I hope this is welcome here, as it’s about autistic burnout. Mild CW for swearing and general negativity.
I finally got my diploma, literally just a couple hours ago.
No I’m not bragging because I’m not fucking proud. It wasn’t a fucking accomplishment. I graduated with a 2.8 by the skin of my teeth. My transcript shows a recent downward trend. It took almost double the time; I did two years in four, and I took out loans to live in poverty away from home, just to limp back home to screw up the last semester.
And I fried my brain in the process. I’m not just afraid of getting a new job, but I would be nervous to even go back to the way things used to be. My parents are like “oh you can go back to pizza delivery” but what they don’t seem to grasp is that I can’t even do that anymore. I’ve been having trouble planning to do projects and activities, even things I want to do. My body feels like it permanently changed for the worse. I literally gained a hundred pounds. Taking care of hygiene feels is too tiring to finish. My ability to remember things is absolutely devastated.
It’s not healthy to be on the brink of disaster for so many years.
So far, I have gotten exactly zero interviews after contacting about thirty employers. (Even the simple task of applying for work feels incomprehensibly complex. I’m good with computers, but it’s just so much typing and reading the job descriptions and stuff.) What good is a degree without a job? Congratulations, I know things, but what good is that for me if I starve to death? What good is it if I can’t be at peace or even comfortable? How am I supposed to pay off my loans? None of my professors liked me, I made no friends at school, joined no clubs, did no extracurriculars other than some research that I can’t explain to a recruiter. I have no experience in the field, not even an internship. I don’t have anything to offer an employer [1].
I have already gotten employers bring up the GPA unprompted to reject me for the position. Most engineering firms aren’t interested in students with a GPA < 3. I’ve applied for all sorts of other jobs, but I’m competing with people who actually studied in that field. I have no projects in a state suitable to present on a resumé, and every recent attempt to start a project has gone almost nowhere.
And frankly, I’m not particularly friendly or sociable. I am ice cold, even when I’m trying to be warm. Even when I’m fully prepared for a social situation, I am still autistic, and people will inevitably find me awkward in a bad way. I’m not open about my political views IRL [2], but it’s very difficult to hide my disdain for capitalism and imperialism from people who think they benefit from them [3].
I would be literally thrilled to do a master’s degree in my field, as I read graduate-level material in my spare time, the rare times I have any energy. However, how could I pay for it? How could I convince an employer to pay for it with my transcript and recent downward trajectory? And if I get accepted, how do I even begin to manage that time? I could barely handle the workload of a bachelor’s degree, and I can barely even handle the workload of looking for a job or even cleaning my body.
I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired. I just want to be able to do things like I used to be able to do. I just want to go back to a time when it actually felt good to achieve my goals. If y’all have any similar experiences, advice, or just want to dunk on my situation, I’d really like to hear it.
[1] I’m not seriously shedding a tear over these “poor employers” and how I can’t provide value to them. I don’t give a fuck about them, fractally so. However, the “value I offer to the company” is the lens through which they view my employability, which in turn determines the level of comfort my paycheck yields me or if I get that comfort at all.
[2] I’m not a great rhetorician. If I argue for my views, I will probably make my case look worse. It takes a lot of energy to talk, so my arguments are usually really sloppy when talking in person. For this reason, I’m very careful to look like a “normie.” E.g., you would not peg me for an anarchist if you met me on the street.
[3] I don’t apply for defense contractors, police contractors, or prisons for ethical reasons, mostly ACAB-related. Engineers usually have no conscience of the world outside their field; e.g., a job is a job regardless of how your product gets used. This alone kills so many otherwise excellent job opportunities, and it alienated me from my peers. Turns out that the fash pays well for your integrity.
I want to go into research, like the biomedical research I did at school, but I don’t think I have the grades for that. I became an engineer to do good things with math and science. I’m not giving up on that, but I’m tempering my expectations for sure.
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This is decidedly not advice on how and what job to get (i’m unable myself) …
If you are burned out you need to rest your brain! Seriously, take care of your mental health. Best would peobably be to change environment, into a quiet (natural) environment where it’s required that you physically exercise (walk). Don’t know if you have such a possibility, it’s just what i learned from my burn-out situations, that i needed to move, and especially to move my thoughts away from whatever clogged my brain, and forcing myself to physically move also helped (i’m in a mountaneous environment, though).
You mentioned music making. Could that perhaps help sanitize? Do you play an instrument, or perhaps want to build one (thinking of rather simple things now, like i started to build drums)? Were you ever interested in crafting? Anyway, get plenty of sleep and water.Then, i’m having the idea that you could write up a positive self-assessment. So, not “in what ways do i fail to assimilate” but rather “What sets me apart from most other people which is actually valueable?” – It may be more difficult at a young age, so take your time (think of it as an ongoing process in which you note any idea you have, perhaps over weeks – the thing could develop into a journal after all).
Think of it like this: you have this certain ethical conscience, and that shall actually guide you to your duty you were naturally born to do. I do believe that ND people are here for a purpose in this time and age. … So, imagine there is a company of sorts, or a cooperative, which seeks not just employees but participants. Because that company is set to make this world a better place, and to prepare a better environment for future generations to thrive in. They are pioneers, and so are they pioneering in their way of selecting employees: they will ask you what special value you could bring in, and in which ways you will do stuff differently from most other people, which would help them reach their goal of doing things better. They want to know how you do things and how your mind and conscience works, not what scooling you have endured. They do not ask for your competitiveness, else they could ask anyone else.
As an example, i learned that i am not slow at all, once i got a real friend who could tell me (damned be those class"mates" who bullied me with that shit). – It’s rather that my mind can not as quickly arrive at one single answer because it processes many more options and outcomes than what NT minds would do (well, many of them anyway ;-). That enables me to get a picture of processes that appear complex to others – variables, efficiency, sustainability, future consequences of decisions, and “what if everyone did it like this?” I tend to be hyperactive inside. … I’m sensitive to harmony and dissonance/inbalance, and i see similarities in patterns in action everywhere.
That’s my idea. Don’t know if this could be helpful. Maybe you’ll find that organization to work for which asks for exactly such things in job applications (or they do not ask for applications as usual at all but you rather just pay them a visit). But at the moment, it seems you should take a break.
