It gets better: Navigating social expectations as a spiritual autistic woman

“I thought I cannot bear this world a moment longer.
Then, child, make another.” - Madeline Miller, Circe

One Sunday morning I rushed out of my apartment thinking I’d be meeting three friends at the kickboxing gym for a sparring session. When I got there, already 10 minutes late, Em was practicing uppercuts on a bag by herself. Two ladies changed the meeting forgot to tell us. Em was struggling with her form; being four levels her senior, I opted to spend the hour coaching her instead.

Real recognizes real. The more we talked in between lead kicks and rear knees, the more we found in common. Turns out she’s autistic too, was homeless and broke for her early adulthood too, has echolalia and chirps along with the birds, too. By the end of our hour together her knees were brutal and I knew that—over time, and if I’m lucky—we’d be found family.

I also wondered: are all autistic women and NBs living the same lives?

We all spend the first, oh, 30 years of our lives desperately trying to live up to societal expectations that are, to put it mildly, neurocognitively impossible. We all collect a metric fuckload of trauma as a result, to the point where we all seem to have a dark night of the soul and reinvent ourselves at some stage in our adulthood — or at every stage of life, for some.

We get really good at laughing, creating, and memeing through it. We take such a beating we become healers in whatever ways we can access. Em became a welfare worker. Another friend became an acupuncturist. My reiki practitioner bopped from abusive relationship to abusive relationship until she’d nearly given up on life, before energy work found her.

Some Buddhists genuinely believe autistic people, like Bodhisattvas, were literally put on this earth to suffer, so they can turn that immense suffering into healing. As my grandma would say, “God will keep breaking your heart until it stays open.”

Most people in the western world actively reject autism and spirituality, or anything that cannot be explained through academia or concrete fact. Let me tell you one thing I’ve learned about these people:

Oftentimes the only sense of wonder or curiosity they have comes from their children, who haven’t yet had either beaten out of them. In other words, they’re…kind of boring?

The thing about people who are creeped out by autists — or trans people, or Black people, or gay people — is that there is no mandate forcing you to care about their opinions. I spent my entire life thinking I had to care, that I had to get a salaried job and suffer through corporate America, that I had to attend my friend’s three fucking bachelorette parties, and destination wedding, and bunk in a room with six other women, and like it.

Well, I’m older and wiser now. What do I actually need to do with my one precious life?

Commit to, and advocate for, myself

None of us are truly “self-made.” You’re able to read this blog post because someone birthed you; taught you letters and how to form them into words; and gave you the push — by help or hellfire — to either research autism or identify as an autist. I believe we all subconsciously understand the time, attention, and sacrifices made by our parents or parent-figures, teachers, role models and mentors. And as a result, we all have at least some urge to be of service. To give back.

I also believe that capitalism exploits that inherent urge, especially in the United States. No matter what high school teachers, hiring managers, “rise and grind” hustlers, or your disappointed dad might tell you, there is no perfect, one-size-fits-all approach to being of service. But here we sure don’t act like it.

I’ve learned that it’s incredibly easy to get swept up in the urgency and fervor of becoming a cog in the wheel. And when I — a Black, queer, AuDHD creative — simply do not fit in the wheel. Like…at all.

And that’s okay, because there are other ways to be of service. It took over 30 years of my life to discover there’s a sustainable life to be lived outside of corporate America and noisy city commutes and buying more things just to impress people I don’t even like.

Since then, I’ve learned to fight — physically, and intellectually.

I’ve learned how to establish, and enforce, boundaries; how to protect my space and heart without losing my compassion. I’m not exactly an expert yet, but I’m learning how to accept the lessons I should never have had to learn, while still moving on from the trauma, pain, and people that taught them to me.

I’ve learned to ask for accommodations, even without a diagnosis. Some people don’t have a piece of paper with their diagnosis because they can’t afford it, or can’t find an appointment. I don’t have one because I don’t want one. Let my therapist, former roommates and bosses, and everyone who knows me in-person confirm it for you: I am autistic as fuck.

That’s why, when I explain to a professor or employer why I need the accommodations I’m asking for and what adverse reactions they alleviate for me, and they insist on a diagnosis, I know that this environment is not a safe place for me. I may ask again later to confirm it, but ultimately, people are human. If I tell you know I suffer under the conditions you’ve provided and it costs you next to nothing to change them, choosing not to change them simply because I haven’t paid for the privilege of a Neurodivergent Club Card? That’s an inhumane way to act.

On that note:

I’m refusing to argue with people who are dedicated to misunderstanding me.

This decision has changed my life.

A few hundred TikTok trends ago, the girlypops launched a movement to ruthlessly cut anybody out of their lives who wasn’t serving them, and a ton of people took it literally. Yes! go no-contact with your abusive mother! but also, Yes! Vanish from your friends’ lives if they didn’t wish you happy birthday on time!

To me, that statement means I won’t debate with bad actors, especially when it comes to my identity, my boundaries, or what I want out of life. We can argue about politics, or even my core beliefs. But I won’t entertain anybody trying to browbeat me into being something I'm not.

Even people you love with all your heart can do this; that’s why I’m learning not to jump straight to cutting out, blocking, ghosting, or whatever other punishing behaviors people are calling “empowering” now. If you see me dedicating all my free time to educating on creative spirituality and healing and suggest more than once that I make Muay Thai TikToks instead, I’m not going to rake you over the coals for it; I’m just gonna assume you don't listen. We'll still get along, but there's no point in telling you about what moves I'm making.

Create with, and in spite of, others

Back in middle school, long before I had the language for it, I could sense that I wasn’t on the same wavelength as other kids. Unless I could surround myself with other weird gremlin children who knew the names and numbers of all the original 151 Pokémon by heart and could double-dutch to them on the beat, I struggled to see the value in collaborating in groups.

When it came time for group projects, the assignment was always clear: everyone comes up with an idea, kids gather up to the ones with the best ideas, they form a group, make a project, and present it at the end of class. But I, with my super cool idea that no one picked, would insist on doing my project alone. I’d fail to complete it in time to present, then sit in the hall and pout about it. So…this lesson’s been a long time coming.

I’m figuring out when to do things my own way, and when to follow the herd. Sometimes being a sheep is a good thing, actually!

I’ve learned to let go of control and let people teach me things.

When I started kickboxing in 2023, I had no choice but to accept that I could barely balance long enough to land a kick. When three different coaches gave me the same critique three different times, I needed to swallow my pride and ask for help: to explain the move in a different way, or sometimes even — god forbid — position my body so that I can feel what I’m supposed to be doing with it.

Checking my ego was a chore, but once I’d done it, I was able to approach new experiences — and people — with what Zen Buddhists would call a “beginner’s mind.”

I started learning new things from just about everybody. I eventually met Hannah, who joined the gym around the same time. On a random summer day, she taught me how to play her bass guitar. After decades of sticking to the same instruments I played since childhood, the bass felt like a breath of fresh air — and something I would never have even thought to pick up.

A few months after selling my dusty old keyboard and buying my own bass, I’m often the only bass player at our jam sessions. Now I can spend hours trading tips while having fun with some new friends, and I get to enjoy that sweet, sweet gratification of being useful, for the low, low price of keeping a beat.

It’s all well worth letting go of being a smartass. And another thing:

Openly experience and express joy

Due to being treated like round pegs fitting into the square holes of society, complex trauma comes with the territory of being neurodivergent. When my years of desperately trying to fit into spaces I thought I had to exist in led to debilitating burnout, my next strategy was to spend years desperately trying to “fix” myself so I could…keep doing what I was doing. ”If I can just get rid of my baggage, I’ll learn how to stop making weird financial decisions, then I can keep working this insanely stressful job that pays well and save up enough money that I can buy a house in the woods and never have to talk to another human being again. And then I’ll finally be safe!”

30-year-old me was not in a healthy place.

In Vibrate Higher Daily, Lalah Delia describes a high-vibrational life as one that nourishes not just your body, mind, and soul, but your community’s too, creating a positive feedback loop we all need more of in this world. I’ve learned that dimming your light — or worse, locking it in a chest where no one can ever find it — is a great way to extinguish that light completely.

My therapist had to coax me out of hiding, like a frightened cat stuck behind the couch. If she hadn’t, I wouldn’t be here today.

People need other caring, supportive people to survive.

Full stop. Thanks to the people in my life today, my life is richer. I have something, and so many someones, to look forward to seeing each day, and when I get depressed, I know that there are people outside my apartment who would blow up my phone if I vanished for more than three days in a row.

Like many autists, I grew up in a hotbed of abuse that I learned to live with in adulthood. When my teens turned to twenties turned to thirties and I still felt small and unwanted everywhere I went, my joy turned into bitterness until I finally found the courage to go outside and fight through it. (Literally.)

By finding Em and Hannah, and many more amazing people, I could finally see what I was missing out on and find a place to belong.

Your trauma isn’t meant to be exorcised; it’s meant to be tamed.

Love and be loved

Another thing trauma regularly obscures from our lives is the idea that love is supposed to feel good; that we were put on this earth to be someone’s manic pixie dream girl until the end of our days.

Getting out of my comfort zone and having just enough vulnerability to let myself be guided gave me the opportunity to love and be loved in healthier ways than I was raised to settle for. Refusing to let people talk me out of loving myself and all my autisticality helped me re-learn that, actually, I am worth protecting.

It sounds cheesy, but we forget, don’t we? Sometimes we feel like we have to, just to survive.

I thought I’d have to hide my tinctures and moon journals and energy work and tarot cards alone in my apartment for the rest of my life. Now I bring my tarot cards to parties, jam sessions, and house hangouts, just in case. I take herbal teas to sick friends. And since everyone assumes I’m a witch anyway, I get to occasionally threaten to hex a homegirl’s aggressive ex-boyfriend, and we never hear from him again.

Finding community is the best thing I’ve ever done for myself. The more I show up for my community, the more it shows up for me in every way possible. The more I give, the more I get — not always materially, but emotionally and energetically? Every day.

Everything comes down to learning how to yield and flow

I talk a lot about my gym on this blog. That’s because, to me, the martial arts are one more form of creative alchemy. I started going to my gym to process, to exorcise something, without really knowing what. Therapy saved my life by giving me a goal to look forward to in the future, but I was desperate for a reason to keep living now.

Everyone in my stick-fighting classes tells me I’m too stiff; that I need to relax, and strike softly, and learn to play. They’ve been telling me this for months, but I still don’t quite get it. And that’s okay; I have something to look forward to learning tomorrow. Clinging to control helped me survive an uncertain childhood, but what has it done for me lately? In the ring, in relationships, in my career?

My biggest lesson will be, as our professor Jeff Patterson calls it, learning to yield; how to be sensitive to pressure without getting pushed around.

Spirituality shouldn’t just be another quirky autistic thing you do in the quiet of your room. Showing up 100% as you are (around the people who understand, accept, and affirm you) is the key to being perceived and actually enjoying it.

If you haven’t found that space to be who you are yet, you will. May you never dim your light again.