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Struggles of Women Who Mask Their Autism

153 points by ardit33 9y ago

draw_down 9y ago
I’m not a woman but I do this too. It really just came from others’ negative reactions to certain behaviors I would do, which taught me that it’s not acceptable to behave in those ways around “normal” people. (Like some of the women in the article I knew I wasn’t normal but didn’t know why.) Ironically, I have gotten so good at this that I sometimes get annoyed when a person I am talking to acts “weird”. I feel “lucky” in that I’m not too far off from normal, whatever that is, on the spectrum. But I still find it exhausting and depressing, like they do. I have also had the feeling that certain friendships and relationships are fake because I act differently to who I am when around those people. I don’t feel that anyone at work really knows me. I don’t think it is worth trying to be yourself at work, even disregarding the spectrum stuff. The bit about the difficulties with diagnosing autism in women is also interesting. There are many similar situations in regard to mental health, for example women are diagnosed as borderline much more often.
- watwut 9y ago
  Why are women more likely to be diagnosed borderline?
  - rosser 9y ago
    Not least because of gender assumptions (see, e.g., implicit bias) on the part of the clinicians.
  - draw_down 9y ago
    https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2007/10/the_diagnosis_of_borderline_pe.html https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2007/10/the_diagnosis_of_bor...
  - Geeek 9y ago
    The same reason why schizophrenia, ADHD and a plethora of others are more likely to be diagnosed in men? We diagnose on symptoms not on biological origins.
  - SolaceQuantum 9y ago
    I found a googleable meta study about it that concluded that BPD traits were associated with women, but also that women who don’t express gender normal behavior are perceived as BPD by men. Although men scored higher in individual BPD behaviors, they were not perceived as BPD by themselves or others unless they behaved outside of gender normal behavior (acted more “feminine”). There’s a genetic component by a twin study, but it’s unknown it’s causative effect to gender. There’s studies that women score higher in neuroticism(anxiety, depression, etc) as a personality trait. It is also known child trauma has a causative effect, and may be related to how women are sexually assaulted as children at higher rates than men. Basically, a complex mix of social expectations, social bias, how women are treated in society, and biological aspects of women’s personalities may contribute to an overall significantly higher rate of BPD diagnosis being a female diagnosis. Interestingly, a disorder on the same axis (antisocial personality disorder) has an exact opposite gender disparity (3:1 men over women) and that is also investigated in other studies. http://www.sakkyndig.com/psykologi/artvit/skodol2003.pdf http://www.sakkyndig.com/psykologi/artvit/skodol2003.pdf [2003]
    - lulmerchant 9y ago
      How people perceive others is irrelevant to the question. Women are more often clinically diagnosed with BPD, not simply perceived by others to express it. The rest of your post is mostly unsupported speculation. Apart from the parallel you've drawn with APD, which has a lot of similarities to BPD, except with inverse gender distribution.
      - SolaceQuantum 9y ago
        Nothing I wrote wasn’t a conclusion of a paper or genetic study, as according to the meta paper that attempted to understand all facets of why women make the majority of the BPD diagnosis. I understand that because humans are not formally mathematically provable, some conjectures may be made from surveys, genetic relations, and studying behavior to attempt to reverse engineer the program that produced this societal result.
        9y ago
- opportune 9y ago
  > It really just came from others’ negative reactions to certain behaviors I would do Isn't this how everyone learns social skills? Maybe for you (and me) this just occurs a little later in life than most.
  - draw_down 9y ago
    Maybe. It just seemed to me as a child that I would rather often do things that other kids wouldn't think to do in the first place, and then get mildly made fun of for it.
    - sudosteph 9y ago
      I can relate. I think kids are actually much better at grasping when something is "off" with other kids than adults are. They know who the weird ones are, and they'll definitely let you know if it's you... though if you're like me you may be oblivious to a lot of it. The worst was always when they would pretend to be nice so they could get you to make an even bigger fool of yourself when you finally felt safe enough to be yourself :(
  - watwut 9y ago
    To some extend. Neurotypical people do this without effort or thinking, it happens "automaticaly". You might even be unaware of the process, you just sorta kinda feel weird or bad after doing whatever caused negative reaction previously. Autistic have to think about situation and memorize it the same way as normal people memorize writers and their books for school.
    - fps 9y ago
      I don't believe you. Either that or I've never in my life encountered a "neurotypical" child. Figuring out which behaviors are appropriate/inapproriate and changing accordingly, through self awareness and peer feedback, is most of what growing up is. Some people don't outwardly display as much effort, but it requires effort from everyone.
      - 9y ago
- mar77i 9y ago
  When I was in school I noticed I was off and completely not up to other people's magic sauce - whatever they did that I wasn't able to compete with. As for school it always left me a bit dizzy by cramming in all the subjects and leaving out all the cool details at a pace that just blurred everything for me. I only got to know fun with people in various subcultures, and the more off people around me were, by looks or by spirits, the less I needed to worry about fitting in and learned to simply enjoy myself. Until I realized what the actual problem was. Most people tend to make life hard for themselves by needing to fit in and pretending and aspiring. It's okay. Let go and drop your misery and do whatever the hell you happen to think is best. If you want to build a UFO and take over the world, please go do it. Autism is a terrible name for whatever slight - or not so slight - imbalance of mental traits, and seeing the shit that regular people mutter you're probably better than that anyway - because you wouldn't believe what an autist's mental hygiene is like.
  - kasey_junk 9y ago
    I’m not trying to argue against your premise about fitting in. I would like to point out that autism is an actual specified condition. Being socially different or feeling inept about social situations does not put you on the autistic spectrum. In some ways it’s incredibly insulting to imply that any discomfort in social settings is a sign of autism. Not least because is implies that autistic people can’t be capable, extroverted and able in social settings, which they absolutely can be.
    - itronitron 9y ago
      A result of articles like this one which describes experiences of people with autism is that many of the readers without autism will attribute some of those adaptation behaviors as an indicator for autism. It would be nice if the article provided more detail on the actual condition, the tests for it, and how it differs from the common 'i am a human' anxiety. Virtually everyone, men included, has experienced the same things that the article describes as being experienced by women with autism. I think there is a risk with these sorts of articles that many people will make a lot of unwarranted assumptions about other peoples' abilities and behaviors.
sudosteph 9y ago
This makes sense. I became a much happier person when I exited high school and realized that I actually could get positive outcomes from being weird. The "Mask" is more like a script imo, and it's good to be able to drop it when needed. The examples of girls with autism trying to fit in with other girls was sad. I remember in middle school how my nerdy coed friend group got bullied for sitting together at lunch. The guys got called gay and the girls were shunned by other girls. There was a lot of explicit peer group pressure to only associate by gender. Fortunately most people grew out of this by high school. Personally, I think I tended towards associating with males more often because I enjoyed competitive games (yugioh, magic, etc) and they were more likely to play. I always preferred hobbies with explicit rules to the comparative anarchy of navigating social circles. It's a shame that so many other girls get pressured by family and peers to avoid predominantly male social hobbies. I think they actually help improve self-confidence and create meaningful friendships far more easily for autistic folks than typical sleepovers or gossiping or whatever.
- ikeyany 9y ago
  > Fortunately most people grew out of this by high school. But did they?
  - sudosteph 9y ago
    Well, they started sitting at tables with people of the opposite sex at least. By that measurement at least, I presumed so.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - ikeyany 9y ago
      That's true. Originally I had the " men and women can't be good friends unless there's an ulterior motive" line you see in adulthood.
      - 9y ago
arcaster 9y ago
I'm at a loss as to why this article claims being on the autism scale / weird is only hard for women...?
- lumberjack 9y ago
  Didn't read the article, but autism in men and women are two different diseases.
  - OscarCunningham 9y ago
    The same condition, but affecting people's lives differently.
  - sudosteph 9y ago
    citation needed.
- sudosteph 9y ago
  Seems that the point was that it's especially hard for women to get diagnosed and receive proper support for it. Not that it isn't also difficult for men. Girls and boys are socialized differently, and boys with autism are more likely to behave in outwardly disruptive ways, while girls are more likely to appear shy and anxious. Teachers and parents are more likely to bring up disruptive behavior to a doctor than just shyness and general social ineptitude.
  - arcaster 9y ago
    IMO it's a loss for everyone to make mental health / disability a gendered issue. Mental illness is hard for everyone, regardless of what gender they identify as...
    - dragonwriter 9y ago
      Recognizing gender differences in how conditions are expressed and challenges that relate to interaction between conditions and existing gender roles and norms is important. This isn't making mental health and gendered issue, it's recognizing that me talk health is an issue which interacts with other aspects of life, including gender.
rhexs 9y ago
This is interesting. The descriptions in the article also seem to describe what may be identified as social anxiety disorder. I wonder how those two diagnoses differ?
- kosma 9y ago
  With ASD, social ineptitude doesn't go away when anxiety is sorted out. Autistic people usually have it the other way round: it's their ineptitude that inevitably causes anxiety due to repeated failures.
  - gt_ 9y ago
    Well said. I think this particular mixup makes for a lot of extra confusion on the part of people trying to understand ASD.
tinyegg 9y ago
This is hard to do but, are any other women on the spectrum looking for a friend? I'm 34, a SAHM and I live in Mountain View.
- nothrabannosir 9y ago
  I think this is the first time I’ve ever gotten angry about a downvote. tinyegg, I think it was an exemplary and inspirational action, and I hope your seed of courage bears fruit. Although it might be practical to add contact info to your profile :)
  - tinyegg 9y ago
    Thanks, will do.
    - rhapsodic 9y ago
      And be careful when communicating with and/or meeting the strangers who contact you. They might not be who they purport to be.
      - tinyegg 9y ago
        Thank you, I'll make sure to meet them in a public place.
- oaxacaoaxaca 9y ago
  Years ago I visited Jamaica. When nice local people greeted me, to show they were nice they would say "respect", but with an emphasis on the first syllable, like "REE-spect". That's what I want to say to you for posting this. REspect, mon.
- quickthrower2 9y ago
  Wish you success with this.
kraig911 9y ago
I guess stories of people with autism who are merely socially scared and shy are easier to approach. Meanwhile there are parents who live every day in fear of how the hell can their son or daughter endure when they die. My daughter was diagnosed severe/non-verbale at age 3. If this woman is able to live a life such as this and able to use the bathroom, have a job, etc I'm hopeful of at least that for my daughter. It gives me hope. But I've met parents of children who are much much worse. Something must be done to change this narrative that Autism isn't curable. The stigma certainly doesn't help either.
- rtpg 9y ago
  I hope we can find treatments and the right set of accomodations. A thing I heard is that you can't cure many mental illnesses, much like you often can't cure a missing limb. But if you find the right prosthetic your life can become much better. I hope we can find this for more and more people on the spectrum.
- sudosteph 9y ago
  Temple Grandin gives me hope for severely autistic people. She's an amazing example of someone who has done well for herself despite very pronounced deficits and original diagnosis of non-verbal autism. I'm not very hopeful that it will ever be fully "curable", though maybe I'll be proven wrong. If we could at least medically correct for the overstimulation and hypersensitivity aspects, it would be such a huge win. I strongly believe the most negative and impairing parts of autism stem from this part. The people who are "merely" socially awkward often hide these aspects or avoid situations that would trigger them (ex: I carry ear plugs on my keychain because street noise or crowds in restaurants can be overwhelming, and I don't do tech conferences any more for the same reason). The more severe amongst us unfortunately usually need more than muffled sound to feel in control. That said, I do think there are ways of coping, tools, practices, that will make life for autistic people much better going forward. We need to keep researching those just as much a cure or pregnancy-time diagnosis. I hope things do get better for both you and your daughter.
- tinyegg 9y ago
  You may want to try switching to non-scented soaps, laundry detergent and cleaners. Do you feel or have you been told she has sensory processing disorder? Another thing to try is talking to her, a lot. If you have a wife who works have her stay at home and work with your daughter on meeting milestones. Get whole genome sequencing done. See if she has any issues with methylation etc. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4203003/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4203003/ Give her Dha and a multivitamin with more bioavailable forms of each vitamin or a whole food vitamin. My daughter will take these along with greens and fruit in smoothie form. Basically, do everything you can.
tinyegg 9y ago
As a child I rocked back and forth for hours finally stopping at nineteen with a huge amount of effort. I always did it behind closed doors. I was sexual abused and abandoned in my early teens. I came to California to help an AI researcher but ended up as a bio engineer and now a SAHM. The library was my refuge as a kid, no academic parents, no inspiring teachers. Fitting in was and is a huge challenge.
- tyingq 9y ago
  That's a pretty "out there share". Appreciate it. If you're ever in a position looking for a DFW (DALLAS/ Forth Worth) position, let me know).
stcredzero 9y ago
I've always liked "Aspergirls." (This is the term a friend of mine uses for herself.) As a group, they seem noticeably more attractive to me. I've noted that a lot of them do not like me, and make it more apparent than most women, though often this is done in a rational and polite fashion which I find more intellectually honest and respectful, and so like better. I was also in a relationship with one. That was quite difficult.
- quickthrower2 9y ago
  > As a group, they seem noticeably more attractive to me Is that because you like smart girls? Or is it they'd understand you better as a geek?
  - stcredzero 9y ago
    Yes and yes. Also, they seem to smell better. I think in part because they tend to have a no-nonsense approach to hygiene, and aren't as afflicted by societal distortions around body odor.
Snowwombat 9y ago
"Asteroid to destroy earth! Women most affected!" Articles like this annoy the hell out of me, because it implies that men with Autism have it better somehow. I would argue that society is WAY more forgiving of "strange" women than it is towards men of a similar strange level. This coming from a guy married to a high functioning ASD woman.
- grzm 9y ago
  I don't read any implication of better or worse in the article, only that it's different. Would you point out passages that give you that impression?
  - Snowwombat 9y ago
    Pretty much the chunks of the articles that show that women can at least adapt and have the ability do "fake" social function. Yes it's very draining in some cases, but at least they can hold down a job, and function as a "normal" adult for the most part. On top of that people and employers are more than willing to make all the required accommodations when asked. I work in engineering / IT as well as being a geek so I run into ASD guys pretty much daily and they get no accommodations and are usually brute forced into complying with the required norms, or they get fired. Even the most simple accommodations like a bit of work hour flexibly and working from home are not even entertained in most cases. They stick them in open plan offices, 8am to 6pm and brute force social interaction on them which is the opposite of what they need. I do know a few other female ASD people, and they themselves acknowledge that they get way better treatment and help then their ASD male friends.
    - hyperpape 9y ago
      In a lot of engineering circles, you can get away with hours of having your headphones on, wearing the exact same cut and color of shirt 365 days a year, fidgeting constantly, and not making eye contact. It’s not paradise, but there are much less friendly environments.
- PhasmaFelis 9y ago
rrauenza 9y ago
I’ve found https://interpersonal.stackexchange.com https://interpersonal.stackexchange.com to be an amazing resource for improving interpersonal skills. Folks in the spectrum may also appreciate reading the content there. And asking for help when a situation just seems unfathomable.
anotherevan 9y ago
Both my kids are aspie. My son was diagnosed when he was seven because of some speech delay when he was younger and social awkwardness. My daughter was diagnosed at sixteen after two years of missed school and barely leaving the house due to incredibly high anxiety. Oh, and the first time she was assessed eighteen months prior she was only "borderline" aspie even though in retrospect she has been effected much more profoundly. (She also had a similar speech delay when she was younger too, btw.) We need to get a lot better at recognising the condition in girls, as we have with boys. § If you are wanting to know more about autism in all its flavours, google for just about anything by Tony Attwood. In more recent years he has been concentrating more on autism in women, so adding "women" to your search terms will surface specific material in that regard.
truculation 9y ago
Anybody know any stories or resources about autistic motherhood? It strikes me that being a mother with autism could be a challenge, for example when it comes to 'bonding' with the baby. Yet I haven't seen it discussed anywhere.
- grzm 9y ago
  The internet does appear to have some resources. I can't vouch for their quality, having just used a search engine, but they're at least a starting point: - https://autismwomensnetwork.org/motherhood-autistic-parenting/ https://autismwomensnetwork.org/motherhood-autistic-parentin... - https://www.thestar.com/news/investigations/2012/11/17/the_autism_project_mothers_with_asd_ask_why_scientists_are_missing_girls.html https://www.thestar.com/news/investigations/2012/11/17/the_a... - https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/apr/15/women-autistic-mothers-undiagnosed-children https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/apr/15/women-a... - http://network.autism.org.uk/knowledge/insight-opinion/autistic-women-pregnancy-and-motherhood http://network.autism.org.uk/knowledge/insight-opinion/autis... - https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/05/autism-parenting/526989/ https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/05/autism-pa...
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- kstenerud 9y ago
  A friend of a friend spoke about getting pregnant and having a baby. For the entire duration up until the baby's birth, she worried because she didn't have any strong feelings. The moment the baby was delivered, something inside her said "This! This is what I was made for!". And then an hour later the feeling passed. Her kids seem to have automatically adjusted to her condition, being more vocal when they need something, or something is wrong (otherwise she wouldn't know). The movie "Snow Cake" does a pretty good job describing some of the challenges.
- stared 9y ago
  I guess each story differ. Though, I remember finding these: - http://web.archive.org/web/20160313002827/http://www.backfromnature.org/2015/03/i-gave-my-child-autism.html http://web.archive.org/web/20160313002827/http://www.backfro... (and its HN thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9245022 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9245022) - https://musingsofanaspie.com/about/ https://musingsofanaspie.com/about/
amriksohata 9y ago
Children at school can be very mean, I am much happier as an adult
- romanovcode 9y ago
  Adults can be plain evil just for the sake of it sometimes. They're not so different!
krylon 9y ago
I am male, but I can totally relate. I was diagnosed with (relatively mild) autism spectrum disorder last year at the age of 37. I kind of suspected for a long time, but somehow several psychiatrists and psychologists managed to miss it. I wish I had gotten that diagnosis earlier, because it makes it a lot easier to explain to people how I am different. I am not sure if I would call it covering it up, but a lot of my social skills are the result of a very conscious cognitive learning process. By now it is fairly automatic, but on a not-so-good day I tend to avoid eye contact and communication in general. Writing, strangely is much, much easier. On the upside, I managed to - partly - turn this to my advantage by making a point of being explicitly polite to people.
- Aaargh20318 9y ago
  I'm very similar to you, got diagnosed early 30's, now 38. Still haven't gotten the hang of the eye-contact thing, I know I basically avoid eye-contact, it's not a conscious thing. I have to force myself to make eye contact and always feels weird to do. As far as I understand the lack of eye contact is an issue for allistic people so I try to remember, but I usually fail.
  - krylon 9y ago
    It might seem somewhat ironic for a borderline-autist, but I find it kind of comforting that I am not the only one with this condition. To me, eye contact gets harder if I have to focus. Greeting people or answering simple tech-support questions is not a big deal, but when I have to explain - or listen to! - something moderately complex, eye contact becomes difficult. I suspect the phenomenon is related to the Clippy-disaster with MS Office; recognizing faces takes a lot of brain power, and the human brain allocates a significant chunk to that specific task (at least that is what a neurologist once told me). Somebody wrote a Master's thesis or Ph.D. thesis in psychology about why Clippy was hated so much, and it was basically because face-like things at the margin of our field of vision take up a lot of "bandwidth" in the brain and thus distract from other things.
- Cthulhu_ 9y ago
  I think knowing the symptoms of autism and such can help you explain at least to yourself how you're different; I think that peace of mind and acceptance is the most important. I'm fairly sure I'm somewhere on the spectrum too, but it's mild and I'm managing fine. I'm afraid I'd turn it into a victim complex if I were to get a diagnosis.
kstenerud 9y ago
One big issue common with autism is blindness to body language, which apparently comprises 90% of the (in-person) communication we do. Does anyone know if there are courses one can take to learn how to recognize and produce correct body language?
- terminalcommand 9y ago
  I don't know about any courses, but watching a lot of tv shows especially situational comedies such as Frasier, Seinfeld etc. helped me immensely on reading people. The facial expressions usually give away the situation. The downside is that you need to constantly read the other parties expressions, and that can get noticed if you're not subtle enough. It required some energy, but over time you get proficient at it. Another thing that will help is to find safe topics. Talking about music, girls, sports are the easiest to learn. My advice would be not to shy away from social interactions. Practice makes perfect. Some people may inherently be born with an intuition to handle social interactions, but that doesn't mean that you cannot learn it by observing and mimicking. I guess this is what the article calls as masking. But masking doesn't have to be that painful. i believe people can grow and chance. If you put an honest effort you'll eventually fit into the society.
- Cthulhu_ 9y ago
  The way I see it, if it's not something you can just do naturally, you need to apply a more conscious, scientific process to it. There's loads of books on the subject, starting with e.g. Dale Carnegie's classic on what to look for and how to act.
stared 9y ago
See also "On emotional authenticity and masking as an autistic person" (http://cassolotl.tumblr.com/post/160117558965 http://cassolotl.tumblr.com/post/160117558965), which was posted here as well (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14226784 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14226784).
henrygabriel 9y ago
So I recognise all of the signs the article talks about in my partner. Most prominently (other than behavioural symptoms) she really struggles in social situations - finds them totally exhausting. I think it contributes heavily to her depression. However, she’s undiagnosed, and has not self-diagnosed - she just thinks she’s ‘not normal’. Do HN readers think I should bring this up with her? Does anyone dealing with this personally have any advice on this? I’d really appreciate it.

153 points by ardit33 9y ago

I’m not a woman but I do this too. It really just came from others’ negative reactions to certain behaviors I would do, which taught me that it’s not acceptable to behave in those ways around “normal” people. (Like some of the women in the article I knew I wasn’t normal but didn’t know why.) Ironically, I have gotten so good at this that I sometimes get annoyed when a person I am talking to acts “weird”. I feel “lucky” in that I’m not too far off from normal, whatever that is, on the spectrum. But I still find it exhausting and depressing, like they do. I have also had the feeling that certain friendships and relationships are fake because I act differently to who I am when around those people. I don’t feel that anyone at work really knows me. I don’t think it is worth trying to be yourself at work, even disregarding the spectrum stuff. The bit about the difficulties with diagnosing autism in women is also interesting. There are many similar situations in regard to mental health, for example women are diagnosed as borderline much more often.

watwut 9y ago
Why are women more likely to be diagnosed borderline?
- rosser 9y ago
  Not least because of gender assumptions (see, e.g., implicit bias) on the part of the clinicians.
- draw_down 9y ago
  https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2007/10/the_diagnosis_of_borderline_pe.html https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2007/10/the_diagnosis_of_bor...
- Geeek 9y ago
  The same reason why schizophrenia, ADHD and a plethora of others are more likely to be diagnosed in men? We diagnose on symptoms not on biological origins.
- SolaceQuantum 9y ago
  I found a googleable meta study about it that concluded that BPD traits were associated with women, but also that women who don’t express gender normal behavior are perceived as BPD by men. Although men scored higher in individual BPD behaviors, they were not perceived as BPD by themselves or others unless they behaved outside of gender normal behavior (acted more “feminine”). There’s a genetic component by a twin study, but it’s unknown it’s causative effect to gender. There’s studies that women score higher in neuroticism(anxiety, depression, etc) as a personality trait. It is also known child trauma has a causative effect, and may be related to how women are sexually assaulted as children at higher rates than men. Basically, a complex mix of social expectations, social bias, how women are treated in society, and biological aspects of women’s personalities may contribute to an overall significantly higher rate of BPD diagnosis being a female diagnosis. Interestingly, a disorder on the same axis (antisocial personality disorder) has an exact opposite gender disparity (3:1 men over women) and that is also investigated in other studies. http://www.sakkyndig.com/psykologi/artvit/skodol2003.pdf http://www.sakkyndig.com/psykologi/artvit/skodol2003.pdf [2003]
  - lulmerchant 9y ago
    How people perceive others is irrelevant to the question. Women are more often clinically diagnosed with BPD, not simply perceived by others to express it. The rest of your post is mostly unsupported speculation. Apart from the parallel you've drawn with APD, which has a lot of similarities to BPD, except with inverse gender distribution.
    - SolaceQuantum 9y ago
      Nothing I wrote wasn’t a conclusion of a paper or genetic study, as according to the meta paper that attempted to understand all facets of why women make the majority of the BPD diagnosis. I understand that because humans are not formally mathematically provable, some conjectures may be made from surveys, genetic relations, and studying behavior to attempt to reverse engineer the program that produced this societal result.
      - 9y ago
opportune 9y ago
> It really just came from others’ negative reactions to certain behaviors I would do Isn't this how everyone learns social skills? Maybe for you (and me) this just occurs a little later in life than most.
- draw_down 9y ago
  Maybe. It just seemed to me as a child that I would rather often do things that other kids wouldn't think to do in the first place, and then get mildly made fun of for it.
  - sudosteph 9y ago
    I can relate. I think kids are actually much better at grasping when something is "off" with other kids than adults are. They know who the weird ones are, and they'll definitely let you know if it's you... though if you're like me you may be oblivious to a lot of it. The worst was always when they would pretend to be nice so they could get you to make an even bigger fool of yourself when you finally felt safe enough to be yourself :(
- watwut 9y ago
  To some extend. Neurotypical people do this without effort or thinking, it happens "automaticaly". You might even be unaware of the process, you just sorta kinda feel weird or bad after doing whatever caused negative reaction previously. Autistic have to think about situation and memorize it the same way as normal people memorize writers and their books for school.
  - fps 9y ago
    I don't believe you. Either that or I've never in my life encountered a "neurotypical" child. Figuring out which behaviors are appropriate/inapproriate and changing accordingly, through self awareness and peer feedback, is most of what growing up is. Some people don't outwardly display as much effort, but it requires effort from everyone.
    - 9y ago
mar77i 9y ago
When I was in school I noticed I was off and completely not up to other people's magic sauce - whatever they did that I wasn't able to compete with. As for school it always left me a bit dizzy by cramming in all the subjects and leaving out all the cool details at a pace that just blurred everything for me. I only got to know fun with people in various subcultures, and the more off people around me were, by looks or by spirits, the less I needed to worry about fitting in and learned to simply enjoy myself. Until I realized what the actual problem was. Most people tend to make life hard for themselves by needing to fit in and pretending and aspiring. It's okay. Let go and drop your misery and do whatever the hell you happen to think is best. If you want to build a UFO and take over the world, please go do it. Autism is a terrible name for whatever slight - or not so slight - imbalance of mental traits, and seeing the shit that regular people mutter you're probably better than that anyway - because you wouldn't believe what an autist's mental hygiene is like.
- kasey_junk 9y ago
  I’m not trying to argue against your premise about fitting in. I would like to point out that autism is an actual specified condition. Being socially different or feeling inept about social situations does not put you on the autistic spectrum. In some ways it’s incredibly insulting to imply that any discomfort in social settings is a sign of autism. Not least because is implies that autistic people can’t be capable, extroverted and able in social settings, which they absolutely can be.
  - itronitron 9y ago
    A result of articles like this one which describes experiences of people with autism is that many of the readers without autism will attribute some of those adaptation behaviors as an indicator for autism. It would be nice if the article provided more detail on the actual condition, the tests for it, and how it differs from the common 'i am a human' anxiety. Virtually everyone, men included, has experienced the same things that the article describes as being experienced by women with autism. I think there is a risk with these sorts of articles that many people will make a lot of unwarranted assumptions about other peoples' abilities and behaviors.

sudosteph 9y ago

This makes sense. I became a much happier person when I exited high school and realized that I actually could get positive outcomes from being weird. The "Mask" is more like a script imo, and it's good to be able to drop it when needed. The examples of girls with autism trying to fit in with other girls was sad. I remember in middle school how my nerdy coed friend group got bullied for sitting together at lunch. The guys got called gay and the girls were shunned by other girls. There was a lot of explicit peer group pressure to only associate by gender. Fortunately most people grew out of this by high school. Personally, I think I tended towards associating with males more often because I enjoyed competitive games (yugioh, magic, etc) and they were more likely to play. I always preferred hobbies with explicit rules to the comparative anarchy of navigating social circles. It's a shame that so many other girls get pressured by family and peers to avoid predominantly male social hobbies. I think they actually help improve self-confidence and create meaningful friendships far more easily for autistic folks than typical sleepovers or gossiping or whatever.

ikeyany 9y ago
> Fortunately most people grew out of this by high school. But did they?
- sudosteph 9y ago
  Well, they started sitting at tables with people of the opposite sex at least. By that measurement at least, I presumed so.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - ikeyany 9y ago
    That's true. Originally I had the " men and women can't be good friends unless there's an ulterior motive" line you see in adulthood.
    - 9y ago

arcaster 9y ago

I'm at a loss as to why this article claims being on the autism scale / weird is only hard for women...?

lumberjack 9y ago
Didn't read the article, but autism in men and women are two different diseases.
- OscarCunningham 9y ago
  The same condition, but affecting people's lives differently.
- sudosteph 9y ago
  citation needed.
sudosteph 9y ago
Seems that the point was that it's especially hard for women to get diagnosed and receive proper support for it. Not that it isn't also difficult for men. Girls and boys are socialized differently, and boys with autism are more likely to behave in outwardly disruptive ways, while girls are more likely to appear shy and anxious. Teachers and parents are more likely to bring up disruptive behavior to a doctor than just shyness and general social ineptitude.
- arcaster 9y ago
  IMO it's a loss for everyone to make mental health / disability a gendered issue. Mental illness is hard for everyone, regardless of what gender they identify as...
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    Recognizing gender differences in how conditions are expressed and challenges that relate to interaction between conditions and existing gender roles and norms is important. This isn't making mental health and gendered issue, it's recognizing that me talk health is an issue which interacts with other aspects of life, including gender.

rhexs 9y ago

This is interesting. The descriptions in the article also seem to describe what may be identified as social anxiety disorder. I wonder how those two diagnoses differ?

kosma 9y ago
With ASD, social ineptitude doesn't go away when anxiety is sorted out. Autistic people usually have it the other way round: it's their ineptitude that inevitably causes anxiety due to repeated failures.
- gt_ 9y ago
  Well said. I think this particular mixup makes for a lot of extra confusion on the part of people trying to understand ASD.

tinyegg 9y ago

This is hard to do but, are any other women on the spectrum looking for a friend? I'm 34, a SAHM and I live in Mountain View.

nothrabannosir 9y ago
I think this is the first time I’ve ever gotten angry about a downvote. tinyegg, I think it was an exemplary and inspirational action, and I hope your seed of courage bears fruit. Although it might be practical to add contact info to your profile :)
- tinyegg 9y ago
  Thanks, will do.
  - rhapsodic 9y ago
    And be careful when communicating with and/or meeting the strangers who contact you. They might not be who they purport to be.
    - tinyegg 9y ago
      Thank you, I'll make sure to meet them in a public place.
oaxacaoaxaca 9y ago
Years ago I visited Jamaica. When nice local people greeted me, to show they were nice they would say "respect", but with an emphasis on the first syllable, like "REE-spect". That's what I want to say to you for posting this. REspect, mon.
quickthrower2 9y ago
Wish you success with this.

kraig911 9y ago

I guess stories of people with autism who are merely socially scared and shy are easier to approach. Meanwhile there are parents who live every day in fear of how the hell can their son or daughter endure when they die. My daughter was diagnosed severe/non-verbale at age 3. If this woman is able to live a life such as this and able to use the bathroom, have a job, etc I'm hopeful of at least that for my daughter. It gives me hope. But I've met parents of children who are much much worse. Something must be done to change this narrative that Autism isn't curable. The stigma certainly doesn't help either.

rtpg 9y ago
I hope we can find treatments and the right set of accomodations. A thing I heard is that you can't cure many mental illnesses, much like you often can't cure a missing limb. But if you find the right prosthetic your life can become much better. I hope we can find this for more and more people on the spectrum.
sudosteph 9y ago
Temple Grandin gives me hope for severely autistic people. She's an amazing example of someone who has done well for herself despite very pronounced deficits and original diagnosis of non-verbal autism. I'm not very hopeful that it will ever be fully "curable", though maybe I'll be proven wrong. If we could at least medically correct for the overstimulation and hypersensitivity aspects, it would be such a huge win. I strongly believe the most negative and impairing parts of autism stem from this part. The people who are "merely" socially awkward often hide these aspects or avoid situations that would trigger them (ex: I carry ear plugs on my keychain because street noise or crowds in restaurants can be overwhelming, and I don't do tech conferences any more for the same reason). The more severe amongst us unfortunately usually need more than muffled sound to feel in control. That said, I do think there are ways of coping, tools, practices, that will make life for autistic people much better going forward. We need to keep researching those just as much a cure or pregnancy-time diagnosis. I hope things do get better for both you and your daughter.
tinyegg 9y ago
You may want to try switching to non-scented soaps, laundry detergent and cleaners. Do you feel or have you been told she has sensory processing disorder? Another thing to try is talking to her, a lot. If you have a wife who works have her stay at home and work with your daughter on meeting milestones. Get whole genome sequencing done. See if she has any issues with methylation etc. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4203003/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4203003/ Give her Dha and a multivitamin with more bioavailable forms of each vitamin or a whole food vitamin. My daughter will take these along with greens and fruit in smoothie form. Basically, do everything you can.

tinyegg 9y ago

As a child I rocked back and forth for hours finally stopping at nineteen with a huge amount of effort. I always did it behind closed doors. I was sexual abused and abandoned in my early teens. I came to California to help an AI researcher but ended up as a bio engineer and now a SAHM. The library was my refuge as a kid, no academic parents, no inspiring teachers. Fitting in was and is a huge challenge.

tyingq 9y ago
That's a pretty "out there share". Appreciate it. If you're ever in a position looking for a DFW (DALLAS/ Forth Worth) position, let me know).

stcredzero 9y ago

I've always liked "Aspergirls." (This is the term a friend of mine uses for herself.) As a group, they seem noticeably more attractive to me. I've noted that a lot of them do not like me, and make it more apparent than most women, though often this is done in a rational and polite fashion which I find more intellectually honest and respectful, and so like better. I was also in a relationship with one. That was quite difficult.

quickthrower2 9y ago
> As a group, they seem noticeably more attractive to me Is that because you like smart girls? Or is it they'd understand you better as a geek?
- stcredzero 9y ago
  Yes and yes. Also, they seem to smell better. I think in part because they tend to have a no-nonsense approach to hygiene, and aren't as afflicted by societal distortions around body odor.

Snowwombat 9y ago

"Asteroid to destroy earth! Women most affected!" Articles like this annoy the hell out of me, because it implies that men with Autism have it better somehow. I would argue that society is WAY more forgiving of "strange" women than it is towards men of a similar strange level. This coming from a guy married to a high functioning ASD woman.

grzm 9y ago
I don't read any implication of better or worse in the article, only that it's different. Would you point out passages that give you that impression?
- Snowwombat 9y ago
  Pretty much the chunks of the articles that show that women can at least adapt and have the ability do "fake" social function. Yes it's very draining in some cases, but at least they can hold down a job, and function as a "normal" adult for the most part. On top of that people and employers are more than willing to make all the required accommodations when asked. I work in engineering / IT as well as being a geek so I run into ASD guys pretty much daily and they get no accommodations and are usually brute forced into complying with the required norms, or they get fired. Even the most simple accommodations like a bit of work hour flexibly and working from home are not even entertained in most cases. They stick them in open plan offices, 8am to 6pm and brute force social interaction on them which is the opposite of what they need. I do know a few other female ASD people, and they themselves acknowledge that they get way better treatment and help then their ASD male friends.
  - hyperpape 9y ago
    In a lot of engineering circles, you can get away with hours of having your headphones on, wearing the exact same cut and color of shirt 365 days a year, fidgeting constantly, and not making eye contact. It’s not paradise, but there are much less friendly environments.
PhasmaFelis 9y ago

rrauenza 9y ago

I’ve found https://interpersonal.stackexchange.com https://interpersonal.stackexchange.com to be an amazing resource for improving interpersonal skills. Folks in the spectrum may also appreciate reading the content there. And asking for help when a situation just seems unfathomable.

anotherevan 9y ago

Both my kids are aspie. My son was diagnosed when he was seven because of some speech delay when he was younger and social awkwardness. My daughter was diagnosed at sixteen after two years of missed school and barely leaving the house due to incredibly high anxiety. Oh, and the first time she was assessed eighteen months prior she was only "borderline" aspie even though in retrospect she has been effected much more profoundly. (She also had a similar speech delay when she was younger too, btw.) We need to get a lot better at recognising the condition in girls, as we have with boys. § If you are wanting to know more about autism in all its flavours, google for just about anything by Tony Attwood. In more recent years he has been concentrating more on autism in women, so adding "women" to your search terms will surface specific material in that regard.

truculation 9y ago

Anybody know any stories or resources about autistic motherhood? It strikes me that being a mother with autism could be a challenge, for example when it comes to 'bonding' with the baby. Yet I haven't seen it discussed anywhere.

grzm 9y ago
The internet does appear to have some resources. I can't vouch for their quality, having just used a search engine, but they're at least a starting point: - https://autismwomensnetwork.org/motherhood-autistic-parenting/ https://autismwomensnetwork.org/motherhood-autistic-parentin... - https://www.thestar.com/news/investigations/2012/11/17/the_autism_project_mothers_with_asd_ask_why_scientists_are_missing_girls.html https://www.thestar.com/news/investigations/2012/11/17/the_a... - https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/apr/15/women-autistic-mothers-undiagnosed-children https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/apr/15/women-a... - http://network.autism.org.uk/knowledge/insight-opinion/autistic-women-pregnancy-and-motherhood http://network.autism.org.uk/knowledge/insight-opinion/autis... - https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/05/autism-parenting/526989/ https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/05/autism-pa...
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
kstenerud 9y ago
A friend of a friend spoke about getting pregnant and having a baby. For the entire duration up until the baby's birth, she worried because she didn't have any strong feelings. The moment the baby was delivered, something inside her said "This! This is what I was made for!". And then an hour later the feeling passed. Her kids seem to have automatically adjusted to her condition, being more vocal when they need something, or something is wrong (otherwise she wouldn't know). The movie "Snow Cake" does a pretty good job describing some of the challenges.
stared 9y ago
I guess each story differ. Though, I remember finding these: - http://web.archive.org/web/20160313002827/http://www.backfromnature.org/2015/03/i-gave-my-child-autism.html http://web.archive.org/web/20160313002827/http://www.backfro... (and its HN thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9245022 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9245022) - https://musingsofanaspie.com/about/ https://musingsofanaspie.com/about/

amriksohata 9y ago

Children at school can be very mean, I am much happier as an adult

romanovcode 9y ago
Adults can be plain evil just for the sake of it sometimes. They're not so different!

krylon 9y ago

I am male, but I can totally relate. I was diagnosed with (relatively mild) autism spectrum disorder last year at the age of 37. I kind of suspected for a long time, but somehow several psychiatrists and psychologists managed to miss it. I wish I had gotten that diagnosis earlier, because it makes it a lot easier to explain to people how I am different. I am not sure if I would call it covering it up, but a lot of my social skills are the result of a very conscious cognitive learning process. By now it is fairly automatic, but on a not-so-good day I tend to avoid eye contact and communication in general. Writing, strangely is much, much easier. On the upside, I managed to - partly - turn this to my advantage by making a point of being explicitly polite to people.

Aaargh20318 9y ago
I'm very similar to you, got diagnosed early 30's, now 38. Still haven't gotten the hang of the eye-contact thing, I know I basically avoid eye-contact, it's not a conscious thing. I have to force myself to make eye contact and always feels weird to do. As far as I understand the lack of eye contact is an issue for allistic people so I try to remember, but I usually fail.
- krylon 9y ago
  It might seem somewhat ironic for a borderline-autist, but I find it kind of comforting that I am not the only one with this condition. To me, eye contact gets harder if I have to focus. Greeting people or answering simple tech-support questions is not a big deal, but when I have to explain - or listen to! - something moderately complex, eye contact becomes difficult. I suspect the phenomenon is related to the Clippy-disaster with MS Office; recognizing faces takes a lot of brain power, and the human brain allocates a significant chunk to that specific task (at least that is what a neurologist once told me). Somebody wrote a Master's thesis or Ph.D. thesis in psychology about why Clippy was hated so much, and it was basically because face-like things at the margin of our field of vision take up a lot of "bandwidth" in the brain and thus distract from other things.
Cthulhu_ 9y ago
I think knowing the symptoms of autism and such can help you explain at least to yourself how you're different; I think that peace of mind and acceptance is the most important. I'm fairly sure I'm somewhere on the spectrum too, but it's mild and I'm managing fine. I'm afraid I'd turn it into a victim complex if I were to get a diagnosis.

kstenerud 9y ago

One big issue common with autism is blindness to body language, which apparently comprises 90% of the (in-person) communication we do. Does anyone know if there are courses one can take to learn how to recognize and produce correct body language?

terminalcommand 9y ago
I don't know about any courses, but watching a lot of tv shows especially situational comedies such as Frasier, Seinfeld etc. helped me immensely on reading people. The facial expressions usually give away the situation. The downside is that you need to constantly read the other parties expressions, and that can get noticed if you're not subtle enough. It required some energy, but over time you get proficient at it. Another thing that will help is to find safe topics. Talking about music, girls, sports are the easiest to learn. My advice would be not to shy away from social interactions. Practice makes perfect. Some people may inherently be born with an intuition to handle social interactions, but that doesn't mean that you cannot learn it by observing and mimicking. I guess this is what the article calls as masking. But masking doesn't have to be that painful. i believe people can grow and chance. If you put an honest effort you'll eventually fit into the society.
Cthulhu_ 9y ago
The way I see it, if it's not something you can just do naturally, you need to apply a more conscious, scientific process to it. There's loads of books on the subject, starting with e.g. Dale Carnegie's classic on what to look for and how to act.

stared 9y ago

See also "On emotional authenticity and masking as an autistic person" (http://cassolotl.tumblr.com/post/160117558965 http://cassolotl.tumblr.com/post/160117558965), which was posted here as well (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14226784 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14226784).

henrygabriel 9y ago

So I recognise all of the signs the article talks about in my partner. Most prominently (other than behavioural symptoms) she really struggles in social situations - finds them totally exhausting. I think it contributes heavily to her depression. However, she’s undiagnosed, and has not self-diagnosed - she just thinks she’s ‘not normal’. Do HN readers think I should bring this up with her? Does anyone dealing with this personally have any advice on this? I’d really appreciate it.