I remember all the bad things that occurred to me growing up. Every single bad experience changed me, but at the time, I didn’t understand. Often I think I let it happen, and it makes me feel heartbroken.
At the time, all I wanted was to be ‘not broken’. I tried to hide, tried to do what I hoped was the right thing – whatever people wanted me to do. I pretended to understand when others expected me to understand, even though I had no idea what was going on. So bad things happened and I never knew how to stop it.
It wasn’t just the traumatic events, but the little things too. When the sunlight hurt my eyes so badly that I could hardly see, I hid inside or sat still trying to look as if I wasn’t in pain. When the sound of a vacuum cleaner felt like torture, I didn’t understand how anyone could live through the pain every week, but I said nothing. I spent my days hiding in plain sight, hoping no one would see me, hoping that my weakness, my broken soul, would not be seen by others. I was alone.
Honestly, now I don’t know why I was so afraid, even though it made perfect sense at the time. I knew many years before my official diagnosis why I was different. In spite of that, I pushed myself far beyond the limits of my mind and body and in the end, it almost broke me.
I say almost, but maybe it actually did break me. I knew that I had to either finally end it all or go ask for help. I asked for help and I was diagnosed with Asperger’s (or ASD). As so many others on the spectrum, I also have a range of other challenges like anxiety and depression. My diagnosis came as a relief. I now had hope. I thought things would change. It did, just not the way I thought it would.
I messed up so much of my life just because I was afraid. I was self-destructive, always in pain. Worst of all is that I felt I deserved it. I was lying to everyone, but to no one more than myself. I didn’t see it as lying, I saw it as survival.
No one deserves that.
I found out, after becoming more and more open about my life and my ASD diagnosis, that most people don’t understand. I get that. Understanding things can be terribly difficult when it doesn’t make sense. I know, because so much of neurotypical behaviour seems counterproductive and just plain silly to me. So, if I see people like that, I understand that my behaviour can be as strange and alien to others, as theirs is to me.
It almost seems to me that people, myself included, sometimes forget the most vital thing about understanding. Understanding comes from making an effort to understand what one does not. It’s something we should try to remember. I can’t live a life where I just insist on others making the effort to understand my issues, and then wilfully ignore that I don’t understand theirs. Every time I am misunderstood, I want to work harder on understanding others and improve the way I express myself. I don’t blame others for misunderstanding, nor do I blame myself for not being understood. I simply want to do better next time.
It doesn’t matter whether we are neurotypical or not, everyone is different. We all know this. Innumerable songs, books and movies have been made on the topic and yet, for some reason, it still comes as a surprise to us when someone we know is different from the norm. Or perhaps, just different from what we expect of that person. So, what should we do, you ask? That is great question. I don’t know.
I don’t know what others should do, that is, but I know what I want to do. I want to work on understanding. I want to share my understanding, my experiences and my life. I hope to learn more about understanding and at the same time, I hope others can learn more as well. I want to get better at understanding all those things I have yet to understand, hopefully understanding myself better with every day that passes. More than anything, I hope not to do this alone.
I believe understanding is not something we do alone, but something we share.
