Autistic people are all too often accused of violating other people's boundaries.
I recently re-learned a lesson the hard way. The reason many Autistics have trouble with boundaries is because too many of us are people pleasers. We surrender our personal self-care to someone who seeks our help, and because so many of us are hyper-empathetic we give into people pleasing without limits on ourselves.
When we fly on a plane, the flight attendants (or now a days there is a video), demonstrating the safety features and instructions of the aircraft. Among the things they say is to put the oxygen mask on yourself, then assist someone else with theirs. Autistic people are pleasers tend to focus on putting the air mask on the other person and forget to put the mask on ourselves. For example, we may take care of someone who is sick for years until at last they pass away. In our grief, and a complete collapse of all of our routines, we start to do self-care and we realize how much oxygen we have deprived ourselves of taking care of the other person. We didn't set good boundaries for ourselves. All of that energy that Autistics often give away to be a people pleaser leads us to burnout. Then setting new boundaries around others becomes a lot more complicated.
People pleasing is the enemy of managing boundaries. And all of that gets stored up in our nervous system, then we might wonder why others are not keeping our new boundaries. We were not able to because we forgot to make and keep boundaries for ourselves. Once we start setting our own boundaries, it can be difficult for others to respect them, because previously we had surrendered them without thinking about it.
There are several episodes of Today's Autistic Moment during which my guests spoke about setting good boundaries and self-care. Go through my list of episodes all the way back to about 2022 and listen to the advice of many about self-care and setting good boundaries.
One of the reasons setting boundaries is so difficult for Neurodivergents is because we want to create them the way that Neurotypical people do. Again, because of our tendency towards people pleasing. Our boundaries are what works for our neuro profile.
Stop being a people pleaser and hold on to your boundaries in any relationship. Make a list on a piece of paper, a notebook, or even on the notes of your smartphone. When you meet someone new, tell them what your boundaries are and check them off for yourself.
You may not be able to control the things that happen in your life, but you can take control of yourself and do what you need to do.
Lastly, be sure you give yourself and others some grace when you people please too much and/or someone walks on our boundaries. Everyone makes mistakes, many of which we make multiple times.
