Autism and trauma
Trauma in autistic adults is often overlooked because it presents differently in autistic people. Autistic people are predisposed to a life of ridicule and bullying so how can they not have trauma.
Another issue I have seen is it seems sometimes whatever the initial diagnosis is seems to cloud clinicians seeing co-occurring conditions. For instance when autism is diagnosed, trauma goes unnoticed and when trauma is diagnosed autism goes unnoticed. Too many assumptions get made, and why late diagnosis is so common coupled with the extent of people trying to cover up their autisitc traits.
We live in a world that want to wrongly label differences as deficits and natural responses as disorders. Complex trauma should not be classed as a disorder when this is an expected response to trauma, and there are many other conditions that should have disorder removed when they are natural responses to abuse or trauma.
Disclaimer: The writings in this article are for general education and entertainment purposes only and do not replace professional advice. All views are my own opinions, observations, and personal lived experiences. For professional advice please seek help from a qualified provider.
Personal trauma△
As a child through to adulthood I was constantly abused from my mother, authority figures and other people who gaslighted and ridiculed me for decades for being different.
Family△
I grew up in a toxic environment and if I tried to tell anyone they shut me down in disbelief.
I have severe general and social anxiety and also experience panic attacks at times. I believe I have undiagnosed C-PTSD due to the repeated ridicule and abuse throughout my life and also experiencing 3 events of life changing loss and tragedy when I was 26 during the same year.
I was ridiculed most of my life for my autistic traits and my mother spent decades emotionally and physically abusing me for being different. As a result I developed extreme general and social anxiety. Some will develop complex trauma but most will at least develop an anxiety condition.
For a long time, I made excuses for my father for not protecting me from my mother, but I later stopped that because they was enabling this abuse by not protecting me from it. I got along with my father but given they did nothing about the abuse, I never felt safe at home, and I often wished someone would come and take me away from them. After I left home I went on to be estranged from my parents on and off for several years at a time. My brother died in 1984 from a car accident.
My father died in 2011 at the age of 80 and he was not in communication with me prior to his death. He wasn't in contact if my mother was not, nor did she inform me that he had died. At the time of my mother's death at 87 years old in 2022 we had not communicated for about 17 years. I was not told by anyone that she had died. I found out through the internet about a year after both my parent's deaths.
I was terrified of my mother and felt helpless as they were so unpredictable. I tried ways to please them but it only made it worse. They would often often hit me around the head and face, called me cruel names and told me I would never amount to much. I remember being beaten by them with an electric jug chord. They would often use household items like a jug chord or a broomstick to weaponise their rage. I remember barely being able to move my arm for at least a week. After an abusive outburst they would often say, do you want a cup of tea, or pretend nothing had happened.
My father never asked me what happened to my arm and would sometimes try to comfort me if they could do it without my mother's knowledge, as they feared the consequences if they were to find out My brother was their favourite so they escaped this abuse which I was grateful for. It still affected them though as my brother felt a lot of hatred towards my mother.
I had panic attacks and meltdowns when I was experiencing any type of sensory overload like loud noise, lighting, yelling, fire alarm bells etc. I was often abused for not listening when I was trying to deal with sensory issues. If I rocked, repeated words, or flapped my hands, I was yelled at and told to stop it. It was very traumatising when other's behaved cruel towards me when I was overwhelmed with sensory issues.
Both my parents were not emotionally available or affectionate, nor did they hug us, and we were never told we were loved. For the most part I accepted this as I didn’t like being hugged most of the time. I believe my father was autistic, and they were not bothered by my autistic traits, probably because they shared so many of them with me. While I believe my mother may have been autistic, they were very intolerant of my autistic traits and probably had a personality disorder of sorts.
Life△
One of my schoolteachers often made me sit in front of the class with a book on my head or put my nose in a ring on the blackboard. Walking home kids would call me names and throw stones at me.
I learned from a young age it was not safe to be me, so I needed to find a way to try and be like other people for survival. This was probably the start of my masking journey. However, I was so poor at it so it did not protect me very much from harm.
My sensory issues are often extreme fuelling a lot of anxiety. I startle very easily and are traumatised when getting a fright. Causes for this are being touched without warning, being approached when I am unaware of someone being there, someone waving their hands around my face or head, and any noise I do not expect from outside or inside my environment.
I have high anxiety around fire alarms, loud noises, and unidentified noises I cant place. If the fire alarm goes off in my apartment, I experience intense anxiety, and panic. After the alarm has stopped, I can still hear it in my head sometimes for a few days and fear the alarm will go off again soon. I experience this as well with other sensory traumas. I just cannot get them out of my head for days. Other noises I hear can also remind me of other noises and then I experience fear around what is going to happen.
In the same year when I was 26, my brother was killed in a car accident, my five-year relationship and engagement ended, my grandfather died two weeks after my brother’s death and a pedestrian was killed when they ran out in front of my car. As a result, I had a major breakdown.
I script which is common in both PTSD and autism, so I may script a pre-planned dialogue I have worked out before speaking to someone like a doctor, dentist or other important appointments. I also experience other symptoms of c-trauma that overlap with autism and my anxiety disorders. These are: Shame, low self-esteem, problems with self-regulation, difficulty maintaining relationships, misunderstandings, demand avoidance, very easily startled, avoiding people, intrusive thoughts, avoidance behaviours, restrictive eating, irritability, lack trust in people and difficulty concentrating.
I also experience hypervigilance, palpitations, tremors, panic attack, nausea, digestive issues, and a constant feeling of uneasiness that I do not understand. I often have anxiety filled dreams where I feel panic and wake up from the dream but do not remember what the dream was about.
I am vegan, exercise daily, and do not drink, or smoke. I practice meditation, and mindfulness which I've done for decades. I have substantial support needs that are not being met due to different factors and reasons. I am trying to navigate what would help improve my quality of life. I have difficulty trusting other people because of my past experiences. I am not one for dwelling in the past, however, my anxiety sits in the future, thus will I be okay, how will I take care of myself, and will I have a roof over my head and why I hope I die before my spouse.
I live in an apartment block and do not have much interaction with the outside world. I only leave the house once a week or fortnight to do a little shopping. I keep to myself when out and are often nonspeaking due to situational mutism. I use noise cancelling earphones, wear tinted glasses for light sensitivity and often wear an autistic ID card. I would like to live in a more reclusive area, but my spouse does not want to live too far away from people. They are introverted but they like to know people are close by.
I have tried a lot of therapies in the past all while not knowing I was autistic and have exhausted all the typical medications used. CBT does not work for me which is not unusual for autistic people. I am on anxiety medication which I may take a couple of times a week as I am very sensitive to medication. The most help I have got is from unconventional methods and self-help. If it was not for the spiritual path (non-religious) I have been on for many decades, I would not be here today, given I have had suicidal ideations all my life.
The most that helps me now is staying away from the outside world as much as I can which is the most comforting. In many ways I think my diagnosis being so late, I am at a point in my life that many therapies that would have helped in the past are little too late. I do not mean nothing can help me but rather that these things are no longer the help I need.
Situational mutism△
Situational mutism is where a person is unable to speak in certain social situations despite being able to speak in others.
Selective mutism and situational mutism are often used interchangeably, but the only official term is selective mutism. People want this changed to situational mutism because they feel selective implies it is a choice when it isn't. This condition usually starts in early childhood and can continue into adulthood if not treated and even then, the person may still not be able to speak in all situations.
People with situational mutism may look frozen or have a blank look on their face when they are expected to respond. They might be able to speak to family and friends they know well but have difficulty speaking in other environments or with people they hardly know. Situational mutism can co-occur with complex trauma, and studies have shown that an autistic person with complex trauma is more at risk of developing situational mutism.
People with autism are more prone to developing situational mutism due to the social anxiety and communication issues they experience with their autism. This can be found across all levels of autism, but it is more frequently observed in those with Level 2 and Level 3 autism. Situational mutism is primarily considered an anxiety disorder, so it can be directly linked to general anxiety and social anxiety disorder.
I rarely spoke in the early years of school until I went to secondary school. Post school and through adult life it has still been an issue. I deal with this by preparing extensive notes when I am being assessed for something, or where I need to provide a lot of information. I think situational mutism was first noticed by my family when I was taken out of the home to attend kindergarten. My parents were told I was very nervous, shy and withdrawn, and when spoken to I would only nod my head or point to things rather than speak.
When I leave the house these days I don’t speak in many circumstances and usually nod my head and use other gestures liking pointing to things rather than talk, as I become overwhelmed in busy surroundings. My spouse will tell you I can have intelligent conversations at home and when I am out of the house, I will present the opposite.
I need to write scripts before known upcoming appointments or other interactions, because I can become non speaking when overwhelmed. Sometimes I cannot advocate for myself if someone mistreats me, so I guess this is trauma induced selective mutism which is probably tied to the abuse I have received throughout my life started early on in the home.
Public perception△
The DSM-5 fails to see how complex trauma presents in autism. C-PTSD does not include a diagnosis in the DSM-5, but it does exist in the ICD-11 5. However, like the original DSM it relies on symptoms.
Complex trauma in autistic people can exacerbate autistic traits to the point where it can cause further regression of skills and communication. I certainly know this is the case for me in relation to the trauma I experienced in masking my autistic traits my whole life, and then experienced autistic regression when I began to reveal them. Trying to hide my autism was debilitating, exhausting and took a large tole on my mental health which I have not recovered from as yet.
The lines can be blurry when an autistic person is also experiencing complex trauma symptoms because they can overlap with autism symptoms, and probably why C-trauma is not reported as much as it should be in autistic people. Clinicians need to stop making assumptions when interviewing autistic people, and not defaulting to neurotypical terms and methods, as they will continue to miss the red flags. CBT is often an approach which does not work for many autistic people, and that was certainly the case for me as well.
Social skills can be confusing for autistic people which is why they are also more likely to experience bullying and abuse. Being autistic already makes a person more vulnerable to trauma thus making them predisposed to a lifetime of harm. An autistic brain does not process information as easily as non-autistic people which is another factor in making them more vulnerable to C-trauma. Autistic brains seem to hold on to trauma which also makes them more likely to experience complex trauma.
Autistic people can be traumatised by many things that non-autistic people are not, so how can many people who are autistic not also have C-trauma. They have been traumatised by noise, sensory issues, and abused by society just for being autistic. The fact that autistic people are bullied, made fun of, excluded, and misunderstood more than non-autistic people, and that they are more sensitive to these things, explains to me why C-trauma in autistic people would be common yet often goes unnoticed.
Physical, emotional, and sexual abuse, violence, natural disasters, and war are all common causes of post-traumatic stress in the general population. Of course, these things could and do cause post-traumatic stress in autistic people as well. However, autistic people also experience trauma from things like fire alarms, filling out paperwork and attending appointments, or even a stranger’s offensive comment can also cause instability in an autistic person, thus they can be easily traumatised by other people’s behaviour towards them.
Autistic people are more easily startled and more likely to have insomnia which can make them more prone to anger, and anxiety or have greater difficulty concentrating than may be seen in typical forms of C-trauma. Good REM sleep is important for all of us to process trauma. Autistic people tend to wake from a dream so they do not process their memories during dreams which makes them more likely to be more traumatised as a result.
Adults with undiagnosed and diagnosed autism are 4 times more likely to be diagnosed with C-trauma than adults without autism. Traumatic events for autistic people may not automatically lead to C-trauma but at the very least they will be associated with other anxiety disorders and depression.
Therapy△
Most clinicians are not equipped to help autistic people, because they do not understand how our brains work unless they are an autistic expert and many of these clinicians are autistic themselves.
For someone like me who has chosen to grow through a spiritual path it is different, and many psychologists are challenged by this for many reasons. I have done decades of inner work and transformational therapies through the means of a spiritual path. I find therapy through conventional methods an analysis paralysis process. Psychology often fixates on the ego on when in a psychological term, the ego is only a small part of the thinking consciousness. When we are dealing with the total personality there is much more going on.
A trauma specialist who isn't familiar with autism may not be the best fit for someone who is autistic as autistic people require specific understanding and strategies that differ from typical trauma treatment. Autistic individuals often have unique ways of processing trauma, sensory sensitivities, and communication preferences that need to be recognised. A therapist with experience in both autism and trauma would be better equipped to help and support an autisitc individual.
The DSM-5 portrays a one-size-fits-all structure which can be limiting when it comes to understanding autism. The DSM tends to generalise traits and behaviours in a way that doesn’t show the lived reality of autistic people, and how trauma can manifest uniquely for them.
For these reasons for the most part counselling through conventional methods and approaches have never resonated with me or been very helpful. The only time it was helpful and necessary was when I needed grief counselling for living through three tragedies in the same year of my life and through all this I had no idea I was autistic.
Sub personalities△
We do not have all these sub personalities that we need to rescue and parent. Rather they programs and beliefs the personality has created in reaction to traumatic experiences through out a life time.
There may be fragmented parts of our personality in a sense but they are not separate identities we need to deal with, but rather part of the one personality trying to deal with running programs and beliefs developed to deal with trauma and many other issues in life.
Programs are beliefs the personality has created in reaction to traumatic experiences through out a life time. This is why we keep repeating patterns until we get it. To become our true selves we need to intergrade what's real rather than what we have told ourselves. We don't heal trauma, we let it go which is a journey of discovery and awareness.
The personality involves a lot more directing consciousness than just ideas of identity (sense of self). The personality carries the emotional, mental and the physical. I use the term personality because it deals with the totality of the personality self, not just one aspect thus the ego, as that limits the broader aspect of the lower self and its relationship with the higher self.
It is not easy to define the higher mind in objective terms. Analysis will not help us understand the higher mind, as we must be it rather than talk about it. When we try to describe it, we have automatically become outside it. The higher mind is very definitive when we are in there, but we are only in the higher mind at times because the personality pulls us out of it. The higher minds nature needs to be experienced thus we cannot separate our consciousness from it and experience it.
We must be open to it and then it will be revealed. We cannot think our way in there. Trying to describe it takes us out of the space of being able to experience it. Thoughts of the higher mind are definitive but they hard to describe, as the higher mind is highly subjective. It demands being identified with so if you cannot objectify it, you are outside it.
The lower mind is about logic. We need an anchor which gives a sense of what is real, thus we need the higher mind so we can have right thought. One effective way to engage the higher mind is to sit in contemplation and ask, what is the truth. We must be open and stop analysing.