Accepting My Own Neurodivergence

Hello, my name is Lynn, and I have autism.

Like many of you, this came as a shock to me, but then again, it didn’t. It rather came with a sense of relief, vindication, mingled with grief and indignation for not knowing sooner.

You may recall how I have spoken about being an INFJ at great lengths, emphasizing that was the reason for my difference in perspective about the world. However, in recent years, I have developed a sense of…transcendence, for lack of a better term, knowing who I am, what I am, exists beyond the confines of any simple personality assessment. In fact, I’ve come to…I wouldn’t say detest those tests; realise and understand their limitations, and thus, view them with a rather skeptical eye.

What I have suspected for years now, though, is what this term “neurodivergent” means and whether or not I am.

As we reconnected during our twenties, after practically keeping each other at arm’s length throughout our teenage years, my younger sister and I frequently discussed how weird we are, how we didn’t really fit in at school, and especially how we came to understand how similar we are, these similarities being a different way of synthesising data or interacting with the world than the rest of the populace.

What we didn’t know then, but perhaps had our premonitions, was how rare these similarities are.

Fast forward about ten years, and turns out, we’ve been autistic this entire time. Of course.

We suspect there might be more lurking beneath the surface, other “disabilities” which emphasise our uniqueness, but those assessments are still pending.

Personally, I learned of my autism from my therapist (I have PTSD, so of course I have a therapist) only recently. During a session, I described to her my first week at my new job, specifically how during the department welcome lunch they hosted for me, I sat analysing the conversations and the people trying to learn their mannerisms and where I could potentially insert myself in the conversation because I’ve learned I need to be more assertive and less passive when I would much rather be at the end of the table and lost in my own thoughts, which many have interpreted as aloofness, ignoring others, or unapproachability. She immediately said after my conclusion—which I can assure you was much more detailed than that summary—how she can officially, confidently, diagnose me with autism from that description alone. (She’s been assessing me for longer but wasn’t certain at first since with women we have this wonderful habit of “masking” ourselves since our normal self wouldn’t comply with the societal standards of what a woman should be.)

Though I have suspected my own neurodivergence for years, I have avoided it at great lengths because of my own misunderstanding of what it is. However, since my husband was diagnosed with epilepsy, my sister with narcolepsy, and struggling with everything in between since 2020, the cracks in the mask I wore I didn’t even know existed have grown and inevitably it has crumbled into ruin. Especially after getting married.

You see, I knew myself. I knew my limits. I knew my quirks, and I was content being alone. It was comfortable and easy. My company was myself. Add a complete stranger into the mix, someone you suddenly have to learn how to live with, that’s when all the tiniest of quirks you thought were completely normal are revealed to be ta-da-da-da!! Autism.

Dating and getting married was difficult at the time, but now after four years of marriage, I realise how easy that was, too, because as my husband and I began to build a life together, as we grew to become our own new family, I realised more and more I needed to communicate, or explain, to him (a complete stranger) why I am the way I am. When that stranger is also a brilliant engineer, they want detailed schematics that I simply cannot provide. Imagine the fights!

It took me four years to accept I have no frickin’ idea how to explain myself to anyone. Throw in a few personal crises, and you have a perfect recipe for disaster.

As my sister has come to learn about her own disability (the narcolepsy), and how to function and adapt to her new normal way of life, she has discovered there are terms for those similarities we shared which fall under the umbrella of neurodivergence. When her suspicions arose, she shared with me how I should seek my own assessments and confirmations from psychological professionals because the probability was too high for me to not have a disability of my own. All of this has happened in the last six or so months.

Since then, I started researching and exploring what it meant to have my own special flavour of neurodivergence, and I came to realise that this “label” I had been avoiding for years gave my husband and I the tools to communicate what I thought were bizarre or unrealistic needs I frequently asked him to meet, or explain all those little “triggers” I thought were just quirks.

For example, I have about three towels hanging in my kitchen right now. One is for drying dishes, one is for drying hands, and one is there for whatever because we probably pulled it out of the drawer to use for something not one of those two things, but once it is removed from the drawer, it’s not allowed to go back in the drawer. If he so much as thinks about putting his hands on the dish towel to dry them, I correct him. If he uses the hand towel to dry off dishes, I correct him. Sometimes, my corrections aren’t gentle either.

When he asked me why I do this early, early on in our marriage, my only explanation was that the dish towel needed to be kept clean for dishes and the hand towel was too dirty. His argument? If we just washed out hands, then that means their clean. Well yeah, for him, but when I’m cooking or baking, I constantly have to rinse of my hands or fingers because the feeling of different substances caking on my skin is overstimulating and gross. Meaning, rinsing doesn’t always include soap, so sometimes my hands might be dirty when I use the towel.

Why is that so hard to understand?

I could keep going, but I think you get the point.

What I thought were just bad habits or quirks, things my husband has either complained about or teased me for, we have come to realise are symptoms of my neurodivergence.

The thing is, even now, I feel like I’m lying telling you all of this. The conditioning of society I have endured over my three plus decades of life, of what I should or shouldn’t be as defined by a multitude of standards from various sources, augmented by my being a woman, has caused me to doubt my own differences and self. Not to mention the extreme lack of, or nonexistent, research for women with neurodivergence.

However, as I said earlier, the cracking in my mask worsened last year, so much so, it shattered completely. I genuinely thought I was losing my mind and going crazy or having a mental breakdown. I realised I could no longer cope, I could no longer mask. I had to be me. I had to be free.

Except learning I was autistic wasn’t only a source of relief. As I said, it also brought with it grief and indignation.

A lot of days—most days—it is grief.

Fear that I won’t ever be accepted as I am. Pain, anger, and sorrow for all the bullying I endured on my own when if maybe my peers knew, or at least I knew, I was autistic, it might have been different. (Probably not because kids are cruel.)

Even though it is technically a “disability,” I don’t think we use that term accurately, or at least, it has become its own misconception.

I don’t feel disabled, but then again, this is all extremely new for me. As I come to allow myself to be me, to not mask, I’ll probably come to find areas I had been forcing myself to comply with which really I should afford myself some grace. I mean, even my therapist said that. Or maybe because I’ve been living with my disability for so long, knowing I had quirks which I needed to improve about myself, I now have tools to function and not let the disability control me. Either way, I see my autism as a superpower.

No, really, I do. I’m not just being cheesy. And this isn’t to say I’m better than anyone else. I just mean I don’t see it as disabling me but empowering me to succeed in ways and areas others might not be capable. In the same way Steve Rogers or Diana Prince can’t ever really be “normal,” their powers provide tools to aid society, to protect it.

Think of Hercules before he trains with Phil in the Disney version. He’s always trying to help others, and is genuinely trying to be dependable, but each time he lends a helping hand, disaster ensues. Why? He can’t control his own strength. He hasn’t learned how to yet. He’s just a kid. That’s what this feels like, except I learned to control my autism on my own without the proper tools and resources, so instead of enhancing my strengths, there are some I’ve potentially crippled. Temporarily. Granted, I don’t plan on saving the world, but hey—there’s a reason for my autism’s existence. Might not know what yet. Though, I do think this explains why I see things differently than others, which gives me an advantage to propel change forward and innovate.

This is why there is so much hope amidst my sorrow. I know now I can grow and move forward and be the best version of myself. I can have the best, most successful marriage possible for my husband and I, because knowing the truth of what I am gives me the resources and tools to be me, to be free.

I know, too, my struggles are not my own. There are other neurodivergent people out there who feel just as I do, who experience life as I do. This knowledge, even without meeting and interacting with them, makes me feel less isolated, gives me a sense of relief after years of thinking and feeling I was alone.

So thank you for being a part of my journey, especially those of you who have been here since the beginning. Of course, I wonder if you stumbled upon my blog and have lingered here with me for you share some of the traits I described, that you too could be neurodivergent. Even if you’re not, you’re still welcome to join in the conversation.

Whatever the reason, I’m glad you’re here.

As we continue to grow and learn here together, there are a couple of things I need to temporarily pause.

I had thought starting a new job wouldn’t conflict too much with my wanting to publish my short fiction, but then I learned I have autism. [Insert maniacal laughter here.] Translation: I have too many new things coinciding. This week, I’ve come to accept it’s even effecting my sleep and thus health. (Did you know sleep deprivation and stress can weaken your immune system and make you sick?) Even if all this new is good stress, eustress as some psychologists would call it, as my sister reminded me: stress is still stress. It still takes a toll. And now that we know I’m autistic, I have to accept stress probably affects me differently, if not deeper, than most.

Thus, I am delaying my Fiction Friday releases. I had feared biweekly publications would be a little too ambitious, and I was right. Should have listened to my gut. That means tomorrow’s short will be releasing on February 2 instead, and so forth. I’m hoping to one day, once I get in the groove of all this new, I can bring back biweekly shorts again. (Thankfully, haven’t gotten that far into it, so it makes me feel better changing things now when it’s still in its baby stages and not even toddling along.)

On the one hand, I feel it necessary to apologise for misleading you, my audience, with giving your false expectations. Then again, I think you’re a compassionate bunch, so you’re probably cheering me on; at least, that’s how I’m imagining it so the guilt doesn’t cripple me.

I know this isn’t what I had wanted or planned, but I think knowing more about myself now, especially as these new changes continue to develop into familiarity, it’s going to help me bring you the writing you keep coming back for—and more.

So stay tuned! It’s going to be a thrilling year!