Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder Quotes

“And don’t ever, EVER compare yourself to a neurotypical (NT) girl or woman. They are a different species and you’ll only feel inadequate and bad about yourself. Find your tribe – online, in groups at comic conventions. Find people who are delighted that you are you. And you should be delighted that you are you too because when you’re 70, you’ll still be skateboarding, you’ll look amazing (from all those years of not ruining your skin with make-up) and you’ll realise that all those things you worried about don’t matter at all.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“I do believe that we (autistic individuals such as myself) are very susceptible to suicidal thinking for multiple reasons that include: chronic high levels of anxiety, tendency to fixate on or get stuck on negative disturbing thoughts, low self-worth, inability to have significant or intimate relationships with others, replaying over and over again negative statements that others have said to us, feeling unable to be understood, lack [of] a solid self-identity, difficulty with expressing self to others, feelings of great isolation, feeling that you are or may be a burden to others, feeling unable to contribute to society or the greater good, etc […] I do believe that the most important thing that someone else can do for a struggling autistic individual is to affirm their self-worth, recognise and validate their struggles and affirm the things that they do that are greatly valued by others. The worst thing to do for an autistic individual, or any struggling individual for that matter, is to not believe them or to deny the validity of their struggles. My greatest and deepest hurt is that doctors, family members and important others did not believe me in my struggles, particularly when I was younger, before my diagnosis at the age of 35 years. This has been the strongest impetus for my feelings of unworthiness and suicidal thoughts. (Woman with autism)”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“Real me only leaks out when the rote-learning system I have devised has insufficient data to maintain the facade. Real me is also allowed out in times of complete comfort and acceptance (it takes a rare soul to love and accept without judgement...)”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder

“It makes it very hard to work out where you belong when you are brilliant at things that others find hard, but useless at things that others find easy.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder

“If a friend asks what I think about her new handbag, I find myself unable to speak; despite trawling through my brain for something, anything, to say, I cannot muster a single word as I have absolutely no opinion on handbags beyond it's a bag, it carries stuff.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder

“Mental health conditions are the outcome of this refusal to admit limitations. Admission of limitations equates to failure for many women with autism. Admitting vulnerability and asking for concessions or help is hard after a lifetime of masking.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder

“All the qualifications in the world dont mean a thing if you can't hold a conversation.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder

“...it is often reported that women with autism are more likely to internalise the anxiety and stress they feel around change, not wanting to draw attention to their inability to cope with the situation. This leads other people to believe they are coping, when in fact they are not. Repression of emotions and the effort involved in hiding them from others can cause long-term mental health problems, and eventually the facade crashes as the curtailed stress has to come out.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder

“The ‘buzzy’ head mentioned by younger girls seems to persist for some older women. The need to ‘file’ and process the day that has passed and to anticipate the one to come appears to prevent easy rest. Difficulty in getting to sleep was most commonly mentioned.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“I hate it when people change plans, but I never let it show because I’m supposed to be flexible. This leads people to think that I can handle anything. I tell them it’s fine, but it’s not fine. It’s never fine. When they have gone my head hurts with the effort of making sense of why they couldn’t do what they said they were going to do, what it will mean for me to have to reconfigure everything to take into account the new situation and what bad things I can wish upon them for being so unreliable.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“Among those women questioned, art and English topped the list of favourite subjects at school.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“Many of the women and girls who participated in this book were precocious early talkers, often with extensive vocabularies. This does not mean that learning came/comes easily to them, on account of the neurotypical system they were/are expected to adhere to. We must not forget that, even in a learning environment, social requirements are always present, which means that our girl with ASD has to work doubly hard to make sense of both the social and the academic elements.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“We may assume that the socialising aspect of play settings is beneficial to the child. This is an almost universally held belief, particularly in the case of girls. The child with ASD may disagree. It may be that for some children with ASD there really is no point or functional benefit in them attending a group play setting and that the distress caused outweighs any possible benefit gained. This notion is difficult for many parents to acknowledge as they believe that being alone cannot be good for the child; but for many children and adults with ASD, being alone is the best thing of all.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“Girls and women with autism: You're fine exactly as you are. Yes, you're a bit weird, but that's perfectly alright. You might not feel much like a 'woman', but that's ok too - most of us don't. And you're totally right about handbags. You only need one, and that's a rucksack.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder

“I don't have the ability to process my feelings and articulate them; I just feel a whirl of emotions and physical sensations: dizziness, nausea, tight chest and overwhelming emotional pain...”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder

“I need other people to be understanding and not get annoyed with me. I need my partner to put up with being shouted at when he doesn’t really deserve it.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“not ever having experienced such ease around people and the natural acceptance of each other’s quirks that they seem to have. Paradoxically, I find most people extremely irritating, facile and socially dishonest, which means that the likelihood of me ever finding my ‘gang’ is pretty small!”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“The issue of friends is a complex one throughout life for these women with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and it takes many years to get their heads around either what it means to be a friend or how to be around people without anxiety and fear of rejection and social failure.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“Admitting vulnerability and asking for concessions or help is hard after a lifetime of masking.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“learned that it was simply difficult for me to communicate in the way that makes people comfortable forming bonds of friendship. Before the diagnosis, when I ‘withdrew’ it had always been attributed to me being ‘moody’ or ‘sulky’, when actually, inside, I often felt calm and happy and was surprised when people were angry.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“She finds sharing very difficult and wants everything to be done on her terms […] ‘Precious’ toys have to be hidden away before other children come to play. She would never think to offer sweets to others and refuses to do so when prompted. (Woman with autism)”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“Needing the world to be ‘on their terms’ is a common comment made by those living with and supporting individuals with autism.”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“these women displayed more masculinised characteristics. It also found that men with autism presented more feminised characteristics, indicating that rather than women with autism being more masculinised per se, both genders may be more androgynous and represent a ‘gender defiant disorder’ (Bejerot et al. 2012,”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age

“Dislike of changes to plans or vague plans when trying to plan outfit/shoes/things appropriate to activity/location/weather – intense dislike of feeling wrongly dressed or not having the right things with me. (Woman with autism)”
― Sarah Hendrickx, Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age