'Using' Autism as an 'Excuse'
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- Опубликовано: 29 авг 2024
- Life is a struggle and my brain is tired 24/7, so sorry if this video sucks lmao I feel like there's so much more to say and I just don't have it.
/ dana_._andersen
/ danaoandersen
carryonbeautif...
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Yeah, I'm an "explainer" too. To me, just saying "sorry" after a misunderstanding solves nothing. In order to prevent the problem from happening again, we have to actually talk through the situation and reconcile our understandings to find out where things went wrong. For that reason, I'm a huge believer in blameless postmortems in both my personal and professional life.
I will usually start by explaining what my understanding was of the situation/request and my reasoning for doing what I did, then I will ask about the those details from the other person to get their perspective. Ideally, we would come to a mutual understanding of the point things went off the rails, so we can do better next time.
Unfortunately, many neurotypicals perceive this as me refusing to take blame for my mistakes. They just want to hear "sorry" and be done with it. However from my perspective, assigning blame is a pointless activity. All it does is make some person or group of people feel bad, without actually addressing anything.
Unless someone did something intentionally malicious, whether they say "sorry" to me or not doesn't really matter. I assume people act with positive intentions unless there is significant evidence to the contrary, so most of these situations come down to a simple misunderstanding or mistake. I would rather hear the story and logic behind it rather than some pointless apology to convey their remorse.
I’m late diagnosed and I’ve been gaslit for so long that I don’t know the meaning of reason vs excuse. Especially since so many of my reasons (executive dysfunction etc) can theoretically be fixed if I put in the ‘effort’ (setting timers etc). So now I overcompensate and rely on myself too much or shrink myself as small as possible and not be a bother. Which rarely works out so I’m just left confused and frustrated. Luckily everyone I care abt gets it, but it makes the wider world immensely difficult
I could scream over how hard I relate. I was only diagnosed last year, but my life is one big pattern of
- Tries to do thing
- Can't manage to make brain do thing
- Get told I'm lazy, not trying hard enough, or making excuses
- Try harder and send myself deeper into burnout by doing that, back to step 1 but worse
And the amount of trauma this has left me with makes it that much harder to manage. Both communicating when I'm struggling and trying to do a thing come with this extra layer of "I'm going to mess it up and no one will believe that I didn't want that" that still does actually happen often enough to reinforce those thoughts. I've never felt like I'm allowed to just... not manage things, or fail at something. Reminding myself that I'm allowed to is constant work in progress.
That pattern is only starting to change not because people in my life are finally recognising there's a disconnect between trying and results, but because I've had access to some disability support for a few months now. My funding isn't enough for the kinds of daily supports I need (Australian, NDIS has issues with underfunding people), but just having someone around each week to prompt me means I can actually manage doing basic household stuff for pretty much the first time in my life. It's wild, I'm ecstatic and angry and all the emotions about it all at once.
I have a hard time understanding why that pattern didn't stop once I was diagnosed. Like, now people should get why my brain doesn't always work the way most expect it to, right? I don't have to agonise over trying to explain my own executive dysfunction without people thinking I _want_ it to or let it happen, right? But nope. My ex ended our nearly 8 year relationship a few months ago with a whole letter hitting this particular insecurity, saying I'm making excuses because his autistic sister manages things I haven't been able to. It's been months, he did apologise well enough for it, and yet I still can't move past how someone I trusted more than anyone else had written an entire letter telling me that I'm using my diagnosis as an excuse not to do things I desperately want to.
The more time goes on, the more I think I need to just fill my social circle with other ND people.
Yeah, I totally agree.
And I also feel the same way that sometimes it can definitely be a valid excuse. But neurotypicals tend to not agree with/understand that.
One of my favourite "mottos" in Nerdfighteria is "imagine others complexly", and I think that is lacking everywhere in our society. But I feel like us neurodivergent people are a little better at it/open to it, since we have the first hand experience of being 'different' and we have always had to try to understand the world around us/neurotypicals and imagine them complexly. Whereas neurotypical people generally can get well through life without having to imagine others complexly because the majority of people act/function in similar ways to them.
Just a thought that came up :)
Loved the video, as always, hope you're doing okay.
If someone knows I’m autistic I’ll make it clear that yes I did mess up and that I’ll work on reading cues better or whatever, but I’ll make sure to say that it doesn’t come naturally to my autistic brain so it is somewhat a part of me. To me, that sounds more like an explanation than an excuse bc you’re still taking responsibility and trying to make a change. But yeah it’s hard when miscommunication is from both sides but one person doesn’t want to hear about how your autism contributed. Also that situation with your boss sounds super frustrating and like they weren’t listening to you at all.
For me, autism is an excuse.
It's an excuse to be my best self.
Hi Dana, I teared up from watching your video. I discovered that I'm autistic just over a year ago in my 30s and it has been really hard journey, aside from coming to terms with my traits, the part of explaining to someone close and have been hurt by my actions before. Certain things in communication and expressing are harder for me to do it in the way that most people will get my intentions correctly. Also, while autistic terminology is really helpful to understand myself, it backfired so hard when explaining to someone who's not interested in how my mind work.
Cheers from Thailand
there is an emphasis on the disabled people picking up for the apparently socially able neurotypicals when they in every turn show that they're not socially able or they would have communitated effectively to you
9:47 people are classist toward themselves and they like to overassociate. Overassociating with autistics is disgusting, and this is not your fault.
13:28 I've noticed that excusing the autistic people etc is another way neurotypicals seem to cop out of them taking responsibility for their sense of facts, interpretations, emotions and opinions
and also we don't "excuse" android phones for not taking an iphone app, we acknowledge the systems
My problem is that I try to rationalize it in a way that fits into neurotypical standards. Spoiler alert- it doesn't work. Idk, I'm unsure how to bring up my autism/adhd and I feel that if I make such a bold claim, I need to Really explain how they're relevant. but I lack the ability to communicate the 'why' clearly (it doesn't even make sense to me).
also because I grew up undiagnosed, i'm really curious about how the things I "taught myself about society" shape every bit of my being (like little rules that I can't just... 'get over', yknow?). I'm interested to hear more thoughts/explanations if anyone's able to articulate that better, haha
I know that this isn’t related to autism, but I feel like it relates back to the topic of excuses. I have something called agoraphobia which means that I will have extreme anxiety and panic attacks when going more than a couple minutes away from home pretty much. If I wasn’t able to go to a wedding that was five hours away, me saying that I have agoraphobia isn’t a bad thing because the person we need to know that it’s not because I just don’t give a shit about them, it’s that I literally feel like it’s impossible for me to go even though I really want to.
The best way I've heard it explained is that if a blind person bumped into you and said "oh, sorry, I didn't see you there because I'm blind."
You wouldn't be mad at them for "using their blindness as an excuse".
You would understand that they had no ill intent and cut them some slack because they literally cannot see.
Omg, you explained exactually what I am going through. every time I say sorry because some one thing what I said is wrong/ rude / inappropriate after the sorry I have to say but and give an explanation for why I said what I said but sometimes people want just sorry without any explanation but for me I can't say only sorry I have to explain why. Also, last week someone mentioned to me that I am using autism us an excuse but in reality I am not. I just wanted to explain myself and wanted the other that person understand me and help me. I hate it when she said that I am using autism as excuse and I hate it more when I couldn't find words to explain myself to her.
It's so difficult to find the terms that accurately describe how we feel, especially when people don't seem to want to hear it. I'm sorry you've been in those types of situations, but I'm relieved to know its not just me!
You reminded me of a conversation way before learning I was autistic when I worked in McDonalds and I needed more shifts because my mam was insisting that I needed to earn more there or go and look for another job. The guy who did the shifts was really pissed off when I told him my situation as he said I was being funny with him. It’s been over twenty years since that happened and I still don’t understand why telling someone my situation is being funny with them. I was struggling really badly with life then, the pressure was too much and I had a breakdown not long afterwards.
I’m lucky in that I am not driven to explain, I have been yelled at enough, so it’s easier to say sorry and fix whatever I did or didn’t do. I understand why you would want to explain however, I suspect if you were neurotypical and explaining it would be taken better.
I’m upset when I see someone on the news who is trying to get away with a serious crime using their autism as I feel that firstly it’s no excuse for many crimes and secondly it’s reflecting badly on all of us. About twenty years ago I knew of a situation that still makes me sick if I think about it. A young girl my parents knew developed an eating disorder and had to go away to a special unit. While she was there she revealed that her brother had tried on several occasions to rape her. They took her brother to a doctor not the police and he was diagnosed as autistic and they decided he didn’t know what was appropriate and she came back to a home still containing her abuser. In my opinion he should either have been in prison because he knew the difference between right and wrong or he really couldn’t understand what he did was wrong and should have been in a secure unit for as long as it took to stop him being a danger to society. She was barely a teenager, I can’t imagine what damage it did to her long term or what damage he has done as a man. That to me is using autism as an excuse. Most of the time it’s a genuine reason but we know right from wrong unless we have constant high support needs. Under those circumstances an autistic person should be getting the support they need that includes preventing them from committing crimes. In my very limited experience of people needing high levels of support they are happiest in their own world and are extremely unlikely to commit crime anyway.
I worry about my niece and nephew, my sister shares custody 50/50 with her autistic ex wife of my niece. My sister is too strict and pushes my niece to achieve although she does understand she’s not like the other children and has knowledge about caring for autistic people. Her autistic ex wife however does use autism as an excuse, rather than use her position as the person in my niece and adult nephew’s life who understands the most and can teach them how to get through life she seems to be preparing them for a life on benefits rather than any higher education or work. My nephew is already on benefits and he went to college to learn about computer repair, he could be working. I don’t want the poor kids to be reliant on benefits it’s not an easy life. I’m on benefits and I dread those brown envelopes. I am getting help from my psychiatrist and therapist though because I am trying to improve my situation. There’s things that autism will always be the reason for and that’s the case for all the us. we’ve only crossed over to making it an excuse if we aren’t honest about a situation and we refuse to learn when really we can.
I’m sorry I went on a bit again but it is something that I have opinions on. If you broke your leg no one would expect you to stand on it yet because we have a condition that can’t be seen it’s an excuse when we really can’t do something. It makes me angry. Thanks for the video Dana I hope you are well
@@artemisXsidecross Thank you you’re an incredibly kind person. I’m sure you’re dealing with your own problems too. It’s the kids I really worry about, I will survive, but I’m hoping there’s a better future for them. I really went on about this subject but it was how I felt straight after watching the video, I just hope Dana doesn’t mind, she also seems like a very kind and tolerant person.
Feel this a lot
When a behavior is repeated with little or no attempt to rectify the problem, then the explanation becomes an excuse. If someone actively listens and makes active attempts to fix an issue, then yes there is nothing wrong with providing an explanation. Cheers and love to all
thank you
What we need is special schools for the poor minority children who have good manners ,pay attention and don't have massive tantrums if their every whim i not immediately pandered to.
Relate so hard. Somehow trying to communicate my intentions seems to make it worse (don't understand) - eg. something that happens often is me trying to explain why I did something so that they know it wasn't meant badly, just get told 'well that's wrong' lol. How can I be wrong about my own intentions?
I think the point is if our autism is a valid reason, then why should we have to apologise for our autism?
That is a stupid circular argument with 0. Point
This is SO relatable…
yep many times in my life
At least we’re in it together 😂
@@DanaAndersen yeah very true we all are! xD
I'd be training someone at my old job in the food industry, and i'd explain to them and show them myself how to do something then make them do it in front of me(micromanaging), then i'd word vomit in apologies and try to explain why i'm being so detailed, I often said " I know I definitely would've appreciated the clear instructions and guidance." Some new coworkers appreciated it and told me, others just looked at me like I was crazy
Hey Dana, this is my first time commenting, I've been a long time lurker here on your channel. I love your content and appreciate having someone to relate to online. I was wondering if you might do an update video on this topic? I also like to explain my side of things and I like to feel like there is a resolution to things. If I say sorry, I want the other person to know why I'm apologizing and understand what happened or why I'm sorry. The reason why I wanted to comment and request you make another video on this topic is because I'm currently self diagnosed and working with a therapist to get a diagnosis. I have a separate therapist I'm in CBT with to process trauma and shame, but she tells me that when apologizing, I shouldn't explain myself and told me it sounds bad, like I'm making an excuse. I feel really conflicted here because I can talk myself in circles when I see both perspectives in this way. Unfortunately my trauma/shame therapist does not want to talk about diagnosis with me so I can't tell her about why I believe I'm autistic/got a separate therapist... What is your take on this? (And any others who would like to share! I'd love to have a talk about this.) Thank you for your time 💓