Thread by @NortherlyRose

#Thread
A personal (very late diagonised) #ActuallyAutistic perspective on #change.
For me coming to understand myself better as a result of a very late #autism diagnosis led to some very gradual but significant changes.
Three and a half years on things are very different.
1/

This isn’t the result of a ‘throw everything up in the air and see where it lands’ kind of change, although I’ve done a fair bit of that in my time.
What has been happening is that I have been getting to know myself - the truly autistic ‘me’, not the people pleasing version.
2/

This takes time. There’s no rushing it. It has taken even longer to accept and appreciate essential autistic qualities and perspectives that the neurotypical world regards as defective or odd.
But very gradually, like the changing of the seasons, my life is being transformed.
3/

One of the things that made me think I couldn’t possibly be autistic was my enthusiasm for change.
I delight in the possibility of things becoming different.
For me change means energy, life and transformation.
Not being stuck in the mud of stolid ‘sameness’.
Change is vital.
4/

I was in ‘the change’ when I bought an old neon sign from a penny arcade spelling change in large red letters.
The glow from it was so intense I felt it washing over me.
It referenced my perimemopausal woes and the career flux I found myself in.
Change. Dangerous and exciting.
5/

There’s a career theory about success being dependent on ‘staying on the bus’.
To achieve your maximum potential you mustn’t keep chopping and changing.
I sometimes barely took a seat on the bus before being ousted by someone who objected to me being there, and bullied me off.
6/

It has been painful coming to terms with this.
With regards to conventional ‘career success’, an earlier autism diagnosis would have been a mixed blessing.
I could have started getting to know myself much sooner, but some opportunities would have been denied me due to stigma.
7/

A sense of urgency drove me to my autism assessment.
I was growing older by then, approaching 60.
I wanted to live the rest of my life authentically, autistically.
But I didn’t anticipate how much cognitive and emotional work this would involve, or how long it would take.
8/

I am still only partway there. The change has been gradual and faltering.
These are steep and shifting sands.
I get a footing then slip back.
But my progress is obvious when I look behind me and see where I started.
It’s not the external changes which are most significant.
9/

The most important transformation is in how I have come to see myself.
The emergence of self care and self compassion that were so long overdue.
My unwillingness to put up with any more sh** from bullies and narcissists.
And boundaries I am gradually starting to put in place.
10/

Moving on means letting go of things that have been harmful to me.
It took me some time to recognise exactly what these were.
Maladaptive coping mechanisms can be surprisingly successful, that’s why they’re so seductive, even though they tend to prove destructive in the end.
11/

‘Moving on’ also means knowing where I’m heading.
In my case this is a general direction rather than specific goals.
It’s about who I want to be and how I want to invest the precious time that remains.
My consciousness of life’s finitude spurs me on to unknown possibilities.
12/

This great tumultuous adventure I have been on for the last six decades might stop abruptly.
I don’t want my life to end with regret.
The final chapter is the most important one.
It’s the one I get to plan and write myself.
I am mainly looking forward now, not back.
13/

I’ve worked through a lot of difficult stuff buried deep in my past.
I’ve battled with internalised ableism and got the better of it.
I’ve seen how the world treats autistic people and I object.
I’m an autistic activist.
#SelfActualization
#ActuallyAutistic
#AutisticPride
14/end

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