Autistic Burnout (& How To Survive It) [CC]

'Tis the season where everyone feels like they have been hit by a truck (:
[I also forgot to mention that my gender dysphoria gets worse when I’m burnt out. I forgot about that until I went through truly 15 different outfits to find the one I’m wearing in this video because everything made me want to puke, just uh… yeh. That’s also part of the this situation]
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Ultimate resource guide - www.disabledautisticlesbian.c...
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Help! I think I’m autistic - www.disabledautisticlesbian.c...
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Wow! You scrolled to the bottom! Thanks for reading this far & also for being here! Glad to have ya :)

[@elliotm.5057]

This video couldn't have come at a better time, I've been absolutely WRECKED by burnout which then turned into physical sickness. Thank you for this lol.

[@LaCafedora]

YES, assembling my appearance in the ideal way means doing unpleasant things, like wearing snug clothing when I need it to be loose, or wearing a particular garment when I don't like the fabric, and I often choose comfort over appearance, but I really want to control my appearance and hate having to choose between comfort and style. But maybe that's not actually different from wearing clothes at all, because I hate clothes in general, but I accept that I need to be dressed when I go into public and that simply is not negotiable. It's a struggle for sure.

[@miawuff3997]

A relief to watch a video by someone with a similar brain as me, many thanks!
EDIT: IBS solidarity!

[@andrewsmart7158]

The Algorithm has become too good. As an experienced content enjoyer I have never been so properly and suddenly diagnosed through the power of a recomended video. This part of the future I like very much

[@charlottewood2102]

This is great, thank you 🥰

[@JJ-ds2get-her]

This video is great. I see me in it. You’ve helped me release me deeper. So thank you.
I hope you get better.

[@idioteza]

I remember being a teen and being frustrated because "I became interested/passionate about things when I'm too busy and I don't want to", now it makes sense.

[@HayleyWinter]

One of the first things to alert me that I'm nearing burnout is decreased finger dexterity/ fine motor skills. And I bump into eeeeeverything 😅

[@dimimegesis]

hangin in there 😮‍💨

[@LaCafedora]

So yeah, I actually thought I was headed toward burnout in the middle of December. It was a crazy busy week because I work at the college theater and everything happens at the end of the semester. I only wanted to finish the week because I knew I would have all of winter break to rest. Turns out, I had Covid-19 and didn't know it, and it was slowly sapping my energy every day over the course of the week. I'm recovered now, but the day that I realized I was sick and decided to stay home, I felt horrible because I knew there was so much work to do and they needed me, but really what they did not need was a virus dispenser getting everyone else sick so staying home was the best for everyone. That week, though, when I didn't know that I was sick and thought I was feeling a burnout coming, that was scary. I wasn't sure if it was temporary, or if I was just now discovering that maybe I cannot actually sustain even this job that I thought was accessible to me. I'm so glad to know that it was only me being sick, albeit with an illness that is infamous for its fatigue. I gaslit myself. Thankfully, I survived!

[@jangrudo]

I have a (not scientific) theory about two communication styles: exploratory and manipulative. The first is about exploring other people like one explores the world, with the intent of identifying problems and searching for solutions. The second is about searching for people who already know the solution, and persuading them into sharing it.
These styles are not exclusive to allistic or autistic people. Autistics can just as well be mean and manipulative. And allistics can solve problems and collaborate, when they need to. But the idea is that they are much more capable in the manipulative style, to the extent of apparently having specialized brain regions for it.
So, the theory is that autistic burnout happens when we work a lot (in exploratory style, you bet), and then we run into the manipulative style, and it destroys our sense of life.
In my case, recently, I’ve reacted by cutting off the communication almost entirely. Luckily, I could do that, and it worked. Now I’m planning to resume it, with stronger emphasis on boundaries. (Actually, one of the reasons it went smooth was because I knew what was happening, mostly thanks to your previous burnout video).
Manipulative style is obviously energy-saving, on an individual level, but totally asymmetric. So it starts an evolutionary arms race, and we end up with everybody spending a lot of effort manipulating, and detecting manipulation, and with only a fraction actually “benefitting”. Which is not very efficient on the society level. So we end up with artificial rules to limit the manipulation, like law enforcement. And then this doesn’t always work because brains do have a need to exercise their manipulative style capabilities, and always find a way to do so. And then we have things like smalltalk, or sports, which allow them to exercise this capability, in a safer way. I would even hypothesize that smalltalk is an allistic equivalent of stimming: it doesn’t seem to make sense, but is actually a healthy thing for them to self-regulate, in a world full of rules. Overall, I think we are not going in a very wrong direction, even if we might not be there yet.

[@publicano777]

AS A PERSON BEING

[@clarek8945]

Got any resources on how to do the energy economising thing?

[@disabled.autistic.lesbian]

yep! I linked it in the card above at the moment I talked about it but in case you didn't catch it there, it's a video on my channel called "A Beginner's Guide to Managing Disability & Economizing Energy" :)

[@nataliatheweirdo]

had to take a ‘debriefing’ class for school, the first class was about us listing all these case studies and we had to identify how they could be burnt out and what they could do about it, i was going THROUGH IT at that time, so i decided to whip my phone out and make a funny joke abt it, realised after that, i had my camera on and it looked like i was fluking off. i was just so tired i didnt notice 😂 i find that awfully ironic to me

[@johnbillings5260]

Behold, the irony of creating a video on autistic burnout while in such. Hope you can rest well.
Fun fact: I used to have bad earworms until I figured out that I can change the song in my head that I'm listening to. I'm a light psychonaut so I think that helped to develop this ability. Now brain worms don't bug me.

[@CDAActivism]

1st