u/riminski_

I’m watching this show for the first time (was way too young for it when it aired) with a friend of mine, and I’m blown away by all of it.

As someone who’s in recovery from alcohol addiction, I’m also just in awe at how well-written Leo is. His monologues on addiction have been shared with me by the amazing friend I’m watching with, and it’s like someone copy-and-pasted my own thoughts and put them on paper. I carry a lot of shame around my addiction and how I never have the “willpower” to stop thinking about drinking. Leo’s “smart and stupid” monologue is imprinting itself inside of my brain as I type this, hoping it’ll make a difference.

I’m really struggling right now (still sober!), and I’ve been watching this show every night to get some form of escapism from my brain as I wait for an inpatient bed.

So thanks, West Wing writers and John Spencer, for just “getting it.”

I (22F) have parents who just downright dislike me, and I’m willing to bet anything it’s because of my autism.

My mother is the parent who dislikes me most, although my dad also wouldn’t piss on me if I was on fire. She has chronically bad moods and has endless rude and/or passive aggressive things to say about me, and I’m the target of most of them because I live with them. She has a ton of NPD/undiagnosed autistic traits, but I don’t want to diagnose her because I feel vastly unqualified to do it, and because she does plenty of amazing things, too, such as house me, help feed me, and does a few extracurricular things with me that she pays for. Every therapist I’ve had has described her as “some form of abusive”, if not downright abusive, but I feel like it’s all my fault, and it probably contributes to her stress and her hatred of therapists, even though she sees one herself. I love her dearly, and I try so hard to make her busy and stressful life easier (she also works full-time and suffers from chronic pain, which doesn’t help her moods), but nothing I do seems to ever be good enough.

I wonder if this is an autism thing. DAE have parents like this?