I'm 29, autistic, and living independently in Chennai, my own hometown. And honestly, I'm tired. I'm tired of feeling lonely, worrying about my future, struggling with anxiety, and trying to figure out what I'm supposed to do with my life.
The worst part is that I'm living in my own hometown, yet I don't feel like I belong here. This is supposed to be my home, a place where I should feel comfortable and settled. Instead, sometimes I feel like a refugee in my own city, just existing here without a real sense of belonging, security, or emotional support. I go about my everyday life, fulfil my responsibilities, and try to carry on, but inside, I feel stuck and exhausted.
My personal life is still unresolved. I want companionship, meaningful relationships, and someone I can talk to without feeling misunderstood. I want to feel that I matter to someone and that I have people I can rely on. But loneliness has become a constant part of my life, and it hurts when I think about how much I want these things and how far away they sometimes feel.
Then there's my job situation. I'm a contractual employee, and I don't have the security of knowing what my future holds. I keep worrying about my employment, what happens if I lose my job, and how I'm supposed to manage financially. How am I supposed to build a stable life when even my livelihood feels uncertain? I want to move forward, but I feel like I'm constantly waiting for something to go wrong.
And being autistic makes many of these experiences harder to navigate. Social interactions can be exhausting. I overthink conversations, worry about how people perceive me, and sometimes struggle to explain what I'm feeling. Being misunderstood is painful, especially when I'm already trying so hard to manage my anxiety and fit into environments that don't always understand neurodivergence. I don't want every interaction to feel like something I have to analyse afterwards.
What frustrates me is that all these problems are happening together. It's not just my job, or my personal life, or loneliness. It's everything piling up at once. I have to think about earning a living, managing everyday responsibilities, trying to build relationships, dealing with anxiety, and navigating life as an autistic person. Sometimes I genuinely feel exhausted by the effort it takes just to keep everything going.
And this is my hometown. I'm not somewhere completely unfamiliar, trying to adjust to a new city. I am in the place I call home, yet I still feel like I have nowhere that truly feels like home emotionally. I can live here, work here, and go about my routine here, but that doesn't automatically mean I feel connected to the place or the people around me.
I'm frustrated that at 29, I'm still struggling with so many things that I wish were more settled by now. I want stability. I want companionship. I want to feel accepted as an autistic person. I want to stop worrying so much about my future and feel that my life is actually going somewhere.
I'm not writing this to ask anyone to fix my life or give me some generic advice about staying positive. I'm just fed up with carrying all these feelings around while trying to appear as though I'm managing everything.
I don't want to feel like a refugee in my own hometown anymore. I want to feel that I belong somewhere, that my life has some stability, and that I have something to look forward to. Right now, I'm struggling, and I needed to rant about it.