When you lose your place and the thought process you follow to get back there is EXACTLY how I work. I understand why you might think NT people are not going to like this, but WE AUTISTIC people do. Very seriously, well done! And you are a fantastic parent.
As to the last comment about being taken as a drug addicted person, this is something I hear that black autistic men in the US have to deal with. If they act odd or have a meltdown in public, the police respond in a very unfriendly and damaging manner.
Makes me think of my own situation. Back in my school days I was *always* picked last for the team. (Actually, I wasn't "picked", I was the last one left of all the kids, and that team got "stuck" with me. I still remember the audible "awws" of complaining.) I was embarrassingly clumsy, and everyone knew it.
Such raw honesty helps all the rest of us accept ourselves, and explain our reality to our NT friends - thank you for the courage that helps us be courageous too ❤
It's brave to be raw like this, but it's going to empower people. Some wouldn't be brave enough to do this themselves without seeing you do it first. 🙏🎉 In my view, the more different you feel and the more authentic you can be, the greater your impact!
Thank for this . I'm sick of people telling me I'm not Autistic or" I do that" when I try and explain myself . I had to edit this three times hahaha. I will probably make more comments as they come to my mind as I forget what I'm thinking so quick some times.
I wonder how many people are like “you don’t have autism, that’s normal, I do that” but then later they find out they are autistic themselves (and so, probably, were many people in their family/friend circle) haha
What a lot of neurotypical people can't understand is how informative and traumatizing these early years can be, and how much adults play a part in how kids are treated by their peers. I was not diagnosed autistic yet as a child, and I remember having issues with my teachers as early as my first day in the first grade. I had to sit in the corner and wear the "naughty" hat because the teacher thought I had traced a drawing (I hadn't) and then lied about it. The kids immediately began ostrazising me as a result of that one inciting incident because I kept defending myself. Later on the playground, a boy was so mean to me about it and kept trying to hit me in the head with a ball that I had a meltdown and scratched his arm in self defence. I spent five years at that school, bullied and ostrazised, just as much from the teachers as from the students. I had two more meltdowns and scratching moments during those five years (just to be clear, I never drew blood, just left red streaks) which only deepened the ostrasization. With the exception of one deep part of myself, I had fully internalized that I was "evil" and "naughty" and "wrong," and that was the source of my very deep, dark, depression as a teen, and something that took years to unpack in therapy as an adult.
Orion you feel like these unmasked vids are jumping off a cliff, yeah? There are two things that can happen after that. You fall. Or you *fly*. You gotta fall first to fly. I believe in you and this work you're doing. It's incredibly validating and insightful for me to watch these unedited vids.
Here I am crying again watching this 2nd video. I mask to please people - but I don't have an educative RUclips channel on autism, I am only a 'quiet' (to please people) 45 year old woman who is trying to survive this complex and exhausting social interaction filled circus. The other day I was in the hospital for a pain-relief injection, it was very crowded, the toilet I had to use had very cheap and hard toilet paper and there were wet spots on the ground, the soap to wash my hands was bright pink and the water running from the faucet was too cold, back in the room where I had to wait there was a fly on the outside of the window trying to come in (I wondered why a fly would want to come inside a hospital, go away I wanted to shout), there was annoying elevator music playing in the background, there was a pen on the edge of a table about to fall on the ground but the secretary did nothing about it, there was an ugly painting of some fruit on the wall with dust collecting on the lower edges, there was a pile of different coloured folders, but they were not sorted correctly, each chair in the waiting room area was a different color, the one I liked was taken up by a young child, the doctor came in looking overwhelmed, she recognized my face but didn't remember what procedure I was in for, she then turned her back on me and I saw a tiny little hole in her white doctor's coat, a woman using crutches came into the room staring and smiling at me, I smiled back, she complimented my colourful shoes, I smiled even more (go away!!! shouted my brain), I wanted to compliment her back, but didn't see anything I liked about her, then the nurse called me into the examination room, I went in, there were 4 other nurses there, all staring at me, I asked where do I put my handbag, no one answered, I asked again, none of the nurses gave me a clear answer, I then put it on this desk, they all shouted 'no no', I pulled my bag away, started hugging my bag, 'the doctor will place the sterilised needles on that desk', they took my bag away from me and put it on a chair (a chair????), they told me to take off my shirt and sit down, I was naked under my shirt, so I only lowered my shirt, still covering most of my body, they told me to sit still, they told me to move to the right, they told me to take off the shirt completely, they told me to calm down, they told me to breathe, they told me to calm down, they asked 'are you ok?', they told me to calm down, someone asked 'should we measure your blood pressure?, please calm down, come on breathe for us ..... I then bolted out of the room, out of the hospital yelling im sorry, im sorry, it's me, it's me, not you, me, me, me ..... I couldn't mask any longer. Everything was sooo overwhelming. It felt like I was trying to keep this little monster in me - who wanted to clean the toilet, put the pen away from the edge, organize those folders, clear off the dust etc - hidden from the world. But the monster was too strong for me .... I bolted and cried at the bus stop while people were staring at me. No idea how I got to that bus stop. No idea how I managed to come home. All I know is that I wish today didn't happen. This video is so crucial for people to understand what happens to us, how our brain and thoughts work. Thanks as always. (and yes I'm still crying)
Sorry for your awful experience & resulting sadness 😔 Hope you can try again for the procedure another time. Just wanted to let you know you're not alone in having these awkward experiences, I'm very much the same! I try not to care as much these days about what others think, or how ignorant, rude, or lazy many people are, but it takes a toll nonetheless! The masking & the shame & constant self-doubt / second-guessing oneself, is exhausting! Next time maybe wear some earbuds & quietly play your favourite music, it may help keep calm & focused, to lessen the overwhelm 💜
I too feel tight in my forehead, shoulders and watery eyes. The familiar tension from anxiety. The memories I have and the exact kind of thinking you convey so well. I'm avoiding my clinics for reasons and that's not helping me.
So sorry for your experience, as a nurse I am proud of how caring I was as a general & mental nurse not knowing until the age of 65 yrs young that I was autistic. Doctors & nurses can be cruel like anyone , I have witnessed this & it hurt me. My love goes to you not all of us are like that, I fortunately recognised the signs.
Oh my that sounds terrific, so sorry you had to go through that. I checked out your channel and saw how cats make you happy - they make me happy too, let’s focus on them when things get tough, always reward ourselves with more time with the felines! ❤
You have no idea how much this type of video helps. Before I was five I would get a slap on my face if I so much as covered my ears to shut out a person. I was forced to mask to avoid punishment, and over 30 years later I literally don't know what it means to be me, because I don't even know how to unmask. Hell, three years ago I didn't even know I have autism, so I didn't even know I HAVE something to unmask! This video helps a lot trying to figure that out. So thank you!
@@darbydelane4588 Thanks, but I feel that I failed to make an attempt to broadly generalize the issue enough for the comment to apply to all interested parties of the topic, like I intended it to with my last sentence. I don't have children, I don't know what it even feels like to be a father. But I remember how I felt being a child with autism. The internalised ableism. All of it. This video is helping to expose the wrongness of how children with autism are being approached, how to deal with this issue on both sides, when you are the one affected, either past or present, either yourself or your kid, or you are the one who did the offense and here you are taught how you were wrong. Oh well, I wouldn't be the first autistic person who'd have failed to get their meaning through...
@@dominic.h.3363it's a daily struggle. Best case scenario, people don't "get it"... Worst case scenario, they jump to conclusions and I'm "an asshole".
@@AutisticAthena Yea, the amount of times I've been described as self-absorbed, when all I wanted is to recall a similar experience of mine to exemplify that I can relate and therefore I actually care, is staggering...
@@dominic.h.3363 I have found out that NT people see that as "one upping" and not "I can relate because I have experienced something similar". It's hard making connections. In order for them to LIKE us, we have to edit so hard that it's not even US they like... Just what we've figured out how to give them so we don't get outcast... AGAIN.
I'm a 28F (almost 29) and while I'm not officially diagnosed, I've suspected I'm on the spectrum ever since I learned about how women on the spectrum differ from men 7 years ago. When I was growing up, girls didn't 'get' autism. I was just 'weird'. Even though I have 2 siblings and both of them have been diagnosed with autism and adhd. This isn't even super relevant to what I'm trying to say. I've just been feeling a bit of imposter syndrome, even though it all adds up and makes my lived experiences finally make sense. Anyway, I was in a period of denial for a long time, but I had another breakdown recently where I decided enough was enough. These past few days I've been watching countless RUclips videos and writing out a document. Writing down every connection I can find in myself and in my life to the experiences of other people on the spectrum. Planning on using it in the future to explain to others 'SEE, I'M NOT CRAZY' and eventually (when financially able) seek a formal diagnosis. Really, just to finally be understood. Watching these unmasked videos from you is like watching myself talk to... myself when I'm alone. I don't know if this is a common thing in autistic people (I haven't looked into this specific topic yet), but your mannerisms, thought process, and how you talk things out. I do all of that and always have in private. But in front of other people I've always been very reserved and quiet, almost never talking. No one would ever believe this is the real me. Anyway, I still need to watch the whole video, because I'm only 8 minutes in and I know it's going to be good, but I just wanted to say out of all the countless videos I've watched by autistic people, these are the ones that I have appreciated the most. They make me feel less alone and that's invaluable to me in a world that has only ever made me feel painfully isolated. tl;dr: he just like me frfr (and thank you so much for being brave enough to show it)
your message gave me some tears and a wide smile... ☺ it feels so great to finally not be alone in that. oh my goodness... if only i had heard such things at least 20 years earlier
I was never invited to birthdays and the teacher let the popular kids hand out the invitations IN CLASS. I sat there with bated breath when they came my way. Then they passed me. I was devastated. They also had flowers that you can order for all your friends and they passed them out in class. I never got a single one. My mom complained to the school. They basically told her i was a jerk. Icried my self to sleep every night of the 8th grade. So i unfortunately relate.
School is horrible for anyone who is different. The two things I try to bring to my son are that home is shelter, and I will always be his ally. The thought that anyone would abuse my boy because of his differences rips me up inside. Honestly, it's so hard not to hate them for the suffering they cause. These memories are something he will have his entire life. A living record of negative reinforcement.
Before my diagnosis (at 37) I had been tested for street drugs any time I would end up at the hospital because of a meltdown in a public space (brought by the police). People often think I'm on drugs when I can't speak and do a lot of stereotypic movements.
LOVE the unedited videos. As a late diagnosed female, I've been working hard on limiting my masking. Having people such as yourself be vulnerable in this way is helping so much - having experienced numerous burnouts my adult life and now trying to limit them. I'm not a parent, but I can feel you and your family's hurt and anger. That behaviour (the mother/s) is so unacceptable and unfortunately it is leaving a legacy for it to continue. Although frustrating, we need to continue to advocate for ourselves to hopefully make a small change in younger generation's lives.
I relate to this so much as im late diagnosed myself. Lol. The lost generation. I began advocating for myself 3 years ago and im finally getting heard. People think that here in canada health care is just handed out like breath mints. It is not the case. I had to work hard. Anyway. We are together, all over the world.
@thom ascher wow! I have to admit I was definitely under the impression that Canada's healthcare situation is all sunshine and rainbows. I'm in South Africa and the healthcare here (particularly mental health) is like 20 years behind everyone else 🙈 Having an online community is such an underrated help when the healthcare systems fail us. I'm so happy you've had the mental fortitude to continue advocating for the past 3 years and that things are finally starting to head in the right direction 🥳
@@sarahschmidt1076 Thank you! It wasn't JUST the system failing us. I failed myself and spiralled to drug abuse. im 14 years sober however that is 10 plus years of lessons I shouldn't have needed to learn. I did, and here I am. Alive, not thriving, not yet but soon hopefully. Addiction is an illness, yes, it can be but so is hatred and prejudice and ignorance. I am Without these, So, I'm doing 👍. South Africa 🇿🇦 I feel for your situation, evrything is not lekker! I follow closely. Not even Mandela could make sense of that! I fear as Wagner had made their way through Burkina Faso Sudan and the Central African Republic they may have their eyes set on South Africa and now the Indo community the Africaanz and the indigenous community are trying to destroy one another! and it's t strategic! I feel for your country. Likening felt for Harare, Zimbabwe we are all the same. can't we all see color, means nothing. difference makes us stronger more interesting. Like our own immune systems! expose yourself to every culture every way of life!
I went from reading late diagnosed female to thinking you had been diagnosed female & my brain just went on a huge tandem story completely irrelevant... What's that about? That's what happens in hospital waiting rooms.
I'm 35, recently realizing I'm probably autistic. I can relate with your stories so thoroughly. I grew up being told that I had a temper. I live with the burden of knowing I hit/retaliated against multiple kids. I went from 13-30 knowing I was a monster, trying to justify it, since they were all bullies. I'm just glad that kids now are being diagnosed and validated at a more effective rate. Maybe they won't have as deep of scars. Thanks for being you, Orion.
Im 34. Same here. I got into fights with both boys and girls at school. I never stroke first...it was just the bullying and teasing becoming too much. They dont back down they just act nastier as youre close to meltdown. I get it.
in 5th grade, my friends, all of a sudden (to me), made a club named ihb for “i hate [me]”. in my late 30s now and still don’t know why that happened. that kind of thing doesn’t ever leave you.
I am so sorry you went through that. you didn't deserve that and I hope you can find yourself surrounded by people who see you and love you for who you are authentically ❤❤.
Hi Orion, this is so true. I got beaten up buy 6 girls all at once at a school disco for talking to a boy! When my kinds went to school, I would get ostracised in the playground by the other parents. But I got a job in a primary school looking after a autistic boy, because of my own issues dyslexia, dyspraxia, autism and adhd. I also had NVQ in teaching assistant and maths GCSE B and I taught art using different mediums. So I was able to put myself in his shoes I. There was a incident in the play ground, and when all the children came back into class, all of them were really mad and been really nasty to (my) boy. I ask what had happen and they said that he had spent the whole play time going around hitting all of us. So I asked (my) boy if this was true and he said yes, but they are all doing it too, why can't I. So as we got to the bottom of it, the other kids were play tic, but all (my) boy saw was everyone just running around hitting everyone. So after explaining the cross communication, all the kids said sorry to (my) boy because by now he was crying. This was in the kinder of at the being of term and they were 8yrs old. Because of the miss understand was so big, all kids said, if anything happened like they would tell a teacher at the start and not at the end of something happening. Which they did most of the time. ( Nipping it in the bud!) Your Kids school needs to do a hell of a lot more, it is there job to keep your son safe. I'm so sorry that your family is going through this. My kids are now 30 and 32yrs and they both are not having children themselves, as they say live is just too hard. Sorry this was so long winded. Take care🥰
My daughter recently had a meltdown at school. She locked the bathroom stalls AFTER someone was copying her (REALLY annoys her) and the teacher took away her stimming thing she was doing. Shes never done that before. Then she couldn’t play outside. So she came home very upset that day. And after hearing her side of things, I know she had a meltdown because I had one the day before and I asked her questions about how she felt. She says “I don’t even know what happened. All I know is I was extremely upset and had to get it out.” I’m trying to get my daughters dad on board with homeschooling her because I can already see molding happening and I don’t want that for her. We recently had a meeting (it wasn’t helpful). They are choosing when she can stim and when she can’t! I’m furious. I’ve already told them via writing. If I had 10% more say, she’d be homeschooled today, but I don’t. So I feel helpless to help her. Other than being in her corner, I don’t know what to do.
The story you told about your son and your wife, that has happened to me my whole life. People ignoring me and walking right past me to talk to other people. Causing me to feel unimportant my whole entire life. I'm 61 years old now. I have a lot of autistic grandchildren, I think that is very unusual. And I see them at school and I see things like this happening to them. I'm so grateful for your videos. Thank you so much❤
😩 I'm ADHD (still figuring out the rest) and this comment gave me another one of those 're-live your life real quick' moments. Greeting customer warmly as they walk in, asking how I may help them and they walk right past me to someone else, a lot. 😩 Maybe I just have a vibe, idk. I am ND though and apparently NT can sense a difference of some kind in us and it causes aversion. 🥴
I'm about to be 60. I walked into the breakroom at work the other day with 3 people sitting at the table. I said Hello. Not one person responded to me. I said How's everyone doing today? One person said fine. I give up. I'm ignored at work, not included, not part of the group. I've made every effort to be nice to people, done nothing I'm aware of that should make them not like me, yet they don't. I give up. That was my final effort. From now on I'll just walk into that room, take my break and leave.
@@sallyhamilton7202only so much rejection before you get the "eff you too" feeling? Me too. Only so many times before I give up. I'm not going to inflict my presence on someone who doesn't want me around.
@@sallyhamilton7202 That's what I've been doing since high-school. At Avery young age, I learned that people need to get stuffed. I micro tried to say high to my neighbors, they just stood there. Not sure if they could see but who cares. I waved, nothing back, then went on my way. If they waved fine, if they didn't, fine. Who cares. Take care of you. Your close people who care about you and understand you. Nothing else. ❤
I have realized that because of the short duration of most interactions, most people don't get to know me. I struggle with small talk and short interactions so most people get either a negative first impression because I rub people the wrong way or don't give me enough time to express myself. This has caused me to withdraw due to being misunderstood CONSTANTLY plus the demanding nature of having a meaningful relationship with someone, be it friends family etc. Most people don't have the time anymore to get to know each other. I think social media has only made this exponentially worse.
on the other hand, without the social media i would've never found such channels and folks like you, and i would've forever felt trapped alone in the surrounding cruelty, in this callous stupidity, in this blindness to truth and beauty. it's only through social media that i've found some true human validation. so credit where credit is due. but of course i crave having that in real life too.
I’m a late diagnosed autistic woman and everything you said cut straight to my heart. I grew up believing that I was a monster. I believed that I was just going to lose control and harm someone and not even realize that I had done it because of the way I was treated when I was a kid. It’s taken years of therapy to get past that. I get it Orion.
I very much related to the teasing and bullying points. In my experience schools act like a kid can handle infinite micro-aggression from all sides. It's really just an active enforcement of emotional violence. Basically every time I recall being the one in trouble, it was for reacting after being harassed. These are things adults can't handle, and we expect kids to manage without considering challenges or the actual dynamic of what plays out. It's bad enough for neurotypical kids, but to blame ASD kids for not knowing the unspoken rules you subsequently never examine, or not actively skating around the breakable and bendable rules, just makes me feel angry and ill. It's systems of power blaming the victims, because even understanding what is happening might take real work, and might set some expectation of decency and accountability to justice for authority
This happens in life too. Those who psychologically or emotionally abuse people are often seen as innocent, and those who defend themselves physically are accused as a perpetrator.
@@Isaiah-ft5nx absolutely. Much of our culture is built on psychological coercion. Ads make you feel bad so you'll by skin cream or whatever. In a caustic culture it's so easy to normalize terrible behavior, such as in divorces. We give people passes for treating someone terribly conditionally, when no you should just be decent to people as a basic expectation
I can’t tell you how much I enjoy these videos… actually that’s a stupid phrase. I can tell you and I will. These raw videos bring me joy because I can relate. It makes me feel normal. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could unmask all the time! Thank you for this part two, I hope to see more!
Thanks for sharing this. As an autistic mum I’ve now dispelled any and all regrets about homeschooling my autistic 9 year old son for fear he’s missing out on social interaction. He has a few groups we go to weekly and the home schooled kids seem much more accepting of people with differences and he’s never been bullied by any of them. Get your kids out of these toxic environments if you can and let them grow as they should.
Orion, please make this a regular video format. I am late-diagnosed autistic too. I like all of your videos, but it’s SO MUCH EASIER to keep my concentration on these unedited videos, than it is with your RUclips friendly videos. I know you need both. Just keep these going, please! You rock.
Please say hello to your older son from me. If he's a monster, he's part of the coolest gang of monsters on the planet. This made me cry, not only for him but also because of all the memories it brought up from 40-45 years ago me.
This is what is happening to my 8 year old son. As a mother I can feel your pain for your son. It's heart breaking and your right the world is being run by loads of dumb parents that don't understand and have no interest in understanding. Keep smiling for your sons my friend
Pardon a second comment, but I do think that that drug addict question was genuine. It actually happens to me. Of course, is one of those "a nerotypical would never be asked this" questions, but I do see it as innocent because... Yeah. I've actually had to walk a line at a traffic stop because they assumed I was on drugs just because I act odd. "Are you high?" Has been asked in interviews. It is actually more common than you might think and I think they were asking out of curiosity.
Yeah I feel the same way…I don’t blame Orion for being upset, without context that is a horrible thing to be asked by someone, but I can’t help but worry that another autistic fellow like us was possibly faced with a sense of rejection by the reaction. I’ve been looking through the comments to see if that person might have replied or not, but I also don’t know who that person is.
I have been the recipient of group social rejection, both when I was a child and when I was an adult. I was never invited to kids birthday parties as well. Once I gained some level of social intelligence, I had more acceptance in middle school, high school and in my young adulthood. It started up again in my mid 30's when I stopped trying so much. Instantly, the rejection returned. Tysm for this video.
Dude, I love you so much. Thank you for making these. I carry so much shame from growing up like that, and though my son is an adult now, that trauma and fear constantly clouded my parenting when he was a child. I just internalized that message that there’s something wrong with me, with us, that we have to hide and control ourselves, and the pain of messing up a social interaction still reduces me to an absolute child, it’s very hard to navigate or to explain. You, unmasked, talking about this it’s like i wish i could say how much it resonates inside my entire life. Please continue to be yourself, you are healing so many people just by existing. I’m glad your kids have such a loving and supportive dad, and mom! It can make all the difference in the world to have parents who love and accept you.
Kids birthday parties were a nightmare. I was never invited. The few I did go to it was "invite the entire class" type situations. But honestly, It was painful and no amount of my parents "making it up to me" would ever actually make it better... because on Monday morning all the girls would be talking about "the party". I hope you do more of these videos.
I wish your son luck in finding kind friends and having good birthday parties. I loved going to my best friend’s birthday parties. She was also autistic. Her mom told her that if she didn’t want a big party with a lot of kids and noise she could choose one friend and we could do whatever we wanted. We almost always drove to the city to go to the zoo. We had an amazing time and it didn’t leave use overwhelmed enough to have a meltdown. It was a perfect substitute for a party.
I know that you primarily do this series for the community, but I hope that there is at least a part of this that is genuinely freeing for you as well. Thanks for all you have done, and continue to do.
Boy I felt this. As a pre-K, I was assessed to enter K a year early but was held back due to social skills, and a fat lot of nothing the extra year did me. Kids ran away from me on the playground and yelled at me when I didn't know the rules of the games. High school my so called "friend group" had parties without me, even a senior prom afterparty where everyone was invited except me and my date. I was just diagnosed last year and have had to put so many pieces of my past into context. Oh, and one of my passions is food, so the cheesecake that is a 12-hour no bake might actually be easier technique wise than the baking in a water bath. The texture tends to be different, and you do have to plan for the overnight chill though.
The 'unwatchable' series is nothing short of incredible. Seeing real raw representation means so much to me. I thought I was the only one who's supposed friend made a hate club about me, complete with signatures. It's sad that I'm not alone in that. The internalized ableism is very real.
I cackled loudly at several points. Especially as an autistic mother with a special interest in all things cooking/baking…there SO many times where I’m yelling at a no-bake recipe for being more complicated and annoying than any oven based dessert! On a more serious note my son just completed his first year at school. His teachers were wonderful but the parents of other kids were so fucking weird to me. Why am I getting stared at for trying to interact with my child on the field trip? Even before he started school…. Any time I took him to the park or a playground the other kids would shy away from him as soon as they noticed he was not speaking. My son is the kindest little boy. Always smiling at everyone. But they don’t care. And all the moms are huddled off to the side paying absolutely no attention to anything. Really infuriating to me. I won’t hesitate to tell a bully off…but I don’t want to lead with my triggered inner child who remembers the pain of being bullied and not understanding why.
I'm not autistic (that I know of), but I am ADHD. I grew up homeschooled. My mom is VERY extroverted. I'm more a social introvert. I like to be social in small groups, and then I'm happy for some quiet time. My mom would plan giant birthday parties for me. When I was about 8, I finally got to plan things a bit more for myself. I picked two friends to hang out and have a sleep over. That was generally how I did most of my birthdays after that. Pick one or just a few friends to invite over. Though for my 12th birthday, nothing. I didn't get a birthday because... I don't remember what I did, but I do remember I wasn't allowed to have my one friend over. I was homeschooled too, so my opportunities for friends were limited. I'm sure I tended to be seen as weird. Then when I came back from college, I had tried to make some friends there, but my parents decided I was addicted to the computer and pretty much cut me off from all social stuff for months. I was an adult. I shouldn't have had to deal with it, but I didn't have my degree finished, didn't have a job that paid well enough to leave, and there was nothing I could do except run away to my boyfriend's house. That was a mess.
Your kids’ school is awful. At least our kids’ schools were really good about zero tolerance for bullying. But trying to get extra support for my daughter was a challenge, and I was often misinterpreted (I’m AuDHD) as being controlling and who knows what else. But luckily they evaluated her as on the spectrum and gifted. Next year she’s going to a special program classroom at a different school where it’s a very small class, has a specially trained teacher, and is supervised by a psychologist. There’s no going from class to class all day, either. Just one classroom. I’m really hopeful this is going to help.
Pausing at 25:23. May offer my perspective. As a child, I never had big birthday parties nor did I want to be invited to big birthday parties. I've always been uncomfortable in large crowds and though as an adult, I've found coping mechanisms when I'm forced into those situations, they still make me uncomfortable and exhaust me. So going back to the birthday party situation. Growing up, I really only had one true friend. When my birthday rolled around, my dad would take us to a movie of my choice and to eat at a restaurant of my choice. Maybe the solution with regards to your son is to coordinate with their parents for a seperate, low-key get-together with your son and his one or two friends just to hang out, exchange gifts, etc. I'm not talking about two full blown birthday parties, but just a "play date" if you will. Maybe even suggest you could host so you can define the time length and the pace of things. Thanks for your channel. I've learned a lot from it and at nearly 60, I'm actually thinking about getting professionally evaluated to hopefully get some answers as to why I've lived life as a square block trying to fit into the round hole of the neurotypical world.
Now that I know I am autistic, I find it harder than ever to fit in, let alone even know who the heck I am. Then it came to me, I actually do know my authentic self. I had to really think to find a version of me that was 100% just real me. Authentic me is that guy who is who he is when it's just him and his dog. It took a while but I finally pinpointed a no bones, authentic version of me.
@@HeartOfLightning it's not easy to introspectively find a past situation where you had no mask on at all. Finding out later in life sure did throw a wrench into how I view my past
Your stories about your older son remind me so much of stories my spouse has told me about his own primary school experiences. At 68, he still carries the scars of believing that any unedited, unmasked responses will scare people. Yes, I'm not always sure why he has a meltdown -- but watching your videos really helps me understand. Not to mention doing a lot of reading, and realizing that the same things which make him melt down cause me to shut down.
One thing I have learned in my life is to never underestimate the stupidity of some people. Thank you for providing a perfect example. I would also consider it a privilege to have a friend like you. You are a winner Orion, period.
This one really hit home. My child was recently dx'd with autism/ADHD. I had many conservations with the school principal concerning the bullying my child was experiencing. I would say, it is fine they dont like her but they will not touch her our her things. I was a momma grizzly. Not sure if I made things better or worse.
34:43 and on really made me cry. And I'm someone who has a lot of trouble externalizing my emotions. The time my paternal grandparents died (They weren't as close to me as other relatives), I did feel bad, and I could empathize with my dad, however I barely had any emotion, internal or external. I think I just have a different concept of life and death. But back to why it made me cry: It hit quite close as someone who was bullied in middle school, there wasn't a "Tachysphex is a bastard club" as far as I'm concerned, but I know what it is like to be called a monster because you're different, and how you end up convicing yourself that it is true indeed. To this day, I still have this voice in my mind telling me "people don't like you", "Don't do that, it's weird", "I ruin everything", even though I don't think of myself as a monster anymore.
When I was in primary school I had a very close friend. The only friend I ever really had. One day I cam to school and she just stopped talking to me or spending time with me. She sat with the "cool" kids and just ignored me. She acted all rude towards me when J wanted to ask her what I have done wrong. Till this day, and I'm 30 now, I don't have the slightest idea what I have done wrong accept being myself. The kids used to call me weird, but I didn't care because I had a friend on my side. From that moment on I realized I was going to be alone and just deal with that. I'm still traumatized by that. I never had a real friend since. Only messed up and abusive relationships, because that's a great way to have a friend.🙄(not really)
I was walking around and listening to this until that “I’m a monster” part hit. I sat down immediately, it made me choke up a little. Non-autistic people simply cannot understand the internal hell of meltdown rage that comes with autism, the way it makes you shake and your eyes pulsate, and then the desolate despair of waking back up after the fact. It’s like a horror movie with you as the villain when you never wanted to be casted as that role
I'm a late-diagnosed female and have been unmasking for nearly thirty years. Your videos are so helpful, especially the un-edited ones. Thank you so much for what you do.
My husband is Autistic and he too is constantly being mistaken for a meth addict. I don't think the person who made the comment to which you were referring was trying to be disrespectful. There's a good likelihood that the question was genuine
It saddens me to hear how other kids and their parents are to your son. The schools and administration, teachers etc need to do better. They must enforce a no bullying policy and educate their students on children with disabilities and how they should be treated just like everyone else . Calling your son a monster? That should be addressed to the principal or whoever is in charge there ! We need to keep advocating for our children and never stop.
Just Another Random person here but, I still can't thank you enough Orion. I found myself deleting lots of following random blah blah words, from my comment. But thank you for helping me not feel... "alone" Your words feel like a warm and accepted hug
Powerful. I'm sorry your son is going through that. At almost 50, I'm learning that I am autistic. I was able to mask pretty well throughout my childhood, but I find I can't do it as well anymore, even though I try. In the last couple of years, I feel more and more like a monster. Thank you for your raw honesty and vulnerability. It helps me more than you know.
I appreciate your authenticity in your unedited videos, but your regular videos are much easier to follow. They're both important for different reasons & I resonate with a lot of what you covered here. I'm still being left out of things all the time, usually people forget about me - I'm not sure if that's worse than being deliberately excluded 🤣
My son had an autistic girl in his class. To his 9th birthday party I invited the entire class (about 22 kids) including the girl, ofc! Her mom was in tears thanking me for inviting her daughter, which puzzled me until she explained the exclusion she and her daughter had experienced so far. Totally surprised me until I thought about it.... People simply do not understand autism...and many people think that this sort of condition is contagious! My guess is that your son's friends' MOM is the one controlling who can be invited to his birthday party...and what you said about him saying that some kids couldn't come, so there's room for your son now, I'd bet she told him there was only so much room. That friend will learn from his mom that xenophobic/ableism bias in due time as his mom teaches him. People suck. I prefer animals. They're honest and never lie or play head games.
What I don't understand is why it's okay for Orien's kids to have small birthday parties with two friends, but it's not okay for other parents to set limits on the number of kids invited. It's very obvious that children who invite get invited, and those who don't invite don't get invited. I feel for his son, and for him. It's horrible to see your child in pain. However, I think he's going purely off feelings and leaving logic out of it completely.
This is waaaaay more authentic, interesting, funny and (at times sad) than actual political standup commedy. The emotions feel real and nothing feels fake. It's all relatable and i know from my own childhood that the facts check out. Keep making real videos like this. And yes, everyone was always very surprised that i don't smoke weed...
This is a brilliant video - self advocating is simply asking to be treated with the same degree of respect afforded to non autistic people; that they take for granted. It is so good you said what is often considered unsayable. I admire your authenticity and candour.
Something that struck me as I was watching this is that people said they felt like they had been seen while I felt I see me. I am not trying to devalue how others feel, and I know this is a somewhat semantic take, but there it is. Thank you for your vulnerability and courage. Being in my skin is a little easier today because you made this.
Anyone else get through the "unedited, unscripted, unmasked, unwatchable" disclaimer with a neurospicy crack of the "challenge accepted" knuckles?! Loving these videos, Orion. Thank you so much for having the courage to make them. Your regular videos are absolutely superb, and have been so immensely helpful in navigating the post-diagnosis lack of help/support/information. But there's something so immensely healing and validating about these unmasked ones, and I love that you recognise this is as valuable and important to your autistic audience as the regular informative ones are to a wider audience.
Orion, I'm so sorry you're going through such a rough time. May I please just assure you of one thing? Your unconditional love & empathy for your son shows in his feeling comfortable coming to you and TELLING you about the bullying and how he feels. I grew up with a narcissist for a father & NEVER felt safe telling my parents I was being bullied all through high school because the mass bullying from both the other students at school, my sister, & father alike made me feel like I was a bad, defective person & DESERVED it! I didn't even feel safe telling my mother at the time, and about 30 years later when I DID tell her, SHE felt like an awful mother for not knowing, but it wasn't her fault she didn't realize she'd married a narcissist & neither did I realize he was a narc at the time. I genuinely thought my father was superior to everyone else on earth until I found out that "silent treatments" are a standard weapon in every narcissist's arsenal for controlling others. I suffered from "selective mutism" at school, especially with males, throughout high school & ended up getting voted "Quietest" in my graduating class, and I too had only ONE friend at a time, if I found anyone willing to be seen with me, usually other "misfits," which usually changed every school year. And I didn't get invited to anything either, while my poor mother was constantly being called down to my primary school to pick me up from the principal's office! Your son is so lucky to have you not just as a dad, protector, ally, & advocate who is spreading awareness about & acceptance of autism. I even learned something myself from this video: that my lashing out & attacking other kids who were bullying me, including my younger sister in the presence of the rest of the family in which I was the black sheep, seemingly out of nowhere & then being the one to be punished for it, was actually caused by autism! I was just wondering out loud what caused me to do those things & feeling guilty about it & wondering what the **** was WRONG with me, including almost DROWNING my sister in the pool as a kid because I physically CAN'T swim & HATED being in the pool & she kept splashing "tidal waves" into my face & getting my cousins to join in with her, was caused by AUTISM!!! Wow, mind blown. I still hate myself, but at least now I know I'm not a homicidal monster! THANK YOU for NOT GIVING UP on educating people about autism. It seems like you've barely gotten started compared to other autistic RUclipsrs who helped me figure out I'm autistic in the first place. It's SO hard to advocate for ourselves when we ourselves are autistic. But, trust me, you ARE making a difference!!! I had more to say after I first watched this, but I've been thinking so much about this video for the last few days since I first watched it and it just hit me that your son felt safe telling you that he was being bullied and DOESN'T have too much toxic shame to tell you. I wish I'd had a loving father & autistic role model in my life like he does! You are an awesome dad and human being. Please don't be so hard on yourself.❤ Now WHERE do you PREFER that we buy your book? Do you want me to order it from your website or from Amazon? I watched your most recent video, & I'm sorry for expressing my shock at the cost of mailing it internationally. (I have a friend who's self-published through what I call "Scamazon" & also makes no money from it, but she also goes through Smashwords so I can buy her books for my Nook as I don't have a Kindle, and the laptop app is no use to me because I can't read on my laptop due to the backlighting & physical disability as well. Because America and Australia both use "dollars" as currency, I failed to take the exchange rate (which is constantly changing) into consideration. I'd love a signed copy & will gladly pay the $20 for postage, but if you're feeling burned out & aren't up to taking it to the post office, I'll order it from Amazon. And when it becomes widely available as an e-book, I'll order another one for my Barnes & Noble Nook, which is the only way I can read without physical pain. I'm really looking forward to getting a copy one way or another.
Ps: A parent like you is what we all wished for as kids! You're doing a great job being a father (as far as we can see here) and it is giving hope to see how truely you love your kids!❤meow😻
I can imagine not being invited can feel like being punished. But to turn that round to "the person punished me/ my son/ whom ever when not inviting me" is an interpretation. I don't know what that woman thought. Neither do you. But its more likely that what motivated her decision was something like " I invite the kids my son has visited/ invited most times and they had a good time". Or - sad enough - "I am afraid this autistic child could get and bring us in a situation I don't feel able to handle" or even - having her limitations too - " I will be glad when this horrible party is over without someone being seriously hurt, I wont volunteer for inviting someone who gets in or bring us in a kind of trouble I have no experience with". Sad enough for the not invited person. But that is not punish, if I understand the word right as "willingly making someone suffer with the intention to take revenge or change their behaviour".
This reminds me of how intense my emotions were when I was a kid, and all the crazy sht I thought about doing because of how I was treated by the other kids. I remember I once snapped into a bloody rage and clawed up my classmates face. I remember that there was blood but I don't remember anything else he was my friend and I didn't hate him at all I think I was just teased too much and bottled that up. In my mind everything is intense but I think the mask I wear is very nonchalant. I have always thought and even told people before that if I where to do and say whats in my head then no one would like me.
I understand the spectrum stuff a little bit. Can be tough especially for those who at the time didn’t understand they were on the spectrum. Can be traumatic.
It's like looking into a mirror watching the unedited vids. I mask it with everyone, but the when I'm alone, your mannerisms and frustration comes out just like mine. Thank you for doing these videos! It helps!
When I wash in first year of secondary school (aged 11, I was one year younger than most) a kid hit me on the arse with an elastic band. I had a rolled up piece of A3 paper that I had made into a treasure map with tea and burnt holes made with a blue bic lighter. I burnt my hand and spilled the tea but I was so proud. I don't know why I was so angry but I have a vague recollection of being bullied (I remember basically none of my earlier childhood). I turned around and looked for the person who had hit me on the my chubby left cheek. I swung. It wasn't until after all was said and done that I found out that the person that blocked my swing, was not in fact the culprit. His guilt was irrelevant to be at the time. I didn't know who had done it and tbh I don't think I cared. I swung.....he swung back. What happened next, I can't say for sure. I remember the shape and colour of the hall I was in, it was chipped, heavy navy paint, with a sink that didn't work on the left side and a radiator on the right. The "fight" itself, I blanked out. I was told that I hit his head on a radiator. I honestly don't know. That's the first meltdown I can remember happening even if I don't remember the actual meltdown. This was my first year in the school and while I never did anything like that again, people treated me like some sort of alien pariah for most of my time there. I'm now 44. 33 years later and I remember all of that in detail. I still can't remember my families birthdays. These things hurt. These things don't leave us. The worst part is, we don't even know we do it and only do it when we get poked. Yet we're the problem.
Talking about your son and your family's experiences with school almost brought me to tears. The bullying from adults while my son was in school was shocking. A teacher actually put my son in a box during class. Literally put an appliance box over his desk for a week during class before I found out about it. He was 7. He didn't want me to go to the school because 'the education of the kids around him was important'. You know that didn't come from his little mind. I most certainly did go and take care of that. They banned him from the book fair because he might just steal. He had never stolen anything in his life. It's heartbreaking. I ended up homeschooling from 8th grade on, which was a very hard decision but otherwise I just couldn't get him to go anyhow because it was so horrendous.
I've been asked many times if I was on drugs while just being myself. To be fair, we do have a lot of meth-heads here in the midwest and they can act in ways that could be confused with autistic stimming/behaviors. No, I was never on drugs. Also, my young son is starting to face some of these issues at school, too. Mostly I'm getting the 'boys will be boys' shrug off.
The cake stuff cracked me up! 😂 The one birthday party my mum put on for me had me melting down in front of all the guests. I was 10. Notwithstanding, that was the one and only birthday party I ever had. I didn't put on group parties for my kids, really, but then I had so many kids (7) we had our own party all the time,and I'm autistic, so the idea of having to communicate with all the NT other parents is just too excruciating and unbearable for me. Just having that many children was chronic overwhelm for me (what was I thinking?😮. No, really I was a teenager when I started and I autistically, doggedly, got obsessed with giving my kid's a less lonely, less outcast life, by having all of the children I conceived). I don't regret my large family, despite how difficult it has been, as an autistic person. My second born has the kind of autism that came with development delays and cognitive impairment. And my youngest has the kind that gets called "gifted" Autistic and ADHDy. He was always painfully shy, but the second born is quite outgoing and will talk to pretty much anybody. Ironically, youngest son, now 18 in a couple of weeks, has had the same friends since before school age (all neurodiverse) bar one, and second born isn't that good at maintaining relationships with friends of his own age but his support workers generally really like him. I'm not either. All my energy, for the most part, goes into my kids, now in their 30's, 20's and one teen, and my guy friend and now, 2 grandbabies.
We get to see the mental and emotional effort and energy it takes from you to provide Edited content. Thank you for sharing your Authentic, unedited Self. You’re wonderful. 😊
Absolutely fantastic yet again. Really helps me as a late dx AuDHD with my unmasking and self acceptance. Also faced similar situations as a kid as you and your son with being picked on/cut out at school - as many of us autistics seem to have been. Thank you for being so brave and letting us see your authentic self. It is really helpful - and I loved the comment about the space rocket cake 🤣Please do a third instalment - if you feel up to it.
Thank you! I keep running into people that just can't help themselves but poke at me. Then I get in trouble when I have a reaction, even though everything would have been fine if they just left me alone. I'm sorry I haven't been watching your videos lately. I had a meltdown, lost a lot of work and now I'm having some sort of shutdown. Feeling very bleak about my future, but the video helps me to know that I'm not the only one experiencing this type of behavior from the general public at least. It's a bittersweet comfort, but comfort nonetheless.
I only realized I might be autistic like half a year ago, and I'm still understanding things. Today's realization hit hard. So, I have a problem where I sometimes "snap". Like, it feels unbearable and sometimes is a "small" thing, but also sometimes is frustration for not being understood or whatever. Sometimes I just need to stop what's happening and on the way out I verbally hurt people (not with insults, but I do sound hateful). I snapped once to a boyfriend I had in college, I was really anxious about having to meet with other people and there was also some jealousy, so I badmouthed them. He looked at me in a way I'll never forget and that was the beginning of the end. The relationship didn't last long after that, maybe a week or two. And that's happened with classmates I wasn't friends with too, they've seen me lose my shit one day and they've become more distant. Oh yeah, and there was that time that I got overwhelmed in a party because they wanted to sing karaoke and it killed me with anxiety and I wanted to cry and didn't know how to say goodbye so I just left and it was worse because it caught everyone's attention. I never went to another party like that. I don't know if it's because of autism. But I wish I could be more normal.
I thibk this video helped me. I am not the one who watched all your videoa before, but i am glad i have watched the unedited unmasked ones first. The story about your son reminded me my school years and how they poked me and made fun of me to shout and scream and hit me with rocks and... i am not a monster
Thank you for this. You brought back a lot of memories where i went through a lot of the same as a kid and even still as an adult. People expect neurodivergent/disabled people to act like they aren't. I often was called a robot and treated like a circus freak. Push and pole at me to see how long it takes to get an emotional response out of me. So much so that i internalized a lot of it and still do.
I didn't get invited to parties because my lack of facial expressions and my eccentricities scared people. Made sense to me. Understand as an adult how much that that really shaped my lack of self worth.
Orion, roll on No. 3. 🎬 You have more friends than you could ever probably envisage Your true self with stories equally experienced. Your Yorkshire autistic mate from t'other side of the 🌍 world ( a globe full of great autistic folks) 🤔
Your random rant abt no bake cheesecake really struck me because I realized that I do that! I talk to myself a lot and sometimes I just get into imaginary conversations or I get super excited or antsy abt random stuff just like that! I used to think that maybe I’m moody or am an oddball for getting myself into random rants moods but I’m realizing that this too is just apart of being neurodivergent. That among other tendencies I have I see in myself, makes me feel like weird or crazy for being myself and it’s kinda helping me see HOW I mask bc I don’t always know how I’m doing it. Your unmasked videos essentially show me what being myself looks like….thanks for that ❤
I've always thought that I'm just introverted, awkward, observant and highly attuned to others' emotional states. However, watching your unmasked videos has made me think that it might be worth pursuing an autism assessment. It is exactly how I communicate with a trusted couple of people when I can safely let my guard down and it's sometimes taken by others as my being angry with them or mildly aggressive.
When I was a kid, my sister was invited to a friend's birthday party, and I was dragged along as a second. Her friend's older brother was in my class and knew me. He looked me in the eyes and asked "Why are you here?" I will never forget it. Edit/followup: "I'm a monster." My god, I have never related to anything more. For much of my adult life so far, I have felt like more of a twisted abomination than a person, since I have for so long repressed anything that made me different from how others wanted me to be. I am scared by what those repressed emotions have turned into.
I know it wasn't the main topic of this video, but you talking about meltdowns and your son not remembering what happened sparked repressed/forgotten things from my school time. At around 7 years old for "fastelavn", holiday in Denmark that resembles Halloween a bit but in February, with costumes and barrels that gets beating like a pinata. I gave my glasses to the class teacher before going to the schools gym to beat the barrel. After that when we all got back to the class room I find my glasses on the window sill, destroyed. Next I remember I'm sitting on the chest of one of the biggest guys in the class and he is looking up at me, scared, trying to get through to me that he hadn't touched my glasses. I have no clue what happened in that time frame, but I am now considering if it wasn't a meltdown. 3-4 years later, I had some run-in with a substitute teacher in music class. There were some talking, teacher probably asked a question I don't recall exactly. Again there is a hole in my memory, from the teacher standing at the blackboard to him standing over me at my table I have no idea what happened nor how long. It was reported to the principal, by other students in class that the teacher had slapped me but I have no recollection of that at all. Another possible meltdown on my part? And to get on topic, I was rarely invited to birthday parties. That said I rarely invited people from school or daycare to birthdays either, even from the family it was rarely more than maternal grandparents and at big family gatherings I hid whenever I could, preferring to be on my own as I felt overwhelmed by people. Undiagnosed, but seriously considering that I might be autistic. Getting to talk to someone that can diagnose, is taking forever.
I was diagnosed last month. At the age of 50 years. I cannot thank you enough for putting words and descriptions of things that I have struggled with and exhaustively masked my entire life.
I am in tears. We are scapegoated and I honestly believe it is because we are actually giving lie to the unreasonable cruelty of the NT world. So many of us have been through this. How can it ever be fixed if they make us the problem?
Orion... My heart goes out to you, your family and to others who have challenges with our unaware NT society. Your videos, especially the unmasked ones, teach us a lot and show the life-long effects clueless and uncompassionate NT people have on those with autism or to those who have an autistic loved one. Thank you for helping us understand, and for helping parents of autistic children understand how to share this important message and lesson to NT people. You are a great blessing to the world. ❤
When you lose your place and the thought process you follow to get back there is EXACTLY how I work. I understand why you might think NT people are not going to like this, but WE AUTISTIC people do. Very seriously, well done! And you are a fantastic parent.
As to the last comment about being taken as a drug addicted person, this is something I hear that black autistic men in the US have to deal with. If they act odd or have a meltdown in public, the police respond in a very unfriendly and damaging manner.
I’m 52, and the “being invited to a party at the last minute” hits me between the eyes. That happened to me. Still hurts.
You’re an amazing parent. ❤
Makes me think of my own situation. Back in my school days I was *always* picked last for the team. (Actually, I wasn't "picked", I was the last one left of all the kids, and that team got "stuck" with me. I still remember the audible "awws" of complaining.) I was embarrassingly clumsy, and everyone knew it.
@@nunayurbizness8168 me too. Exactly
Lived that too!
Being a parent the toughest job. Lead with love and patience. You’re doing well imo. ❤
@@nunayurbizness8168
My childhood also.
You’re not ruining your career. You’re being honest and we all appreciate you for taking the time and being so courageous to share this with us. ❤❤
Love to you and your family. You obviously have a deep desire to help people
Oh my god when I first read that I missed the word not. And I was like.What are you talking about? He's awesome!😂 Then I saw the word not😂
Such raw honesty helps all the rest of us accept ourselves, and explain our reality to our NT friends - thank you for the courage that helps us be courageous too ❤
Well said. Took me so many more words! LOL
🙌👏👏👏👏👏
It's brave to be raw like this, but it's going to empower people. Some wouldn't be brave enough to do this themselves without seeing you do it first. 🙏🎉
In my view, the more different you feel and the more authentic you can be, the greater your impact!
The cheesecake segment is totally relatable. 12 HOURS!!! Totally relatable.
Honestly, as neurodivergent kin, this felt easy to follow
So far all of it is very easy to follow.
Thank for this . I'm sick of people telling me I'm not Autistic or" I do that" when I try and explain myself . I had to edit this three times hahaha. I will probably make more comments as they come to my mind as I forget what I'm thinking so quick some times.
I wonder how many people are like “you don’t have autism, that’s normal, I do that” but then later they find out they are autistic themselves (and so, probably, were many people in their family/friend circle) haha
Oh the dreaded “everyone feels that/does that sometimes” justification for why you’re not autistic lol.
What a lot of neurotypical people can't understand is how informative and traumatizing these early years can be, and how much adults play a part in how kids are treated by their peers. I was not diagnosed autistic yet as a child, and I remember having issues with my teachers as early as my first day in the first grade. I had to sit in the corner and wear the "naughty" hat because the teacher thought I had traced a drawing (I hadn't) and then lied about it. The kids immediately began ostrazising me as a result of that one inciting incident because I kept defending myself. Later on the playground, a boy was so mean to me about it and kept trying to hit me in the head with a ball that I had a meltdown and scratched his arm in self defence. I spent five years at that school, bullied and ostrazised, just as much from the teachers as from the students. I had two more meltdowns and scratching moments during those five years (just to be clear, I never drew blood, just left red streaks) which only deepened the ostrasization. With the exception of one deep part of myself, I had fully internalized that I was "evil" and "naughty" and "wrong," and that was the source of my very deep, dark, depression as a teen, and something that took years to unpack in therapy as an adult.
Orion you feel like these unmasked vids are jumping off a cliff, yeah?
There are two things that can happen after that. You fall. Or you *fly*. You gotta fall first to fly.
I believe in you and this work you're doing. It's incredibly validating and insightful for me to watch these unedited vids.
Here I am crying again watching this 2nd video. I mask to please people - but I don't have an educative RUclips channel on autism, I am only a 'quiet' (to please people) 45 year old woman who is trying to survive this complex and exhausting social interaction filled circus. The other day I was in the hospital for a pain-relief injection, it was very crowded, the toilet I had to use had very cheap and hard toilet paper and there were wet spots on the ground, the soap to wash my hands was bright pink and the water running from the faucet was too cold, back in the room where I had to wait there was a fly on the outside of the window trying to come in (I wondered why a fly would want to come inside a hospital, go away I wanted to shout), there was annoying elevator music playing in the background, there was a pen on the edge of a table about to fall on the ground but the secretary did nothing about it, there was an ugly painting of some fruit on the wall with dust collecting on the lower edges, there was a pile of different coloured folders, but they were not sorted correctly, each chair in the waiting room area was a different color, the one I liked was taken up by a young child, the doctor came in looking overwhelmed, she recognized my face but didn't remember what procedure I was in for, she then turned her back on me and I saw a tiny little hole in her white doctor's coat, a woman using crutches came into the room staring and smiling at me, I smiled back, she complimented my colourful shoes, I smiled even more (go away!!! shouted my brain), I wanted to compliment her back, but didn't see anything I liked about her, then the nurse called me into the examination room, I went in, there were 4 other nurses there, all staring at me, I asked where do I put my handbag, no one answered, I asked again, none of the nurses gave me a clear answer, I then put it on this desk, they all shouted 'no no', I pulled my bag away, started hugging my bag, 'the doctor will place the sterilised needles on that desk', they took my bag away from me and put it on a chair (a chair????), they told me to take off my shirt and sit down, I was naked under my shirt, so I only lowered my shirt, still covering most of my body, they told me to sit still, they told me to move to the right, they told me to take off the shirt completely, they told me to calm down, they told me to breathe, they told me to calm down, they asked 'are you ok?', they told me to calm down, someone asked 'should we measure your blood pressure?, please calm down, come on breathe for us ..... I then bolted out of the room, out of the hospital yelling im sorry, im sorry, it's me, it's me, not you, me, me, me ..... I couldn't mask any longer. Everything was sooo overwhelming. It felt like I was trying to keep this little monster in me - who wanted to clean the toilet, put the pen away from the edge, organize those folders, clear off the dust etc - hidden from the world. But the monster was too strong for me .... I bolted and cried at the bus stop while people were staring at me. No idea how I got to that bus stop. No idea how I managed to come home. All I know is that I wish today didn't happen. This video is so crucial for people to understand what happens to us, how our brain and thoughts work. Thanks as always. (and yes I'm still crying)
Sorry for your awful experience & resulting sadness 😔 Hope you can try again for the procedure another time. Just wanted to let you know you're not alone in having these awkward experiences, I'm very much the same! I try not to care as much these days about what others think, or how ignorant, rude, or lazy many people are, but it takes a toll nonetheless! The masking & the shame & constant self-doubt / second-guessing oneself, is exhausting! Next time maybe wear some earbuds & quietly play your favourite music, it may help keep calm & focused, to lessen the overwhelm 💜
I too feel tight in my forehead, shoulders and watery eyes. The familiar tension from anxiety. The memories I have and the exact kind of thinking you convey so well. I'm avoiding my clinics for reasons and that's not helping me.
So sorry for you ♥️ That is awful. I have a very similar experience if i have to go to the doctor or a hospital. You describe the situation so well.
So sorry for your experience, as a nurse I am proud of how caring I was as a general & mental nurse not knowing until the age of 65 yrs young that I was autistic. Doctors & nurses can be cruel like anyone , I have witnessed this & it hurt me. My love goes to you not all of us are like that, I fortunately recognised the signs.
Oh my that sounds terrific, so sorry you had to go through that. I checked out your channel and saw how cats make you happy - they make me happy too, let’s focus on them when things get tough, always reward ourselves with more time with the felines! ❤
You have no idea how much this type of video helps. Before I was five I would get a slap on my face if I so much as covered my ears to shut out a person. I was forced to mask to avoid punishment, and over 30 years later I literally don't know what it means to be me, because I don't even know how to unmask. Hell, three years ago I didn't even know I have autism, so I didn't even know I HAVE something to unmask! This video helps a lot trying to figure that out.
So thank you!
Hugging you.🙏🏾🤟🏽
@@darbydelane4588 Thanks, but I feel that I failed to make an attempt to broadly generalize the issue enough for the comment to apply to all interested parties of the topic, like I intended it to with my last sentence.
I don't have children, I don't know what it even feels like to be a father. But I remember how I felt being a child with autism. The internalised ableism. All of it. This video is helping to expose the wrongness of how children with autism are being approached, how to deal with this issue on both sides, when you are the one affected, either past or present, either yourself or your kid, or you are the one who did the offense and here you are taught how you were wrong.
Oh well, I wouldn't be the first autistic person who'd have failed to get their meaning through...
@@dominic.h.3363it's a daily struggle. Best case scenario, people don't "get it"... Worst case scenario, they jump to conclusions and I'm "an asshole".
@@AutisticAthena Yea, the amount of times I've been described as self-absorbed, when all I wanted is to recall a similar experience of mine to exemplify that I can relate and therefore I actually care, is staggering...
@@dominic.h.3363 I have found out that NT people see that as "one upping" and not "I can relate because I have experienced something similar". It's hard making connections. In order for them to LIKE us, we have to edit so hard that it's not even US they like... Just what we've figured out how to give them so we don't get outcast... AGAIN.
I'm a 28F (almost 29) and while I'm not officially diagnosed, I've suspected I'm on the spectrum ever since I learned about how women on the spectrum differ from men 7 years ago. When I was growing up, girls didn't 'get' autism. I was just 'weird'. Even though I have 2 siblings and both of them have been diagnosed with autism and adhd. This isn't even super relevant to what I'm trying to say. I've just been feeling a bit of imposter syndrome, even though it all adds up and makes my lived experiences finally make sense.
Anyway, I was in a period of denial for a long time, but I had another breakdown recently where I decided enough was enough. These past few days I've been watching countless RUclips videos and writing out a document. Writing down every connection I can find in myself and in my life to the experiences of other people on the spectrum. Planning on using it in the future to explain to others 'SEE, I'M NOT CRAZY' and eventually (when financially able) seek a formal diagnosis. Really, just to finally be understood.
Watching these unmasked videos from you is like watching myself talk to... myself when I'm alone. I don't know if this is a common thing in autistic people (I haven't looked into this specific topic yet), but your mannerisms, thought process, and how you talk things out. I do all of that and always have in private. But in front of other people I've always been very reserved and quiet, almost never talking. No one would ever believe this is the real me. Anyway, I still need to watch the whole video, because I'm only 8 minutes in and I know it's going to be good, but I just wanted to say out of all the countless videos I've watched by autistic people, these are the ones that I have appreciated the most. They make me feel less alone and that's invaluable to me in a world that has only ever made me feel painfully isolated.
tl;dr: he just like me frfr (and thank you so much for being brave enough to show it)
your message gave me some tears and a wide smile... ☺ it feels so great to finally not be alone in that. oh my goodness... if only i had heard such things at least 20 years earlier
I was never invited to birthdays and the teacher let the popular kids hand out the invitations IN CLASS. I sat there with bated breath when they came my way. Then they passed me. I was devastated. They also had flowers that you can order for all your friends and they passed them out in class. I never got a single one. My mom complained to the school. They basically told her i was a jerk. Icried my self to sleep every night of the 8th grade. So i unfortunately relate.
🫶🏼
You're not alone, Heather. So many of us can relate exactly to this.
I am so sorry to hear this 😢
School is horrible for anyone who is different. The two things I try to bring to my son are that home is shelter, and I will always be his ally. The thought that anyone would abuse my boy because of his differences rips me up inside. Honestly, it's so hard not to hate them for the suffering they cause. These memories are something he will have his entire life. A living record of negative reinforcement.
As an autistic single mother raising 2 autistic boys, I can absolutely relate. Thank you for your honesty.
Before my diagnosis (at 37) I had been tested for street drugs any time I would end up at the hospital because of a meltdown in a public space (brought by the police). People often think I'm on drugs when I can't speak and do a lot of stereotypic movements.
LOVE the unedited videos. As a late diagnosed female, I've been working hard on limiting my masking. Having people such as yourself be vulnerable in this way is helping so much - having experienced numerous burnouts my adult life and now trying to limit them.
I'm not a parent, but I can feel you and your family's hurt and anger. That behaviour (the mother/s) is so unacceptable and unfortunately it is leaving a legacy for it to continue. Although frustrating, we need to continue to advocate for ourselves to hopefully make a small change in younger generation's lives.
I relate to this so much as im late diagnosed myself. Lol. The lost generation. I began advocating for myself 3 years ago and im finally getting heard. People think that here in canada health care is just handed out like breath mints. It is not the case. I had to work hard. Anyway. We are together, all over the world.
@thom ascher wow! I have to admit I was definitely under the impression that Canada's healthcare situation is all sunshine and rainbows. I'm in South Africa and the healthcare here (particularly mental health) is like 20 years behind everyone else 🙈 Having an online community is such an underrated help when the healthcare systems fail us. I'm so happy you've had the mental fortitude to continue advocating for the past 3 years and that things are finally starting to head in the right direction 🥳
@@sarahschmidt1076 Thank you! It wasn't JUST the system failing us. I failed myself and spiralled to drug abuse. im 14 years sober however that is 10 plus years of lessons I shouldn't have needed to learn. I did, and here I am. Alive, not thriving, not yet but soon hopefully. Addiction is an illness, yes, it can be but so is hatred and prejudice and ignorance. I am Without these, So, I'm doing 👍. South Africa 🇿🇦 I feel for your situation, evrything is not lekker! I follow closely. Not even Mandela could make sense of that! I fear as Wagner had made their way through Burkina Faso Sudan and the Central African Republic they may have their eyes set on South Africa and now the Indo community the Africaanz and the indigenous community are trying to destroy one another! and it's t
strategic! I feel for your country. Likening felt for Harare, Zimbabwe we are all the same. can't we all see color, means nothing. difference makes us stronger more interesting. Like our own immune systems! expose yourself to every culture every way of life!
I went from reading late diagnosed female to thinking you had been diagnosed female & my brain just went on a huge tandem story completely irrelevant... What's that about? That's what happens in hospital waiting rooms.
I'm 35, recently realizing I'm probably autistic. I can relate with your stories so thoroughly. I grew up being told that I had a temper. I live with the burden of knowing I hit/retaliated against multiple kids. I went from 13-30 knowing I was a monster, trying to justify it, since they were all bullies. I'm just glad that kids now are being diagnosed and validated at a more effective rate. Maybe they won't have as deep of scars. Thanks for being you, Orion.
Im 34. Same here. I got into fights with both boys and girls at school. I never stroke first...it was just the bullying and teasing becoming too much. They dont back down they just act nastier as youre close to meltdown. I get it.
in 5th grade, my friends, all of a sudden (to me), made a club named ihb for “i hate [me]”. in my late 30s now and still don’t know why that happened. that kind of thing doesn’t ever leave you.
I am so sorry you went through that. you didn't deserve that and I hope you can find yourself surrounded by people who see you and love you for who you are authentically ❤❤.
That is disgusting and so sad.
I hope you found better friends along the way.
Hi Orion, this is so true. I got beaten up buy 6 girls all at once at a school disco for talking to a boy! When my kinds went to school, I would get ostracised in the playground by the other parents. But I got a job in a primary school looking after a autistic boy, because of my own issues dyslexia, dyspraxia, autism and adhd. I also had NVQ in teaching assistant and maths GCSE B and I taught art using different mediums. So I was able to put myself in his shoes I. There was a incident in the play ground, and when all the children came back into class, all of them were really mad and been really nasty to (my) boy. I ask what had happen and they said that he had spent the whole play time going around hitting all of us. So I asked (my) boy if this was true and he said yes, but they are all doing it too, why can't I. So as we got to the bottom of it, the other kids were play tic, but all (my) boy saw was everyone just running around hitting everyone. So after explaining the cross communication, all the kids said sorry to (my) boy because by now he was crying. This was in the kinder of at the being of term and they were 8yrs old. Because of the miss understand was so big, all kids said, if anything happened like they would tell a teacher at the start and not at the end of something happening. Which they did most of the time. ( Nipping it in the bud!)
Your Kids school needs to do a hell of a lot more, it is there job to keep your son safe. I'm so sorry that your family is going through this. My kids are now 30 and 32yrs and they both are not having children themselves, as they say live is just too hard. Sorry this was so long winded. Take care🥰
My daughter recently had a meltdown at school. She locked the bathroom stalls AFTER someone was copying her (REALLY annoys her) and the teacher took away her stimming thing she was doing. Shes never done that before. Then she couldn’t play outside. So she came home very upset that day. And after hearing her side of things, I know she had a meltdown because I had one the day before and I asked her questions about how she felt. She says “I don’t even know what happened. All I know is I was extremely upset and had to get it out.” I’m trying to get my daughters dad on board with homeschooling her because I can already see molding happening and I don’t want that for her. We recently had a meeting (it wasn’t helpful). They are choosing when she can stim and when she can’t! I’m furious. I’ve already told them via writing. If I had 10% more say, she’d be homeschooled today, but I don’t. So I feel helpless to help her. Other than being in her corner, I don’t know what to do.
The story you told about your son and your wife, that has happened to me my whole life. People ignoring me and walking right past me to talk to other people. Causing me to feel unimportant my whole entire life. I'm 61 years old now. I have a lot of autistic grandchildren, I think that is very unusual. And I see them at school and I see things like this happening to them. I'm so grateful for your videos. Thank you so much❤
😩 I'm ADHD (still figuring out the rest) and this comment gave me another one of those 're-live your life real quick' moments. Greeting customer warmly as they walk in, asking how I may help them and they walk right past me to someone else, a lot. 😩 Maybe I just have a vibe, idk. I am ND though and apparently NT can sense a difference of some kind in us and it causes aversion. 🥴
I'm about to be 60. I walked into the breakroom at work the other day with 3 people sitting at the table. I said Hello. Not one person responded to me. I said How's everyone doing today? One person said fine. I give up. I'm ignored at work, not included, not part of the group. I've made every effort to be nice to people, done nothing I'm aware of that should make them not like me, yet they don't. I give up. That was my final effort. From now on I'll just walk into that room, take my break and leave.
@@sallyhamilton7202only so much rejection before you get the "eff you too" feeling? Me too. Only so many times before I give up. I'm not going to inflict my presence on someone who doesn't want me around.
@@sallyhamilton7202 That's what I've been doing since high-school. At Avery young age, I learned that people need to get stuffed. I micro tried to say high to my neighbors, they just stood there. Not sure if they could see but who cares. I waved, nothing back, then went on my way. If they waved fine, if they didn't, fine. Who cares. Take care of you. Your close people who care about you and understand you. Nothing else. ❤
I have realized that because of the short duration of most interactions, most people don't get to know me. I struggle with small talk and short interactions so most people get either a negative first impression because I rub people the wrong way or don't give me enough time to express myself. This has caused me to withdraw due to being misunderstood CONSTANTLY plus the demanding nature of having a meaningful relationship with someone, be it friends family etc. Most people don't have the time anymore to get to know each other. I think social media has only made this exponentially worse.
on the other hand, without the social media i would've never found such channels and folks like you, and i would've forever felt trapped alone in the surrounding cruelty, in this callous stupidity, in this blindness to truth and beauty. it's only through social media that i've found some true human validation. so credit where credit is due. but of course i crave having that in real life too.
I’m a late diagnosed autistic woman and everything you said cut straight to my heart. I grew up believing that I was a monster. I believed that I was just going to lose control and harm someone and not even realize that I had done it because of the way I was treated when I was a kid. It’s taken years of therapy to get past that. I get it Orion.
I very much related to the teasing and bullying points. In my experience schools act like a kid can handle infinite micro-aggression from all sides. It's really just an active enforcement of emotional violence. Basically every time I recall being the one in trouble, it was for reacting after being harassed. These are things adults can't handle, and we expect kids to manage without considering challenges or the actual dynamic of what plays out.
It's bad enough for neurotypical kids, but to blame ASD kids for not knowing the unspoken rules you subsequently never examine, or not actively skating around the breakable and bendable rules, just makes me feel angry and ill. It's systems of power blaming the victims, because even understanding what is happening might take real work, and might set some expectation of decency and accountability to justice for authority
This happens in life too. Those who psychologically or emotionally abuse people are often seen as innocent, and those who defend themselves physically are accused as a perpetrator.
@@Isaiah-ft5nx absolutely. Much of our culture is built on psychological coercion. Ads make you feel bad so you'll by skin cream or whatever. In a caustic culture it's so easy to normalize terrible behavior, such as in divorces. We give people passes for treating someone terribly conditionally, when no you should just be decent to people as a basic expectation
I can’t tell you how much I enjoy these videos… actually that’s a stupid phrase. I can tell you and I will. These raw videos bring me joy because I can relate. It makes me feel normal. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could unmask all the time! Thank you for this part two, I hope to see more!
As an autistic person I've had "friends" not invite me to special gatherings because they were afraid I would be an embarrassment to them .
Thanks for sharing this. As an autistic mum I’ve now dispelled any and all regrets about homeschooling my autistic 9 year old son for fear he’s missing out on social interaction. He has a few groups we go to weekly and the home schooled kids seem much more accepting of people with differences and he’s never been bullied by any of them. Get your kids out of these toxic environments if you can and let them grow as they should.
😢😢😢😢😢😢😢😢😢😢😢😢😢 I am so sorry this is happening to your family Orion.
Orion, please make this a regular video format. I am late-diagnosed autistic too. I like all of your videos, but it’s SO MUCH EASIER to keep my concentration on these unedited videos, than it is with your RUclips friendly videos. I know you need both. Just keep these going, please! You rock.
Same
This is great
Please say hello to your older son from me. If he's a monster, he's part of the coolest gang of monsters on the planet. This made me cry, not only for him but also because of all the memories it brought up from 40-45 years ago me.
This is what is happening to my 8 year old son. As a mother I can feel your pain for your son. It's heart breaking and your right the world is being run by loads of dumb parents that don't understand and have no interest in understanding. Keep smiling for your sons my friend
Pardon a second comment, but I do think that that drug addict question was genuine. It actually happens to me. Of course, is one of those "a nerotypical would never be asked this" questions, but I do see it as innocent because... Yeah. I've actually had to walk a line at a traffic stop because they assumed I was on drugs just because I act odd. "Are you high?" Has been asked in interviews. It is actually more common than you might think and I think they were asking out of curiosity.
Yeah I feel the same way…I don’t blame Orion for being upset, without context that is a horrible thing to be asked by someone, but I can’t help but worry that another autistic fellow like us was possibly faced with a sense of rejection by the reaction. I’ve been looking through the comments to see if that person might have replied or not, but I also don’t know who that person is.
Yeah, I had that thought too. Happens to me also lol
I have been the recipient of group social rejection, both when I was a child and when I was an adult. I was never invited to kids birthday parties as well. Once I gained some level of social intelligence, I had more acceptance in middle school, high school and in my young adulthood. It started up again in my mid 30's when I stopped trying so much. Instantly, the rejection returned. Tysm for this video.
You had me laughing through the pain. This is raw truth. I mask until I can't. The love you feel for you family comes through strong.
Dude, I love you so much. Thank you for making these. I carry so much shame from growing up like that, and though my son is an adult now, that trauma and fear constantly clouded my parenting when he was a child. I just internalized that message that there’s something wrong with me, with us, that we have to hide and control ourselves, and the pain of messing up a social interaction still reduces me to an absolute child, it’s very hard to navigate or to explain. You, unmasked, talking about this it’s like i wish i could say how much it resonates inside my entire life. Please continue to be yourself, you are healing so many people just by existing. I’m glad your kids have such a loving and supportive dad, and mom! It can make all the difference in the world to have parents who love and accept you.
Kids birthday parties were a nightmare. I was never invited. The few I did go to it was "invite the entire class" type situations. But honestly, It was painful and no amount of my parents "making it up to me" would ever actually make it better... because on Monday morning all the girls would be talking about "the party". I hope you do more of these videos.
I wish your son luck in finding kind friends and having good birthday parties. I loved going to my best friend’s birthday parties. She was also autistic. Her mom told her that if she didn’t want a big party with a lot of kids and noise she could choose one friend and we could do whatever we wanted. We almost always drove to the city to go to the zoo. We had an amazing time and it didn’t leave use overwhelmed enough to have a meltdown. It was a perfect substitute for a party.
I know that you primarily do this series for the community, but I hope that there is at least a part of this that is genuinely freeing for you as well.
Thanks for all you have done, and continue to do.
Boy I felt this. As a pre-K, I was assessed to enter K a year early but was held back due to social skills, and a fat lot of nothing the extra year did me. Kids ran away from me on the playground and yelled at me when I didn't know the rules of the games. High school my so called "friend group" had parties without me, even a senior prom afterparty where everyone was invited except me and my date. I was just diagnosed last year and have had to put so many pieces of my past into context.
Oh, and one of my passions is food, so the cheesecake that is a 12-hour no bake might actually be easier technique wise than the baking in a water bath. The texture tends to be different, and you do have to plan for the overnight chill though.
The 'unwatchable' series is nothing short of incredible. Seeing real raw representation means so much to me.
I thought I was the only one who's supposed friend made a hate club about me, complete with signatures. It's sad that I'm not alone in that.
The internalized ableism is very real.
I cackled loudly at several points. Especially as an autistic mother with a special interest in all things cooking/baking…there SO many times where I’m yelling at a no-bake recipe for being more complicated and annoying than any oven based dessert! On a more serious note my son just completed his first year at school. His teachers were wonderful but the parents of other kids were so fucking weird to me. Why am I getting stared at for trying to interact with my child on the field trip? Even before he started school…. Any time I took him to the park or a playground the other kids would shy away from him as soon as they noticed he was not speaking. My son is the kindest little boy. Always smiling at everyone. But they don’t care. And all the moms are huddled off to the side paying absolutely no attention to anything. Really infuriating to me. I won’t hesitate to tell a bully off…but I don’t want to lead with my triggered inner child who remembers the pain of being bullied and not understanding why.
I'm not autistic (that I know of), but I am ADHD. I grew up homeschooled. My mom is VERY extroverted. I'm more a social introvert. I like to be social in small groups, and then I'm happy for some quiet time. My mom would plan giant birthday parties for me. When I was about 8, I finally got to plan things a bit more for myself. I picked two friends to hang out and have a sleep over. That was generally how I did most of my birthdays after that. Pick one or just a few friends to invite over. Though for my 12th birthday, nothing. I didn't get a birthday because... I don't remember what I did, but I do remember I wasn't allowed to have my one friend over. I was homeschooled too, so my opportunities for friends were limited. I'm sure I tended to be seen as weird. Then when I came back from college, I had tried to make some friends there, but my parents decided I was addicted to the computer and pretty much cut me off from all social stuff for months. I was an adult. I shouldn't have had to deal with it, but I didn't have my degree finished, didn't have a job that paid well enough to leave, and there was nothing I could do except run away to my boyfriend's house. That was a mess.
Your kids’ school is awful. At least our kids’ schools were really good about zero tolerance for bullying. But trying to get extra support for my daughter was a challenge, and I was often misinterpreted (I’m AuDHD) as being controlling and who knows what else. But luckily they evaluated her as on the spectrum and gifted. Next year she’s going to a special program classroom at a different school where it’s a very small class, has a specially trained teacher, and is supervised by a psychologist. There’s no going from class to class all day, either. Just one classroom. I’m really hopeful this is going to help.
Pausing at 25:23. May offer my perspective. As a child, I never had big birthday parties nor did I want to be invited to big birthday parties. I've always been uncomfortable in large crowds and though as an adult, I've found coping mechanisms when I'm forced into those situations, they still make me uncomfortable and exhaust me.
So going back to the birthday party situation. Growing up, I really only had one true friend. When my birthday rolled around, my dad would take us to a movie of my choice and to eat at a restaurant of my choice. Maybe the solution with regards to your son is to coordinate with their parents for a seperate, low-key get-together with your son and his one or two friends just to hang out, exchange gifts, etc. I'm not talking about two full blown birthday parties, but just a "play date" if you will. Maybe even suggest you could host so you can define the time length and the pace of things.
Thanks for your channel. I've learned a lot from it and at nearly 60, I'm actually thinking about getting professionally evaluated to hopefully get some answers as to why I've lived life as a square block trying to fit into the round hole of the neurotypical world.
Now that I know I am autistic, I find it harder than ever to fit in, let alone even know who the heck I am. Then it came to me, I actually do know my authentic self. I had to really think to find a version of me that was 100% just real me. Authentic me is that guy who is who he is when it's just him and his dog. It took a while but I finally pinpointed a no bones, authentic version of me.
I can relate to that.
Now that I know it's a thing and I'm not the only one, I finally find out more and more about myself.
Thanks for sharing 🙏🙂
Comments like this can help others see that authentic person within themselves, too.
@@HeartOfLightning it's not easy to introspectively find a past situation where you had no mask on at all. Finding out later in life sure did throw a wrench into how I view my past
Your stories about your older son remind me so much of stories my spouse has told me about his own primary school experiences. At 68, he still carries the scars of believing that any unedited, unmasked responses will scare people. Yes, I'm not always sure why he has a meltdown -- but watching your videos really helps me understand. Not to mention doing a lot of reading, and realizing that the same things which make him melt down cause me to shut down.
34:37 I don't even cry but at that point I did feel actual tears welling up in my eyes. I feel bad for that kid.
One thing I have learned in my life is to never underestimate the stupidity of some people. Thank you for providing a perfect example. I would also consider it a privilege to have a friend like you. You are a winner Orion, period.
This one really hit home. My child was recently dx'd with autism/ADHD. I had many conservations with the school principal concerning the bullying my child was experiencing. I would say, it is fine they dont like her but they will not touch her our her things. I was a momma grizzly. Not sure if I made things better or worse.
34:43 and on really made me cry. And I'm someone who has a lot of trouble externalizing my emotions. The time my paternal grandparents died (They weren't as close to me as other relatives), I did feel bad, and I could empathize with my dad, however I barely had any emotion, internal or external. I think I just have a different concept of life and death. But back to why it made me cry: It hit quite close as someone who was bullied in middle school, there wasn't a "Tachysphex is a bastard club" as far as I'm concerned, but I know what it is like to be called a monster because you're different, and how you end up convicing yourself that it is true indeed. To this day, I still have this voice in my mind telling me "people don't like you", "Don't do that, it's weird", "I ruin everything", even though I don't think of myself as a monster anymore.
When I was in primary school I had a very close friend. The only friend I ever really had. One day I cam to school and she just stopped talking to me or spending time with me. She sat with the "cool" kids and just ignored me. She acted all rude towards me when J wanted to ask her what I have done wrong. Till this day, and I'm 30 now, I don't have the slightest idea what I have done wrong accept being myself. The kids used to call me weird, but I didn't care because I had a friend on my side. From that moment on I realized I was going to be alone and just deal with that. I'm still traumatized by that. I never had a real friend since. Only messed up and abusive relationships, because that's a great way to have a friend.🙄(not really)
I was walking around and listening to this until that “I’m a monster” part hit. I sat down immediately, it made me choke up a little. Non-autistic people simply cannot understand the internal hell of meltdown rage that comes with autism, the way it makes you shake and your eyes pulsate, and then the desolate despair of waking back up after the fact. It’s like a horror movie with you as the villain when you never wanted to be casted as that role
I'm a late-diagnosed female and have been unmasking for nearly thirty years. Your videos are so helpful, especially the un-edited ones. Thank you so much for what you do.
The birthday bit was hilarious and had me constantly saying YES YES YES and AMEN
My husband is Autistic and he too is constantly being mistaken for a meth addict. I don't think the person who made the comment to which you were referring was trying to be disrespectful. There's a good likelihood that the question was genuine
Hey, I love to hear you rant - it is like my brain all the time!
It saddens me to hear how other kids and their parents are to your son. The schools and administration, teachers etc need to do better. They must enforce a no bullying policy and educate their students on children with disabilities and how they should be treated just like everyone else . Calling your son a monster? That should be addressed to the principal or whoever is in charge there ! We need to keep advocating for our children and never stop.
Just Another Random person here but, I still can't thank you enough Orion.
I found myself deleting lots of following random blah blah words, from my comment. But thank you for helping me not feel... "alone"
Your words feel like a warm and accepted hug
Powerful. I'm sorry your son is going through that. At almost 50, I'm learning that I am autistic. I was able to mask pretty well throughout my childhood, but I find I can't do it as well anymore, even though I try. In the last couple of years, I feel more and more like a monster. Thank you for your raw honesty and vulnerability. It helps me more than you know.
I appreciate your authenticity in your unedited videos, but your regular videos are much easier to follow. They're both important for different reasons & I resonate with a lot of what you covered here. I'm still being left out of things all the time, usually people forget about me - I'm not sure if that's worse than being deliberately excluded 🤣
My son had an autistic girl in his class. To his 9th birthday party I invited the entire class (about 22 kids) including the girl, ofc! Her mom was in tears thanking me for inviting her daughter, which puzzled me until she explained the exclusion she and her daughter had experienced so far. Totally surprised me until I thought about it.... People simply do not understand autism...and many people think that this sort of condition is contagious!
My guess is that your son's friends' MOM is the one controlling who can be invited to his birthday party...and what you said about him saying that some kids couldn't come, so there's room for your son now, I'd bet she told him there was only so much room.
That friend will learn from his mom that xenophobic/ableism bias in due time as his mom teaches him.
People suck. I prefer animals. They're honest and never lie or play head games.
What I don't understand is why it's okay for Orien's kids to have small birthday parties with two friends, but it's not okay for other parents to set limits on the number of kids invited.
It's very obvious that children who invite get invited, and those who don't invite don't get invited.
I feel for his son, and for him. It's horrible to see your child in pain. However, I think he's going purely off feelings and leaving logic out of it completely.
This is waaaaay more authentic, interesting, funny and (at times sad) than actual political standup commedy.
The emotions feel real and nothing feels fake. It's all relatable and i know from my own childhood that the facts check out.
Keep making real videos like this.
And yes, everyone was always very surprised that i don't smoke weed...
This is a brilliant video - self advocating is simply asking to be treated with the same degree of respect afforded to non autistic people; that they take for granted. It is so good you said what is often considered unsayable. I admire your authenticity and candour.
Something that struck me as I was watching this is that people said they felt like they had been seen while I felt I see me. I am not trying to devalue how others feel, and I know this is a somewhat semantic take, but there it is.
Thank you for your vulnerability and courage. Being in my skin is a little easier today because you made this.
Anyone else get through the "unedited, unscripted, unmasked, unwatchable" disclaimer with a neurospicy crack of the "challenge accepted" knuckles?! Loving these videos, Orion. Thank you so much for having the courage to make them. Your regular videos are absolutely superb, and have been so immensely helpful in navigating the post-diagnosis lack of help/support/information. But there's something so immensely healing and validating about these unmasked ones, and I love that you recognise this is as valuable and important to your autistic audience as the regular informative ones are to a wider audience.
All of the best to people in the comment section. Hi!
Orion, I'm so sorry you're going through such a rough time. May I please just assure you of one thing? Your unconditional love & empathy for your son shows in his feeling comfortable coming to you and TELLING you about the bullying and how he feels. I grew up with a narcissist for a father & NEVER felt safe telling my parents I was being bullied all through high school because the mass bullying from both the other students at school, my sister, & father alike made me feel like I was a bad, defective person & DESERVED it! I didn't even feel safe telling my mother at the time, and about 30 years later when I DID tell her, SHE felt like an awful mother for not knowing, but it wasn't her fault she didn't realize she'd married a narcissist & neither did I realize he was a narc at the time. I genuinely thought my father was superior to everyone else on earth until I found out that "silent treatments" are a standard weapon in every narcissist's arsenal for controlling others. I suffered from "selective mutism" at school, especially with males, throughout high school & ended up getting voted "Quietest" in my graduating class, and I too had only ONE friend at a time, if I found anyone willing to be seen with me, usually other "misfits," which usually changed every school year. And I didn't get invited to anything either, while my poor mother was constantly being called down to my primary school to pick me up from the principal's office!
Your son is so lucky to have you not just as a dad, protector, ally, & advocate who is spreading awareness about & acceptance of autism. I even learned something myself from this video: that my lashing out & attacking other kids who were bullying me, including my younger sister in the presence of the rest of the family in which I was the black sheep, seemingly out of nowhere & then being the one to be punished for it, was actually caused by autism! I was just wondering out loud what caused me to do those things & feeling guilty about it & wondering what the **** was WRONG with me, including almost DROWNING my sister in the pool as a kid because I physically CAN'T swim & HATED being in the pool & she kept splashing "tidal waves" into my face & getting my cousins to join in with her, was caused by AUTISM!!! Wow, mind blown. I still hate myself, but at least now I know I'm not a homicidal monster!
THANK YOU for NOT GIVING UP on educating people about autism. It seems like you've barely gotten started compared to other autistic RUclipsrs who helped me figure out I'm autistic in the first place. It's SO hard to advocate for ourselves when we ourselves are autistic. But, trust me, you ARE making a difference!!!
I had more to say after I first watched this, but I've been thinking so much about this video for the last few days since I first watched it and it just hit me that your son felt safe telling you that he was being bullied and DOESN'T have too much toxic shame to tell you. I wish I'd had a loving father & autistic role model in my life like he does! You are an awesome dad and human being. Please don't be so hard on yourself.❤
Now WHERE do you PREFER that we buy your book? Do you want me to order it from your website or from Amazon? I watched your most recent video, & I'm sorry for expressing my shock at the cost of mailing it internationally. (I have a friend who's self-published through what I call "Scamazon" & also makes no money from it, but she also goes through Smashwords so I can buy her books for my Nook as I don't have a Kindle, and the laptop app is no use to me because I can't read on my laptop due to the backlighting & physical disability as well. Because America and Australia both use "dollars" as currency, I failed to take the exchange rate (which is constantly changing) into consideration. I'd love a signed copy & will gladly pay the $20 for postage, but if you're feeling burned out & aren't up to taking it to the post office, I'll order it from Amazon. And when it becomes widely available as an e-book, I'll order another one for my Barnes & Noble Nook, which is the only way I can read without physical pain. I'm really looking forward to getting a copy one way or another.
Ps: A parent like you is what we all wished for as kids! You're doing a great job being a father (as far as we can see here) and it is giving hope to see how truely you love your kids!❤meow😻
I can imagine not being invited can feel like being punished. But to turn that round to "the person punished me/ my son/ whom ever when not inviting me" is an interpretation. I don't know what that woman thought. Neither do you. But its more likely that what motivated her decision was something like " I invite the kids my son has visited/ invited most times and they had a good time". Or - sad enough - "I am afraid this autistic child could get and bring us in a situation I don't feel able to handle" or even - having her limitations too - " I will be glad when this horrible party is over without someone being seriously hurt, I wont volunteer for inviting someone who gets in or bring us in a kind of trouble I have no experience with". Sad enough for the not invited person. But that is not punish, if I understand the word right as "willingly making someone suffer with the intention to take revenge or change their behaviour".
This reminds me of how intense my emotions were when I was a kid, and all the crazy sht I thought about doing because of how I was treated by the other kids. I remember I once snapped into a bloody rage and clawed up my classmates face. I remember that there was blood but I don't remember anything else he was my friend and I didn't hate him at all I think I was just teased too much and bottled that up. In my mind everything is intense but I think the mask I wear is very nonchalant. I have always thought and even told people before that if I where to do and say whats in my head then no one would like me.
I understand the spectrum stuff a little bit. Can be tough especially for those who at the time didn’t understand they were on the spectrum. Can be traumatic.
It's like looking into a mirror watching the unedited vids. I mask it with everyone, but the when I'm alone, your mannerisms and frustration comes out just like mine. Thank you for doing these videos! It helps!
When I wash in first year of secondary school (aged 11, I was one year younger than most) a kid hit me on the arse with an elastic band.
I had a rolled up piece of A3 paper that I had made into a treasure map with tea and burnt holes made with a blue bic lighter. I burnt my hand and spilled the tea but I was so proud.
I don't know why I was so angry but I have a vague recollection of being bullied (I remember basically none of my earlier childhood). I turned around and looked for the person who had hit me on the my chubby left cheek.
I swung.
It wasn't until after all was said and done that I found out that the person that blocked my swing, was not in fact the culprit.
His guilt was irrelevant to be at the time. I didn't know who had done it and tbh I don't think I cared.
I swung.....he swung back.
What happened next, I can't say for sure. I remember the shape and colour of the hall I was in, it was chipped, heavy navy paint, with a sink that didn't work on the left side and a radiator on the right.
The "fight" itself, I blanked out. I was told that I hit his head on a radiator. I honestly don't know. That's the first meltdown I can remember happening even if I don't remember the actual meltdown.
This was my first year in the school and while I never did anything like that again, people treated me like some sort of alien pariah for most of my time there.
I'm now 44. 33 years later and I remember all of that in detail. I still can't remember my families birthdays. These things hurt. These things don't leave us. The worst part is, we don't even know we do it and only do it when we get poked. Yet we're the problem.
Talking about your son and your family's experiences with school almost brought me to tears. The bullying from adults while my son was in school was shocking. A teacher actually put my son in a box during class. Literally put an appliance box over his desk for a week during class before I found out about it. He was 7. He didn't want me to go to the school because 'the education of the kids around him was important'. You know that didn't come from his little mind. I most certainly did go and take care of that. They banned him from the book fair because he might just steal. He had never stolen anything in his life. It's heartbreaking. I ended up homeschooling from 8th grade on, which was a very hard decision but otherwise I just couldn't get him to go anyhow because it was so horrendous.
Omg
So glad you are willing to "let it all hang out" and be real. I'm a hot mess, too, and it is liberating to see others like me.
Thank you for showing how we (autistics) are “in the raw”. Makes me feel “normal” 🤪 and quite okay and accepted ….💙👊
I've been asked many times if I was on drugs while just being myself. To be fair, we do have a lot of meth-heads here in the midwest and they can act in ways that could be confused with autistic stimming/behaviors. No, I was never on drugs.
Also, my young son is starting to face some of these issues at school, too. Mostly I'm getting the 'boys will be boys' shrug off.
The cake stuff cracked me up! 😂
The one birthday party my mum put on for me had me melting down in front of all the guests. I was 10. Notwithstanding, that was the one and only birthday party I ever had.
I didn't put on group parties for my kids, really, but then I had so many kids (7) we had our own party all the time,and I'm autistic, so the idea of having to communicate with all the NT other parents is just too excruciating and unbearable for me. Just having that many children was chronic overwhelm for me (what was I thinking?😮. No, really I was a teenager when I started and I autistically, doggedly, got obsessed with giving my kid's a less lonely, less outcast life, by having all of the children I conceived).
I don't regret my large family, despite how difficult it has been, as an autistic person. My second born has the kind of autism that came with development delays and cognitive impairment. And my youngest has the kind that gets called "gifted" Autistic and ADHDy. He was always painfully shy, but the second born is quite outgoing and will talk to pretty much anybody.
Ironically, youngest son, now 18 in a couple of weeks, has had the same friends since before school age (all neurodiverse) bar one, and second born isn't that good at maintaining relationships with friends of his own age but his support workers generally really like him.
I'm not either. All my energy, for the most part, goes into my kids, now in their 30's, 20's and one teen, and my guy friend and now, 2 grandbabies.
We get to see the mental and emotional effort and energy it takes from you to provide Edited content. Thank you for sharing your Authentic, unedited Self. You’re wonderful. 😊
I like to see Orion acting as truly himself. As for me, he would never need to edit
Absolutely fantastic yet again. Really helps me as a late dx AuDHD with my unmasking and self acceptance. Also faced similar situations as a kid as you and your son with being picked on/cut out at school - as many of us autistics seem to have been. Thank you for being so brave and letting us see your authentic self. It is really helpful - and I loved the comment about the space rocket cake 🤣Please do a third instalment - if you feel up to it.
Thank you! I keep running into people that just can't help themselves but poke at me. Then I get in trouble when I have a reaction, even though everything would have been fine if they just left me alone.
I'm sorry I haven't been watching your videos lately. I had a meltdown, lost a lot of work and now I'm having some sort of shutdown. Feeling very bleak about my future, but the video helps me to know that I'm not the only one experiencing this type of behavior from the general public at least. It's a bittersweet comfort, but comfort nonetheless.
I only realized I might be autistic like half a year ago, and I'm still understanding things. Today's realization hit hard. So, I have a problem where I sometimes "snap". Like, it feels unbearable and sometimes is a "small" thing, but also sometimes is frustration for not being understood or whatever. Sometimes I just need to stop what's happening and on the way out I verbally hurt people (not with insults, but I do sound hateful). I snapped once to a boyfriend I had in college, I was really anxious about having to meet with other people and there was also some jealousy, so I badmouthed them. He looked at me in a way I'll never forget and that was the beginning of the end. The relationship didn't last long after that, maybe a week or two. And that's happened with classmates I wasn't friends with too, they've seen me lose my shit one day and they've become more distant. Oh yeah, and there was that time that I got overwhelmed in a party because they wanted to sing karaoke and it killed me with anxiety and I wanted to cry and didn't know how to say goodbye so I just left and it was worse because it caught everyone's attention. I never went to another party like that.
I don't know if it's because of autism. But I wish I could be more normal.
I thibk this video helped me. I am not the one who watched all your videoa before, but i am glad i have watched the unedited unmasked ones first. The story about your son reminded me my school years and how they poked me and made fun of me to shout and scream and hit me with rocks and... i am not a monster
I don't view this as uncomfortable. You're venting and that's healthy to do.
Thank you for this. You brought back a lot of memories where i went through a lot of the same as a kid and even still as an adult. People expect neurodivergent/disabled people to act like they aren't.
I often was called a robot and treated like a circus freak. Push and pole at me to see how long it takes to get an emotional response out of me. So much so that i internalized a lot of it and still do.
I didn't get invited to parties because my lack of facial expressions and my eccentricities scared people. Made sense to me. Understand as an adult how much that that really shaped my lack of self worth.
Orion, roll on No. 3. 🎬
You have more friends than you could ever probably envisage
Your true self with stories equally experienced.
Your Yorkshire autistic
mate from t'other side of the 🌍 world ( a globe full of great autistic folks) 🤔
I loved the no bake rant. I've never felt more validated
Your random rant abt no bake cheesecake really struck me because I realized that I do that! I talk to myself a lot and sometimes I just get into imaginary conversations or I get super excited or antsy abt random stuff just like that! I used to think that maybe I’m moody or am an oddball for getting myself into random rants moods but I’m realizing that this too is just apart of being neurodivergent. That among other tendencies I have I see in myself, makes me feel like weird or crazy for being myself and it’s kinda helping me see HOW I mask bc I don’t always know how I’m doing it. Your unmasked videos essentially show me what being myself looks like….thanks for that ❤
I've always thought that I'm just introverted, awkward, observant and highly attuned to others' emotional states. However, watching your unmasked videos has made me think that it might be worth pursuing an autism assessment. It is exactly how I communicate with a trusted couple of people when I can safely let my guard down and it's sometimes taken by others as my being angry with them or mildly aggressive.
LMAOOOO "it looks disgusting, it tastes disgusting, i dont know why you did it" 💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀 thank you for your service. 😭🤣😭🤣🤣🤣😭😭💀💀💀
“Don’t look it straight in the eye!” Sounds like a T-shirt idea.
When I was a kid, my sister was invited to a friend's birthday party, and I was dragged along as a second. Her friend's older brother was in my class and knew me. He looked me in the eyes and asked "Why are you here?" I will never forget it.
Edit/followup: "I'm a monster." My god, I have never related to anything more. For much of my adult life so far, I have felt like more of a twisted abomination than a person, since I have for so long repressed anything that made me different from how others wanted me to be. I am scared by what those repressed emotions have turned into.
I know it wasn't the main topic of this video, but you talking about meltdowns and your son not remembering what happened sparked repressed/forgotten things from my school time.
At around 7 years old for "fastelavn", holiday in Denmark that resembles Halloween a bit but in February, with costumes and barrels that gets beating like a pinata.
I gave my glasses to the class teacher before going to the schools gym to beat the barrel. After that when we all got back to the class room I find my glasses on the window sill, destroyed. Next I remember I'm sitting on the chest of one of the biggest guys in the class and he is looking up at me, scared, trying to get through to me that he hadn't touched my glasses. I have no clue what happened in that time frame, but I am now considering if it wasn't a meltdown.
3-4 years later, I had some run-in with a substitute teacher in music class. There were some talking, teacher probably asked a question I don't recall exactly. Again there is a hole in my memory, from the teacher standing at the blackboard to him standing over me at my table I have no idea what happened nor how long. It was reported to the principal, by other students in class that the teacher had slapped me but I have no recollection of that at all. Another possible meltdown on my part?
And to get on topic, I was rarely invited to birthday parties. That said I rarely invited people from school or daycare to birthdays either, even from the family it was rarely more than maternal grandparents and at big family gatherings I hid whenever I could, preferring to be on my own as I felt overwhelmed by people.
Undiagnosed, but seriously considering that I might be autistic. Getting to talk to someone that can diagnose, is taking forever.
I was diagnosed last month.
At the age of 50 years.
I cannot thank you enough for putting words and descriptions of things that I have struggled with and exhaustively masked my entire life.
I am in tears. We are scapegoated and I honestly believe it is because we are actually giving lie to the unreasonable cruelty of the NT world. So many of us have been through this. How can it ever be fixed if they make us the problem?
Omg Orion I love these raw videos. Awesome to see behind all our masks.
Thank you for doing this again Orion, it must take some bravery on your part. Also I am enjoying your book❤
Orion... My heart goes out to you, your family and to others who have challenges with our unaware NT society.
Your videos, especially the unmasked ones, teach us a lot and show the life-long effects clueless and uncompassionate NT people have on those with autism or to those who have an autistic loved one.
Thank you for helping us understand, and for helping parents of autistic children understand how to share this important message and lesson to NT people. You are a great blessing to the world. ❤