Anticipatory Rejection

To be neurodivergent is to know anticipatory rejection.

With enough practice, you can learn how to accurately guess when you might be made the “pariah” of the group, and guessing right can save you.

Unfortunately it takes a lot of time and experience and heartache to learn this. But it can be done.

All it takes is one sideways glance between two people to forever set you up as the “weird girl.”

For those of us who are high-masking, people reveal themselves to you long before they have the chance to reject you.

I consider this a gift.

Being high-masking, your true self can hide in the shadows, being someone that’s “easy to talk to” or “easy to connect with.”

Maybe some would consider that a red flag.

And before you know it, people stop by to chat, which feels nice, but then they say something that makes you think twice, and then it feels icky.

But you count that on your tally sheet of crises averted, and life goes on.

You ponder it later. It simmers and settles into your mind as yet another experience that confirms that if given the properly-shaped and -sized space, they will show themselves to you without realizing it.

So, you have to go with your gut. Sometimes this means not putting yourself out there as you would like to. As you see other people do, no problem. It may cost you a potentially amazing and long-standing friendship.

I don’t take this personally much anymore. It is what it is. It’s been my life experience of a high-masking AuDHD girl.

I’ve done my work. I’ve done the work. I’ve done enough work that I can hang out in the shadows, on the periphery of social circles, and observe like a scientist would.