Autism and also dependency, two words hardly ever integrated yet a mixture that can cause tremendous difficulty. Dylan Dailor reviews the difficulties he faces daily as somebody living with Autism and, advocating for the neurodiverse.
Dylan Dailor goes to Hobart College and also resides in Rochester, NY. He is a neurodiversity supporter and also the author of the children's publication I Am Not a Freak. Much of his time is spent in the pursuit of finding new and also ingenious ways to describe the autism range to a wide array of people which is the subject of the second book that he is writing. In his downtime, he takes pleasure in composing, playing, and performing music, suggesting with anyone who will say with him, and enjoying way too much TV for his own excellent. This talk was offered at a TEDx event utilizing the TED conference format however independently organized by a neighborhood area. Find out more at
Dylan, that was a really good talk, thank you. One thing I know at 63, which I did not know as a neurodiverse person when I was much younger, is that what bothers you may not go away, but they get outnumbered by better things, the longer you live. There will be more good and bad things, but the good things begin to add up, and also to count more. It’s a weighted average. We find a way to give more weight to the good things. With the amount of insight you are already showing, you are on the right path.
Thank you for sharing this, Dylan. Yes, there is no normal. We are all different. Our job is to love ourself just as we are. You are a wonderful person.
Not being able to express oneself naturally leads to this imbalance. As a person on the autism spectrum, I can say this is not about autism so much as about (autistic) human needs. We are actively discouraged to take care of our own needs by our peers and family, taught not to listen to our bodies, which leads to this imbalance: constantly pushing for more than we can handle and wearing out our bodies and minds.
My first autistic reaction memory is when I had my second birthday. My parents invited some kids to my birthday party and I was like ‘wtf are these things and why are they around me?’ I knew I was somehow different from them. I was diagnosed with aspergers at age 45.
Some comments were that you were nervous. I don’t agree. I’m 78, on the spectrum, but it’s been 50 years since the diagnosis. I’ve changed, but I like myself, at long last. No problems, except other people’s inability to accept anyone different to themselves. Glad I saw your Talk. Bravo.
Dylan, I identify with you so much. This was real and vulnerable. You’re brave to speak about the difficulties you’ve faced. I really like you.
What he says starting around 13:35 is so deeply true and just… honest. I struggle with that so much, how what other people perceive as ‘achievements’ don’t make you happy since you are still lacking that feeling of connection that keeps eluding you as a non-NT. You do have a desire and need deep inside but the outside world is so utterly not setup to fulfill it, even to meet it halfway. So even as you try and live and achieve things, you still don’t feel truly ‘happy’ yet it’s almost a taboo to openly admit you are not happy. It downright scares people or they feel pity for you. I am in awe of how candid and brave he was to just say it out loud.
Hit the nail on the head in the talk. No amount of keeping busy is going to contribute to a sense of belonging. Connection works, community works. We get addicted to patterns as much as to substances. We see a link between the pattern of upgrading skills and social appraisal and that can make us jump to the conclusion that that’s also how we get accepted and that we can finally relax in the sense of belonging. But it’s our rusty parts that get us friends. I like seeing this talk as one of Dylan’s first steps to sharing about his wounds and vulnerabilities. And it’s also what makes me like and accept Dylan now.
I hope for a world where autism and addiction are better understood, both separately and in combination. This talk is very valuable in showing that not only does autism not preclude addiction, it makes complete logical sense that those with high anxiety and a syndrome involving repetitive behaviours and sensory overload would develop addictions.
Astonishingly honest – all the more surprising since the talk doesn’t take the optimistic route in the end as usual. I really appreciate that Dylan didn’t give the audience members what some of them certainly wanted ….like “how I overcame it”….
@M C Yes, I believe that may what he is saying; or at least I think people should heed it that way because even simple acknowledgement from others instead of judgement goes a long way. It removes one more reason to feel one has to mask and hide; it’s one less pressure. Either way, fantastic talk. And I agree that it is huge to be able to identify that feeling, because it can devour you from the inside if you don’t find ways to cope with it. It doesn’t fix it but it’s like having an chronic infection: If you know about it, you can contain it, keep it as clean as possible so it doesn’t spread all over. It’s a fighting chance.
I find it amazing how many people relate specifically to this (including myself). But when I’m out and about it seems like nobody knows what it’s like. We should all have like a secret greeting to identify with each other haha
That was a great talk.. I could see him shaking and at times getting flustered, but he did awesome, and while I do know some about autism and about the struggles I’ve seen family and friends face, it is great to hear another person’s experience with it. Someone I don’t know and how it’s affected them throughout the years. And also learning more, so we can help people with Autism more.
I love what he said at the end about how no one is normal.. Your normal is someone else’s weird.
All the best Dylan. <3
Yes, and the part of the “training to fit” is so true! But at the end this training is so stressful that any achievement will feel poor because will never fit. But it makes me angry at the same time, why I need to struggle to understand the NT if they don’t try to understand my situation and the way I view the world?
PS: English is not my first language so a lot that I want to say sounds much better in spanish jaja.
@Mariana Soto Usted habla español? El video tiene subtitulos en su lenguaje?
@maddogkilla1 Hola, sí hablo español, el video no tiene subtítulos en español pero yo entiendo mejor el inglés de lo que hablo o escribo en ese idioma.
Sería genial si tuviera subtítulos.
Being a skilled person with autism can make life more difficult because your abilities will allow you to achieve but your interpersonal relationships, which you are cognizant of, can hold you back from improvement. A gifted person who has a history of difficult social interactions can find themselves much more anxious because the desire and need for connection is there and being themselves and being natural consistently gives negative feedback.
People will naturally draw their own personal conclusions from this talk. Personally, I think a clear message is that autism can’t always be adequately addressed by modern treatments. An individual can give it their very best, and achieve metrics that society regards to be ‘success’, but that isn’t always enough. Sometimes the condition brings about unabating suffering with no clear answers in sight.
This reality applies to mental illness in general. It’s a reality that society lamentably rejects with romanticism and anecdotes, because no one wants to confront the pain of hopeless suffering. The problem is, when you’re the victim of such pain, you don’t get the luxury of telling yourself a pleasant story. You’re forced to confront it. Yet when you try to talk about it, many are keen to reject it. Just mention the term ‘treatment-resistant depression’, a firmly established medical designation, and you’ll see what I mean.
The survivor bias holds that those who survive, or ‘succeed’, are generally noticed more often than those who struggle, because the successful tend to have more visibility, while the less successful dwell in obscurity. This leads to delusionally optimistic beliefs. The survivor bias is – ironically – readily apparent even in Dylan’s talk. The only reason he’s able to tell the world about his struggles, is because of his perceived successes. No one wants to hear about an autistic, or mentally ill nobody, living in misery and squalor while subsisting off meager disability checks. Everyone loves to hear a good success story, despite the fact that they represent a small minority.
We get addicted to substances because our brains arent working and the body is broken. It’s all chemical.
feel like i have a bit of an inability to quit things properly
some of it is a bit harmles
but i end up trying to get the table to look straighter than straight
or try to even things out a bit more
eats all the cookies or candies
read all the news articles
play games for the rest of the day
or drink all the liquor
but apparently i’m autistic so i couldn’t possibly be impulsive…
think i have a mild addiction-phobia
I have tried explaining this issue many times but I have never been able to state it as clearly as you have. I am sure you have heard “you’re not the only one” and “if he can do it so can you” and “you just need a better attitude” many times trying to explain survivor bias. It is very real but no one wants to hear that the emperor has no clothes because they sincerely are oblivious and assume you’re the delusional one. Subjective truth is an endless dilemma. There is too much to be gained from excessive optimism for society to risk allowing itself a healthier acceptance of painful reality. I have seen this phenomenon play out in countless ways within individuals and collectives.
The fact that this guy, whom I’ve never even met or heard of before, has, for the first time in the course of my nearly 18 years of existence, accurately summed up my life in less the 20 minutes is somewhat terrifying and uplifting both at the same time. One cannot explain what one feels like with autism but it can be a damaging spiral if not handled correctly. Unfortunately most cases are.
wowww ❤❤❤
@Andrew Kleine also the concept of self-determination is important philosophically and legally, but they are out-of-scope psychologically. No matter how much self determination a person has in one situation, if you put them in a categorically worse situation, it will eventually evaporate, and they will be just as sapped as the people they berate for lacking motivation.
Deus Ex Populus check out sam harris free will stuff man, no ones got a choice
Yr amazing Mary , special and unique in every way . Well done for achieving the inner love and beauty , we are in a different world to other people and when we are safe we grow even more ,hope yr safe and well
Karon, thanks for your comment; one year ago I was learning about autism. Dylan’s talk was so helpful.
@Mary Nordseth yr welcome I’m also ADHD and autistic and it takes a lot of years and understanding who we are but we grow and we learn and we survive ,I’m 44 and I think we are the normal people it’s the rest of the world that’s madness , thank you for your reply I’m glad yr safe and well please look after yourself in this time of great stress . I love hearing other people’s experiences of there autism it feels like we can communicate better with each other then normal people all the best Mary sending luv from the UK 😊
Thank you Denise
Man… I can feel his frustration and appreciate his honesty. I struggle too sometimes with addictive behaviors, it is worth the fight though. Normal is way overrated. Be kind to yourselves people…
As someone with Aspergers Syndrome i struggled with understanding humour and double entendres. I also got bumped up a class when I was 6 years of age as i was getting 20/20 in my maths and english. It was only four years later they realised I had autism. Obviously I did not have a clue what it meant but they basically said I see and understand things differently. This manifested in my passions for sports, space, history, english and gaming. It was weird being the youngest in every class i went to, even in university. People would ask me what it was like to be a prodigy, I told them there was no such thing. I told them i did not speak for the first time until I was three. And that my sleeping pattern was chaotic, with difficulties maintaining relationships of every kind. Not exactly prodigical markers. The level of self knowledge for people on the spectrum is second to none. This gives us an immense advantage in obtaining knowledge because we are hard on ourselves and always starved of information. Our standards tend to be so high that people are alienated away from our minds and souls.
I always thought people in the spectrum die out early
For a long time I abused drugs and alcohol so I could feel connected to people. I stopped when I realized I wasn’t truly connecting with anyone and that it would be more noble to face my discomfort head on.
When I was 4, my dad got diagnosed. When they took me to get checked out, I was on the spectrum as well. My father hid the diagnosis from me, because where I was from, autistic kids are treated like monsters, and get placed in special classes. I did not learn about my diagnosis till I was 22.
Great comment!!! So true!!
True what works for some people doesn’t work for others. In our world we deal with society judging us.
@Thomas Giles I had trouble getting along with the kids in preschool also.
People had high expectations of me when I was young. I did very well at art and school. Now I am on disability for mental illnesses and Autism. I keep thinking if only I try hard enough I will overcome my disabilities and accomplish something. However, I am 45 and should realize that this is probably not going to happen. I am grateful people believed in me but I am torturing myself trying to meet our cultural ideal of overcoming adversity.
@Diane Bingham 😑 stop spreading misinformation. Vaccines do not cause autism.
@Dan John yes!! Furthermore He and the whole Celestial Gang are the only ones who understand and celebrates our unique and neurodiverse creation.
@Daniel Morales – Juanito, maybe if you had a child damaged by vaccines you might even look into it a bit more. But why wait?
@Kelvin R – that’s not even funny. Most people don’t do research themselves or even own a lab to test things, they just parrot words and concepts that support their opinions. And interestingly enough the most rude and insulting posters are always the pro-vaccine ones. With nothing to back them up instead of providing an intelligent argument they just insult.
i just have autism and adhd
That’s beautiful Denise, thank you for sharing your wisdom.
Denise that is so well stated. Thank you for your insight!
Amen!!!
This…so much!
I share the same sentiments. It starts from unmet needs and trauma in childhood
Interesting! Sweet from your dad wanting to protect you. It makes me curious, may I ask if you think that the fact of not knowing you were in the spectrum helped you? Besides people treating autistic kids bad, did it help you or do you think it would have been easier for you to know it so you could have understood yourself better?
I would also like to hear back from you about the comment above. 🙂 God Bless!!!
Thank you ♡
My son is autistic, and he struggles with anxiety and rules and finding comfort in the chaos of the world, much like you do. I worry for him because he so easily falls into patterns of comfort that aren’t good for him. I want to protect him from the painful things in the world, but I can’t protect him from himself.
This is very true.I really think this text sums it up brilliantly. Thank you for putting it so clearly.
@Dan John amen
Yea it what life is there is no perfect life
Same. 👍
I’ve struggled with substance abuse on and off for over 2 years since I was 17. The reason I started doing drugs was partly because I didn’t feel much connection to the people around me.
I also struggled to socialize and make friends. My only friends were practically my parents and siblings.
But I think for a lot of autistic people, even if you do have other people in your life, it can be hard to relate to them on a deeper level.
So depression is more common for us than NT’s, probably as a consequence of this.
Most autistic people also have a greater need for continuity and habits, and addiction is just that.
So to me it seems clear that the combination of loneliness as a result of lacking social skills and unfulfilling relationships, depression mostly as a consequence of the latter, and the need for continuity in your life very easily could send you down a bad spiral of addiction.
I look back at every bad social experience whenever in a new unpredictable social scenario and I find the perfect moment to flee. Sometimes politely but mainly just with no one noticing
I don’t know. College was going ok but then both my physical and mental health deteriorated and I’ve been sick at home for 5 years. I found my one true love finally at 34 years old, but im too sick to even provide a living for myself. I don’t know what is worse.. to have love and or friends but no job or have a career but no one to hang out with. I feel a bit or both is needed or people get unhappy if one of the important parts in life is missing
@Auramyna infantilism is the absolute worst
👏
That’s the truest thing I’ve read all day!