Venting growing up with a brother with autism

[ihateittoo]

I have an older brother who is 2 years older(hes 20 turns 21 in august) than me and he struggles with autism. In recent times autism has become a more broad term as more people identify with the label, but in this case I mean a heavier amount than most. He went to a regular high school(a private one, but not one for special needs) and is capable of many things however has found it hard to grow into an independent adult. He will often struggle to take showers regularly, doesn't do his own laundry and things of that nature. I say this just to give you a rough idea on the level of autism he deals with as its important to the story.

My brother used to very heavily beat me for a lot of my childhood. As far back as I can remember he would be incredibly physically violent to me. When I was around 5 he slammed my head into a fridge. Another time he sat on top of me, spat on my face, eyes, and mouth and a list of more. The normal beating mostly just consisted of me curled up on the floor while he would relentlessly punch me, mostly my arms or torso. These would typically happen after some kind of minor argument that normal siblings had. A lot of this was brushed off as "normal brotherly behavior"(I at the time had not transitioned into a woman yet, I started that around the time I turned 17). It stopped about the time covid hit but it is still something I think about and it bothers me.

My brother always took up all of my parents attention, specifically when I growing up, because at the time no one could figure out what was wrong with him when we were growing up. It took a long time to get an autism diagnosis and for all my childhood we were told it was just a bad case of ADHD, or maybe it was bipolar, my grandma thought he was a schizoid. All that to say we didn't know what was wrong because at the time autism was sort of viewed as a "down syndrome lite". He would throw tantrums very frequently, both in private and in public. A LOT of his tantrums came from video games. He used to play geometry dash and when he would die in the game he would slam his desk and yell very loud which was very stressful to hear. He would yell things about how worthless he was and how he should just kill himself, which are things he still does today in some fashion. He would also argue a lot with my parents, mainly when he started high school. He would tell my dad to kill himself while yelling at the top of his lungs in the room right next to me. These loud verbal arguments were pretty common for me and they would always deeply bother me.

One night my brother left his computer on, as he always does(he hasn't turned it off voluntarily in probably 2 years because apparently it takes too long to boot up) during a thunder storm and the power went off and when it went turned back on his computer had blue screened. He absolutely lost his mind(I would be upset too) and was yelling at my mom telling her to fix it. I at the time(i was in about 9th grade at the time) was on a VC with some friends when I got fed up and went to his room and yelled at him that he needs to stop yelling and act his age. I obviously should not have yelled at him and I of course regret it a lot, but he stormed out of the room and I fixed the computer for him(it wasnt a perma blue screen, it was just the one that comes up and restarts your computer i hope someone knows what I mean). My mom was freaking out and telling me that he was trying to CTB and that it was because I had yelled at him and they were thinking they may have to call the police. I don't think my brother has, or will make a serious attempt on his life as im sure a lot of people here know, CTB is HARD and SI is a bitch.

He got accepted into his dream college that had an incredible program for the field he was going into(game design). It was out of state and decently far away from us(requires a short flight to visit). Something that I do not like that my parents did was helping him on almost all of his homework throughout all of high school, specfically my mom. My mom is very much a control freak and her "help" mostly ended up being her doing the work for him and letting him skim through it and trying to roughly explain it to him. He never really did any assigments on his own to my knowledge and never built his own independence, where I was forced to because he took up so much of the attention. So when he got to college he struggled a good bit. He ended up calling my parents for help on his homework and they would stay on the phone for hours while he worked. My brother never made a single friend at college as in his words "humans are inherintly evil and 99% of the population sucks" so me, my mom, and my dad are the only people he ever really talks to. He ended up "taking medical leave for depression" during his second semester(or the end of first) which sent him back home early. He did this because he was spiraling freaking out about grades or something of that nature. He certainly could have passed his semester, or at the very least made the credits up later. He was very far from screwed until he screwed himself. He went back the next year and the same thing happened. It upsets me to see him throw his life away like this. I do not doubt that he is depressed, he is practically a NEET right now which is depressing for anyone. But he certainly overexaggerates it in my eyes. I know depression looks different in everyone, but he doesn't exhibit many symptoms of depression outwardly. When I was at my most depressed ALL I did was lay in bed, I barely ate, I would skip school all the time, I had absolutely no energy at all and could do nothing. I wasnt spending my days playing video games and laughing at youtube while doordashing chick fil a all day every day. I know some people struggle more inwardly, but with the level of depression that he was claiming it would have certainly been at least slighlty more noticeable.

Nowadays we have an alright relationship. I take him out to lunch, or to go to guitar center, pretty much an errand im running ill invite him because I think it's good to get him out of the house. He produces music at home and will record vocals very loudly at like 9:30am which annoys me a lot. This is mainly because he has never learned how to sing and it mostly consists of off pitch sort of yell singing. It is not pleasant to hear in the morning, and even with the heavy autotune I think it still needs a bit of work. He goes on these long winded rants that makes talking as a family hard. I want to have more mature conversations with my parents but all my brother ever really wants to talk about is how much he hates AI(i hate it too but he needs to learn when to quit) or music that he likes. My brother rarely if ever asks how im doing, how my shift was or things like that. But he always has time to tell me he didn't like the new YHWH Nailgun album cause it was too short(hes wrong the album is great).

 

[SASU-KE]

You seem like a good sibling to your brother. It's nice that your relationship these days is normal. He's lucky to have you.

When he used to be that violent as a kid though, didn't your parents step in?

 

[ihateittoo]

When he used to be that violent as a kid though, didn't your parents step in?

They did on some occasions, but during summer break they would be working and we were left with a babysitter and she would not step in. It happened almost always in the basement of my house so no one would see it. My brother would get punished, mostly just not being allowed to play video games for a week or two. I talked to my dad about it recently and he told me he never knew it was that bad when our babysitter would mention that we got into a fight. Most times no one saw it happening, they only had my word to go off of. So I figure they assumed that I was just being a kid and exaggerating.

 

[Forever Sleep]

I really admire you for not resenting him more to be honest. I realise it isn't his fault and that he must struggle enormously but, this must have deeply affected all of your lives.

 

[Sleepwalkuntilsane]

Sorry for posting on a dead thread, but it feels almost uncanny how many things me and your brother had in common. I am also an autistic guy who has an august birthday (!) I think I'm pretty much exactly one year younger than your brother. I didn't get diagnosed until senior year in highschool (ADHD as well), and my parents were very 'sink or swim' in terms of my grades and mental health. I also have a sister (fraternal twin). I had to come back home from college after one semester but I was able to do a transfer application to one closer to my house to save credits. I want to say thank you. My sister legitimately saved my life throughout middle and high school (we went to the same school), and I think I would either be dead or even more of a mess without her. She has her own problems and since she goes to college out of state we don't talk as much but we are still very close. About your brother, sharing my perspective as an autistic person, I don't think we had the same problems. I never got physical or mad with people (I instead mostly broke down into tears), but I do understand the self-isolation and anger, it was very hard to interact in a world where it seemed like others couldn't understand you and wanted you to be hurt. I have been getting better through a combination of meds and therapy, but I still struggle with making friends and talking to anybody that isn't online or in my immediate family. Holding down my job is hard for me, and doing summer school drains my social battery. It is good that you are getting him out of the house, in my perspective it gets worse when you are stuck in one spot. In college I didn't keep up with personal hygiene because I was so sad and listless all of the time, but joining clubs helped a little and got me through finals. Again, I just want to say thank you, I never could have made any progress without my sister, and I see my relationship with her reflected alot with you and your brother. I'm sorry you went through being a kid with him like that, no one deserves that and while being autistic makes emotional regulation harder for some people it doesn't excuse being a violent person and a bad brother. I hope your relationship with him continues to improve.

 

[Give Up The Ghost]

Dude I'm sorry you went through all that. It's tough growing up with an autistic sibling. One thing I really felt was that he was never on my side. He could never understand family dynamics, so he'd never help me out, even if he wanted to. Plus, he was diagnosed pretty young so got a lot of attention and support, whereas I only got diagnosed (ADHD, not autism but still neurodivergent) in adult life. Even now, I'm seen as the 'well-child' who has to be responsible and pay rent whereas he can get away with doing nothing. Not that it's easy for him, he has challenges ofc, it's just tough growing up alongside him

 

[Hystearical]

Sorry for reviving this thread again but I came across it. To be honest I didn't just came across but it took a bit to come back to reply to it.

To be honest I found this post upsetting. I found it upsetting as an autistic person to see in *this* place someone "venting" about the source of my pain and the primary reason I ended up here....but not because they suffer from it too (such posts there have been plenty of) but rather because someone else in their life suffers from it and thereby has caused them distress.

That couldn't help but sting and I think you can understand that. if someone posted a vent about a trans relative and the trouble that person has caused them by virtue of being trans, I imagine you would feel similarly bad.

It also felt bad because I am the autistic one of a set of identical twins, which is probably the most complicated allistic-autistic sibling dynamic there is. We have pretty much zero relationship now as that difference between us essentially has made a relationship impossible for various reasons. I know in the past considered me burdensome. I know hoe I am seen by people in my family's orbit.

BUT

BUT

It doesn't elude me at all that autistic people can be difficult and unpleasant to deal with, much more when it's a relative.

I have seen similar complaints to yours made my other people, here and elsewhere, people who had siblings with autism or some other pronounced disability. The disabled sibling would monopolize the parents' attention and interest to the neglect of the abled sibling's own needs and desires or responsibility for the disabled sibling would inappropriately be foisted onto the abled sibling.

I can appreciate that is a difficult situation and maybe what the abled sibling has to endure doesn't get enough appreciation. It sounds like your parents may be particularly guilty of that especially with enabling the physical abuse. I don't blame you for still feeling bothered by that especially if he never took responsibility for it later in life.

I have an older brother who is 2 years older(hes 20 turns 21 in august) than me and he struggles with autism. In recent times autism has become a more broad term as more people identify with the label, but in this case I mean a heavier amount than most.

All that to say we didn't know what was wrong because at the time autism was sort of viewed as a "down syndrome lite".

Casual self-diagnosis without true rigor definitely has cheapened what it means to claim autism. "Down syndrome lite" or however you want to phrase it was more of a thing decades past and what would have been called "Asperger's" or "HFA" would have been known before your brother would as born. The truth is that huge swathes of the mental health industry are not very fluent in autism and diagnosis is often a shitshow. It doesn't help that a lot of problems associated with autism are if not impervious to treatment, then pretty damn close.

I do not doubt that he is depressed, he is practically a NEET right now which is depressing for anyone. But he certainly overexaggerates it in my eyes. I know depression looks different in everyone, but he doesn't exhibit many symptoms of depression outwardly. When I was at my most depressed ALL I did was lay in bed, I barely ate, I would skip school all the time, I had absolutely no energy at all and could do nothing. I wasnt spending my days playing video games and laughing at youtube while doordashing chick fil a all day every day. I know some people struggle more inwardly, but with the level of depression that he was claiming it would have certainly been at least slighlty more noticeable

Bear in mind that a lot of autistic people can have trouble expressing how they feel. And most likely there is more than just "depression" at play here. Executive dysfunction snd trouble with self-activation, difficulty pivoting around life, emotional and sensory overload, avoidance behaviors...these are all classic problems of autism. And they certainly make it much harder to "get yourself together". That isn't is to completely absolve someone of personal responsibility because there is generally always at least some of that circumstances, no matter how painful, can't strip someone of. But still.

Nowadays we have an alright relationship. I take him out to lunch, or to go to guitar center, pretty much an errand im running ill invite him because I think it's good to get him out of the house. He produces music at home and will record vocals very loudly at like 9:30am which annoys me a lot. This is mainly because he has never learned how to sing and it mostly consists of off pitch sort of yell singing. It is not pleasant to hear in the morning, and even with the heavy autotune I think it still needs a bit of work. He goes on these long winded rants that makes talking as a family hard. I want to have more mature conversations with my parents but all my brother ever really wants to talk about is how much he hates AI(i hate it too but he needs to learn when to quit) or music that he likes. My brother rarely if ever asks how im doing, how my shift was or things like that. But he always has time to tell me he didn't like the new YHWH Nailgun album cause it was too short(hes wrong the album is great).

Well it's understandable to find those behaviors annoying. Autistic people, especially younger ones, broadly have trouble *intuiting* things in the way the NT majority takes for granted, but assuming they're of regular intelligence at least, they shouldn't have trouble *understanding* once things have been laid out plainly to them (i.e. you singing loudly in the morning bothers me, please refrain). Though it can still take time to really sink in and effect a behavioral change.

___________


Autism is difficult. It is hard. It makes life so much harder than otherwise and if you spend more time here you will find that autistic people are very disproportionately represented here, on a suicide forum, for good reason. As you can see I've been a while and I've seen a fair number of autistic people make confirmed exits.

But the unpleasant things you have been forced to endure certainly matter. And I'll phrase this generally. Someone in your position doesn't always have to be bursting with compassion, patience, and empathy for someone in your brother's position (and in York specific case, perhaps there is a limit to how much of those things he is entitled to!. But they should at least to try to understand what the other people is dealing with and take that into full consideration. And I intentionally phrased that generally because it does sound like that is what you are already doing.

And of course there is the obvious fact that you chose to come to this site to share your story and express your feelings. So you must be dealing with heavy stuff personally too. You probably already know this but if you're struggling it's okay to focus on helping yourself even if your brother is floundering.

 

[neurotoxic]

I sympathize with OP a lot, reading the beginning of the post at first it was like reading about my childhood experiences with my brother, but you definitely did more to preserve your relationship with your brother than I did with mine. My brother and I both have high functioning ASD, but he was never made to manage his aggression and he was coddled more, so he never became independent or functional. It really does take all the attention away from you while growing up, and in my case it was pretty hard not to resent him for that. When our dad passed away, he did nothing to help in the aftermath of that or with caring for our mom. He just played video games all day. When the house had to be sold eventually to pay for her care, I didn't hesitate to kick him out. I hold him responsible for his behvaior because despite his struggles hes still an intelligent adult, and if I've learned anything from having to function with ASD myself and from working with kids with ASD, using the disorder as an excuse for aggression in high functioning individuals is bad for them and everyone else.

 

[ihateittoo]

Sorry for reviving this thread again but I came across it. To be honest I didn't just came across but it took a bit to come back to reply to it.

To be honest I found this post upsetting. I found it upsetting as an autistic person to see in *this* place someone "venting" about the source of my pain and the primary reason I ended up here....but not because they suffer from it too (such posts there have been plenty of) but rather because someone else in their life suffers from it and thereby has caused them distress.

this is a vent about my personal experience and is not meant to comment on autism in general. autism runs in my family and i am on the specturm as well, just much less than my brother.

That couldn't help but sting and I think you can understand that. if someone posted a vent about a trans relative and the trouble that person has caused them by virtue of being trans, I imagine you would feel similarly bad.

i understand that having a trans family member can be hard and is not easy on people around them. i have read posts from spouses talking negatively talking about having a parter transition and how it can be upsetting and generally feel sympathy towards the spouse. It must be hard to have your husband suddenly say they are a woman, espically if it has been a long marriage. I can understand that peoples situations can be negatively impacted by labels I identify with but that doesn't change the fact theyre feeling are real. Even if it were upsetting they still have a right to be upset.

Bear in mind that a lot of autistic people can have trouble expressing how they feel. And most likely there is more than just "depression" at play here. Executive dysfunction snd trouble with self-activation, difficulty pivoting around life, emotional and sensory overload, avoidance behaviors...these are all classic problems of autism. And they certainly make it much harder to "get yourself together". That isn't is to completely absolve someone of personal responsibility because there is generally always at least some of that circumstances, no matter how painful, can't strip someone of. But still.

I understand this because I have a good understanding of autism. Do you think im stupid? I know he isnt going to be able to just "pull himself up by his bootstraps".

Well it's understandable to find those behaviors annoying. Autistic people, especially younger ones, broadly have trouble *intuiting* things in the way the NT majority takes for granted, but assuming they're of regular intelligence at least, they shouldn't have trouble *understanding* once things have been laid out plainly to them (i.e. you singing loudly in the morning bothers me, please refrain). Though it can still take time to really sink in and effect a behavioral change.

He understands that the singing bothers the house as he has stated he's aware its loud multiple times. The reason I dont tell him to stop is because I am willing to put up with it because I love him and dont want to embaress him. He has meltdowns a lot and if putting up with some loud not so good singing means everyone can stay happy I will put up with it. I just need this space to vent my frustrations because ultimately it is hard.

And of course there is the obvious fact that you chose to come to this site to share your story and express your feelings. So you must be dealing with heavy stuff personally too. You probably already know this but if you're struggling it's okay to focus on helping yourself even if your brother is floundering.

to be honest your reply kinda bugged me. im sorry if my post bothered you but theres a time and place to express that and i dont feel like this is the place, if we were friends and I had texted this to you I would understand, but we are strangers on the internet on a suicide forum. Your reply feels like its trying to make me feel as if I've done something wrong. Sometimes you just have to let a post upset you and keep scrolling.

 

[Hystearical]

to be honest your reply kinda bugged me. im sorry if my post bothered you but theres a time and place to express that and i dont feel like this is the place, if we were friends and I had texted this to you I would understand, but we are strangers on the internet on a suicide forum. Your reply feels like its trying to make me feel as if I've done something wrong. Sometimes you just have to let a post upset you and keep scrolling.

I'm very sorry for irritating you. No you really didn't do anything wrong or anything that you shouldn't have done regardless of my or anyone's feelings. I had been in a certain emotional state with its frustration and desperation and coupled with some self-identification in the topic of the thread it was just a little jarring to encounter on this site but that's not your problem or anything reflective of you and you're right I should have kept anything that came up emotionally to myself and and dealt with it alone and not intruded on your vent. Lately my frustration I mentioned has led me to speak out in ways online that I would have not before probably especially when it comes to autism even if it's unwise or unfruitful and my reply to you wasn't exactly those things.

No I don't think you are stupid. You didn't say or hint you were also on the spectrum and so it wasn't clear what you understood though and I apologize for the unsolicited advice or insight you didn't need. Some of that was due to personal projection from lack of fundamental understanding I've encountered personally but again that's not your problem or anything to do with you.

And you have a right to how you feel about these difficulties; I tried to emphasize that but in any case I didn't mean to suggest in any way that you didn't. And you're entitled to want to voice your feelings even though my comment made it seem like you didn't.

Sorry.