When I was about 10, I had a lovely deep pressure vest. I'm not sure if it was entirely the pressure, or if the compression involved in properly fastening it also was part of what I liked, I know that before I got the vest I tried a few improvised compression solutions (under my mum's supervision, I was careful), that were pleasant experiences. However, I am an AFAB individual, so that hug vest obviously fit preteen me reasonably for a lot less time than it might have continued to fit if I was AMAB. And as far as I can tell, no one makes pressure vests for sensory purposes in adult sizes (and anything labeled a sensory tool or disability aid tends to be at a premium, and I really couldn't afford it anyway). I've been looking for a replacement for that hug vest for over a decade now.

I've been asking everyone I know IRL to help me look for solutions, but most of them are NT individuals who've never worn a pressure vest ever, so, I thought it might be more productive to ask other neurodiverse folks for solutions.

Idk if this is relatable at all, but I get a sort of “high” when things pile up (primarily in social/engagement contexts. I think part of it stems from the fact that I see numerous hints of something to do, but that is immediately offset by the thought/potential of negative engagement and/or rejection. There’s also the thought that once I do engage/respond, my “inbox” will never return to that level. And then I see that as a reflection of myself being too much/not enough. Rinse and repeat

God, it’s such a toxic cycle. I can’t remember any time in my life when I haven’t had this problem in some way, but I think it first started bothering me in high school when I would get unfollowed on instagram or people wouldn’t respond to my texts. So I kinda learned to just avoid and dodge what hurt. Honestly might have been earlier than that when I was deemed a loud mouth and always told to shut up/pay attention

I feel like it’s something I must learn to conquer though, especially in this day and age. I always think to the interactions I’ve had online where I do end up responding and connecting with people (though it doesn’t happen often). It’s like it suddenly dawned on me that I get so upset when I am lonely but sometimes go out of the way to ensure no one finds me. And when people do find me, I always keep them at a distance :/

Crossposted from https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/64470729

It’s called Evil Autism, because it’s a space based on the old subreddit that was so fun back in the day. Please join and help make this new space feel like another safe space for those of who are ND. I hope to see you there!

Join this space on Matrix https://matrix.to/#/#evil-autism:matrix.org

i mean even tho i have a master degree in psychology i never really looked into autism

but i always felt off as a kid, had deep depression between 15 and 18, I left home at 18 ans could feel sorta normal at uni even though it was mostly through alcohol abuse, and then a drug phase, and then i sorta runaway for a while. In foreign country at least i could be alone, in the countryside / seaside, things like that. I never was happier than working on a farm. I self diagnosed with adhd, which sorta makes sense to me.

But now im with wifu inside the big city, no more drinking, and we have fought a lot, it's like she's getting mad at me for not being able to speak after a day at the office, she's getting mad at me for some stupid stuff and i freak out, sometime it's like i get that she's mad at me and then she says she wasn't that mad. And when it happens it takes days for me to come back to baseline, and then i get even more mad because she makes me unable to function for 3 days over some stupid laundry stuff

but then last time i saw they stopped thinking of adhd and autism as totally separate thing and it all made sense somehow. but i now i dont know how to tell wifu

I washed my car today and I can't stop grinning like an idiot when I glance out the window at it. Just wanted to share that joy and hear about other's wins - no matter how small they might seem.

I am writing at fucking 200 words per hour. After every paragaph I want nothing more than to lay down and do fucking nothing. I am writing this between paragraphs because the idea of writing about early 20th century European realpolitik fills me with utter dread. I don't fucking care about Clemenceau I don't care. I hate him, I hate them all. Why did I even take a modern history course I hate modern history all of these people are awful.

I wanna write about ancient art and religion dammit. I'm tired. Atleast with meds I could power through this. Bang it out and move on with my life. But noooooooo, I forgot to make an appointment with my doctor so now I don't get meds for a month and it takes me 3 days to write a 2500 word paper. The essay is already fucking late. I'm in my closet pacing rn.

I want to do something, anything, but organizing/participating in orgs is really hard with how my brain works. Theres chapters/locals out here, dsa, psl, frso, etc., but i feel like i cant participate.

I get overwhelmed by noise and large groups, especially if those groups are shouting or chanting. Protests and marches and demonstrations are a nonstarter cause having panic or anxiety incidents at those does more harm than good. Ive tried attending meetings and discussion groups, but theyve been so incredibly difficult for me and i end up contributing nothing and taking nothing away. I cant hear what people are saying cause if multiple people are talking it all blurs into a single sentence. And my body dumps literally all the cortisol into my blood and i have to recover for a good while afterwards.

What can i even do? Like, i could admin a *nix box that serves stuff, i can cook, i can do (very basic) firearm safety, i can do things, but the social aspect is really hard for me. Organizers want to fire people up, but that firing up incapacitates me. How can i attend a meeting when that meeting is geared toward not-me and within 15 minutes im in emergency mode and lose the ability to form solid memories from the meeting, or lose the ability to speak? Last one i went to, it started with chants and that was kinda it for me. I stayed thru the end, but it was really intense and i needed to lay down cry and be held afterwards. I cant participate in those kinds of things in a manner that is sustainable for me.

I want to do stuff, i want to contribute, i want to make the world even just a little bit better, but i feel like all the activities and actions that are available to me are things that are either veryvery difficult or incapacitating for me.

Being not immune to culture, I saw recent articles about the Solid Snake active listening; more accurately “Aizuchi“. Being a generally poor listener, I decided to give it a shot!

I’d say it works well! At the very least it gets me to pay enough attention to where I can even offer an interjection. Normally I’m just waiting to talk, but this turns that on its head enough to make a difference in how i converse. Kinda neat!

Anyone else tried this or similar?

https://web.archive.org/web/20250925045309/https://www.upworthy.com/solid-snake-active-listening-tips-ex1

First off, thanks for all the supportive notes when I mentioned being nervous about my psychiatry appointment!

I got diagnosed with Inattentive type ADHD, which makes a lot of sense to me. Currently I'm coming to terms that I've spent a lot of energy covering up my dysfunctional traits for the past decades, and put myself into a state of burnout for the past few years. I've started medication, too, and that's been a huge help to start building good habits and pull myself out of the slump I've been in. Super weird not needing coffee throughout the day, though! I feel like a cyborg or vampire or something when I prepare a single coffee for my partner lol

CW: ableism (I think)

I've been recovering from/experiencing burnout symptoms for the majority of the last couple years. It definitely messed with my relationships and life in general to the point where some people were really confused and put off by my behavior. I've been isolating myself a lot and been kinda flaky with showing up to events or hang outs because I just haven't had the energy. I didn't really explain or offer reasons for my actions. I've just had no energy, no capacity to deal with life, let alone social situations.

Well, an old friend who's been going to therapy weekly for who knows how long basically confronted me the other day saying that I needed to 'get help', go on meds, or 'fix whatever the hell is going on' with me because I was starting to seem agoraphobic or severely depressed and 'overly obsessed with covid' (because I still mask when in public and large groups) and that they'd spoken to their therapist about me, who apparently suggested those terms to describe me...almost like the therapist made a second-hand diagnosis of me or something. I am AuDHD. They know I'm neurodivergent. I guess Autistic burnout is something completely foreign to both of them, because I'm a walking info graphic on burnout and it's notable symptoms.

I need space to recoup my very tiny battery, I get overwhelmed by too much stimuli, I've had deteriorating executive function, struggled to communicate, and just do life stuff some days. I told them I was burnt out, and they never responded. I guess it's been annoying enough for this person to talk to their therapist at length about what's wrong with me, which makes me feel fucking weird.

Idk what I'm expecting by posting this. I guess I'm wondering if anyone has experienced something like this and maybe have advice on what to say to this person, who I thought understood that I was ND and struggling with everything? How the fuck do I even begin to counter those weird accusations and the low-key aggressive way that they approached me with this? I was so flabbergasted I just didn't respond. And now I can't stop thinking about it.

It's a long video, but I'm really impressed with the amount of research he put into this. I knew about ABA's problematic origins but going more in depth really paints a picture of how bad it is. As well as, that there ARE people out there working to change it from within, but they face ENORMOUS structural and for-profit incentive pressure against them. I think the best part is near the end, where he lays out the sort of things parents should be asking in order to evaluate just what kind of therapy is right for their child. I'll copy some:

• What behaviours are you planning to change, and who decided they were problems?
• How do you respond if my child says “no”, cries, hides, or wants to stop?
• Do you ever target stimming, eye contact, or “looking normal”? Why?
• How do you measure my child’s wellbeing during and after the session, not just their behaviour?
• What alternatives (OT, speech, autistic-led supports, relationship-based models) have you considered?

As an anecdote, I once took a psychology 101 course in college. I thought it was gonna be all that interesting internal stuff like Jung. But no, the entire course was focused on BF Skinner's behaviorism. The cold mechanical view treating people like input output robots really freaked me out. The professor even once showed us a video of a mother "extinguishing" a behavior in a 2 year old, and all I could see is that she basically traumatized this baby. But no one else seemed to see that. The professor showed this example as a good thing. I was horrified. The nonchalance of the psych professor teaching this behaviorism put me off so much, that it made me reluctant to seek out therapy for my mental health, fearing that this is how therapists must think of us. I kinda regret not speaking up in class about it, but the way nobody seemed to care made me feel like I was being too sensitive or something. The fact that ABA is entirely a behaviorist model is really the root of the problem.

Obviously if the doctor switched me off vyvanse it's not ideal. I'm having serious executive disfunction and it's going to be weeks until they let me refill.

I don't remember the brand name of the one I'm supposed to be taking but if it's important I'll get the chemical name off the bottle.

Priority 1 is still finding the bottle but garbage bag man needs his pills.

This was published on nature.com.

It looks like the whole article was AI generated.Here are responses from pubpeer.

I never thought I'd see professionals just kind of collectively give up on putting effort into things. Maybe by "fexcectorn" and "frymbial" levels are abnormal?

Sorry for this long post! I used collapsing quotes to make it more digestible.

As you may or may not know, there are proposals to change/update the hexbear CoC here. This is an extension of the original discussion thread here.

While there isn't a specific section in the original CoC about neurodiversity, there are some pertinent sections on mental health crises:

and use of content warnings:

I reworded the original mental health crises line to include medical emergencies. That way we are not singling out people who experience mental health crises:

If this seems unnecessary and you would like to keep the original wording, or want to provide an alternative, please say so.

There was some great suggestions on content warnings. Here is a draft with some changes to include epilepsy warnings and abbreviations for triggers:

If this seems good or you would like to suggest any changes/additions, let me know

There was also some good discussion on latent ableism via the vague "disengage" rule as well.

Original CoC:

Updated with proposals to reduce abuse, make it a personal statement of resignation than command to others:

People have been discussing widely accepted ableist slurs for some time, outside of these most current discussions. I felt that should warrant its own section in an updated CoC. I started with the usual sanist suspects but decided to include widely accepted racist slurs as well:

All this boils down to me requesting input from this community on the matters closest to you. Any suggestions, re-wording, additions, critiques, or comments on keeping the old CoC rather than changes would be very appreciated. Contributors will be cited as such in drafts. If you have already contributed, thank you! Sorry to bother you with this again.

I managed to get a final consultation with the psychiatrist that diagnosed me with ADHD (I’m switching to another cheaper practice). They suggested mood stabilizers as the most promising route, which also came up in my own personal research a couple months back after I have stopped taking any regular medication for ADHD or GAD.

I have been put on SSRIs (sertraline and citalopram), Stimulants (Lisdexamfetamine and long-acting methylphenidate), and non-stimulants (atomoxetine) from different doctors. I had been titrating ADHD medications concurrently with citalopram but stopped taking either a few months back.

All of them had mixed to negative results, in emotional instability, (low) mood changes, crashes, insomnia and/or physical side-effects (palpitations and other heart-related effects). Most are not manageable.

I’m becoming to learn that my symptoms face a sort of cyclicality, in which there are periods (day to day, week by week, but also season by season) where executive dysfunction and emotional dysregulation especially are more pronounced. This makes it difficult to manage my chronic illnesses, necessary day-to-day chores, and university.

what game is this one from

Real title: major autism study uncovers biologically distinct subtypes

But if you read it, thats not what they did. They just re-taxonomized it as multiple different things. This is a good thing but it feels silly to call it a "discovery."

Like dude, the guy who mastirbates in public and slams his head into walls when he's frustrated doesnt have the same thing as the guy who started reading at 3 and really likes birding.

It should not have taken this long for the people who fund science to acknowledge this but I'm glad they finally did and...

Here's the real discovery: those dudes have different genes! Thats right, the first one is non-heritable! Its not even the same thing biologically.

So if they have different presentations and different biologies, why are we calling them both autism??!

I know aspergers was a bad dude but I feel like having a different name for it communicated something important.

Here's another implication: the people self diagnosing as autistic on TikTok were actually following the rules for autism that clinicians set out: there are no rules and its anything that makes you seem wrong to normies. The big sin of the TikTok self-diagnosees/rs was declaring that the emperor has no cloths!

cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/9233783

Just another misogynist instance of blaming women for their children's neurology

They will simply not recognize why the only reason they are feeling this way about Kirk is because the video of his death was extremely graphic, but would never have the same energy for the people dying in the same way in other countries. Idk I guess asking for consistency is asking for the world

I personally find nothing wrong with acknowledging that it’s horrendous that his children no longer have a father. But why does that always seem to terminate all thought and excuse every vile thing he stood for in his life 🤔 truly, it’s like a Godamn get out of jail free card

This is why I don’t spend a lot of time outside. People are extremely fake and always rationalizing their fakeness by hiding behind statistics that reveal them to be “normal.”

Time for another Stimpunks Post, ya'll. While this is mostly coming from research and language around Autism and ADHD, I hope it is relatable enough for a majority of ND peeps. This is just a summary post, the direct link has a lot of additional context, videos, and reading material for those who are interested.

Locution means a word or expression characteristic of a region, group, or cultural level

Note: This piece originally used the phrase “love languages”. Despite the popularity of the term, we have opted for “love locutions” to distance from the emotionally abusive and heteronormative history of the book “The Five Love Languages”.

Emotional bids are the pixels of relationship communications and are important to relationship accommodations. This list is about recognizing and meeting some common neurodivergent emotional bids in relationships, thus the phrase “love locutions”.

To elaborate, an emotional bid is when we do something to signal that we want attention and connection. Bids can be small or big, verbal or nonverbal. They’re requests to connect. Bids are often purposefully subtle because people are afraid to be vulnerable and put themselves out there. It’s scary to say, “Hey! I want to connect! Pay attention to me!” so instead, we ask a question or tell a story or offer our hand for connection. We hope we’ll receive connection in return, but if not, it’s less scary than pleading, “Connect with me, please”.

The Love Locutions consist of: Infodumping, Parallel Play/Body Doubling, Support Swapping/Sharing Spoons, Deep Pressure, and Penguin Pebbling

Let's break down the list of locutions: