Mastodawn

Lilith, Mother of Darkness

Do any of you #actuallyautistic fedifriends jump immediately to the worst case scenario when you are worried about something?

I was just reading about autism and catastrophising, and immediately recognised myself in this. Almost every single time I start worrying about something, it takes only a few moments for me to start thinking "I'm screwed, my family is screwed, everything is going to go horribly wrong and I'm going to end up dead or living in a cardboard box under a bridge. Probably with cancer."

No matter how insignificant the actual situation is.

Ash-Miw-Re Mar 8

@Lunalucardrose20 Yes. Though, TBF, I'm usually closer to right than the people insisting it'll be fine.

@Lunalucardrose20 yes, all the time. Starting to think it's a feature of #autism mixing with #cptsd where my #hypervigilance uses my pattern matching to skip to the conclusion.

Lilith, Mother of Darkness Mar 8

@eazy This was what I was thinking, too.

Kevin Davy Mar 8

@Lunalucardrose20 @eazy
This is how we tend to work. In the sea of possibility, work out what's worst and then once we have a play book to deal with that, anything less is a bonus.

Lilith, Mother of Darkness Mar 8

@pathfinder @eazy Damn, well said.

Flesh & bone by the telephone Mar 8

@pathfinder
@Lunalucardrose20 @eazy Our brains want to prepare for anything, because we've experienced too many situations where the worst actually happened.

That doesn't mean that our brain is able to prepare, unfortunately.

@pathfinder @Lunalucardrose20 That's exactly how I deal with everything

Lilith, Mother of Darkness Mar 8

@eazy It seems a lot of us do this.

@eazy @Lunalucardrose20 This!

Chaos Agent Spectre Mar 8

@Lunalucardrose20 Yep, its an annoying feature that I've gotten better at managing thanks to meds and therapy. Most of my depression is directly tied to this, and its made me mentally shut down entirely some times.

Lilith, Mother of Darkness Mar 8

@ChaosSpectre This also shuts me down occasionally. I don't really have meds for this, so I have mostly just gotten used to it. Annoying as it is.

Probably at least some of my depression is also the result of this.

@Lunalucardrose20 IMO, it could be trauma

Goiterzan/Amygdalai Lama Mar 8

@Lunalucardrose20
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when my pattern chasing takes me somewhere people don't talk about, I feel like I have to make up for people not talking about it. If there looks like a one in ten chance of a disaster to me, I feel like every tenth person ought to be saying so, it drives me nuts that a ten percent chance gets zero ink, because every regular person sees the ninety percent and chooses, I guess appropriately.
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So there's a one in ten, and zero in a million want to talk about it . . . they make catastrophizing our job by their polyanna-izing, sort of. I say things just because no-one else does and I think somebody has to. 💜
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#ActuallyAutistic

Hugs4friends ♾🇺🇦 🇵🇸😷Mar 8

@punishmenthurts I thought of myself as a pessimistic optimist. Think of the worst that can happen in a given situation; make provision, then hope for the best outcome. @Lunalucardrose20

Goiterzan/Amygdalai Lama Mar 8

@Tooden @Lunalucardrose20
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right? Repairperson. 💜
@autistics

Lilith, Mother of Darkness Mar 8

@Tooden Same.❤️

Sometimes I believe that the worst that can happen, will happen, and I can't even hope for the best.

Hugs4friends ♾🇺🇦 🇵🇸😷Mar 9

@Lunalucardrose20 Anxiety and depression can do that.☹

Bernie Luckily Does It Mar 8

@Tooden @punishmenthurts @Lunalucardrose20 I've used those exact words to describe myself.

Goiterzan/Amygdalai Lama Mar 8

@BernieDoesIt @Tooden @Lunalucardrose20
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I mean, ACTUALLY 😀 , the glass is both half full AND half empty, by definition, isn't it?
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By what weirdness is this supposed to be a choice? Do you think 50% is MORE than 50% or LESS than 50%? 😀

Flor, trouble Mar 8

@Lunalucardrose20 I used to, and now I wonder when and how I stopped.

I've had embarassing panics but that's not it.

I've been in a few situations in which I could have died, and though it would make sense I feel it's not it.

There's the state of the world matching what I used to imagine catastrophizing about it...

I don't know.

Flor, trouble Mar 8

@Lunalucardrose20 I think I figured it out.

I used to believe my intuition was worthless, so I had to think through everything.

Getting diagnosed early meant I was raised and professionally taught as if I had no theory of mind. I've been told I resisted the latter quite a bit. (Teaching a kid to be rational about social interactions and ignore bad vibes is a really bad idea by the way)

I know other autistic people have difficulty recognizing they're hungry and such. That also leads to thinking about everything.

If you don't or can't trust that you'll always get yourself out of trouble without much thought when it happens, then trying to plan for anything is the sensible thing to do. It's difficult to know what's too unlikely to plan for.

Lilith, Mother of Darkness Mar 8

@gooseliketyping Good points, these.

Goddamn, I guess there are some perks for not getting an official diagnosis until later. I was tested as a child, but then my parents refused to take me to the last meeting where I would be given an official diagnosis. They were ashamed that their child was "different."

@Lunalucardrose20 I am
unsure if it is the autism at work, or more the PTSD/cPTSD, but yes, absolutely. So much anxiety, all the time.
I think this is one of the reasons we want predictability, and love things that brings us comfort. Like watching the same movie over and over and over again. Always eating at the same restaurant. Buying 5 identical shirts.

Also, I don't think our brains do the predicting thing quite like allistics. Read “The Predictive Mind” by Vermeulen.

Lilith, Mother of Darkness Mar 8

@Trine_DK That is definitely true, predictability brings comfort because less chance I have to worry about things.

Thanks for the suggestion, I haven't read that before, will read it through.❤️

Fish Id Wardrobe ⁂Mar 8

@Lunalucardrose20 yep, i do that. it's less about the raw panic for me, but:

i always want to know what the worst case scenario is; that's rational i think.

but sometimes i'll spend a bit too much time planning for that scenario.

and sometimes, if i'm anxious enough, i'll ignore all the others, assume the worst is bound to happen, and feel like an idiot when i work out i've done that.

edit: i don't have ptsd/cptsd.

Lilith, Mother of Darkness Mar 8

@fishidwardrobe I too often spend way too much time planning for the worst, completely ignoring any other possible outcomes.

F-O tistic Mar 11

@Lunalucardrose20 yes. For me I think it's part all-or-nothing thinking and part anxiety.

I can also say that I was treated for many years for anxiety and dealing with catastrophic scenarios was a huge thing.