Autistic in Wonderland

Being autistic

The truth is that in real life, I have the emotional development of a two year old and the mental age of a thirteen year old. I don't act my age most of the time but I have reasons for that. My brain is wired differently so in other words, things that are no big deal to you are always going to be a big deal for me.

If you were to yell at me in real life, I will cry and sometimes cover my ears because of the sounds. But that's not because you are scolding me. I am afraid and sometimes I don't understand. Other times I don't know what to think.

There are times when I have to know things such as, howling I need to wait for something, when something is going to and even how or why it will happen. It's have to know these things so I can prepare myself when they occur. If I'm not aware of those things, then I meltdown. My brain runs on a timeline, a schedule and things have to be in order. At times things get worse when I have to predict my own occurrences.

But what happens when I predict my own outcomes? I meltdown and I begin to panic. This is because without having people tell me what I should expect, I panic easier. It's not the same as getting my own way. I know I can't expect things to go as planned or to have things explained so I know what to expect but that my mind is different than yours is.

There are many things that I fear even things most people consider very irrational and are very unlikely to happen. Do you know why I still fear those things? Because in my eyes, the world is still unknown to me. There are things I should know and should expect but I don't.

I don't expect that things will be sugarcoated just the same as people who don't expect the meltdowns or outbursts I will have. I don't have any idea how to control them because they don't occur the same way a child has a tantrum.

When I have a meltdown, it's not to get my way. It's because I am overloaded with what is going on and most of the time my mind can't handle all the stress that is happening around me. I have taken a lot of things that I don't understand. I have trouble with being able to focus and understand my surroundings.

I try very hard to understand. I try hard to be a good-behaved person but I am also not misbehaved at all because my brain is wired differently. Things are out of order and when things are misplaced, my mind has to put the puzzle pieces back together.

But some of those pieces in my brain are lost, broken or forced together in places that they don't belong. The pieces aren't in the same order. They say autism is like a puzzle because it's so hard to understand. That much is true because for the autistic person, the pieces that puts the brain together aren't there and are forced together to try and make the puzzle work.

That's why when things happen, my brain doesn't have the right pieces in the right places to know how to react. When that happens, that's when things spiral out of control. That's why things fall out of place and go totally wrong.

But for someone without autism, they wonder why there is a twenty three year old woman acting like she is two. No understands the puzzle my brain put together because my brain did it wrong. With the pieces missing or placed in the wrong order or even broken, things are always going to be different for me.

I never asked for it to happen. I never had had that control. No one, not even me, knows what happened to those lost and forgotten pieces as I grew older. Perhaps they were never there in the first place, or maybe they were lost when I was growing up. I don't know any of those answers yet and I probably never will.

All I can say is, when you see me to not yell at me, to not tell me I am overreacting because then my brain goes into overdrive and things will go down. I wish I could order the pieces back together the right way but when the piece are lost and forgotten, what is left becomes part of the mixed up puzzle that forms my brain.

I do my best to make everyone and understand and to understand them as well. But things will always be a challenge for me and all I need is reassurance that things will work out and to be giving patience and acceptance for the way things go.