It is said that we, autistics, have difficulties with recognising our feelings. I can recognise at least some of them, I can definitely recognise sadness, anger and fear. But the problem is that I don’t understand why recognising our feelings is supposed to be so important.

It seems to me that if I was unable to recognise fear I wouldn’t be able to experience anxiety attacks, but correct me if I’m wrong. Also, some psychological litdrature states that recognising our feelings helps us to make the right decisions while other says that we shouldn’t be impulsive and should based our decisions on facts only. That is confusing already, but then let’s not forget that although sadness is an emotional reaction, the fact that something makes me sad is a fact.

I remember that in the past I put myself in situations where I attempted to give in to my feelings hoping that will make the world less confusing to me. I wouldn’t watch news, I wouldn’t talk to people, I just focused on how I felt. It didn’t help. If anything, it made things worse because not only I was still confused about my emotional world, but I become detached from the world of facts that I can understand quite well.

If I have to be honest now, I stopped reading news quite a while ago. I may have a look very occasionally but I’m always disappointed with the number of covid and brexit stories. It’s very tiring. I’d like to know, however, if Professor Simon Baron-Cohen has been featured in any recent article about autism and what he said, but does that matter? I mean, it does, definitely, but I can’t do anything about it, can I? The fact that he purposefully chose to communicate with me in a way that made me feel bad – who cares? I’m just one, middle-aged, emotionally f***ed up autism blogger. My opining does not matter for anyone. What matters is that Professor gets the attention that he wants and certainly deserves.

Btw, I thought I moved on from that situation, but it looks like the feeling of sadness brought those uncomfortable memories back. That is what always happens to me. I wonder if it works the same way for neurotypicals? I’m actually surprised that I didn’t start dwelling on what Home Group did to me. I guess that is because, with everything that happened, I can at least see that Home Group higher management got deceived by The Lady (and, well, by me at the end too). They shouldn’t let this happen and should still check all the paperwork related to my diagnosis while investigating my grievance but at the end of the day I can see how this happened, does that make sense? The Lady was always very professional, except of those days when we had contractors coming in. She would then dress like luxurious prostitute, she especially liked emphasising her camel toe on those days. But higher management didn’t see her like that so they thought she’s so professional. They wouldn’t expect her to make up stuff about me. They thought she wouldn’t need to. Therefore whatever she said about me must have been true. I must have been that horrible person who let the manager pay for my private diagnosis and then claimed it was all on the NHS!

You see, I’m capable enough to see other people perspective. Even though those are the people who’s conduct made me develop my first psychotic episode and, as a result made me more likely to have any further episodes. And made it difficult for me to receive treatment for my panic attacks as doctors in Poland interpreted it as schizophrenia because they just didn’t believe my story.

Anyway, I don’t know why I’m sad. I’m certainly not sad because of Professor Baron-Cohen and not because of Home Group. I just woke up like that. Possibly because I just had two days off work that I spent almost entirely at home? Possibly having days off feels to me like I should be doing exciting stuff? But then, when I try to do anything it’s always like that: too noisy, too cold, food is not saucy enough, too many people, omg I’m overeaten again and so on. And then, at the end I’m being asked by people what it was that I did and I don’t know what to say, because the truth sounds like complaining.

Possibly I’m sad because John said yesterday that he read on my blog that he made me unhappy. Is that what I said? I’m sure, I didn’t! What I was saying was that I was unhappy due to other things going on in my life and that’s why I didn’t have energy to really invest in this relationship. And that I was worried that he will continue to see me like that: like a person who can’t cope with life. But he never said anything about this so I couldn’t be sure. And because I couldn’t be sure, I couldn’t do anything to change it. I was, however, worried that due to that this relationship would fall apart at some point soon. That either he will leave me because he will feel confused and uninspired or, possibly, it will all blow out during a massive, unexpected argument where we will be saying things that we don’t really mean but that will be so hurtful that it will be impossible to forget them and forgive. And anyway, what’s the point in forgiveness if you have nothing to build on?

But it makes me sad to think that John interpreted that as me saying he made me unhappy. No, he never did! He definitely made those difficult times more bearable to me.

So I wonder how he got to this conclusion: is it because I didn’t describe the situation properly or is it because we, autistics, twist words to mimic what we have in our heads already? It feels sad to think that, with all the effort I’m making, I may still not be considered a good communicator. But it makes me even more sad to think that John expected that our relationship will make me unhappy. Is that the pattern he experienced through life? That his efforts to help people feel better made them feel worse?

I, personally, love talking to him. So much that I stopped emailing The Friend when I feel stressed. John somehow almost always say the thing I want to hear and in a way that works for me. But then, what happened was, he become my agony uncle. And possibly he didn’t feel appreciated for that? I don’t know. Possibly I was taking him for granted?

It’s all getting complicated now. One thought leads to another and neither of them brings me closer to where I want to be. I don’t even know where I want to be. I think I just want to stop feeling sad.