Personal Hygiene is Hard When You're Autistic.

In the past I had water that was so hard it really hurted me.

watching this video to procrastinate taking a shower

It's very relatable, I always thought it was just me.

I love this rant 💕 You crack me up 😂 I have felt the same way, not feeling like I want to shower. I live in a hot climate tho so I’ve overcome my shower hesitancy by making my bathroom really beautiful with salt lamp and candle, my favourite body bars, cosy towel. And even tho the rest of my house is messy af, I try to always keep the bathroom clean and smelling gorgeous with essential oils. It’s a sensory pleasure for me then 💕👃🕯🪔

It was good that you raised the point about clothes and personal hygiene as it's so easily overlooked. Showering and cleaning the body is obviously important but it becomes pointless if someone then puts on stale / over-worn or dirty clothes. I've made this mistake and perhaps as autists we tend to focus too much on one thing such as showering and overlook that personal hygiene is about other things as well such as wearing fresh clothes. Not changing when we're at home and away from other people is fairly harmless but a bad idea if we're in company. If the issue is with getting attached to a particular item of clothing such as a shirt / top it's a good idea to buy an extra one or even have several of the same brand / design.

That not being able to transition on things... thing - that's something I've ended up explaining as executive dysfunction, personally. Specifically task initiation just being broken for me, and getting worse as time goes on. Every time I try to explain it to someone who doesn't have it, no matter their apparent level of qualification and experience with neurodivergent people, they look at me like I just grew antennae and say something like "oh, so you just don't want to do it/you lack motivation" and just... asdfghjkl! No. Maybe explaining it the way you do is something I'll have more luck with, fingers crossed.

This is like watching my own brain go on a rant about showers. I feel so seen

I tried recently to explain to a pip interview how getting a shower is a full day of planning and execution for me... She just didn't get what I was saying. I would have to take a full ten mins just explaining what executive functioning is first! NTs think I'm lazy or idle or something negative. I began to believe them so thank you for letting me know that I'm not alone. Also love having someone who is just like me, be actually from (quite near) where I live is awesome

Yes...I struggle with this. Its been maybe..4 days? I walk my son to the bus stop in the clothes I slept in some days. But when I'm in the shower, I actually love it. But I want the bathroom to be clean before I shower. Its too hard to be autistic with children to clean up after. So funny when you talk about order! I agree. I do that with seasons. Very very dangerous for me.

This mindset went unchecked in me for my whole life

The shower is a sensory nightmare for me..,but it a part of my morning routine ,so...

Thank you for this video. I’m trying to help my niece figure out personal hygiene and I can see it from her perspective now.

I quite like showering actually. I like it just lukewarm, and fairly low flow. I have my own bathroom and I can just be there away from the world. I could stay in the shower for ages. I don't like soap though - it dries my skin, and smells. Same goes for shampoo and the like. I just use something soap-free and unscented if I need it. Perfumes like cologne etc are a real assault on my senses. I don't use them and I would really rather others didn't slap them on either. There are few things worse than being stuck at close quarters - in a lift for example - with someone who has liberally applied the eau de toilette. There's only so long that I can hold my breath! I also hate air "fresheners" and all the other products designed to mask smells with other smells. I guess I have a particularly sensitive nose - I can recognise people by their smell, and I pick up scents like animals and different plants when I'm outdoors. Spray some air freshener around though and I'm like an insect hit with bug spray 😞. I am really conscious of being fresh and cleanly dressed when out among people. It is a bit of a battle really. If left to my own devices I do tend to wear the same comfy things for days, but I learned long ago that people really will notice if you are grotty or smelly. I don't want that sort of notice.

I have both autism and ADHD and here's what I noticed while watching. You might have a touch of ADHD. I personally noticed that my autistic brain wants/craves routine, structure and nothing to change. So I'll do that thing (be it a food, smell, etc) routinely for so long that the stimulation fades and my ADHD brain kicks in and "ok, bored, next!" It's a struggle fr. I spend so might time fighting myself on the most stupid shit lol.

Taking a shower just takes ages with me how can people take a quick shower just 5 minutes I just can' t.

A good and important topic to explore. To my shame when I was young I had virtually no awareness of personal hygiene and I shudder to think what the results were. This was due to lack of self-awareness rather than sensory issues. Strangely I rarely had comments about it but I am still grateful to a couple of people who pointed out things that I had to do. I feel annoyed in retrospect that more people didn't do this - maybe they thought they were being tactful but to let someone persist with such problems for the sake of "not embarrassing them" is counter-productive. I must stress here it's never right for others to make abusive comments or ridicule someone with hygiene problems, scruffiness, etc, but it should be pointed out supportively for that person's benefit. Maybe I was just seen though as "too strange / weird" to be worth telling. As an adult though I became painfully aware of all kinds of personal defects. Some of these are difficult or impossible to change but ones related to personal hygiene are much easier to rectify. I agree with you that people need guidance and it should never be assumed that everyone knows how to look after themselves or that some tasks are so simple they don't need explanation; you're right that videos on such things are a great help.

I hate showers as well. The scrubbing, having been helped as a teenager sometimes, the vulnerability of nudity...the only reason I shower is because I get filthy and that freaks me out unless I shower.

I couldn’t close my eyes in the shower for years because I was scared something might be there when I opened my eyes. But now I live alone and I close my eyes just fine, I even forget I’m in the shower 😅. Was probably just scared of one of my sisters jump scaring me 😂

I love that you shared this! I totally relate all of that. Difficult topic to discuss. I've been struggling with and analyzing it trying to figure out the why in hopes to turn around my losing battle of late and it was really helpful coming across this video. Thank you so much!

As regards showering I find all the before and after routines a chore but I actually enjoy being in the shower, particularly in cold weather when it's one of only two places (alongside bed) where I feel warm and comfortable! I am generally very slow in all these things and admire all those people who it seems can go from bed, brushing teeth, getting showered and ready and out of the house within minutes it seems and still look (and smell) good!