7 Reasons Oxford House is a Harmful Environment for Autistic Women

For more information on Oxford House, start here:

https://medium.com/p/247a9554003c

Officially diagnosed or not, if you’re a woman on the autism spectrum, you will probably not do well in the OH environment. I’d love to be wrong about this, but experience and multiple sources have shared otherwise.

For starters, your normal autistic behaviors (sensory sensitivities, stimming, avoiding eye contact, intense interests, directness) will be viewed with suspicion, and you will either be accused of “using” or “showing relapse behavior.”

You WILL get bullied.

The philosophy in recovery communities that are 12 step-infected is very harmful to autistic women. I won’t go into all of the ways that 12-step programs themselves are harmful to those with trauma, but anyone on the spectrum is almost always already traumatized from years of being pressured to fit in with everyone else, being taken advantage of, and being bullied. Add substance misuse to this (as a means of coping) and an autistic person will almost inevitably end up in AA, NA, rehab, or a sober living house due to lack of alternatives in many parts of the country.

I already wrote in a previous article about how harmful OH is for women with PTSD, diagnosed or not, and all of it goes triple for an autistic woman.

So, let’s have a list then, shall we?

1. You will be accused of being drunk, high, hiding something, or untrustworthy all around if you avoid eye contact. If you explain that eye contact is difficult for you, you may be lectured on how wrong you are and instructed to look people in the eye and told that “change is a part of recovery.” You will be called a liar. You will further be told “Look me in the eye when you say it.” As if eye contact when speaking means being truthful.
2. A large number of people in OH have undiagnosed personality disorders, so you will be viewed as “easy prey” for the more sociopathic/psychopathic/narcissistic ones. Women will gossip about you. Everything you do in the house will be the subjects of multiple conversations behind your back.
3. Your honest and sometimes blunt manner of communicating will be viewed as rude, abrasive, “talking like you know everything.” Autistic men get away with this on the regular, but you will not.
4. Your tendency to be nonjudgmental and literal will leave you vulnerable to predation by many of the men who will recognize that you take things at face value. They will exploit this and lie to you with impunity. This puts you at risk for sexual assault and disease.
5. If you try to address any issues with OH leadership, you will be blamed for it, accused of bringing it on yourself because you’re “weird,” and further accusations may follow, depending on the pathology of the person you confide in and of that of your housemates.
6. Your need to be alone and away from noise, bright lights, and strong smells will be viewed as “isolating,” and you will be accused of relapse or told that being alone will make you relapse. If you try to explain that forced interactions are stressful, and that you need solitude to maintain your mental health and to avoid overstimulation, you will be told that you must change your “bad habits” to recover.
7. Asking questions for clarification will make your housemates angry because they will see it as you questioning their “authority.” The same goes for having different hobbies, fashion sense, or perspective. You’ll be accused of thinking you’re better than everyone else.

Unfortunately, there are no real options in much of the USA for autistic women when it comes to sober living. There are still so many misconceptions about autism, especially autism in girls and women. OH isn’t a place where the population is too concerned with learning about others or about non-12-step self-improvement, so they’re likely to remain willfully ignorant.

You’re taking a major risk to your sobriety, sanity, and — dare I say — life by living in one of those houses. If you have any other options, I’d say use them. Sadly, autistic women are usually stuck with no other choice, no support system, and they’re left suffer because of the ignorance and apathy of society and the people in charge of OH.