughts I need to get off my chest, this could take a while.


It all started when I realized I really hit rock bottom: I found out that I was sunbconsciously injuring myself.
Nothing too bad, but still pretty disturbing. Waking up in the middle of the night while punching the wall hard enough to scrape some skin off the knuckles. Biting my tongue. Waking up with deep, self-inflicted scratch marks on my hand.
Upon seeing those, my first reaction was a half-assed panic attack (no complete mental breakdown, but I haven't been this upset in quite a while).

My second reaction was to reflect where I went so wrong.

And I remembered having a pretty good childhood, no problems socialising with others, while seemingly things started getting more and more of a "freak" during my teen years.

Well, I realized that wasn't actually the case. I've always been this way. An oddball. But it didn't matter, I was happy, and while not being the most popular guy all around, I got along with people and was accepted as "normal".

Never been the problem child in grade school or an outcast. There probably were people who didn't like me or hated my guts, but I didn't care. Not 'cause I was actively ignoring them, but because they were completely off my radar.
Looking back, I was already showing some unusual traits, being pretty blunt about some things, sometimes absent-minded, and taking some things very literally.
To a certain degree, I was living by my own rules and morals, but never the kind of person who'd challenge authority (although I'm not quite sure if I had a concept of authority at all). And my frustration tolerance was pretty low, but I was a good student and my parents were very patient and supportive, so the problems were miniscule.

______
It didn't really change that much afterwards, but socialising got a whole lot more difficult, and I started to care.

Case in point, the dreaded eye contact.

Do you know how you can tell extroverted and introverted aspies apart?
The extroverts will look at your shoes instead of their own.

Okay, jokes aside, eye contact started to become a problem. I got called out on not maintaining eye contact more frequently, so I actively tried.

Personally, it's not really physical discomfort, but it felt utterly feigned all the time. I felt like exposing parts of myself against my will.

That was the point where I started to realize I was "different". And aspired nothing more than being normal. For years.

Until I realized the ambition to adapt wasn't making me any happier, and apparently frustrating enough to make me physically hurt myself, although on a subconscious level.

Some part of me still strives to achieve "normality". Another, growing part just wants to accept what I am.

That's pretty much it. I've reached way more clarity about myself than before, yet I'm not any happier.
All I know is that I'd much prefer to be that kid again.
The kid that swam against the tide, happily and without any effort.

Hi Buggins! You may still need to go through the motions of "conforming" sometimes, but just try to be yourself as much as possible.

Eye contact is a big problem for many of us. I don't have any really helpful suggestion for dealing with that, because nothing has helped me with it. You can try focussing on the bridge of the other person's nose, or frequently glance at and then away from their face. Both of these may help them feel that you are looking more at them.

As for hurting yourself while asleep--something is really bothering you, but you are not facing it while awake, so you are hurting yourself while asleep. Once you figure out what it is, you can take steps to deal with it.

Hope that helps some.

Thanks for your support. Yeah, definitely trying, but that's not easy if being yourself can be so frustrating.

I mean, I've pretty much scored a jackpot in life-lottery, being born in one of the wealthies democracies, having a very supporting family,
young, reasonably good-looking, gifted (whatever that's worth...), even a bit charismatic, apparently.

And yet I can't get my s**t together and am enough of an emotional trainwreck to be one step short of cutting myself...

Sorry for the venting, I needed that.I'm just really worried I might be losing control. I feel like I've crossed a line with the self-harming.

That was pretty good

If you think about it just about anyone might wish for the freedom/lack of problems of childhood, NT or AS, though Aspies can have it harder, having to cope with a mental disability as well as taking on adulthood responsibilities.

Just as a general thought, and this is just my take on it, the ammount of success in anything is related to the ammount of mastery you have in it. So since the world at large is NT, if you want to be in the whole game, you have to develop duel skills.

I think the reason why things change as we get older is we become more self aware as opposed to Nt's. The problems always existed. It just took us a while to notice them.

I guess so. Fake it till you make it.

Btw, I know I'm living up to the cliché once more, but you spelled "Quadrant" wrong in your location field.

Yeah... spelling is definately not in my strengths column. I'll blame English, for it's illogical construction.