𝔸sh 🐅🍀 @ashleyann_atx Twitter profile

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𝔸sh 🐅🍀

@ashleyann_atx

5 days

Let's connect for a game of Words With Friends! My username is ashleyannatx.

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𝔸sh 🐅🍀

@ashleyann_atx

11 months

I was watching a video about a sexual assault survivor. She said that it took her a long time to understand that she felt unsafe around her family. Her husband did not understand why she still talked to them. But instead of telling her, he let her find that out for herself.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

How I came to find out I had issues with executive functioning occurred when worked at a concussion clinic at a hospital. The therapist asked if I wanted to take an assessment on computer for fun. And so I did. And my score was so low. She thought there was an error. And,…

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

I don’t know who needs to hear this, but don’t mess with someone who has pattern recognition.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

I watched a video where an autistic person was given directions to find a location. The directions were correct but the names of the building were different. He said, “I look at all of the details I am given and if one is off, that can really confuse me.”

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Autistic people need to be accommodated at work — “Autistic people need quiet spaces to work, longer lunch breaks, alternative lighting, predictable schedules or the ability to have a support person with them…

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

As an autistic person, I may cry and my voice might shake when I ask why something is happening. That does not mean I am ‘unstable’ or ‘toxic’ It means that I am genuinely confused. Honestly and genuinely confused. I am not playing games. I am not manipulating a situation.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

A sign of a safe relationship is when you are allowed to make mistakes. People might set a boundary or communicate disappointment but they don't make you feel shame for slipping up. Sometimes I do things not as expected, and it means a lot when people are compassionate + forgive

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

As someone with invisible disabilities (physical trauma and autism), I have to be careful of those who look at my education and scoff. I went to a top school, and I remember a former supervisor at a preschool scoffing and saying,…

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

My grandmother lived in a small village in Japan during WWII. She survived a bombing in her village by US planes. A bomb was dropped. She jumped in one ditch and her friend the other. The bomb killed her friend. She said in school, they were taught that Hitler was,...

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

I learned that autistic people don’t have the same social expectations for relations. They won’t be on the same page in terms of how people view the relationship. This showed up at work and dating for me.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

I think this was important. Trauma survivors don’t know how to trust themselves. They werr around people who were supposed to keep them safe. We have to learn all the rules on our own. Because even if someone tried to teach them, could we even trust them?

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Anyone else feel like 'inability to read social cues' may not be an accurate clinical observation? I can read them, and I do. I just don't always respond to them in the appropriate or expected way. And sometimes, I will be distracted by a thought and miss an important cue.

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@ashleyann_atx

2 years

Noticing that ever since I self-ID’d as autistic, all these memories of myself being autistic came flooding back. It’s almost like… as I suppressed my autistic self, I suppressed all my memories of her too. And this is partly why this process is hard.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

I wish people to know that autistic burnout is traumatic. It is not like traditional burnout where a person experiences stress. For me, the thought of autistic burnout brought me to tears. I remember a colleague saying, the job wasn’t the right fit. We can’t obsess over it…

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@ashleyann_atx

6 months

is it a bad sign when someone cc’s your boss in emails to you when asking simple questions? this has been happening to me at my job and as far as i know, i did not do anything ‘wrong’ except to tell them i am neurodivergent and to please be patient with me.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

It was then that I started to compare myself to peers. I started to notice the effort I put into things took longer. That is why I went to a psychologist to be tested for ADHD. This was 10 years after concussive injury and a semester before graduate school.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

The greatest man alive. They had no idea how evil he was. She said it was only after the war they came to know. To say that Japanese people were evil like Nazis speaks to their government. Not the people. My grandma was one of them. She was not her government.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

Anyone who wants to say Japanese people deserved to be annihilated due to association with Nazis is missing a big piece of what they knew about the world back then. And it perpetuates and upholds racist attitudes against them.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

They diagnosed me with ADHD severe inattentive type and generalized anxiety disorder. And I will never really know if it was acquired or developmental. I am assuming a bit of both.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

My sister shared an insight with me about childhood trauma. She said, ‘The behavior we have as adults is the behavior we needed to avoid punishment as a kid.’

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Does anyone else feel like the masking/fawn response is still on autopilot. It creeps me out sometimes. Sometimes I will agree to things I know I am not ok with and then after the fact, I will be like, Why did I say that? It is that ingrained. There's not really a switch.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

So many things I needed to learn on my own. Even if people told me everything I know now, it would not have taught me what I know. In the most fucked up way possible, I feel that I needed to feel ‘abandoned’ to know what I know. I had to learn to trust myself out of necessity.

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@ashleyann_atx

3 months

the autistic feeling of loving something so much and wanting to share it with everyone around and then wondering how it is that people do not love it as much as you.

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@ashleyann_atx

2 months

one of the most hurtful things of learning i am autistic is just how long i spent my life blindly trusting people. thinking that if someone was nice to me that they liked me. and i could trust them. and be open with them. sometimes i cry thinking of that girl who naively

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

The more I learn about how autism presents outwardly the more I sort of consider that I did not mask as well as I thought. I flew under the radar bc I was quiet. But when I opened my mouth I blurted out the truth, called out elephant in the room or revealed ‘too much’

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

It is actually unsafe for someone to be autistic and not know they are autistic within -the workplace -dating culture -social spaces -doctor’s offices -therapist’s offices -and the list goes on

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

I was telling a friend tonight that trauma, of any kind, that emotional disregulation, just feels like confusion and your brain filling in the missing information. Your brain will fill it in naturally. And if you had trauma, guess what your brain is going to fill in?

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Before I self-IDed as autistic, I shared my thoughts with a colleague. I told her that I had been reading about autism. I shared that there were times I sometimes I would become quiet or pretend I understood something because socializing sometimes left me confused. And she said—

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

If you've ever lied bc you forgot details of memory and said the wrong thing. A 'lie' with no social motivation for deceit. This is called confabulation and it present in autism. I do this and it helps to have a word. I swear people must think I'm gaslighting them. Legit forgot.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

When I worked at a preschool, ABA therapists coded certain behaviors as ‘attention-seeking’ and instructed teachers and profs to ignore these behaviors. Their rationale was if you don’t give them attention, the behavior will stop. Ok, and at what cost?

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

If someone experiences situational mutism, avoid using the phrase, “Use your words.” This is a common phrase used among my peers and it seemed harmless until a peer said it to me while I was having a meltdown. It just made me feel shame for not having them.

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@ashleyann_atx

9 months

Autistic people are often described as ‘controlling’ or ‘inflexible’ … I notice this trait in myself when things are not predictable. I like to know specifics ahead of time. When there are sudden changes it’s hard for me to cope. Do you have better labels for this trait?

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Was listening to a webinar about how autism presents in subtle ways. The presenter said if a boy has flat affect, they are autistic. But if a girl has flat affect, she is seen as having a personality disorder. A trained psychologist noted this misconception among assessors.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

After experiencing autistic burnout, I remember I wanted to leave and go someplace new. I felt like a failure and wanted to start over where no one knew me. I always saw those movies where characters ran away from their problems. That is what I wished to do. But I didn’t.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

My anxiety was never anxiety. It was just me being autistic and not knowing I was autistic.

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@ashleyann_atx

9 months

there is this part in the book — unmasking autism — where the author talks about how learning you are autistic can mean looking at your family and seeing all the undiagnosed autistic family members. has that been your experience?

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@ashleyann_atx

2 years

Has anyone been described as calm by others? Remember people in school telling me that I looked calm. In reality, I was either observing and watching others, lost in my thoughts, or anxiously wondering how I should engage in a space. Anyone else mask by being very quiet?

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

#AskingAutistics : Is it common for people to think you are attacking them, arguing with them, picking a fight, when in your mind, you are just inquiring, discussing, or trying to understand?

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@ashleyann_atx

10 months

that autistic trait of speaking truthfully with the best of intentions about an injustice you are seeing and how it ought to be corrected but the person you are telling already knows and they really just want to show up to work, get their paycheck and go home.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Before I learned I was autistic, I emailed my supervisors + told them I was concerned people in the workplace did not like me. I said I thought it was bc I was not directly employed and that I was an intern. In my mind, I was standing up for myself + trying to resolve a problem

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Part of autistic masking was feigning understanding. I did this in conversation and in school. I nodded in agreement or gave a filler response so people would not know I was confused and that I struggled. I was not aware but did this so others would like me and not be upset.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Attending meetings today, and I am like, I am not autistic. I am managing basic required social engagement just fine. But then I notice all the side chatter. Everyone doing the small talk bit and laughing, and I am quiet. And somehow I am reminded of the things I don’t do.

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@ashleyann_atx

6 months

do you ever notice how people will accuse you of lacking confidence bc you are quiet, masking, preferring solitude, disliking small talk, communicating differently? do you notice that when you do exude confidence people accuse you of being a know it all, arrogant, etc? i do.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Autistic burnout can be embarrassing and humiliating. Particularly if you don’t know you are autistic and you don’t what is ‘hard’ or ‘too much’ You become so stressed and in the stress any attempt at this unconscious attempt to mask is gone. I felt I had no control.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

When I was a kid, I got free lunch at school. From a very young age, I could distinguish myself from the rich kids by whether or not they received free lunch or not. On days they served pancakes I could not eat bc they served them on top of sausages so they tasted like sausage.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

In my webinar about detecting subtle presentation of autism, they said it's important to ask a person what it feels like in their body when they are hungry or when they are angry. They said non-autistic people will have an easy time answering this but autistic people won't.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

Was reading about autistic inertia. I suppose this an example of it. When I am given a project do, I am inclined to cancel and block out hours at a time until task is completed. Employers expect me to do 30 minutes here and there. I find that very difficult bc switching of tasks

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

Not having basic needs met is an entire feeling. And I felt it in jobs, relationships, friendship. It just feels like tension in my body and shame filling up inside of me. It actually feels toxic and harmful to me. And this is the feeling I buried and did not allow self to feel.

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@ashleyann_atx

6 months

neurodivergent people deserve to be trusted that they are capable and able to carry out their job functions. they may do it in a different way. they may break the unwritten rules. they may strictly follow rules others break. it may take them longer. they will get the job done.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

Someone told me, 'If you notice yourself feeling resentment toward someone, that is likely because they crossed your boundary.' Before I had a concept of boundaries, I did not understand this. But I get it now. For all the times I was angry and hurt, this is why.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

They say that an autistic person cannot filter out the sensory environment. They process all of it. And I most certainly agree with this. I will just say, however, before I knew I was autistic, I had learned unhealthy ways of coping with this that extended from masking.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

On 'oversharing' and where it comes from for me: Trauma: I overshare to avoid getting into trouble or to be helpful ADHD: I overshare bc I am impulsive Autism: I 'overshare' my special interests

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

During autistic burnout was the first time I had public meltdowns. Up until that point, I kept it contained and hidden. In school, I might go for a walk and cry, but during my first job, I couldn’t hold it in anymore. One could easily think that my nature, when it wasn’t.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

And no, it is not true that everyone is a little bit autistic.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

When you process being autistic you begin remembering parts of self you had forgotten. You have this new lens and all those suppressed parts become visible. Things I remember from being a kid —

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@ashleyann_atx

20 days

is this reaction that you get as an autistic person? you ask a question and people look at you with annoyance / disgust (?) when they answer you. i can’t really put my finger on it. but before i knew i was autistic i just internalized it. now it’s a very apparent pattern.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

A note about autistic burnout: you have to be able to self-assess very well. I think a reason why autists who are undiagnosed burnout so hard is bc they don’t know their needs. There is a lack of awareness there. I still have a lack of it but it is not as bad as it used to be.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

I relate to this too much. If I am given conflicting or missing information it can be very distressing for me. And I will feel sort of ‘lost’. On the surface, people will assume it’s anxiety when it is not. It is more than that.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

I remember advice given to me growing up: when you know someone is unsafe, you don’t let them know you know. It was a politics game. A strategy. I never learned this rule. I resisted it. I was vocal about injustice. And I learned the hard way that can make one unsafe.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

#AskingAutistics : Did you ever rub your eyes a lot for the fractal patterns or intentionally blur your vision as a kid?

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@ashleyann_atx

9 months

is it normal and part of being autistic to have extreme anxiety when people do not respond to you right away? i think it is related to being stuck and not being able to move forward. things being unpredictable. out of control. it can be very distressing for me.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

I was telling a friend what it was like to learn I am autistic. I couldn’t find the words, but I started to cry. I said that it was like going my whole life feeling uncomfortable and never knowing why. Thinking I was anxious and taking pills for things that were not the problem.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

But there needs to be adequate motivation for those spaces to change, or autistic adults will continue to burn out more intensely than their peers.”

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Learning you are autistic later in life is like putting on glasses that help you see. You will see all the hurt and you will process through what seems to be every memory of your life with this new lens. Things that didn’t make sense will form a clearer picture.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

‘What are they teaching you over there…?’ when I did not fully understand a concept or properly demonstrate my knowledge. I want to make my alma mater look good but wish people also understood that me being there took a lot of effort and often felt I did not belong among peers.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 month

as an autistic person, do you have this wild imagination where you fantasize about things and have all of these ideas?sometimes i do. this very inward thinking. this world of my own. and i wonder if that is related to autism or something else.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

The sad part about not knowing I was autistic is that I thought my confusion when someone was talking or explaining something was a me problem. It never occurred to me that change in environment or asking a person to clarify was an option. So what I did was this…

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

I asked a question at work today. They did not respond. I asked other people at work the same question. They told me to ask the person who was not responding to me. I followed up to ask them again. I told them not knowing the answer was making anxious. They did not respond.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Things said at burnout job that were signs of autism/autistic burnout in workplace: — ‘I keep thinking I am going to get fired…’ — ‘The only reason why I know what I am doing is bc I worked with this one person and I watched everything they did…’

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

I remember treating people at work like close friends when they were just people who helped me. I remember attaching very easily to romantic interests when guys just saw our relationship as casual. I wanted a long term relationship and they just wanted someone’s company.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

At burnout job, I made the mistake of voicing my concerns when I was confused why I was being treated differently from my peers. Other people would have taken note, but I asked questions. I trusted and respected everyone. I thought a conversation would ease my anxiety.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

“Women with late diagnoses of autism are often duck-like. Superficially, we may appear to be effortlessly cruising. But beneath the surface, we are paddling frantically” — Dr. Emma Jane, academic and author

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Everyone is a little autistic. And at the time, I agreed with her. And chalked my experience off to trauma. It was all of the trauma. But I kept learning. And the more I learned and related to the experience, I was like, nope. This is more than trauma.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 days

painful memories from before knowing i was autistic is realizing the times you thought someone liked you but they were just doing that to be nice. i took many interactions at face value. if people were nice, i expected them to have my best interest at heart.

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@ashleyann_atx

2 months

have definitely creeped people by remembering details about them so i have pretended to not know details

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@neuro_lou

2 months

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

As someone who has experienced both physical and emotional abuse, there is something very evil about gaslighting. It is the kind of abuse that hurts more severely than being hit or called a hurtful name. It hurt more in ways bc it sought to destroy my ability to trust myself.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

I thought this was trauma related but it also autism related. I thought I had issues with attachment. I attached too easily because I wanted family and closeness. But it was also related to autism in that I had real difficulty with expectations and context dependent relations.

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@ashleyann_atx

10 months

Sorry if this sounds crazy, but do you ever get the sense that people — grown people do certain things to test your boundaries just to see how you react? Just to see if you get mad? Maybe I am just crazy but sometimes I wonder if people just testing me sometimes. Like a kid.

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@ashleyann_atx

6 months

anyone who discloses they are neurodivergent or the like in the workplace is very brave. i’ve yet to see it come without consequence and any added benefit. it really must be for the person sharing. for their peace of mind. bc it it does not ease those you share it with.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Learning mutism is a side effect of PTSD. I went mute when I was 16. I just stopped talking. And when I sat in class, I thought hard about how to formulate questions and things I wanted to say. So much so that I said nothing. I was scared to talk to people. My mutism,…

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@ashleyann_atx

10 months

I’ll never forget the time I was on an elevator with my sister. This woman got on and mumbled an expletive under her breath to us as we were getting off. I asked my sister what she said, and my sister said wo hesitation, ’Don’t respond. They want a response from you.’

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

“Women are far more likely to be diagnosed with BPD than men. In fact, about 75% of people diagnosed with BPD are women; that's a ratio of 3 women to 1 man diagnosed with BPD. Researchers do not know why there is this gender difference.” They don’t?

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

I was thinking on why depression and autistic burnout can look so similar. It seems that one turns into the other. After leaving burnout job, I had to take a month off for rest here and there. I had to reduce social contact and social engagements. I just needed to nothing.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

Realizing you are autistic closely coincides with waking up to realizing you’ve gaslighted your whole life. And before that, I had read + studied concepts of boundaries, gaslighting, manipulation. I wasn’t this innocent naive walking target. I just did not get it like I do now.

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@ashleyann_atx

10 months

When an autistic person asks for what they need w/in a relationship or workplace or other situation, I wish for people to know how much time, consideration and courage went into asking. It wasn’t impulsive. It might’ve been something they never had and now find worthy of.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

There are some issues with processing trauma when also autistic. Below is advice for resolving childhood trauma and how that might conflict with being autistic in non-inclusive environments:

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

That time my supervisor at a preschool asked me, Are you sure you want to work with kids? And I said, Yes, I only want to work with kids. And she said, Ok, well you can’t talk to them like they are adults. And you need to be more animated. And I said,

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Repetitive behaviors in masked autism — I was known to take breaks to walk around the block. I would leave my office. It was just this urge to pace, walk around block while listening to music. It was a need I had. I moved my hands to music and this was my stim.

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@ashleyann_atx

8 months

i have a question for autistic women: do you have a hard time connecting with other women? and do you relate this to being autistic? i don’t get on with them. i think it bc i am quiet and don’t act in stereotypical way. my only female friends are my sisters.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

I have to often remind myself that I deserved to be there. I worked hard to be there and I am continuing to do that much.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

The scary part about autistic burnout is that I didn't even know I was spiraling. I must have looked unrecognizable to people. Family members and friends expressed concern with my wellbeing. And I didn't even know I was unhappy. I didn't even know I was losing myself.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

When I am self-advocating for myself and saying, I do xyz because I am autistic, I do run the risk of people thinking quietly to themselves ‘You are not autistic’ or ‘She is using autism as an excuse…’ I can feel these reactions. And it is bc I present with masked autism.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

The belief that no one will hurt you so long as you do what is asked of you is not true. The belief that people will like you so long as you are non-disruptive and keep to yourself is not true. The belief that as long as you like people, they will like you back: untrue.

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@ashleyann_atx

6 months

when you realize you were conditioned to *not* have needs. your entire life. and that is why, when you do ask for what you need you can feel the shame build up inside of you. and feel yourself falling into a memory of being hurt. and when you are not hurt, you are relieved.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

There is this girl I once knew who was successful and determined in life. She was not aware of disability and worked 10x harder than everyone else wo complaint. She didn’t take meds and did not burnout. Instead she carefully paced herself.

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

Autism is knowing the social rules but not always feeling comfortable carrying them out. The ‘I know I am supposed to do xyz,… but I don’t want to.’

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

What if that person you thought was 'toxic' was actually just autistic and traumatized, and they did not know?

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

What unmasking looks like for me when I am home/with close friends — watching same music video over to regulate — saying phrases I’ve heard in shows to myself, sometime repetitively bc I like the way it feels or expresses a feeling — dancing + going for walks as stims

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@ashleyann_atx

1 year

If you are autistic and don’t know you are autistic, are a working professional, and don’t reciprocate communication or engage people in small talk, people might think you are a b— when you are actually autistic. You probably wish to have relations but don’t know how.

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@ashleyann_atx

11 months

When you are self-diagnosed autistic there is this fear — impostor syndrome — that ‘what if I am disclosing that I am something that I am not’ and then I think of baby pictures of myself — the pictures that revealed myself before I started masking — and I remember who I am.

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