I recently watched a TikTok from an #autizzy autistic creator who was talking about her unmasked self. She mentioned in it that when she was acting herself, people often told her they thought she was on drugs. I realized I had forgotten that for most of my life, I got the same response. In fact, I think I built my mask around this comment because, after a certain point in my life, people stopped telling me they thought I was on drugs, but I felt less myself and more mentally traumatized.
The most in-depth conversation I had about this topic was with an older friend of mine, who was the mother of my one and only ex-boyfriend. We spent a lot of time together, until we didn't. She had damaged her brain from taking too many drugs in her younger years and it wrecked her amygdala, her fear and anger center of her brain, which meant she felt those emotions intensely and before any other when having interactions and new experiences. I never experienced this side of her.
One day when I was at her house for a visit, I was trying to explain something. I think it was how I viewed the world, or how I saw my imagination overlayed on reality, but not in a way that would be schizophrenic (I knew what I was seeing was not real, unlike with schizophrenia where the person does not know the difference between real and imagined stimulus). She distinctly told me that my brain function sounded exactly the same as her experience on LSD. At the time, I was really excited that someone else could identify with my thoughts, but also disappointed that it meant that I came across as a drug addict to most people. I think I mumbled something about never being interested in taking drugs and that explained why, as a way to deflect from the fact that people needed to be in an altered state of mind to understand me (how did I go through 38 years of life thinking I was neurotypical?).
When examining this LSD = autism further, although I have never taken LSD, the descriptions of experiences are very similar to my brain function. On the website talktofrank.com which is run by Public Health England, there is a page on LSD and how it feels.
There it says:
➡"colours, sounds, objects and even time can all seem very strange and disturbing" (✓).
"Can make you feel:
➡euphoric (✓)
➡in awe of the people and things around you (✓)
➡energized (✓)
➡excited (✓)
➡empatheic (✓)
➡see and hear things that aren't there (✓)
➡confused (✓)
➡suspicious (✓)
➡anxious (✓)
➡panicked (✓)
➡frightened (✓)
➡overwhelmed (✓)"
"...Will be affected by your surroundings, who you're with and how comfortable you are with them, as well as by your mood." (✓)
➡"Some people have trouble speaking when they're on LSD." (✓)
➡"Can act unpredictably (✓)
➡Can become fixated on certain things (✓)
➡Emotional (✓)
➡Paranoid (✓)
➡Aggressive" (✓)
I find this extremely fascinating and also horrifying at the same time. The fact that our regular reactions to the world are percieved as the same as symptoms of someone on LSD makes me understand why there is such a bad reaction by people to autism. At the same time, I also find it interesting that people who are addicted to LSD are basically saying that they like the feeling of being autistic, are actually seeking out the neurology of autism.
This leads me to flow. According to medicalnewstoday.com/articles/flow-state, flow is a state that a person reaches where "they are totally immersed in a task... they may not notice time passing, think about why they are doing the task, or judge their efforts. Instead, they remain completely focused."
Flow is a positive psychological movement and is something that people are actively trying to reach and create within themselves. Positive reactions to being in flow are expressed by "being in the zone." The concept stems from the branch of psychology that studies "things that help humans thrive." Flow is autistic hyper-fixation on special interests. Autistic people reach flow as soon as they are engaged in their special interests. Flow is an autistic person's natural state, yet it is looked down on as a negative aspect of who we are. The fact that autistic people are berated for our flow states while neurotypicals are celebrated for achieving flow makes me stim in frustration. The hypocrisy of this reminds me of when black culture is stolen and used by white people without even nodding at the source. Autistic people (and possibly other neurodivergent groups) are the source of flow, yet no one ever mentions that our neurological differences are what people are trying to achieve.
It's this kind of disconnect that makes me so lost in the world. I also realize that these types of connections are something that allistic people don't often make, as recognizing patterns is also more of an autistic specialty. I just... LSD and flow... it's so obvious to me, so very obvious to me, that using LSD and trying to achieve flow is people looking for the autistic experience.