One of the realities of being an older autist is bursts of understanding of past events, which at the time you didn’t pick up the social cues to understand, didn’t understand the language being used not literally, or didn’t parse the body language and the facial expression necessary to gather what was actually going on.
I was recently diagnosed as autistic and have had a similar experience of revisiting past situations I never understood, that now make far more sense through the lens of autism. It's a blessing and a curse, helping me overcome my impostor syndrome around being autistic because I see how I behaved in a neurodivergent way, while also making me cringe at the misunderstanding!
I'm glad that you were somewhat oblivious. I think on some level we all wanted acceptance even if we were popular because there is always underlying fear especially at that age. I was not popular but I think people thought I was nice, shy, dorky & I had a few friends. I hope you can put old demons away for the here & now.
I was recently diagnosed as autistic and have had a similar experience of revisiting past situations I never understood, that now make far more sense through the lens of autism. It's a blessing and a curse, helping me overcome my impostor syndrome around being autistic because I see how I behaved in a neurodivergent way, while also making me cringe at the misunderstanding!
I'm glad that you were somewhat oblivious. I think on some level we all wanted acceptance even if we were popular because there is always underlying fear especially at that age. I was not popular but I think people thought I was nice, shy, dorky & I had a few friends. I hope you can put old demons away for the here & now.