Anyone relate?

It got better as you figured out how to mask. But it never got all the way better because you didn’t know why you had to act differently than you felt.

I always knew why. Everyone else was usually a dumb ass or too immature.
Too real, I always felt and still feel like I’m wearing a mask. And one i don’t particularly want. I always felt like I was on the outside among everyone, like I was there but unable to connect. I don’t even try anymore

Also as the undiagnosed suicidally depressed kid.

You had swings?!

eventually i just read in a bathroom stall until i heard them coming in and slipped back into the flow

Hey, btw did that one random kid who showed up and tried to be friends with you help? I have an autistic sister and knew other autistic kids as well growing up and i always tried to include everyone in my recess activities and friend group so nobody would feel left out. Hope others also had friends like this or were the friends themselves. At least i know i made some peoples days better. Its a long road to get people to tolerate each other but a worthwhile one.

This is where having a twin worked for me. Until they fucking split us up like assholes! (It helped though, at least for me. I had a friend in elementary)

When I was in first grade, the teacher called everyone by name to line up for recess. Somehow she missed my name. I didn't say anything I just sat because I wasn't called. Then they all went to recess. A little while later the teacher noticed me missing and came back to the classroom to find me crying in my seat.

autism moment (rules are absolute)

I pretty much just sat at my desk, spaced out, and disassociated through most of grade school. In first grade I got detention for having a snowball fight, except I never did fight, and I was just picking up the snow to eat it (I was obsessed with eating snow as a kid). I was so confused and after that I felt like I couldn't play or engage with anything, so I began to disengage as well.

It's only recently that I've realized disassociating and disengaging have made me very lonely and are no longer helpful to me and I've started trying to put more effort into socializing, but I'm also not that great at it.

It feels sometimes like I have the need to socialize but not the desire or the drive, and often if one little thing goes wrong I feel like shit
Like if one had no drive to eat food, and a variety of allergies

You forgot the part where the other kids pelt you with wood chips

our playground had those chunks of recycled truck tire rubber, so kids pelted you with carcinogens

Thankfully no. My school had lot of non asshole kids (I think kids are usually trained to be selfish assholes) who were kind and patient enough to socialize with weirdos (aka undiag autistic kids) like me. They were the reason I developed somewhat functional (though absolutely not 'normal') social life in adulthood. We are still friends, unfortunately we are spread all over the world nowadays cause life.

I think culture matters too, autistic spectrum friends of mine who went to US schools tend so say having very different experience. Opposite anecdotes were from kids in asia.

No, being a selfish asshole is instinctive for humans. Being egalitarian is what must be taught
- I think both traits are taught and at the same time innate at the same time. While growing up, we learn an abstract value system that shapes when we want to be selfish and when not.

There are several peer-reviewed studies that show neurotypicals rate even just the TRANSCRIPT of autistic people's speech as 30% less favorable across all social classes and segments.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5286449/

And worst of all: the subjects couldn't even tell why they did it, they literally hate us instinctively.

No the transcript was the only one where the results between the ASD and NT groups were within error margin
See figure 1

Guess I got lucky. Our primary school library was open at break times and even though the librarian was a bit cranky she let me read all the Asterix and Tintin books I wanted.

You fucks are making me think I'm autistic

You have your $HOME as your username
- Yes
Pineapplelover? You like swings for a whole other reason im sure
- Buddy, it's perfectly normal to meticulously memorize facts about every brand and model of swing set. I wouldn't worry about it.

My primary school had bolted some tractor tyres on their sides to springs and placed them in the play area.

They were nice and warm in the sunshine so I would curl up inside them and rest.

I was somewhat of a loner.

We had them too but they were full of redback spiders
- What stopping you from enjoying your break with them? /s
This sounds so nice, I want to go there right now.

i would walk around in big circles, which coincided with the walking pattern of the surveillants (or whatvere you call the in english), so we started talking.

this did not help beating the "teacher's pet" allegations.

The school district I grew up in called them 'monitors'. It's always neat when languages line up like this, because 'surveil' and 'monitor' mean the same thing in english.

i read Wikipedia.

so

much

wikipedia

my grandma used to call me "el wikipedio" sbsbahb lol.

Altough i was diagnosed.

I love Wikipedia so much. I love being able to just take a random meander through whatever I find interesting. Often, it's not "real learning", that I do, because accumulating random fragments of information isn't the same as actually gaining knowledge, but it sure is fun.
- yes

"Why aren't you out playing sports???"

I heard it many times.

Or just any unpopular kid

At school? How about now?

Whilst online meme-posting is rarely enough to stave off loneliness if you don't have access to an understanding community in real life, I hope that you are able to find some solidarity and comfort in online communities like this one.
Because yeah, you're right that many of us still are still tremendously isolated. It sucks.

It was a lot better when they opened up a PC club and I could start installing Linux on things.

I relate a bit too strongly to that :D
Sadly no computer club for me at school, but soooo much fun at home
- It was a good place to escape from the bullying as they wouldn't go into the computer room.

Nice pair of jeans, though..

I just sat under tree. Just waiting. My God i hated the waiting.

I had one friend and we’d basically impromptu improvise live action anime fanfic… so yeah…

Fully

Didn't have any friends until I was about 9 and moved school, so until then I'd usually spend yard time playing with the skipping ropes in the corner, got pretty good at it

This has nothing to do with autism. When I went to school, we had zero tolerance policies, which meant if the bully bullied you, well you would get suspended too. And nowadays schools look like fucking prisons. You got kids eating washing machine tablets, and bringing guns to school. Girls because of the dark agloridums on social media are unhappy and depressed, while the boys are acting more aggressive than they ever have. I'm so tired of everyone being diagnosed autistic, neurodivergent. The world you live in does not make any fucking sense. And when you pull yourself out of yourself and look at the bigger picture, well, the world is on fire. I'm not saying that people like this don't exist. I feel like it's just a distraction from us actually solving our fucking problems. But those problems have to deal with dealing with the global variant, and that global variant is the capitalist mode of production.

Hey bud it's true not everyone is autistic. But you may want to stop and check where you are at. This is an Autism forum, hence most of our members are autistic. You are in Autism City! So yeah a lot of us, especially older folks empathize with this.
You sound like you were the bully. I was always just wanted recess to be over. One day a asshole came along while I sitting on the monkey bars by myself of course. He grabbed and threw me off. I landed hard and broke my arm. That guy is now doing life in prison. He has been there twenty year.
At the time though they told me both sides were at fault. Didn't care I wasn't doing anything because of course why would some psychopath in training just come by and do that. So I got punished by having my arm broke and he just smirked at me every time I saw him until round two a few year later.