21yo Autistic Adult in India: Trapped with family I suspect aren't mine. Need real help/peers.
Hi everyone. I am a 21-year-old adult living in India, and I am autistic. I am looking for advice, guidance, or to connect with anyone who can help me navigate a highly complex and stressful family situation.
Based on physical evidence, childhood trauma, and deep behavioral patterns, I have strong reasons to believe that the people raising me are not my biological parents, and that the woman raising me is not my biological mother.
Around age 12, I started getting strong thoughts about adoption. I felt completely out of place, experienced a strange sense of nostalgia, and realized I am wired totally differently from everyone else in the house.
I look entirely different from my family. I have a high-bridged, sharp nasal structure and chiseled jawline, while both parents have flat and recessed features. My skin tone is also an extreme contrast to the rest of my family.
As an infant, I would cry every single night and completely reject the mother, showing a total lack of early bonding.
My dad explicitly asked me, "Do you think we adopted you?" It felt like a high-stress probe to test if I knew anything, rather than a joke.
No matter how hard I try, I cannot see the woman raising me as my mother. All I see is just some woman or a nanny. I have never felt her like a mother. If I have to cry, I would choose a pillow over her every single time.
I cannot safely do a DNA test right now while living under their roof, and dealing with this environment while masking my autism is exhausting
I am looking for anyone—especially other Indians or adult adoptees—who can offer advice on how to handle this safely, or how to connect with people who can help me find a way forward i am in south india. Please comment or DM me directly. Thank you.
This is a throwaway account. I am incredibly scared of my safety and retaliation if my family finds this post. I am using a completely anonymous profile.