The reason I ask is because I have been struggling with socializing my whole life. While not autistic, I have lots of shyness and anxiety ever since I was a kid, got a bit bullied in high school, cared too much about what other people thought. Even in my early 30s now this is still a huge problem, because I have become a pretty avoidant person and other people perceive this as lack of initiative, bad work ethic, etc. I also wake up every day replaying any 1 of 100s of bad social experiences in the past, where I said something I shouldn't have impulsively and made things embarassing or awkward, or how I mishandled some friendship.
So its as if I base my whole identity off how well I'm maintaining my personal relationships, literally rewrite Whatsapp messages the more I am not close with someone (should I end the sentence with a period or 'lol'? Is the frequency of these emojis too much? Yeah its that extreme).
When I read your comment, I just get the impression that though you lost all of it, you were able to somehow transform yourself after. How?! If I were in your shoes, I would literally be watching YouTube videos about social skills, and think that "if I can't get this social thing down, I'll never be able to survive at a job". Please break my brain.