You should really take my word when I say I'm trying to stop doing this. I'm making some progress at the head butting, but managing the finger twisting and hitting is proving difficult right now. Want what I used to have - the say in what my body does and doesn't do. Are autistics more wasting away their lives because leading ourselves to be able to function in society is so difficult and exhausting?
Things will take time to improve, but I'm hopeful they will. These days I'm missing out on wanted and loved activities. Yelling with the loudest yell lately. It's getting people upset. Makes going some places impossible right now. Hearing what I sound like disturbs even me. I hate using my voice that way. Yearn to learn to control it. It feels having this problem my whole life. You'd think someone who is almost sixteen wouldn't be crying and screaming all the time. Maybe you've heard me. It's not pleasant. It gets my whole family on edge and will get people around us staring. Need something to change and please pray for me that it will soon.
Meeting the hard demands of high school can be stressful. Mom sees that I'm more relaxed going to summer school, but knows they don't challenge my brain. Miss reading and learning, but I don't miss weeks that we made my school stressed about how to deal with the scenes I make sometimes.
Really every fear that you think might happen has happened to work against all the progress I've made since learning to express myself so well by typing. My biggest fear is that I'm never going to stop doing these things, teaching my family really that having me go to things is permanently too difficult. Facing this future feels bleak.
Want to say really small teaching advice. If you find yourself where someone like me is having a meltdown, make treating that person with empathy and compassion your goal. Imaging feeling the despair we feel over our behavior.
