Autistic Interviews #6 Jeg Er

You are not born a gender, it is physically impossible to born any psychological concept. You are merely born a biological sex

Photo by Fons Heijnsbroek, abstract art on Unsplash

Welcome to Autistic Interviews!

Here you will find different Autistic Voices and Real Life Stories shared, each one unique and highlighting different lived experiences, whilst sharing a common ground: autism. Participants choose which questions to answer, in their own style, making each interview a totally authentic real life story! 

Name: Jeg Er

Age: 57

Sex: Male

Nationality: British

Diagnosis: Diagnosed autistic age 45

Why is diagnosis important to you?

I finally understood my mind after all those years

Do you consider autism a disability/neurological disorder/mental health condition/developmental disorder/other?

Disability, developmental disorder

Have you been diagnosed autistic but you don't think it's the right diagnosis? Or have you been misdiagnosed with other mental health conditions in the past that were incorrect?

In the 80s I got told I had manic depression, they did not know about autism in those days. at one point, a professional suspected schizophrenia due all the loud noise and intense thoughts in my head seeming too real and not of my making

Is anyone else in the family autistic? How did they all find out?

My daughter. assessed and diagnosed. i suspected it

How did you end up getting diagnosed autistic?

I got sent to a psychologist because of long term anxiety disorders. It was she who suspected autism and had me assessed. it had not even crossed my mind

For late diagnosed people, what effect did diagnosis have

Answered a lot of questions, made sense of a lot of things, and sense of relief knowing why i had all those mental health and anxiety disorders throughout my whole life

Do you think getting diagnosed sooner would have had an impact?

Absolutely. my entire life would have been better than it is now, because i would not have crashed and burned at school. if they had understood such things in the 80s and if they ran schools like they do now, i would have been accommodated for and been able to manage academic output and exams and had better prospects and also would have had better management of my mental health

Do you tell people you're autistic? 

Yes.

Because it's true. and in some case it is necessary due to environmental considerations

But it's not like I tell everyone as soon as I meet them or if there is no particular need to. i tell people who have relevance and/or regular involvement in my life

Having said that, I literally do not socialise and have no friend group. which doesn't bother me

Do you feel more confident expressing yourself/advocating for yourself since diagnosis?

Completely

Whilst waiting to be assessed did you feel like you might be wrong/crazy for thinking you might be on the spectrum? 

No at all. i was just intrigued and surprised

Do you have any other mental health diagnosis?

ADHD, some OCD. anxiety

Are you medicated/ever been medicated?

ADHD stimulants and risperidone to calm the noise in my brain. They work very well, made a big difference. they succeeded where therapies had no effect

Have you ever had positive/negative experiences of mental health support?

Either very good or completely terrible

Looking back in childhood, what were the signs?

hanging out by myself all the time. doing strange things like making lines in the garden made up of stones or insects for hours on end. spending hours bouncing a tennis ball against a wall regularly at home or during primary school lunch times. feeling overwhelmed and nervous quite a lot, not being able to keep up in class

In what ways did you feel similar/different to others in childhood/adulthood?

I never did feel similar. I always felt odd. I tended to think about things differently to the average person and had obscure interests for my age when at school. would trance out a lot in adulthood and gets lots of head rushes

If you could go back in time and tell child you anything, what would it be?

Nothing, as there would have been nothing i could do to act upon it as i did not have the mental capacity. instead i would tell my mum and dad about this thing called autism. although that still would not have made much difference in the 80s

Is your family understanding about autism/your diagnosis?

Own family, yes. mother of my daughter, no

Do you live with family & do you think you will ever live independently and leave the family home?

I live independently with family of my own. but i need support workers a few hours per week.

Do you feel independent in life or do you rely on family or social workers etc for support?

Social workers and support workers 6 hours per week. i don't like being independent much, but have to be, so struggle sometimes

Do you have sensory issues?

They have calmed down since my ADHD medication started. but I do get a lot of humming inside my head. before medication used to also get electrical zapping sounds and loud voices in my head. can get overwhelmed easily by obtrusive noise especially if i am already mentally overloaded. If I am calm and less activity in my mind I can cope with sounds better then. My biggest sensory overload is my own thoughts and the hectic, busy, or disorganized way people speak. can struggle in strange environments with groups of people i don't know, makes me anxious and nervous and light headed, can trance out or become excessively drowsy in this situation

Do you stim?

Sometimes hum. will repeat regular phrases. worst thing i do numerous times a day picking lots of my scabs which i have had for years and are never ending because i do this

Do you have special interests/passions/hobbies?

Love academic studies. I’m not on official course, I just do my own. particularly psychological, quite in depth, especially from the point of view of dogs and animals, as i train dogs sometimes. it really helps me focus and relax and i get a great thrill from the process of learning and discovering interesting things

How do you think others perceive you and why?

Not many people will perceive me that much, as i work for myself by myself and have no social life. my family find me quirky but sometimes stressful

If you could change/improve something about yourself what would it be and why?

Suddenly, without thought or hesitation, have constant balanced continual energy throughout the day and just be able to do one task following another. so a higher activity level. because i struggle to get necessary things done in a timely manner or to achieve things which would meet my potential and give me success and personal satisfaction and development

Do you feel understood? 

Not much

What would you like to say to neurotypicals?

Speak slower and more literally and give me time to process what you say before bombarding me with the next comments, and when I speak, stop interrupting me and let me finish my entire comment first then think about what i have said before responding. don't give me your opinions about what i am saying before you know what it is i am saying properly. stop telling me what i am thinking

go about things in a more structured cohesive way

What would you like to say to other autistics?

Stop complaining about all the typical things non-autistic people do which make you struggle with your autism more, then dont go online and do the same things yourself. ie, don't read what someone has written, then imagine they have expressed something different to what you just read, and then accuse them and get annoyed with them over thoughts, beliefs, or opinions you just imagined they have. It is quite surprising how many autistic people do that in discussions. stop being so culturally political and ideological about every little aspect of autism so stop being so precious about how people use autistic related terms, for example. 

If you feel stress and anxiety, try and keep it to yourself, so just go somewhere and withdraw, instead of lashing out at others

Do you mask/camouflage & how does this affect you?

Not really

I don't even need to. i barely have contact with other people

What is your biggest personal challenge you’re currently working on?

Executive function. progressing my business

What type of support do you feel you would benefit from?

Being listened to properly

What mental health support do you have/have had in the past? 

Had a psychologist for a year. various short term CBT programmes. Didn’t work, couldn't stick to them. assessments here and there

Are you in therapy/had therapy in the past?

The one year psychologist was a waste of time. She was great thinking of autism and having me assessed. but rubbish during our sessions, it was the same routine each time. She would ask me what things have happened this week and what difficulties have I had. I would then explain a situation or event which happened, then explain my anxiety responses to it. Then she just spent the rest of the time telling me why the other person did the things that they did and felt the way that they did. when i kept asking her to give me strategies to manage my anxiety thought and feeling responses trigged by these situations, so i could recover relatively quickly and not being fucked up the rest of the day. It just felt like it was an advice pep talking session from my aunt, it was of no practical use. It got so bad, that I experienced the worst bout of OCD I have ever gone through directly the hour before seeing her.

Are you cis/hetero/LGBTQIA+ or Other? (Do you like/dislike these terms?)

My autism tends to cause me to think in very literal and logical terms

So I do not recognise the term 'cis', because it refers to gender, and gender is a social construct, and I have never agreed with social constructs. And it refers to cisgender as in 'what gender you were born'. But you are not born a gender, it is physically impossible to born any psychological concept. You are merely born a biological sex, I am not AMAB, either. As there is no such thing as being 'assigned at birth'. You are simply born male or female. And your sex is identified before birth and then confirmed at birth.

Even when I was 10 I definitely knew I did not believe in religion and objected when relatives called me a Christian. I also reject political belief terms. To me, gender is the same sort expression of a mere belief system. I do not think I am a "gender". I just think I am simply me. I happen to be a biological male, but I don't particularly give any regard to the concepts of masculinity or femininity. Even when i was at school i was not particularly interested in 'boy things', but not 'girl things', either. Just 'my things'. I cant get my head around ideas like stag or hen nights, for example. So I just don't feel 'gendered'. However, unlike most people who have this outlook, i do not then recognise myself as nonbinary, or even other types of labels. Because to me, that is a contradiction. Because that is simply another 'gender', and I do recognise the concepts of gender nor identity, therefore do not feel the need to have either. So by not recognizing myself in terms of a male gender, because I do not believe in such concepts and labels, why would I then recognise and label myself as another gender concept, such as nonbinary? It makes no logical sense.

I accept LGBT are factually correct terms to describe people's actual sexuality or biological sex body dysmorphia, and have no issues with such people. QIA and all the other numerous letters and acronyms and multiplicity of identity pronouns and gender labels I find illogical, nonsensical, and superficially faddish.

All these thoughts and feelings I have formulated at this time of my life about the modern identity culture movement are exactly the same expression and experience of intellectual process I went through when I was rejecting all facets of religion when I was younger in the 80s and 90s, when Christianity was more the widely accepted and popularized social construct at that time.

I am factually heterosexual but have not had sex for decades as I have no associations with people to enable it. But again, this is not my 'identity'.

Do you think labels are helpful or not? (labels such as Autistic, LGBTQIA+, Disability, Woman, Man etc) 

Only in terms of factually grammatically correct description

Do you struggle with identity issues?

Nope

I do not have an 'identity', do not feel the need to have one

I require no support at all for this matter

Do you think autism is important to address when exploring gender identity issues? 

No

Unrelated.

and i do not believe in gender

How important is autism identity/gender identity to you? Is one more important than the other? Do you think they are linked together or completely separate?

Crikey! How many more gender questions??

Neither are important. autism is not my identity, gender is not my identity, i do not believe in identity nor gender, i am not an identity nor a gender

Autism is a factually scientific condition, gender is a social construct. Science and social construct are incompatible opposites with each other, therefore autism is unrelated to gender

What do you think/understand about the overlap/link between autism and gender diversity?

The overlap is not real from a scientific logical point if view

Are you gender nonconforming? (What does being gender nonconforming mean to you?) Do you think anyone can be gender nonconforming?

I  am "gender nonconforming" because I do not conform to the idea there is genders (apart from transgender people, which is based around biological sex body dysmorphia, and therefore should be returned to its original term of transsexual people)

Are you employed? Do you struggle to get/keep a job? Do you excel in the workplace? What problems do you encounter?

Self employed

Struggled in some jobs in the past, trouble fitting in and keeping up

Have you had positive/negative experiences in school/employment due to autism/acceptance/ableism/misunderstandings? 

No

as did not know i was autistic until mid 40s, so it did not come up

What support do you think you/autistic people need to find/keep employment?

All the gender questions have used up most of my brain now, so cant think

Does your employer/colleagues know you are autistic? 

Don't have an employer or colleagues

Do you have accommodations made for your autism in education/workplace?

Self employed

Do you struggle or excel in school/employment?

I  have struggled many times in the past

Are you Introvert/Extrovert?

Introvert

If you could have learnt one lesson in life or childhood, what would it be and why

Just study

How do you feel about being autistic? 

It’s a nuisance and gets in the way

Do you ever wish you were neurotypical and why?

Yes - because autism obstructs me

No - because some of the thought processing and social behaviours of neurotypical people don't make sense, and I would not like to think i think and act like that.

Therefore, i would like to be a non autistic person who has an autistic style brain when it comes to those areas

Do you have a social circle/one friend/group of friends/no friends?

No

I am not lonely. i like it this way

What areas of autism studies/research would you like to see more of in the future?

Late diagnosis/adults

Are you interested in/do you consider yourself Feminist/Environmentalist/Socialist/Gender Critical/Trans Ally/Humanist etc 

Environmentalist

Political stance?

I dont have one. i do not believe in them, i think they are social construct artifices with inherent illogical contradictions

Thank you Jeg Er for your voice! :)