I was intrigued by an essay positing that people with autism experience identity differently from neurotypicals. The writer had surveyed thousands of people in online groups, asking the simple question, Who are you?
I didn’t really care about or agree with the writer’s theory but I was prompted to ask myself the question.
Who am I? My mind went blank. It briefly sampled a few images of myself and then rejected all of them, probably in less than five seconds, before I landed on an answer.
I’m a weirdo.
This response surprised and upset me, but there it is, that’s what I came up with. I’m a weirdo. What the hell am I doing here? etc.
Just a few days earlier, I’d expressed my sadness at losing various identities that had once provided a sense of cohesive existence. I no longer identity as a mother. I no longer think of myself as a writer. I used to think of myself as a Badass; “You don’t know who you’re fucking with” used to be my attitude toward the world. That self is long gone. I’m just too broken to fight off aggressors or most of the time, even idiots. And finally, old age has ruined my identity as someone who is attractive and fuckable.
Losing these different identities is like losing layers of my very being, leaving me with nothing. So I was grateful to find this comment in response to the Who Are You essay:
Having had my most fundamental sense of ‘self’ identity dismantled, or demolished, several times throughout my life, I feel as if the older I get, the more ‘nothing’ I become. I often feel I am just a thing that happens, a consciousness floating untethered in space. Notions of personal history or identification with any description feel irrelevant. There is nothing transcendent or liberating about it, and it can be very discombobulating. What interests me more than identity is what remains in its absence….
YES. I could never have expressed this as lucidly! But the nothing I’ve become still struggles for answers to everything, in particular answers about itself.
My whole life has been overshadowed by the mystery of What’s Wrong With Me. I’ve read that this is the result of childhood trauma, but who knows. It makes sense that if your parents or caretakers reject you, your lovability will always be in doubt (and therefore, What’s Wrong With Me?) It’s such a poignant situation, isn’t it? Well, it’s poignant when it’s about someone else. For me, it has been a fucked up, desperate preoccupation that’s led to countless suppositions. Genetic depression, Pathological Demand Avoidance, ASD, Avolition, PTSD, and of course Girly Brain. All these conditions probably apply, which still leaves me nowhere but gives me an excuse when I need one. Now, when I do something stupid or can’t figure out how to open something, I just shrug and smugly announce, “Autistic!”
Reducing myself to a weirdo is certainly destabilizing, a word that now crops up everywhere but still serves a useful purpose, unlike “intention” and “intentionality”. Maybe since words still affect me so intensely, I can say I’m a weirdo with a thing about words. That works, don’t you think?
Meanwhile, when I’m not wondering What’s wrong with me, I’m wondering what’s wrong with everybody else. My hair person was complaining about her sister, who I’ve never met but analyzed as harboring a primal jealousy toward her younger sibling. I recently explained to my dermatologist, who was going on about her anxiety, that she had “boundary issues”! Try saying that with a straight face! Last night I explained to my husband that his inability to control an outcome was the source of his distress. I am an endless font of this shit. I will tell you what’s wrong with you EVEN IF YOU DON’T ASK!
I would really love everyone to ask themselves Who are you? and then tell me your spontaneous answer. Any other weirdos out there? *And don’t try getting away with cognito ergo sum unless you’re Descartes.
A superweirdo! But more of an optimist than your type. Not that I try, it is just easier for me. I think I’m too lazy to complain or be offended, so I just amuse myself with how absurd everything and everyone is. I laugh so loud that it stops a room, and that amuses me too. Everybody is so uptight! Would it be nice if there was another “me” that I could share these observations with, yes, but sadly nobody “gets” them despite my “sharing”, so I am just okay with knowing I am here to amuse myself, in so many ways.
I’m here aren’t I, you must be a writer.
Pocketsound – I wish there were more of you so you could enjoy your sense of humor together, but meanwhile you have me. And I have you! Very grateful xo
I am a weirdo too. And also have lost my identity. 10 year relationship ended. Closed my business of 17 years. Over 50.
I have literally no idea who I am anymore. Or if I want to continue existing in this weird space I now reside in, with anxiety as my closest companion.
Strange isnt it? The pandemic changed everything for me, but not in the predictable ways. In weird, odd, unforeseen ways.
Overly fascinated by my visceral reactions, aka, girly weirdo. I could go on, and on here. But I won’t.
Fuck it, I will. We are human beings, not human doings (Anne Lamott). And apparently in Black culture, you never ask a person, what do you do for a living? That person may not, and it’s not indicative of their value anyway.
As a white navel gazing American, I continue to gnaw over what’s left after the losses in my life. I had a career once. My kids are growing and leaving in stages, but I know, fuck me for ever even comparing that to what you’ve been through. Mother is so powerful. It’s a role and a job and a name. There is never a more powerful time in your life than when you single handedly keep the small people alive and happy (I know, fathers, but come ON). It’s not so hard intellectually when they’re little, but physically it will kick your ass. It flips suddenly sometime between the ages of 7-13. Then the intellectual will kick your ass. Oh, and break your heart.
Is it that us white Americans don’t know how to relax? I either require to be sleeping, or doing something useful, even if it pisses me off. I can’t just sit there. Meditation? Can I go work in a leper colony when the kids no longer need my health insurance or will I still be too much of a wimp? Will the kids get my 401ks outright when I’m no longer useful and kill myself? Just some of the regular programming here. Cheers
Kellie – Well, you see you’re not alone in this. I agree about the pandemic. Being without the usual distractions has been destabilzing and not in a good way. We will have to exist as formless entities…but maybe that will be a relief at some point??
Dana – The leper colony sounds good. It must be nice to feel noble! I think I have the opposite problem from what you describe: I can sit and do nothing, all day and all night. It scares me. As long as the TV is blaring, I will just sit, like it’s my job.
Very interesting, as I find all of your thoughtful writing. Who am I? I have lost my anchor, my identity, my understanding of what it means to be a human, my reason for being, my son. So I am a raging river bouncing off the rocks, covered by a thin veneer of ice masking as my human face. One quote I heard recently is humility is the greatest virtue. I’m not sure why this is significant to me except that I have truly been humbled.
Jeri – I understand.And I wish I could make it better. You just have to ride it out. For the people who love you, you just have to. You know that thing that Joe Biden keep saying: “believe me, one day you’ll think of your loved one with a smile instead of tears.” It’s so stupid and it has really annoyed me. But this year it happened to me, after 11 years. Time will make it easier to bear. Meanwhile, I know your son wants you to be happy, just like mine does for me. xoxo