Sydney, as an Autistic therapist, I found your feedback to be very useful, I'm fortunate enough to have a large part of my client base to be Autistic, my niche demographic are adults, and being on the Spectrum myself, I feel I can translate and put words to some of the feelings my client's try to describe, that I have often had trouble describing, for me, using metaphors have always worked, but I'll try using less in my practice, which brings me to my next point, I think being a therapist can be an ideal career for Autistics, because it can be patternistic ie: seeing __ number of appointments today, etc), and growth-based- I believe in long-term therapy, so seeing and measuring progress is quite stimulating- I think we can be naturally detail-oriented, so I feel that definitely helps- I would love to connect and Learn more about how I can better bridge some of these gaps!
@@disabled.autistic.lesbian thank you, and if you have any additional feedback, or want to connect, my email is listed in the description on my TH-cam page: Mike Macedo
I think the metaphor thing is individual, for me it works wonders actually. I think and conceptualize predominantly in metaphors and analogies. I think you should check in with each client to see how they feel about that. I´m pretty sure my very first therapist was neurodivergent too and we were such a great match! She immediately recognized my inability to express my feelings with words and encouraged me to describe them in colors for example. We made huge progress together in a very short time but then we lost touch due to external circumstances, which reminds me I should totally get in touch with her again! Another therapist I had (extremely neurotypical lol) discouraged me from using metaphors and said I was "rambling" when I was just trying to explain myself as clearly as possible. That wasn´t great 😬
Indeed... if for example I'm afraid of doing something and the tell me " what's the worst that could happen?" it breeds more fear because I will thing obsessively so many other worst things that I may never had thought before and then it reinforces my fear and increases my resistance of doing it
Interesting for me I always hated that question because it always felt so dismissive and also it put you on the spot to immediately come up with an answer.
You mentioned watching things at 1.5 speed in another video, I used to do that and forgot it helped me. Left it on and opened this video LMAOOOO. You are already at 1.5x
CBT has definitely been very bad for me. It's like my problems are just. Entirely Different Problems than what CBT is addressing. CBT did make me unable to trust myself for years. I've worked really hard to get back in touch with myself and my instincts and emotions and ability to actually regulate myself rather than stuff everything down and tell myself it's all fine and dissociate.
Yeah... my CBT therapy basically went along a burnout cycle. Depression CBT basically meant 'go do things, and slowly that'll give you energy to do more things and you go into an upwards spiral.' I was there because I was extremely burnt out. I'd go up up up until I physically could function anymore, and then I'd crash even harder than before. And I didn't know why, so I blamed myself for failing at therapy. I tried so hard and I couldn't. If this worked for everyone else, why didn't it work for me? Why couldn't I just keep it up? I blamed myself for not 'gaining energy' from activities like seeing my friends and being able to use that energy for productive things like writing my thesis, even though that is literally just not possible for me. And the CBT I had for anxiety, I remember sitting there and telling my therapist that my fears were not irrational because those things happened before and she just kept disbelieving me and minimizing my trauma. I told her I was aut!stic and she a, didn't believe me, and b, said it wasn't relevant because we were working on social anxiety now... Girl... Why do you think I have social anxiety? She told me she could easily relate to what I was going through because she'd had a period of a couple of months where she felt kinda down, and it just felt like she was telling a person who was born without legs that she could relate because she'd twisted her ankle once. "Don't worry, it'll go away and feel like a blip in no time if you just try hard enough!' :) But I do still need help to cope with life. I've been out of therapy for over a year now, because I finally got my diagnosis and decided I needed a therapist who knew how to deal with aut!stic people, but those don't exist, so I've been kinda Googling and losing hope and Googling and losing hope. Guess that's why I'm just shopping around TH-cam channels by aut!stic people, because the science on therapy for aut!stic people keeps telling me 'hey we don't actually have any therapy that's proven to be effective, but peer support seems to help!' And like, great, it does help a little, but it kinda feels like I'm going to a doctor and they tell me 'uhh idk go ask your mom, she has the same genetics, she's probably dealt with whatever you're going through before.' That's just not what you want to hear from a professional.
Hey, I have a therapist that works well for me (just got assessed for asd & waiting on results); so here’s what I think might be more likely to help you find someone who might work for you: You can use Psychology Today’s therapist finder to search by your insurance, and some other filters. Maybe try looking for someone who mentions they are a specific support for the LGBT community? You don’t need to be LGBT yourself. And make sure they specifically speak on their experience with LGBT either in their profile, or when you do a consultation call or the first session (mine went into a little detail on their profile about being “kink friendly”, “open to nonmonogamy”, etc). Reason being, I’ve heard that something like 60% of neurotypicals are hetero, and 60% of autists are lgbt. Trans people are 1/3 autistic (according to some studies). I personally think it may all be because autists are less likely to feel beholden to societal rules, and more likely to pursue their authentic selves. But anyway, you may have a higher chance of finding a neurodivergent therapist this way. Mine turned out to have ADHD and didn’t know (got diagnosed shortly after I started seeing them), and I think it helps them understand that my brain works differently too. Another aspect is that even if they are not ND, a NT who is open to LGBT, it means that they have already demonstrated a capacity for openminded-ness. Someone who can accept that others might have a different internal experience from theirs or what society teaches, is more likely to accept it in other facets, like neurodivergence. And if they learned a lot about the LGBT community, then they’re more likely to be open to learn about autism too (hopefully). One last thing that I think helps, is maybe seeing someone your age or younger (idk your age)? My therapist is a bit younger than me. And I just think finding someone who is part of younger generations (millennials and younger) makes it more likely to find someone more open-minded and willing to learn new things. Hope that helps, or at least gives you ideas of somewhere to start. Because there are good therapists out there for us, they’re just less common and hard to find.
@@SarilainTV Hi, thank you for your recommendations, that's very kind of you! I checked psychology today but I don't think they operate in my country (Netherlands). Here the system is set up like, you get your GP to refer you to a health care provider (organization) and after you're through the waiting list, that organization assigns you a therapist, giving you only their last name so it's kinda impossible to google their info beforehand, and then during the intake you'll have to see whether it's a match, and you can ask for a different one if no. You get to have ten to fifteen 45-minute sessions with them, and if you're not better by then, they'll have to refer you out to another organization to try a different type of therapy, generally escalating the diagnosis (e.g. from 'depression' to 'personality disorder'). I've had a bunch of therapists (like 10 maybe?), and they weren't all d!cks like the one I described in that first comment, but yeah no none of them knew what to do with me. Eventually, after a couple of years, and a couple of 'escalations', the person who was supposed to diagnose me with a personality disorder instead finally listened and sent me to get diagnosed with autism, and when it turned out I had that, it was kinda like 'welp, you don't belong at the institute for personality disorders so bye!' And that's why I ended up kinda stranded, having to go back to the start, my GP. I did ask my GP to refer me to a couple of organizations that say they work with aut!stic people several months ago, but there were miscommunications all around, so sh!t went wrong, and I tried again, and now I need to check back in on that to see if things went right this time and I'm actually on a waiting list (probably not). Thanks for reminding me to check on that lol. I will say that I asked my GP to refer me, not because I have any faith in those organizations to help me, but because my assessors at my gender clinic (because yes I'm trans lol good guess) wanted me to get help for my autism before they would consider allowing me to medically transition (if your terf alarm bell is ringing, it should be). So that's what was happening seven months ago when I wrote this comment. I didn't know it at the time, but those assessors were trying to do conversion therapy on me. I did notice at the time that things were very far from right, but people kept telling me that of course the kinds of people who work at a gender clinic are there because they want to help trans people and they know what they're doing and I shouldn't read too much into it, so... I blamed myself for reading too much into it. Well, until eventually it became too blatant to have any doubts left. I mean, my guy straight up said the quiet part out loud, that he was trying to push back on my belief that I'm trans. He had a list of hypothese for what had caused this belief in me, including all sorts of trauma and aut!stic characteristics. He mocked me when I said that I thought I was born this way because 'how could a baby have a gender identity?' There had to be a cause for why I had developed the idea that I wasn't a girl, and he would find it, and then we could work on fixing that cause. So I guess seven months ago I dealt with a vague frustration that I couldn't really place or shake (because I blamed myself for it) by being bitter and venting in comments, venting about the field of therapy as a whole (because my assessors at my gender clinic are licensed therapists and what they were doing was deeply traumatizing), and by venting about this particular therapist I mentioned in my first comment that wasn't actually all that related to my actual frustrations. And she wasn't THAT bad. She was kinda bad. But there are worse people out there. I passed though, eventually. I was stubborn as f*ck. They eventually begrudgingly gave me permission to transition, while asking me not to do it. So I'm now on to the next waiting list... yay. 4 years in and all I've done is wait. I still do need help figuring out how to live life as an aut!stic human, so having a therapist who could help would still be beneficial, but it's kinda hard to know how much of my depression is just caused by dysphoria and rampant transphobia, and therefore how much of it is actually fixable with therapy. Also, now that the pressure of 'you can't transition if you don't find a therapist to help you with your autism' is gone (I lied about having found one eventually), I'm not as motivated to urgently find one. I've also thoroughly lost my ability to trust therapists. I guess having a group of licensed professional therapists attempt conversion therapy on you will do that to you. I did trust and even personally like each and every one of them the first couple of times I met them. Conversion therapists first build rapport. They say things they know you want to hear, so you open up, and then they use everything you told them about yourself to inculcate doubt into you, no matter how far-fetched and nonsensical. They throw everything at you and see what sticks, what you can't refute, what gets you to cry or panic so hard that you can't breathe. One of them was a gay man, one lady made a point of telling me she had an aut!stic wife so she understood what autism was like, a third said she understood what it was like to struggle with you identity because she'd gone through it with her ethnic identity. They said things like 'of course you get to do with your body what you want to do with it, I'm not here to stop you and you don't need my permission' or 'of course autism is a condition that comes with positive and negative characteristics, and the word 'diagnosis' is kind of strange in this context, isn't it?' These were not things they actually believed to be true, but they knew I was looking to hear them. I used to be very quickly very emotionally open to therapists, very quick to trust. I don't see how I can go back to that now. I don't know if I should. Maybe this was a good wake up call. These are the consequences of trusting people too soon when you know very well you're not good at reading people's intentions. But then if I take 4 sessions before I allow myself to trust a new therapist, I have like 6 left before I legally have to move on to a new one, and you can't do therapy without opening up. And I know that if I put myself in another therapy situation (y'know, one client, one therapist, sitting across from each other at a desk in one of those rooms that are a little too clinical), I am at that point hypersensitive to certain phrases, and likely to get full on triggered, in the original ~trauma~ sense of the word. So yeah I guess I've really not been putting any effort into finding a therapist. There are so many complicating factors that it feels easier and safer to avoid it entirely. But I should get over it and do it already, because it is still necessary. I'll go check on some emails to my GP I guess.
Sooo…my answer as a classical pianist would have been “The worst-case scenario is that I don’t place highly enough in this competition to move on to nationals and have a chance at placing highly enough there to play/“win” a concert with an orchestra, which could have an enormous impact on which schools I can get into.” Or it could just be an audition for anything along that chain of performances that gets you in with the best schools and therefore the best teachers and opportunities. In classical music, a missed note basically means you either didn’t get the muscle memory down or you’re too flustered by performing to be a viable concert pianist (that’s the common belief, anyway). Some of the most cathartic interactions I’ve had with therapists is when I lay something like that out, and they say, “Well shit, that does sound like the stakes are pretty high.” And then we can have a more nuanced, nitty-gritty conversation about the details and how they fit into the bigger picture.
PS The “star” of the piano studio I grew up in told me a story once about going to one of these big competitions and being told that one of the other competitors was playing a piece that was very abstract (ugly, to my ears) but so technically difficult that just getting through it without a missed note meant he won the competition. His teacher told him that, and it played out that way (so to speak; I’m so funny). No artistry accounted for. That’s not uncommon in the classical world, at least for pianists.
Year late to the party, but this… all of this. I’m at that stage where I’ve tried the therapy many times over my life and now that I’m more aware of what is actually wrong I just feel an internalized rage at the whole thing. Tempted to just sit this video in front of my mother to say “SEE!!!?”.
I had a therapist at 14 tell me I wasn't autistic (I had been diagnosed since seven years old) that I was just a spoiled brat with ODD. She would sit really close to me and when I would scoot away from her, she'd scoot right back so she could intentionally be in my personal space.
Thank you for this video. I've just had to finish with a therapist (which made me feel guilty) because she just didn't get me and inadvertently made me feel worse. I am very loud. In everything I do, pretty much all the time. Whenever I kept getting emotional she would talk about "ways of showing healthy anger" and I would get so confused because after I would think, actually no, I was just really sad and it would just reinforce the experience of society viewing my sadness as anger which is really confusing and adds to my upset :(
Thank you so much for this video. When you started talking about the "what's the worst thing that could happen" technique I was reminded of the many, many, many times a therapist asked me "What would you say to a friend who was going through this situation? How would you treat to a friend who was having a hard time?". And my answer to that, back then, would be -awkwardly try to say something comforting, escape from the room, avoid them for a while out of fear that I will make them feel worse and/or hate me because I suck. Also I've found that this kind of socratic dialogue/socratic questioning style makes me feel like I'm being manipulated into a corner where I have to agree with whatever answer therapist has already decided on.
Very late to the party but yes! So much of therapy (and real life tbh, but it feels worse in therapy since it's supposedly somewhere you feel safe) felt like I was supposed to just play the correct part, agree with them. That did not help. I've had good therapy experiences but mostly after my diagnosis so I feel really bad for all the people going to therapy undiagnosed 😢
Im autistic and did CBT before I knew I was autistic. I was masking so heavily during the sessions and the therapist told me to make eye contact (something which makes me feel SO uncomfortable) during the sessions. I thought it helped, but a few years on, I have realised that he just taught me to mask REALLY heavily. However, I found a really good counselor a few years later, and she suggested I might be autistic (i was already in the process of getting a diagnosis but it was nice to get that confirmed). I felt really comfortable and I now know that counselling helps me more than CBT. She also had dogs which came into the sessions which definitely helped.
Thank you so much for this video. I'm self-diagnosed and still trying to figure this out, but this has been a major issue in my past. When I was first referred to a therapist by my GP for depression and social anxiety following years of bullying, it felt like ...more bullying. It felt like I was being punished for "being weird" and further stigmatized, so I tried to be the "perfect" patient, tried to follow all the "rules" and basically just tried to convince the therapist that they have "caught the wrong person", so of course nothing much ever came out of it. I have been self-harm free for almost ten years now and haven't had a major depressive episode in just over 5 years and this has largely been due to the fact that I stopped trying to "fix" myself and focused on acceptance. I began by embracing my special interests, which I'd previously tried to suppress as that was a major thing the kids bullied me for and by generally allowing myself to be more authentic again. Once I learnt about autism, I also realised that those "panic attacks" I would get during which the self-harm would usually happen, were actually meltdowns (which should've been obvious from the amount of stimming that goes on and the fact that I lose my ability to speak other than to repeat the same phrase over and over, but I just didn't know that was a thing), I also started handling them differently, by using the stims as tools and by reducing further sensory input - and finally was able to communicate to "helpful" bystanders that they should not try to "comfort" me by hugging me and should keep communication to a minimum and not ask me questions, because I won't be able to answer and it would further agitate me. I still struggle sometimes, but the autism community has given me a framework and tools to understand and manage my experience, that the world of mental health had not. The main reason I haven't sought out formal diagnosis though, remains the fact that I am very much traumatized by some of my experiences with mental health professionals and just the thought of going for an "evaluation" by a "mental health professional" makes me really agitated. This is something I rarely talk about with my neurotypical friends, because therapy has such a positive reputation, it's like a sacred thing that is beyond critique and just mentioning the possibility that it could be anything other than helpful seems to make some people very angry, because you're seen as attacking something that might have saved their life at some point, so it's a very delicate issue and you've handled it exceptionally well, thank you so much for that.
Semi-unrelated side note: I just began meeting (remotely) with a new therapist, and I made my [many] diagnoses and struggles abundantly clear - including the traits of Pathological Demand Avoidance - and upon closing our first session, I found what feels like a mountain of homework waiting for me in my inbox. I am to watch some videos and answer questions, check in periodically, as well as complete journal entries, etc before our next session. I love researching, deep-diving and learning …. But I have always been “a poor student.” I do NOT handle being assigned / told what to do very well. And my anxiety increases with each new text reminder to “Complete the [fill in the blank]” I thrive in the talking sessions - but did not anticipate this. 😩😩😩
Did you explain about the pathological demand avoidance and how her demanding so much of you seems unprofessional and like she's ignoring a very important part of who you are and how your brain works?
I had to stop seeing my therapist because the way we communicated literally drove me insane. Like after a session I'd be dripping with sweat and shit. Once I started expressing this to her I realized she actually didn't understand anything about autism and that I was wasting my time seeing her. Autistic people process everything differently, including trauma. Hopefully I find someone who actually knows their shit some day.
This was so helpful and healing for me. (ND Female of Color 🙋🏾) I hope this presentation and others like it become required learning material for mental health professionals.
I could actually cry, you just described the last 10 years of my life with words I counldn't find. I wish I knew this 10 years ago, I could have saved myself a lot of pain and £15k.
...alexithymia explains so much about me. also the bit about needing time away from stimulus to process an emotion. by god that's exactly it! I spent most of today in a small dark enclosed space (small dark enclosed spaces my beloved) processing yesterday's emotions, which I was incapable of recognizing in the moment
Thank you :) I just "finished" a DBT group therapy. I am in Canada and if you wait long enough or are unwell enough you are offered mental health services. I spent a great deal of my one on one "therapy" sessions, debating with my DBT therapist. She kept insisting that I had to approach things in the "one size fits all" narrative. I was VERY upset to learn that I had been diagnosed as having borderline personality disorder. This was noted on my medical file and I discovered this at a clinic for Ehlers Danlos. I was diagnosed with severe predominantly hyperactive ADHD and "likely" ASD. An ASD diagnosis has a 6 year waitlist. I had a follow up with the psychiatrist who diagnosed me and she confirmed that I do not have BPD, that the shared traits are an overlap with ADHD and ASD. But the DBT program was designed for borderline and so no matter what I said I was being labelled with BPD and this was recorded on my medical file by my nurse/therapist. How in the hell does any ND person trust the system? You're told to say how you feel but then some nurse with basic training has a personality disorder added to your medical file (it has been removed btw). So now I am waiting for CBT group therapy and although I do need help (can't work, COMPLETE burnout) I am so frustrated and know that I will probably wind up being told I am "doing this wrong" that accepting that things are the way they are is "resigning myself to being unhappy". I am almost done with all of this. We NEED therapy designed FOR US. Sadly therapy has become an additional trauma for me :( So thank you for validating my feelings, it will help when I have to go back. And I want to add this is just MY experience. I do think therapy can be helpful and trying it IS important. If anyone else is struggling please know that we need you. If we continue to speak out we have a chance of changing things for the better for all of us in the community
As an Autistic Canadian who sometimes struggles with understanding himself while doing more difficult self-reflexive work while talking to their trusted friends and chosen family, agreed.
I swapped therapists until I found a good one. A lot of therapy is just me talking and self analyzing with input from the therapist when needed. Plus she's good at focusing on facts over feelings. Who told you you're bad? That sort of thing. 'Cause if I'm the one beating myself up and I haven't heard the bad thing I have to analyze why. I maybe also had a breakthrough type thing yesterday due to my assessing my fear of success. You know 'cause I could fall into the really bad stuff you mentioned. So I figured I'd make the worst less scary and acknowledge that I'm in a bad situation now. Also had a friend once not process that I had to leave when things were spiraling for me emotionally. I was like "I have to leave to calm down" and she kept going which maybe involved some of me screaming every time she started to talk. Also I believe "I'll breathe when I want to" is my favorite response done by me to the "just breathe" comment.
Great points around 14:30 about how our thoughts are NOT irrational or unjustified, but really, truly genuinely rooted in lots of past experience and even e.g. statistics (like of our unemployment rate or unhoused rate) And how we're like 100% all of us traumatized. Ugh. It sucks so much
Oh my gosh, YES! I'm working on my bachelors degree with the goal of getting into a masters program to become a therapist. It's always been my desire that I do significantly less harm and actually help people, helping ease away constrictions and free up more space and possibilities in their lives. It's been a lowkey background fear that the process will grind too much of this out of me. (The ableism in the medical and mental health fields are appalling!) Your video puts so much into words that gives me more hope of what I can do. I not only feel shored up that this possibility, my goal, can happen but buoyed by joy.
Solid points arount 17:30 about how many of us are offing ourselves because the system is so godawful It's so awesome seeing other people put words to exactly how I think and feel; finding those words "for me" SOLID points
Sydney, as an Autistic therapist, I find your feedback extremely interesting, I currently have to tend to another task, and I can't come up with more words right now, so I'll get back to the video and ask more questions after, thanks
Hi Sydney, I am a newly qualified CBT Therapist and can totally empathise with what you are saying. I understand how invalidating it must be to be told your thoughts are "irrational". I feel like the field is SLOWLY evolving as we begin to become more educated regarding Autism/ADHD. I personally take a different approach if I realise someone is on the spectrum (My partner and half my family are autistic so I can usually tell) and would take a more person centred approach. Thank you for your educational videos I really loved how you explained the best way to cope would be to remove self from situation - Have nice sensory input - Cool down and then process the situation and handle on your own - This information is VITAL that people like me learn and understand so we aren't making people worse when they are at their most vulnerable.
Also, as a cis white guy in his late 20s who understands rail is empirically going to be the way mass transit has to develop due to economies of scale, it's funny how I'm the "weird" one.
Thank you so much! All your work has helped me understand why I've been stuck for years in the step of "making new friends" after being isolated due to abusive relationships. I had one therapist told me "you don't look depressed" (sorry i didn't came in all dressed up really goth and stuff, i guess). Another one, in our first interview, saw my routines as ocd, couldn't grap the themes and narrative of what I was trying to say because "it was too confusing" (she claimed to understand domestic violence tho), and tried to scan me for empathy with little probing questions after I challenged her on the fact that NLP and coaching are dangerous pseudociences. I went to her specifically for an autism referral which she was very hesitant to give, she wanted my concern to be her issue, her quota. After she gave me the contact, she did what any neurotypical does: she tried to one up me by saying that she's actually an NLP practicioner before showing me the door. Somehow that empathy thing she threw made her think I guess, because I could tell she was kinda nervous on the elevator (stereotypes about cluster B i assume) and she dropped her keys, not intentionally. But she still wanted me to help her because of "the right thing to do". She could ask the neighboors for help, it was during the day, the janitor was around, she had access to a secondary door, she had resources and options. But she couldn't think her way out of it, she was expecting me to do it for her. So I did what they do in those situations, I came up with a white lie about a doctors appointment and left. No, I won't help nor side with those who have actively engaged in the delivery of pain out of spite. But I will train myself so hard to help those at the receiving end of ignorance and abuse. I will jump for the 6th floor of my appartment in order to go get my cat (Batman, I love him, he's awesome), but I won't help you fish for your damn keys lady, you were rude.
This link is to a channel of a medical practitioner, not a therapist. It may be useful. He does some Autism stuff on his channel. I keep his channel in my resources for serving clients on the spectrum: www.youtube.com/@NeurodivergentDoctor I love what you do, and if I find a Therapist who broadcasts and has ASD hopefully I'll remember to post here! You are maybe my favorite Channel devoted to ASD related things on TH-cam. Thank you! Oh, and one reason why there may be fewer ASD diagnosed therapists is the alexithymia issue (Even youtube autocorrect doesn't know the word!) If it's hard to read emotions that can be an obstacle in the work (although not an impassible barrier), but it gets more complicated when you consider autistic burnout combined with compassion fatigue and what that would do to a person. (Ouch! that sounds hard!) I have ADHD and have never screened for co-occurring Autism. But Just with ADHD as a neurodivergence, I have had my share of challenges, and run my practice in a very specific way to meet my needs. Other therapists I know see many more clients than me and make a lot more money. But I get lots of compliments for my work. Anyway, hope that helps! And thanks again. I really appreciate you!
thanks so much for talking about this. for me the dynamics of therapy - with its own set of rules boundaries etc - i found very confusing & seemed to feel quite not inspired by them. i had times when talk therapy did not support my healing (i felt 'worse') & times when it was necessary. i actually went back & emailed a past therapist where it was really difficult & told them i discovered i am autistic & asked them to be aware of people who "present" like i did, like a "difficult case." (that's how i was described) social dynamics are confusing to me & how the relationship is supposed to be- like intimate yet not at all, that is really hard for me to feel comfortable in. also picking up on things i didn't understand in the therapist was difficult. we need more well informed people for autistic support, this is certainly true. i hope this comes to be for all those that need & want it. thanks for listening, thanks for being !
I was also a "difficult case". It was horrible! It's been years since it ended, but it still hurts me deeply. I'm sending you compassion and virtual hugs. ❤ I'm glad you found a diagnosis. A reasonable explanation for everything, that helped me so much!
Great video. Such an important conversation to be having! I used to like Cinema Therapy, but their DID coverage was so poorly informed and offensive, and my comments sharing my feelings that were meant as constructive got deleted, so I couldn’t continue supporting them. :-/
Sydney, thank you for making this video. I have definitely experienced not feeling totally heard or feeling like I have been misunderstood with a couple different therapists over the years. Hearing you talk about many things that have been similar to my experience has been helpful and validating, especially as I begin to understand my ASD/ADHD diagnosis in my 30's.
You have a pop-up that says therapy isn't the last thing, that "there are other ways they're just hard to see", but what are they? The resources you linked? Doing a single DBT workbook and reading a bunch of blogs? How is that supposed to help with severe dopamine deficiency and executive dysfunction? It seems like you've found things that work for you, which is great! I'm glad! But the systems that exist are insistent that I become another statistic, and all my attempts to find resources to avoid that have reaffirmed that there aren't actually any other ways. None that are safe or helpful.
THANK YOU, I’ve seen tons of videos saying how therapy doesn’t help neurodivergent folks but they never state wtf are the other options. Like wtf am I supposed to do?? Can they please give us other option or possible solutions so I can at least have some starting point because I have zero resources
All therapy is principally self-therapy. We can heal ourselves, with time, effort, and education. I'd recommend: 1) journaling 2) drink water 3) light exercise 4) eat healthy 5) get adequate sleep 6) cut down on screen time 7) spend time in nature 8) avoid drugs and alcohol 9) practice good hygiene 10) take up a creative outlet 11) pursue hobbies you like 12) spend time with friends 13) take action to get away from people who make you feel bad about yourself This is a long list to give options, not to say that everything needs to be done immediately and perfectly. Pick whatever is easiest to do and try to get traction doing it consistently, and gradually add in more good habits as you feel comfortable and able. Use journaling to process your feelings. Avoid self-judgment, shame, guilt, and self-hating thoughts. Try to explore where those are coming from if you're struggling with them. I hope this helps.
Fuck, this video and so many of the comments reflect so many of my experiences with therapy, even in ways I couldn't out into words before. Thank you all. It's awful that this happens, but I'm so glad to realise I'm not alone
I’m a neurotypical who finds videos by autistics and ADHDers quite fascinating. But when i land on a video about these topics that are made be neurotypical therapists and experts, I skip them. I find them dull, impersonal and clinical. If I were autistic , i would certainly seek out an autistic therapist, since they’ve “been there”.
I've seen 9 different therapists/psychologists, 6 of which were before I knew I was autistic. I am now working with an autistic therapist and I know it will be rough, but I think things will get better.
Thank you for making this video. I highly relate to this experience. I'm sharing your video with my therapist so that she can hopefully better understand how to help me.
Love this video, thank you. Admittedly, I spent most of the time wondering if my monitor was broken because of the spot at approx. [845, 373]. But no, seems there's something up with your camera.
as an autistic person, i genuinely think that this world is not structured for or willing to include us. society wants to push forward those who are naturally equipped for what the world offers. if they wanted us to exist they would have made efforts to include us. our greatest protest to this world would be removing ourselves from it. it is the greatest blessing to be released from the mortal coil and its the greatest failure of humanity to make people believe living is not a choice.
It's like trying to give an alien therapy and expecting it to work like it works on humans. Lol Yeah, good luck with that! (I mean an alien from Ridley Scott's Alien. ;-P) They should have gone to therapy! It would have really helped! That is if the goal of course is to eat the therapist and help save the earth from overpopulation!
Interesting that you don’t find metaphors helpful. Often, my therapist will tell me about an idea or even use a specific word that I perfectly understand the meaning of, but I can’t “get” how it applies to me or my situation. If she uses a metaphor, I understand it much better. I am autistic. I think it may be related to this idea of “modular thinking” that has been used to describe autistic processing (the tendency to think from the bottom up, starting with details before arriving at an understanding of the whole picture). To me, the main idea or word she is using is the forest, but the metaphor gives me more details, so it becomes the trees that allow me to understand (metaphor intended!).
some metaphors help me more than regular descriptions ever could, but I find that a lot of the traditional ones used in therapy are very hard to apply to anything or even fully understand
What bothered me when my last therapist would say a metaphor is not me not understanding the meaning. The problem is, the meaning had nothing to do with what was really going on! She was using metaphor for problems I didn't have, and I couldn't understand what was really wrong. It was like we were speaking completely different languages.
I have tried 2 therapists and rather than something going dramatically wrong, I feel like nothing at all happened for me. I was left with the same thought pattern after 4 years. Some people say I had a bad therapist, others have suggested I didn't really put any effort into getting better. The thing is, I was never told I was doing anything wrong by the therapist in the first place, so people suggesting I sabotaged the therapy don't make sense. Does it make sense to find a better therapist or assume I subconsciously sabotage anything I touch and do nothing? It was 2 years after the end of my therapy that facebook people advised me to try a better therapy as they encouraged me therapy must be the answer for all the trouble I was posting in the group. But I am not sure my thoughts are actually genuine, it is like I am thriving on self-pitying the whole time and perhaps the therapist read it wrong. I don't know but I never got any feedback on that.
Hi, I'm not Sydney, but have autism and ADHD. Funny enough, stimulant medication I take for ADHD actually help me LOADS with autistic executive disfunction!!! It's like I switched life from Hardcore mode to Easy mode (while the meds are working at least). It's easier to do EVERYTHING. Not just focus on things, but changing from one situation to another, wich is very difficult for me, with meds it's SOOO easy.
I need help I have ADHD just diagnosed this year, I have trouble with executive functions, but I can't make decisions and move forward with my life. And well I am working with a therapist and I guess he doesn't knows properly anything . I realized For example yesterday I was talking about my feeling of frustration about working in a minimal-wage job and some labor conditions and he said, well what you are saying is classit. I just stopped him like what? This is not related to what I said and I got pissed off. After that, he asked me why I got mad, and I was sorry but I thought you were not getting what I trying to say. Sorry if sounded mad but this comment doesn't make any sense. at the end of the session, he suggested I maybe could have borderline personality disorder, before in another session he said you have autism. Even if I didn't feel it, I accepted it because could be because I have ADHD. But he always find something different. Finally, I asked him well do you have any recommendations for me and he said well you seem to want a magic pill to fix your problems if I said somethi
Please stop using the phrase “ cis white male who loves trains” . As someone who has asd, adhd and dyslexia I find labeling others as sad and depressing, when I hear it. What if some young kid who like trains watches your video, how do they feel after? I like your videos and truly appreciate what you have to say but I find this very off putting. I don’t offer this not as an attack but as a reminder that we are all in this together. Don’t push away those who support you but change it to talk about those who push this idea of the male train obsessed person like Simon Baron-Cohen. No labels except the one you use for yourself. ❤ Thanks
I don’t think that’s others’ intentions when they say that phrase. Rather, they are just illustrating an example of what most people (neurotypicals) think autism looks like. It’s not saying anything negative about the “cis white males who like trains”, just the people who think that’s the only form of autism. I hope that makes sense. I understand how it might sound hurtful, but I think it’s a misunderstanding, is all.😊
@@SarilainTV My reasoning in responding to this is that Sydney has stated this in quite a few videos without clarifying like you just did. I would like to see more context or less labeling in general. This is not meant as an attack but a suggestion.
@@PC991000You can't address a stereotype without saying what it is though. Not sure she can fully convey her point if she can't actually say what the stereotypical autism diagnosis is perceived as and how it creates barriers for those outside of that.
![Autistic Speech Patterns [CC]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/6_det6P3gOY/mqdefault.jpg)
![Autistic Speech Patterns [CC]](/img/tr.png)
Sydney, as an Autistic therapist, I found your feedback to be very useful, I'm fortunate enough to have a large part of my client base to be Autistic, my niche demographic are adults, and being on the Spectrum myself, I feel I can translate and put words to some of the feelings my client's try to describe, that I have often had trouble describing, for me, using metaphors have always worked, but I'll try using less in my practice, which brings me to my next point, I think being a therapist can be an ideal career for Autistics, because it can be patternistic ie: seeing __ number of appointments today, etc), and growth-based- I believe in long-term therapy, so seeing and measuring progress is quite stimulating- I think we can be naturally detail-oriented, so I feel that definitely helps- I would love to connect and Learn more about how I can better bridge some of these gaps!
yes!! I agree with all of this!! Thank you for your input and what you do :)
go autistic therapist !
@@disabled.autistic.lesbian thank you, and if you have any additional feedback, or want to connect, my email is listed in the description on my TH-cam page: Mike Macedo
@@mikemacedo532 could my stress related Epilepsy seizures be a form of a meltdown? I think I'm autistic but not diagnosed
I think the metaphor thing is individual, for me it works wonders actually. I think and conceptualize predominantly in metaphors and analogies. I think you should check in with each client to see how they feel about that. I´m pretty sure my very first therapist was neurodivergent too and we were such a great match! She immediately recognized my inability to express my feelings with words and encouraged me to describe them in colors for example. We made huge progress together in a very short time but then we lost touch due to external circumstances, which reminds me I should totally get in touch with her again! Another therapist I had (extremely neurotypical lol) discouraged me from using metaphors and said I was "rambling" when I was just trying to explain myself as clearly as possible. That wasn´t great 😬
"what's the worst that could happen" is THE WORST thing to EVER ASK ME. 🤦♀️ My brain spirals down to depths way too dark and deep.
Indeed... if for example I'm afraid of doing something and the tell me " what's the worst that could happen?" it breeds more fear because I will thing obsessively so many other worst things that I may never had thought before and then it reinforces my fear and increases my resistance of doing it
Interesting for me I always hated that question because it always felt so dismissive and also it put you on the spot to immediately come up with an answer.
I often say "what's the worst that could happen" and answer myself with " maybe I die oh well" or "probably no one will die"
"what's the worst that could happen?" *Brain flashes scenes from Final Destination*
You mentioned watching things at 1.5 speed in another video, I used to do that and forgot it helped me. Left it on and opened this video LMAOOOO. You are already at 1.5x
damm i'm at 1.75x
Felt about normal at 2x for me.
CBT has definitely been very bad for me. It's like my problems are just. Entirely Different Problems than what CBT is addressing. CBT did make me unable to trust myself for years. I've worked really hard to get back in touch with myself and my instincts and emotions and ability to actually regulate myself rather than stuff everything down and tell myself it's all fine and dissociate.
I thought I wrote this… yes!
Same for me 😢
Yeah... my CBT therapy basically went along a burnout cycle. Depression CBT basically meant 'go do things, and slowly that'll give you energy to do more things and you go into an upwards spiral.' I was there because I was extremely burnt out. I'd go up up up until I physically could function anymore, and then I'd crash even harder than before. And I didn't know why, so I blamed myself for failing at therapy. I tried so hard and I couldn't. If this worked for everyone else, why didn't it work for me? Why couldn't I just keep it up? I blamed myself for not 'gaining energy' from activities like seeing my friends and being able to use that energy for productive things like writing my thesis, even though that is literally just not possible for me.
And the CBT I had for anxiety, I remember sitting there and telling my therapist that my fears were not irrational because those things happened before and she just kept disbelieving me and minimizing my trauma. I told her I was aut!stic and she a, didn't believe me, and b, said it wasn't relevant because we were working on social anxiety now... Girl... Why do you think I have social anxiety?
She told me she could easily relate to what I was going through because she'd had a period of a couple of months where she felt kinda down, and it just felt like she was telling a person who was born without legs that she could relate because she'd twisted her ankle once. "Don't worry, it'll go away and feel like a blip in no time if you just try hard enough!' :)
But I do still need help to cope with life. I've been out of therapy for over a year now, because I finally got my diagnosis and decided I needed a therapist who knew how to deal with aut!stic people, but those don't exist, so I've been kinda Googling and losing hope and Googling and losing hope. Guess that's why I'm just shopping around TH-cam channels by aut!stic people, because the science on therapy for aut!stic people keeps telling me 'hey we don't actually have any therapy that's proven to be effective, but peer support seems to help!' And like, great, it does help a little, but it kinda feels like I'm going to a doctor and they tell me 'uhh idk go ask your mom, she has the same genetics, she's probably dealt with whatever you're going through before.' That's just not what you want to hear from a professional.
Hey, I have a therapist that works well for me (just got assessed for asd & waiting on results); so here’s what I think might be more likely to help you find someone who might work for you:
You can use Psychology Today’s therapist finder to search by your insurance, and some other filters.
Maybe try looking for someone who mentions they are a specific support for the LGBT community? You don’t need to be LGBT yourself. And make sure they specifically speak on their experience with LGBT either in their profile, or when you do a consultation call or the first session (mine went into a little detail on their profile about being “kink friendly”, “open to nonmonogamy”, etc).
Reason being, I’ve heard that something like 60% of neurotypicals are hetero, and 60% of autists are lgbt. Trans people are 1/3 autistic (according to some studies). I personally think it may all be because autists are less likely to feel beholden to societal rules, and more likely to pursue their authentic selves. But anyway, you may have a higher chance of finding a neurodivergent therapist this way. Mine turned out to have ADHD and didn’t know (got diagnosed shortly after I started seeing them), and I think it helps them understand that my brain works differently too.
Another aspect is that even if they are not ND, a NT who is open to LGBT, it means that they have already demonstrated a capacity for openminded-ness. Someone who can accept that others might have a different internal experience from theirs or what society teaches, is more likely to accept it in other facets, like neurodivergence. And if they learned a lot about the LGBT community, then they’re more likely to be open to learn about autism too (hopefully).
One last thing that I think helps, is maybe seeing someone your age or younger (idk your age)? My therapist is a bit younger than me. And I just think finding someone who is part of younger generations (millennials and younger) makes it more likely to find someone more open-minded and willing to learn new things.
Hope that helps, or at least gives you ideas of somewhere to start. Because there are good therapists out there for us, they’re just less common and hard to find.
@@SarilainTV Hi, thank you for your recommendations, that's very kind of you! I checked psychology today but I don't think they operate in my country (Netherlands).
Here the system is set up like, you get your GP to refer you to a health care provider (organization) and after you're through the waiting list, that organization assigns you a therapist, giving you only their last name so it's kinda impossible to google their info beforehand, and then during the intake you'll have to see whether it's a match, and you can ask for a different one if no.
You get to have ten to fifteen 45-minute sessions with them, and if you're not better by then, they'll have to refer you out to another organization to try a different type of therapy, generally escalating the diagnosis (e.g. from 'depression' to 'personality disorder').
I've had a bunch of therapists (like 10 maybe?), and they weren't all d!cks like the one I described in that first comment, but yeah no none of them knew what to do with me. Eventually, after a couple of years, and a couple of 'escalations', the person who was supposed to diagnose me with a personality disorder instead finally listened and sent me to get diagnosed with autism, and when it turned out I had that, it was kinda like 'welp, you don't belong at the institute for personality disorders so bye!' And that's why I ended up kinda stranded, having to go back to the start, my GP.
I did ask my GP to refer me to a couple of organizations that say they work with aut!stic people several months ago, but there were miscommunications all around, so sh!t went wrong, and I tried again, and now I need to check back in on that to see if things went right this time and I'm actually on a waiting list (probably not). Thanks for reminding me to check on that lol.
I will say that I asked my GP to refer me, not because I have any faith in those organizations to help me, but because my assessors at my gender clinic (because yes I'm trans lol good guess) wanted me to get help for my autism before they would consider allowing me to medically transition (if your terf alarm bell is ringing, it should be).
So that's what was happening seven months ago when I wrote this comment. I didn't know it at the time, but those assessors were trying to do conversion therapy on me. I did notice at the time that things were very far from right, but people kept telling me that of course the kinds of people who work at a gender clinic are there because they want to help trans people and they know what they're doing and I shouldn't read too much into it, so... I blamed myself for reading too much into it.
Well, until eventually it became too blatant to have any doubts left. I mean, my guy straight up said the quiet part out loud, that he was trying to push back on my belief that I'm trans. He had a list of hypothese for what had caused this belief in me, including all sorts of trauma and aut!stic characteristics. He mocked me when I said that I thought I was born this way because 'how could a baby have a gender identity?' There had to be a cause for why I had developed the idea that I wasn't a girl, and he would find it, and then we could work on fixing that cause.
So I guess seven months ago I dealt with a vague frustration that I couldn't really place or shake (because I blamed myself for it) by being bitter and venting in comments, venting about the field of therapy as a whole (because my assessors at my gender clinic are licensed therapists and what they were doing was deeply traumatizing), and by venting about this particular therapist I mentioned in my first comment that wasn't actually all that related to my actual frustrations. And she wasn't THAT bad. She was kinda bad. But there are worse people out there.
I passed though, eventually. I was stubborn as f*ck. They eventually begrudgingly gave me permission to transition, while asking me not to do it. So I'm now on to the next waiting list... yay. 4 years in and all I've done is wait.
I still do need help figuring out how to live life as an aut!stic human, so having a therapist who could help would still be beneficial, but it's kinda hard to know how much of my depression is just caused by dysphoria and rampant transphobia, and therefore how much of it is actually fixable with therapy.
Also, now that the pressure of 'you can't transition if you don't find a therapist to help you with your autism' is gone (I lied about having found one eventually), I'm not as motivated to urgently find one.
I've also thoroughly lost my ability to trust therapists. I guess having a group of licensed professional therapists attempt conversion therapy on you will do that to you. I did trust and even personally like each and every one of them the first couple of times I met them. Conversion therapists first build rapport. They say things they know you want to hear, so you open up, and then they use everything you told them about yourself to inculcate doubt into you, no matter how far-fetched and nonsensical. They throw everything at you and see what sticks, what you can't refute, what gets you to cry or panic so hard that you can't breathe.
One of them was a gay man, one lady made a point of telling me she had an aut!stic wife so she understood what autism was like, a third said she understood what it was like to struggle with you identity because she'd gone through it with her ethnic identity.
They said things like 'of course you get to do with your body what you want to do with it, I'm not here to stop you and you don't need my permission' or 'of course autism is a condition that comes with positive and negative characteristics, and the word 'diagnosis' is kind of strange in this context, isn't it?' These were not things they actually believed to be true, but they knew I was looking to hear them.
I used to be very quickly very emotionally open to therapists, very quick to trust. I don't see how I can go back to that now. I don't know if I should. Maybe this was a good wake up call. These are the consequences of trusting people too soon when you know very well you're not good at reading people's intentions.
But then if I take 4 sessions before I allow myself to trust a new therapist, I have like 6 left before I legally have to move on to a new one, and you can't do therapy without opening up.
And I know that if I put myself in another therapy situation (y'know, one client, one therapist, sitting across from each other at a desk in one of those rooms that are a little too clinical), I am at that point hypersensitive to certain phrases, and likely to get full on triggered, in the original ~trauma~ sense of the word.
So yeah I guess I've really not been putting any effort into finding a therapist. There are so many complicating factors that it feels easier and safer to avoid it entirely.
But I should get over it and do it already, because it is still necessary. I'll go check on some emails to my GP I guess.
Sooo…my answer as a classical pianist would have been “The worst-case scenario is that I don’t place highly enough in this competition to move on to nationals and have a chance at placing highly enough there to play/“win” a concert with an orchestra, which could have an enormous impact on which schools I can get into.” Or it could just be an audition for anything along that chain of performances that gets you in with the best schools and therefore the best teachers and opportunities.
In classical music, a missed note basically means you either didn’t get the muscle memory down or you’re too flustered by performing to be a viable concert pianist (that’s the common belief, anyway).
Some of the most cathartic interactions I’ve had with therapists is when I lay something like that out, and they say, “Well shit, that does sound like the stakes are pretty high.” And then we can have a more nuanced, nitty-gritty conversation about the details and how they fit into the bigger picture.
PS The “star” of the piano studio I grew up in told me a story once about going to one of these big competitions and being told that one of the other competitors was playing a piece that was very abstract (ugly, to my ears) but so technically difficult that just getting through it without a missed note meant he won the competition. His teacher told him that, and it played out that way (so to speak; I’m so funny). No artistry accounted for. That’s not uncommon in the classical world, at least for pianists.
Year late to the party, but this… all of this. I’m at that stage where I’ve tried the therapy many times over my life and now that I’m more aware of what is actually wrong I just feel an internalized rage at the whole thing. Tempted to just sit this video in front of my mother to say “SEE!!!?”.
I had a therapist at 14 tell me I wasn't autistic (I had been diagnosed since seven years old) that I was just a spoiled brat with ODD. She would sit really close to me and when I would scoot away from her, she'd scoot right back so she could intentionally be in my personal space.
That's just a violation of basic rights
Thank you for this video. I've just had to finish with a therapist (which made me feel guilty) because she just didn't get me and inadvertently made me feel worse. I am very loud. In everything I do, pretty much all the time. Whenever I kept getting emotional she would talk about "ways of showing healthy anger" and I would get so confused because after I would think, actually no, I was just really sad and it would just reinforce the experience of society viewing my sadness as anger which is really confusing and adds to my upset :(
Super super understandable! For what it's worth I just broke up with my ?fourth therapist lol
Great video! Licensed therapist here and yes, specifically CBT is the worst therapy for autistic people.
Thank you so much for this video. When you started talking about the "what's the worst thing that could happen" technique I was reminded of the many, many, many times a therapist asked me "What would you say to a friend who was going through this situation? How would you treat to a friend who was having a hard time?". And my answer to that, back then, would be -awkwardly try to say something comforting, escape from the room, avoid them for a while out of fear that I will make them feel worse and/or hate me because I suck. Also I've found that this kind of socratic dialogue/socratic questioning style makes me feel like I'm being manipulated into a corner where I have to agree with whatever answer therapist has already decided on.
Very late to the party but yes! So much of therapy (and real life tbh, but it feels worse in therapy since it's supposedly somewhere you feel safe) felt like I was supposed to just play the correct part, agree with them. That did not help. I've had good therapy experiences but mostly after my diagnosis so I feel really bad for all the people going to therapy undiagnosed 😢
Im autistic and did CBT before I knew I was autistic. I was masking so heavily during the sessions and the therapist told me to make eye contact (something which makes me feel SO uncomfortable) during the sessions. I thought it helped, but a few years on, I have realised that he just taught me to mask REALLY heavily. However, I found a really good counselor a few years later, and she suggested I might be autistic (i was already in the process of getting a diagnosis but it was nice to get that confirmed). I felt really comfortable and I now know that counselling helps me more than CBT. She also had dogs which came into the sessions which definitely helped.
Thank you so much for this video. I'm self-diagnosed and still trying to figure this out, but this has been a major issue in my past. When I was first referred to a therapist by my GP for depression and social anxiety following years of bullying, it felt like ...more bullying. It felt like I was being punished for "being weird" and further stigmatized, so I tried to be the "perfect" patient, tried to follow all the "rules" and basically just tried to convince the therapist that they have "caught the wrong person", so of course nothing much ever came out of it. I have been self-harm free for almost ten years now and haven't had a major depressive episode in just over 5 years and this has largely been due to the fact that I stopped trying to "fix" myself and focused on acceptance. I began by embracing my special interests, which I'd previously tried to suppress as that was a major thing the kids bullied me for and by generally allowing myself to be more authentic again.
Once I learnt about autism, I also realised that those "panic attacks" I would get during which the self-harm would usually happen, were actually meltdowns (which should've been obvious from the amount of stimming that goes on and the fact that I lose my ability to speak other than to repeat the same phrase over and over, but I just didn't know that was a thing), I also started handling them differently, by using the stims as tools and by reducing further sensory input - and finally was able to communicate to "helpful" bystanders that they should not try to "comfort" me by hugging me and should keep communication to a minimum and not ask me questions, because I won't be able to answer and it would further agitate me. I still struggle sometimes, but the autism community has given me a framework and tools to understand and manage my experience, that the world of mental health had not.
The main reason I haven't sought out formal diagnosis though, remains the fact that I am very much traumatized by some of my experiences with mental health professionals and just the thought of going for an "evaluation" by a "mental health professional" makes me really agitated. This is something I rarely talk about with my neurotypical friends, because therapy has such a positive reputation, it's like a sacred thing that is beyond critique and just mentioning the possibility that it could be anything other than helpful seems to make some people very angry, because you're seen as attacking something that might have saved their life at some point, so it's a very delicate issue and you've handled it exceptionally well, thank you so much for that.
Semi-unrelated side note: I just began meeting (remotely) with a new therapist, and I made my [many] diagnoses and struggles abundantly clear - including the traits of Pathological Demand Avoidance - and upon closing our first session, I found what feels like a mountain of homework waiting for me in my inbox. I am to watch some videos and answer questions, check in periodically, as well as complete journal entries, etc before our next session. I love researching, deep-diving and learning …. But I have always been “a poor student.” I do NOT handle being assigned / told what to do very well. And my anxiety increases with each new text reminder to “Complete the [fill in the blank]”
I thrive in the talking sessions - but did not anticipate this. 😩😩😩
Did you explain about the pathological demand avoidance and how her demanding so much of you seems unprofessional and like she's ignoring a very important part of who you are and how your brain works?
I had to stop seeing my therapist because the way we communicated literally drove me insane. Like after a session I'd be dripping with sweat and shit. Once I started expressing this to her I realized she actually didn't understand anything about autism and that I was wasting my time seeing her. Autistic people process everything differently, including trauma. Hopefully I find someone who actually knows their shit some day.
This was so helpful and healing for me. (ND Female of Color 🙋🏾) I hope this presentation and others like it become required learning material for mental health professionals.
I could actually cry, you just described the last 10 years of my life with words I counldn't find. I wish I knew this 10 years ago, I could have saved myself a lot of pain and £15k.
...alexithymia explains so much about me. also the bit about needing time away from stimulus to process an emotion. by god that's exactly it! I spent most of today in a small dark enclosed space (small dark enclosed spaces my beloved) processing yesterday's emotions, which I was incapable of recognizing in the moment
Thank you :) I just "finished" a DBT group therapy. I am in Canada and if you wait long enough or are unwell enough you are offered mental health services.
I spent a great deal of my one on one "therapy" sessions, debating with my DBT therapist. She kept insisting that I had to approach things in the "one size fits all" narrative. I was VERY upset to learn that I had been diagnosed as having borderline personality disorder. This was noted on my medical file and I discovered this at a clinic for Ehlers Danlos. I was diagnosed with severe predominantly hyperactive ADHD and "likely" ASD. An ASD diagnosis has a 6 year waitlist. I had a follow up with the psychiatrist who diagnosed me and she confirmed that I do not have BPD, that the shared traits are an overlap with ADHD and ASD. But the DBT program was designed for borderline and so no matter what I said I was being labelled with BPD and this was recorded on my medical file by my nurse/therapist.
How in the hell does any ND person trust the system? You're told to say how you feel but then some nurse with basic training has a personality disorder added to your medical file (it has been removed btw). So now I am waiting for CBT group therapy and although I do need help (can't work, COMPLETE burnout) I am so frustrated and know that I will probably wind up being told I am "doing this wrong" that accepting that things are the way they are is "resigning myself to being unhappy". I am almost done with all of this. We NEED therapy designed FOR US. Sadly therapy has become an additional trauma for me :( So thank you for validating my feelings, it will help when I have to go back. And I want to add this is just MY experience. I do think therapy can be helpful and trying it IS important. If anyone else is struggling please know that we need you. If we continue to speak out we have a chance of changing things for the better for all of us in the community
Omg you sound so much like what I have experienced 😢
As an Autistic Canadian who sometimes struggles with understanding himself while doing more difficult self-reflexive work while talking to their trusted friends and chosen family, agreed.
@@oliviachipperfield6029 Same
I swapped therapists until I found a good one. A lot of therapy is just me talking and self analyzing with input from the therapist when needed. Plus she's good at focusing on facts over feelings. Who told you you're bad? That sort of thing. 'Cause if I'm the one beating myself up and I haven't heard the bad thing I have to analyze why. I maybe also had a breakthrough type thing yesterday due to my assessing my fear of success. You know 'cause I could fall into the really bad stuff you mentioned. So I figured I'd make the worst less scary and acknowledge that I'm in a bad situation now. Also had a friend once not process that I had to leave when things were spiraling for me emotionally. I was like "I have to leave to calm down" and she kept going which maybe involved some of me screaming every time she started to talk.
Also I believe "I'll breathe when I want to" is my favorite response done by me to the "just breathe" comment.
OH the rigid thinking thing is such a lightbulb 😅
This conversation could really help my friend. I fear for their life
My very logical brain AND my crippling irrational anxious thoughts put together make me feel like a walking contradiction. I hate it.
this channel is super underrated
Great points around 14:30 about how our thoughts are NOT irrational or unjustified, but really, truly genuinely rooted in lots of past experience and even e.g. statistics (like of our unemployment rate or unhoused rate)
And how we're like 100% all of us traumatized. Ugh. It sucks so much
Oh my gosh, YES!
I'm working on my bachelors degree with the goal of getting into a masters program to become a therapist. It's always been my desire that I do significantly less harm and actually help people, helping ease away constrictions and free up more space and possibilities in their lives. It's been a lowkey background fear that the process will grind too much of this out of me. (The ableism in the medical and mental health fields are appalling!)
Your video puts so much into words that gives me more hope of what I can do. I not only feel shored up that this possibility, my goal, can happen but buoyed by joy.
Solid points arount 17:30 about how many of us are offing ourselves because the system is so godawful
It's so awesome seeing other people put words to exactly how I think and feel; finding those words "for me"
SOLID points
Sydney, as an Autistic therapist, I find your feedback extremely interesting, I currently have to tend to another task, and I can't come up with more words right now, so I'll get back to the video and ask more questions after, thanks
Hi Sydney, I am a newly qualified CBT Therapist and can totally empathise with what you are saying. I understand how invalidating it must be to be told your thoughts are "irrational". I feel like the field is SLOWLY evolving as we begin to become more educated regarding Autism/ADHD. I personally take a different approach if I realise someone is on the spectrum (My partner and half my family are autistic so I can usually tell) and would take a more person centred approach. Thank you for your educational videos I really loved how you explained the best way to cope would be to remove self from situation - Have nice sensory input - Cool down and then process the situation and handle on your own - This information is VITAL that people like me learn and understand so we aren't making people worse when they are at their most vulnerable.
Also, as a cis white guy in his late 20s who understands rail is empirically going to be the way mass transit has to develop due to economies of scale, it's funny how I'm the "weird" one.
Thank you so much! All your work has helped me understand why I've been stuck for years in the step of "making new friends" after being isolated due to abusive relationships. I had one therapist told me "you don't look depressed" (sorry i didn't came in all dressed up really goth and stuff, i guess). Another one, in our first interview, saw my routines as ocd, couldn't grap the themes and narrative of what I was trying to say because "it was too confusing" (she claimed to understand domestic violence tho), and tried to scan me for empathy with little probing questions after I challenged her on the fact that NLP and coaching are dangerous pseudociences.
I went to her specifically for an autism referral which she was very hesitant to give, she wanted my concern to be her issue, her quota. After she gave me the contact, she did what any neurotypical does: she tried to one up me by saying that she's actually an NLP practicioner before showing me the door. Somehow that empathy thing she threw made her think I guess, because I could tell she was kinda nervous on the elevator (stereotypes about cluster B i assume) and she dropped her keys, not intentionally. But she still wanted me to help her because of "the right thing to do".
She could ask the neighboors for help, it was during the day, the janitor was around, she had access to a secondary door, she had resources and options. But she couldn't think her way out of it, she was expecting me to do it for her. So I did what they do in those situations, I came up with a white lie about a doctors appointment and left.
No, I won't help nor side with those who have actively engaged in the delivery of pain out of spite. But I will train myself so hard to help those at the receiving end of ignorance and abuse.
I will jump for the 6th floor of my appartment in order to go get my cat (Batman, I love him, he's awesome), but I won't help you fish for your damn keys lady, you were rude.
This link is to a channel of a medical practitioner, not a therapist. It may be useful. He does some Autism stuff on his channel.
I keep his channel in my resources for serving clients on the spectrum:
www.youtube.com/@NeurodivergentDoctor
I love what you do, and if I find a Therapist who broadcasts and has ASD hopefully I'll remember to post here! You are maybe my favorite Channel devoted to ASD related things on TH-cam.
Thank you!
Oh, and one reason why there may be fewer ASD diagnosed therapists is the alexithymia issue (Even youtube autocorrect doesn't know the word!) If it's hard to read emotions that can be an obstacle in the work (although not an impassible barrier), but it gets more complicated when you consider autistic burnout combined with compassion fatigue and what that would do to a person. (Ouch! that sounds hard!)
I have ADHD and have never screened for co-occurring Autism. But Just with ADHD as a neurodivergence, I have had my share of challenges, and run my practice in a very specific way to meet my needs. Other therapists I know see many more clients than me and make a lot more money. But I get lots of compliments for my work.
Anyway, hope that helps! And thanks again. I really appreciate you!
thanks so much for talking about this. for me the dynamics of therapy - with its own set of rules boundaries etc - i found very confusing & seemed to feel quite not inspired by them. i had times when talk therapy did not support my healing (i felt 'worse') & times when it was necessary. i actually went back & emailed a past therapist where it was really difficult & told them i discovered i am autistic & asked them to be aware of people who "present" like i did, like a "difficult case." (that's how i was described) social dynamics are confusing to me & how the relationship is supposed to be- like intimate yet not at all, that is really hard for me to feel comfortable in. also picking up on things i didn't understand in the therapist was difficult. we need more well informed people for autistic support, this is certainly true. i hope this comes to be for all those that need & want it. thanks for listening, thanks for being !
I was also a "difficult case". It was horrible! It's been years since it ended, but it still hurts me deeply. I'm sending you compassion and virtual hugs. ❤ I'm glad you found a diagnosis. A reasonable explanation for everything, that helped me so much!
Great video. Such an important conversation to be having!
I used to like Cinema Therapy, but their DID coverage was so poorly informed and offensive, and my comments sharing my feelings that were meant as constructive got deleted, so I couldn’t continue supporting them. :-/
Sydney, thank you for making this video. I have definitely experienced not feeling totally heard or feeling like I have been misunderstood with a couple different therapists over the years. Hearing you talk about many things that have been similar to my experience has been helpful and validating, especially as I begin to understand my ASD/ADHD diagnosis in my 30's.
You have a pop-up that says therapy isn't the last thing, that "there are other ways they're just hard to see", but what are they? The resources you linked? Doing a single DBT workbook and reading a bunch of blogs? How is that supposed to help with severe dopamine deficiency and executive dysfunction? It seems like you've found things that work for you, which is great! I'm glad! But the systems that exist are insistent that I become another statistic, and all my attempts to find resources to avoid that have reaffirmed that there aren't actually any other ways. None that are safe or helpful.
THANK YOU, I’ve seen tons of videos saying how therapy doesn’t help neurodivergent folks but they never state wtf are the other options. Like wtf am I supposed to do?? Can they please give us other option or possible solutions so I can at least have some starting point because I have zero resources
All therapy is principally self-therapy. We can heal ourselves, with time, effort, and education. I'd recommend:
1) journaling
2) drink water
3) light exercise
4) eat healthy
5) get adequate sleep
6) cut down on screen time
7) spend time in nature
8) avoid drugs and alcohol
9) practice good hygiene
10) take up a creative outlet
11) pursue hobbies you like
12) spend time with friends
13) take action to get away from people who make you feel bad about yourself
This is a long list to give options, not to say that everything needs to be done immediately and perfectly. Pick whatever is easiest to do and try to get traction doing it consistently, and gradually add in more good habits as you feel comfortable and able. Use journaling to process your feelings. Avoid self-judgment, shame, guilt, and self-hating thoughts. Try to explore where those are coming from if you're struggling with them.
I hope this helps.
@@grittygoombahthis is non-advice you can find literally everywhere. you're either AI or an extremely ignorant person.
Fuck, this video and so many of the comments reflect so many of my experiences with therapy, even in ways I couldn't out into words before. Thank you all. It's awful that this happens, but I'm so glad to realise I'm not alone
feels like you pulled this from my brain
I’m a neurotypical who finds videos by autistics and ADHDers quite fascinating. But when i land on a video about these topics that are made be neurotypical therapists and experts, I skip them. I find them dull, impersonal and clinical. If I were autistic , i would certainly seek out an autistic therapist, since they’ve “been there”.
I've seen 9 different therapists/psychologists, 6 of which were before I knew I was autistic. I am now working with an autistic therapist and I know it will be rough, but I think things will get better.
Hi thank you for articulating your experience … it made me feel less alone and gave me to vocabulary to communicate my experience. Best to you!!
Omg, the knowing step 1 and 3 thing. I'm gonna use that with my psych 😅 explains it so well.
That was very insightful, Sydney.
Thank you for making this video. I highly relate to this experience. I'm sharing your video with my therapist so that she can hopefully better understand how to help me.
Heck yeah!! So glad it can maybe do something :)
SO, MUCH, YES.
Amazing video! Thankyou Sydney 🙂
Love this video, thank you. Admittedly, I spent most of the time wondering if my monitor was broken because of the spot at approx. [845, 373]. But no, seems there's something up with your camera.
as an autistic person, i genuinely think that this world is not structured for or willing to include us. society wants to push forward those who are naturally equipped for what the world offers. if they wanted us to exist they would have made efforts to include us. our greatest protest to this world would be removing ourselves from it. it is the greatest blessing to be released from the mortal coil and its the greatest failure of humanity to make people believe living is not a choice.
It's like trying to give an alien therapy and expecting it to work like it works on humans. Lol Yeah, good luck with that!
(I mean an alien from Ridley Scott's Alien. ;-P)
They should have gone to therapy! It would have really helped!
That is if the goal of course is to eat the therapist and help save the earth from overpopulation!
Interesting that you don’t find metaphors helpful. Often, my therapist will tell me about an idea or even use a specific word that I perfectly understand the meaning of, but I can’t “get” how it applies to me or my situation. If she uses a metaphor, I understand it much better. I am autistic. I think it may be related to this idea of “modular thinking” that has been used to describe autistic processing (the tendency to think from the bottom up, starting with details before arriving at an understanding of the whole picture). To me, the main idea or word she is using is the forest, but the metaphor gives me more details, so it becomes the trees that allow me to understand (metaphor intended!).
some metaphors help me more than regular descriptions ever could, but I find that a lot of the traditional ones used in therapy are very hard to apply to anything or even fully understand
Me too! I use metaphors for everything. I'm also autistic.
What bothered me when my last therapist would say a metaphor is not me not understanding the meaning. The problem is, the meaning had nothing to do with what was really going on! She was using metaphor for problems I didn't have, and I couldn't understand what was really wrong. It was like we were speaking completely different languages.
Good video! 👍
At 5:05 - Oh, that's me four years ago. :-)
Thank you sweetie ❤
All valid points. I’m lost in the sauce lol
I have tried 2 therapists and rather than something going dramatically wrong, I feel like nothing at all happened for me. I was left with the same thought pattern after 4 years. Some people say I had a bad therapist, others have suggested I didn't really put any effort into getting better. The thing is, I was never told I was doing anything wrong by the therapist in the first place, so people suggesting I sabotaged the therapy don't make sense. Does it make sense to find a better therapist or assume I subconsciously sabotage anything I touch and do nothing?
It was 2 years after the end of my therapy that facebook people advised me to try a better therapy as they encouraged me therapy must be the answer for all the trouble I was posting in the group. But I am not sure my thoughts are actually genuine, it is like I am thriving on self-pitying the whole time and perhaps the therapist read it wrong. I don't know but I never got any feedback on that.
hi @sydney have you found any thing that's been helpful to deal with autism executive dysfunctioning please?
Hi, I'm not Sydney, but have autism and ADHD. Funny enough, stimulant medication I take for ADHD actually help me LOADS with autistic executive disfunction!!! It's like I switched life from Hardcore mode to Easy mode (while the meds are working at least). It's easier to do EVERYTHING. Not just focus on things, but changing from one situation to another, wich is very difficult for me, with meds it's SOOO easy.
I need help I have ADHD just diagnosed this year, I have trouble with executive functions, but I can't make decisions and move forward with my life.
And well I am working with a therapist and I guess he doesn't knows properly anything . I realized
For example yesterday I was talking about my feeling of frustration about working in a minimal-wage job and some labor conditions and he said, well what you are saying is classit. I just stopped him like what? This is not related to what I said and I got pissed off.
After that, he asked me why I got mad, and I was sorry but I thought you were not getting what I trying to say. Sorry if sounded mad but this comment doesn't make any sense.
at the end of the session, he suggested I maybe could have borderline personality disorder, before in another session he said you have autism. Even if I didn't feel it, I accepted it because could be because I have ADHD.
But he always find something different.
Finally, I asked him well do you have any recommendations for me and he said well you seem to want a magic pill to fix your problems if I said somethi
16:10
wow!!! so you did this topic YEARS before steph jones!!!!????
I can't stand Expose Strategies.
Please stop using the phrase “ cis white male who loves trains” . As someone who has asd, adhd and dyslexia I find labeling others as sad and depressing, when I hear it. What if some young kid who like trains watches your video, how do they feel after? I like your videos and truly appreciate what you have to say but I find this very off putting. I don’t offer this not as an attack but as a reminder that we are all in this together. Don’t push away those who support you but change it to talk about those who push this idea of the male train obsessed person like Simon Baron-Cohen. No labels except the one you use for yourself. ❤
Thanks
I don’t think that’s others’ intentions when they say that phrase. Rather, they are just illustrating an example of what most people (neurotypicals) think autism looks like. It’s not saying anything negative about the “cis white males who like trains”, just the people who think that’s the only form of autism.
I hope that makes sense. I understand how it might sound hurtful, but I think it’s a misunderstanding, is all.😊
@@SarilainTV My reasoning in responding to this is that Sydney has stated this in quite a few videos without clarifying like you just did. I would like to see more context or less labeling in general. This is not meant as an attack but a suggestion.
@@PC991000You can't address a stereotype without saying what it is though. Not sure she can fully convey her point if she can't actually say what the stereotypical autism diagnosis is perceived as and how it creates barriers for those outside of that.
No one has a problem with cis white males who love trains, we just recognise in NT minds they are the uber-autists.