Adolescence is a time of life that generates discomfort for most people. Bodily changes, identity development, socialization with peers are some of the aspects that can cause doubts and conflicts. For people on the autistic spectrum, the phase can also be troubled and has particularities.
The beginning of the 1st year of high school for Amanda Gabrielle Campos Cabral, 15, coincided with the period of discovery of autism. “I would look around and think, ‘Man, everyone is going to think I’m weird.’ Because I already knew that the guys had a bit of prejudice ”, she says. Fear of judgment meant that the diagnosis was shared with a few colleagues at the elementary school where she studied until 2022.
Now attending high school at a vocational school, little by little Gabrielle seeks to make new friends. “It is very difficult to socialize. I always have it in my head that people don’t like me. Since I was about seven years old, people had teased me and I started to have a lot of insecurities”, she recalls. Despite the fact that she already had the understanding that she related to the world in a different way, making friends in childhood was easier for the young woman.
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Child and adolescent psychotherapist Anna Beatriz Gomes explains that people on the autistic spectrum have very different experiences during this period, some with more or less difficulty in socializing. The need to fit in with groups and seek to better understand one’s identity as an individual is an important part of adolescence that can be complex for autistic people.
“Many times the need for a group will not be understood, they will not identify with a specific group. The autistic person may have this difficulty in bonding, in perceiving himself, in identifying what he wants and what he does not want”, says the professional.
It is also during adolescence that autistic people can begin to realize what it is like to be neurodivergent within society. “It is very important that this identity be placed, that encourages self-perception as an autistic person”, says Beatriz. For her, this even influences the fight for rights, which even today is more played out by family members and health professionals than by the people who are on the spectrum.
Therefore, working on acceptance of the diagnosis is one of the ways to help autistic adolescents to deal with the diversity of ways of existing in the world. “It’s also not because you’re different that people can judge you, that you have to judge yourself. Being different is good”, says Gabrielle.
The psychologist reports that the internet context currently allows teenagers to have more information about mental health issues, giving more opportunities for the person to understand signs of autism, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), symptoms of anxiety, between others. As a result, it also became more common for young people to seek psychological support.
“When we realize that we are different, it can often scare us. However, if we observe that the person perceives himself to be different and accepts himself, the family encourages this and he is in a favorable context to understand himself as an autistic person, it will bring many benefits to the issue of self-esteem”, says Beatriz. Without the necessary psychological and emotional help, some neurodivergent people may find it more difficult to accept themselves and develop comorbidities, such as anxiety and depression.
Search for similar people
It was only in college that Carolina de Souza Ribeiro, 19, was able to find people with the same tastes as her, like games and anime. The third-semester Computer Science student at Unifor was diagnosed with autism at age 10. “Unfortunately, I never had many people in the real world who shared most of my interests,” she says. As a teenager, socializing was not so simple and Carolina tried to make friends outside of school, on the internet.
Gabrielle also looked online for people who were as into Kpop as she was, but who were also autistic. She even joined a Discord messaging app community to try to socialize. “I thought ‘I’ll find someone, a group so I can understand myself better’. But the group did not answer me. I needed to find someone just like me, but I ended up not finding it. I think it will be very difficult”, says the teenager.
“It’s that thing every young person does. Our way of looking for friends is naturally by identification. I observe that my autistic patients identify more with people who are also neurodiverse”, says the psychologist.
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