How do you tell the difference between reactions you have because you're neurospicy and the reactions you have from past trauma? (Let alone where they overlap!)
(I'm talking more behavioral than sensory here, things akin to rejection sensitivity, etc)
You can make hypothesis and rank them, but there is no confidence that the hypothesis on top is right.
I guess for PTSD you can compare behavior before and after the event. But if it's CPTSD and traumatizing situations in early childhood you will lack a reference.
I understand the wish for distinction, because it is relevant for possible improvements.
Nevertheless, I think it is important to accept oneself and the own history, the good and the bad. I guess no matter what the origin is, if one is busy fighting and loathing the reality one has not the ressources to work on it.
To me, the distinction between autistic reactions and cPTSD events is important. I've faced multiple cPTSD triggers head-on, worked through them and neutralised them. It's hard work and it's painful, but it can be done. Autistic overwhelm, in contrast, is not something I can train myself out of. For that, I need to find ways to avoid the stimulus -- it's the exact opposite to my approach to cPTSD.
@Dr_Obvious@StevenSaus@actuallyautistic@actuallyaudhd
As a recently self-diagnosed autist, I'm wrestling with this myself. For me, I think the clue is in the reaction. If it's numbness plus an urge to escape, it's autistic overwhelm. If it's numbness plus terror, misery, self-loathing and/or a deep feeling of uselessness or hopelessness, it's cPTSD.
@StevenSaus@actuallyautistic@actuallyaudhd i'm not sure there is a meaningful distinction. for one thing, trauma related conditions like ptsd are also neurodivergences (or neurospices?). and i think some behaviors/experiences that are classified as autistic are really post-traumatic from the traumas experienced as an autistic person in a neuronormative world. also, some behaviors are caused by both. so there is overlap to the point where those are not separate categories imho.
@StevenSaus@actuallyautistic@actuallyaudhd A lot of it overlaps for me. For an example, I have repeatedly prepared to make major life changes. I don’t even want to actually make the change most of the time, it just feels like I need to prepare. And then sometimes the preparation brings about the change because I can’t change the path I have put myself on. It took me a long time to realize this is due to changes made to my life during childhood that I had no control over. My autism made my reaction to these changes much worse, and caused them to be much more traumatic. My behavior as an adult has been an attempt to control life changes by preparing for things to happen, even when they weren’t going to. This is a trauma response to events in my childhood that were amplified by my autism. I have a lot of examples like this, where they overlap or one amplifies the other. #ActuallyAutistic
@StevenSaus@actuallyautistic@actuallyaudhd Personally, I've come to accept that being autistic means that literally everything about me is affected. Every reaction I have comes from an autistic perspective.
Though I'm loathe to do so, I will have to use the word "normal" here. In this particular case, "normal" is defined as "what is average to me, personally." Once I've identified what my "normal" heads pace and thought processes are, from there I can then identify if a specific reaction is happening due to trauma. However, it can take a lot of introspection to identify all of these variables. And when it comes to trauma in particular, one has to continue to look, even when it hurts, so it can take longer to identify a trauma response.
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