They didn’t burn me out. They harvested me.

Their ruthless expectation for me to mask didn’t just burn me out. It reached inside me and scraped out everything that made me me. My voice, my joy, my safety, my goddamn identity. And I let them. Because I thought it was love. I thought it was respect. I thought it was what you’re supposed to do to survive.

What do you call it when people clap for your pain? When they smile at your trauma because you hid it well enough to make them comfortable? When your ability to die quietly is mistaken for strength?

I was “high-functioning” I was the “inspiration.” The “you don’t look autistic” poster child. You know what that means? It means I learned how to cry without sound. It means I could sit in a room full of people and bleed invisibly. It means I smiled through my own erasure.

This wasn’t burnout. This was euthanasia by accommodation. Death by a thousand polite interactions. I didn’t explode. I evaporated.

They didn’t break me. They trained me to break myself so they could stay comfortable.

And when the pieces finally scattered, they asked me why I made such a mess.

If this hit you in the gut, say something. I want to know I’m not the only one who bled for their comfort. Tell me your story