CW: ableism (I think)
I've been recovering from/experiencing burnout symptoms for the majority of the last couple years. It definitely messed with my relationships and life in general to the point where some people were really confused and put off by my behavior. I've been isolating myself a lot and been kinda flaky with showing up to events or hang outs because I just haven't had the energy. I didn't really explain or offer reasons for my actions. I've just had no energy, no capacity to deal with life, let alone social situations.
Well, an old friend who's been going to therapy weekly for who knows how long basically confronted me the other day saying that I needed to 'get help', go on meds, or 'fix whatever the hell is going on' with me because I was starting to seem agoraphobic or severely depressed and 'overly obsessed with covid' (because I still mask when in public and large groups) and that they'd spoken to their therapist about me, who apparently suggested those terms to describe me...almost like the therapist made a second-hand diagnosis of me or something. I am AuDHD. They know I'm neurodivergent. I guess Autistic burnout is something completely foreign to both of them, because I'm a walking info graphic on burnout and it's notable symptoms.
I need space to recoup my very tiny battery, I get overwhelmed by too much stimuli, I've had deteriorating executive function, struggled to communicate, and just do life stuff some days. I told them I was burnt out, and they never responded. I guess it's been annoying enough for this person to talk to their therapist at length about what's wrong with me, which makes me feel fucking weird.
Idk what I'm expecting by posting this. I guess I'm wondering if anyone has experienced something like this and maybe have advice on what to say to this person, who I thought understood that I was ND and struggling with everything? How the fuck do I even begin to counter those weird accusations and the low-key aggressive way that they approached me with this? I was so flabbergasted I just didn't respond. And now I can't stop thinking about it.
I'd get really icy over someone doing this to me.
At best it comes from a place of good intentions but there's a fair chance that it comes from a different place as well. As your chronic auDHD burnout buddy, I can assure you that I've had people pull similar shit on me because they either want their free resource to start working consistently again or they feel latent discomfort/helplessness about being confronted by my own circumstances and, instead of owning that and dealing with their own emotional reaction to it, they project it out onto me and demand that I start doing x and y so they don't have to experience that discomfort or helplessness anymore. Which is really selfish, although not uncommon, and I'm going to liken it to when someone misgenders a trans person and makes a big production out of apologizing which, ironically, creates a whole lot of additional emotional labor for the aggrieved party - if you misgender someone then the last thing you should be doing is centering your own discomfort and essentially forcing forgiveness out of the person you misgendered; don't go putting more on someone else's plate while you convince yourself that you're doing the right thing and that you're helping them. That's a very self-centered attitude.
I think I'd tell them that I don't take kindly to the presumption that I'm not already doing everything that I can, that they know my circumstances better than I do, and that although I'm not opposed to them talking to their therapist about me if it's about navigating their own stuff like emotions, boundaries, and our friendship, I am very disappointed that they are conveying what they assume are my symptoms to their therapist on my behalf without my consent (which is tantamount to gossip) and that I'm even more disappointed that their therapist saw fit to diagnose me in absentia, that this was very poorly handled by their therapist, and it feels like a violation of their professional ethics.
This would likely burn a bridge but, honestly, I don't have the time or the energy for that shit (see above re: chronic burnout) so if that's gonna burn that bridge then I take a "so be it" position. A therapist should know much better than to dive headlong into triangulation and to be so careless about it, even if that's not what is going on here (not that they have the ability to know the truth of it). It's extremely reckless of them.
Caveat to say that, clearly, I'm bringing in a ton of my own emotional baggage into this discussion right now and that's coloring my response to it so take what I've said with a good pinch of salt and maybe run it by someone else who is trustworthy and has good emotional awareness before you go agreeing with what I've said here because I'm very much in my feelings on this topic.
You have very succinctly pinpointed my feelings on this, and expressed it far better than I ever could. I am feeling really put off by this person because of this, to the point where I'm starting to question whether they've really been a friend to me all this time, or if they've only been accepting of my masked self rather than my true self. Appreciate you sharing, and I hope you're doing okay with your burnout, too. I'm going to give myself some time to think about how I want to approach this going forward.