# 43: Autism and Liars - Why Dishonesty Feels So Disorienting to Many Autistic People

Why can being lied to feel so profoundly destabilizing for many autistic people?

In this episode, Dr. Allison Sucamele explores the relationship between autism, trust, honesty, pattern recognition, and deception. From hidden social rules and mixed messages to gaslighting, manipulation, and the collapse of certainty, we examine why dishonesty can feel less like discovering a lie and more like having the ground disappear beneath your feet.

Together, we'll discuss the hidden curriculum, the role of consistency in autistic thinking, why contradictions can be so difficult to reconcile, and how repeated deception can impact trust, relationships, and the nervous system. Most importantly, we'll explore what healing looks like, not becoming cynical, but learning to trust yourself, recognize patterns, and develop discernment.

If you've ever found yourself asking, "Why would someone lie?" or questioning your own perceptions after discovering the truth, this episode is for you.

Disclaimer:
Quietly Autistic at Last is intended for educational and informational purposes only and reflects the lived experience and perspectives of one autistic person supported by research. This podcast is not medical, psychological, legal, or mental health advice. Autism presents differently from person to person, and each autistic experience is unique and valid. If you are experiencing a crisis, call or text 988 in the United States and Canada, or contact your local emergency services.

Resources:
• CAT-Q (Camouflaging Autistic Traits Questionnaire)
• RAADS-R (Ritvo Autism Asperger Diagnostic Scale-Revised)
• NeuroClastic
• Autism Self Advocacy Network (ASAN)
• Embrace Autism
• Yellow Ladybugs (Autistic girls and women)

Connect with the Podcast:
Instagram: @quietlyautisticatlastpodcast

Transcript

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Welcome back to Quietly Autistic at Last, the podcast where we explore autism, identity, burnout, and what it means to finally understand yourself after years of wondering why life felt harder than it seemed for everyone else. I'm your host, Dr. Allison Sukamelli, and today we're talking about something that comes up constantly in the lived experiences of autistic people: liars. More specifically, why dishonesty, manipulation, deception, mixed messages, and hidden agendas can feel uniquely disorienting, painful, and exhausting for many autistic individuals. And this is not an episode about claiming autistic people never lie. Human beings lie, neurotypical people lie, autistic people lie, children lie, and adults lie. And the question is not whether autistic people can lie. The question is why do so many autistic people seem profoundly affected by dishonesty in ways that others don't appear to be? So to clarify, I mean when we are lied to by others, this can feel like an astounding revelation. Why can discovering a lie feel less like learning a fact and more like having the floor disappear beneath your feet or a rug pulled out from under you, or an entire universal shift of what you thought to be factual and true? But before we get into it, kind reminder: this podcast is intended for educational and informational purposes only and reflects one autistic individual's lived experience. That would be me, but also backed by research. However, as we know, autism presents differently from person to person, and each autistic experience is unique and valid. Valid being the keyword. And this episode is not medical, psychological, or legal advice of any kind. Same thing with Instagram. If you follow the pod at QuietlyAutistic at Last Podcast. And if you are in crisis, you can call or text 988 in the United States and Canada or contact your local emergency services. You deserve support. And again, each person's experience is unique and valid. Okay, let's get into this week's episode. So to start, the autistic brain often operates on trust. I know that is how I set out on this journey of life: trusting people and not even beginning to fathom how or why, or even the mere possibility of someone lying to me. Because why would they? Why would they need to? Many autistic people navigate the world through systems, patterns, rules, consistency, and predictability. And when something repeatedly demonstrates itself to be true, we begin building our understanding around it. And that isn't being naive, it's efficiency. This is totally me. And if a person says they care about you and their actions match their words, your brain stores that information. If a teacher follows the syllabus, your brain stores that information. But quick little side story here. In high school, I remember having one teacher with a very elaborate, dated, week by week, very stringent syllabus. But each week we would always be crossing out assignments and changing dates, which led me to believe, why even have such a syllabus in the first place? So what I'm trying to say is I found myself not trusting what this teacher had in store for us week after week, or more importantly, timelines in which to do my work, which was absolutely essential for me. But jumping back to trust, if a friend says they will call tomorrow and they do, your brain stores that information. And over time, trust becomes a map. And many of us autistic people rely heavily on that map because the world already contains enormous amounts of ambiguity. Take the changing syllabus, for example, and add in social situations which can be confusing, unwritten rules, which can be confusing, hidden expectations can be confusing. So the trust map helps in monumental ways if you're wired like I am. Now imagine discovering that significant portions of the map were false. This isn't merely disappointing, it's destabilizing. Your entire belief system becomes rubble and you need to rebuild. But how? It comes with a lot of questions, not only about the other person, the person who lied to you, but about yourself and the world that you knew to be true. The damage lying does often can't be measured in comprehensible terms for some autistic individuals, while some neurotypical people can just shrug it off. And one reason dishonesty can feel particularly confusing is because autistic people often struggle with what researchers call the hidden curriculum. I danced around this a bit earlier in this episode, but the hidden curriculum refers to the unspoken social rules that many people absorb naturally. Things like I didn't mean what I said, I'm being polite, I'm hinting, I'm pretending, I'm exaggerating, I'm leaving information out. I'm saying one thing but hoping you'll infer another. And many neurotypical people learn these subtleties intuitively. Many autistic people do not. And I'm stuck on when neurotypical people don't say what they mean and hope you infer what they mean. Honestly, I seriously can't wrap my brain around that one. I'm very direct, and God forbid I asked someone what they mean by their statement. Has that ever happened to you? You asked for clarification and suddenly you're a villain? I wasn't the one being vague. I will never understand that one. And a while back at work, we received an email about a paid summer position, and I emailed back asking the dates and times of the in-person meetings, and the supervisor responded, okay, I'll take your name off the list. What? In the fall, I found out that there were not any in-person meetings, and coworkers were bragging about getting paid to sit by their pools and do their work. So I'm lost. What subtleties did I miss? We often assume language is being used literally and sincerely. And until recently, I thought that was true of everyone. When someone says I'm fine, we may believe they're fine. When someone says I support you, we may believe they support us. When someone says nothing is wrong, we may believe nothing is wrong. Then later we discover something entirely different was happening. And the result is often confusion and a self-mistrust. And something I've noticed among late diagnosed autistic adults is that lies often don't stay contained. The lie becomes attached to every other interaction. You begin wondering, what else wasn't true? What else did I miss? What else was everyone else seeing that I wasn't? And the brain begins reprocessing years of information, and this is draining and exhausting. It isn't the lie itself, it's the collapse of certainty. It's the dismantling of our long-held belief system. And many autistic people spend decades working incredibly hard to understand social reality. Discovering major deception can make you question the accuracy of your entire understanding. And autistic people are frequently strong pattern detectors. I know I am. And we notice inconsistencies, we notice, and I'll just say it, we notice other people's bullshit, changes, contradictions, missing pieces. Many of us don't necessarily know what the inconsistency means. We simply know something doesn't fit. Or at times something doesn't feel right. Imagine reading a novel. A character behaves completely differently in chapter 10 than they did in chapters 1 through 9. You notice, you may not know why, you simply know the story no longer makes sense. And dishonesty often creates that feeling. The narrative stops fitting together, the puzzle pieces stop connecting. The brain becomes consumed trying to resolve the discrepancy. And one phrase I hear often from autistic adults and often find myself thinking is, I don't understand why they would lie. This is often interpreted as innocence. Sometimes it isn't. Sometimes it's logic. Many autistic people ask, what was the purpose? What did lying accomplish? Why create complexity when truth would have been easier? This is because many autistic people value direct communication, and deception of any kind can seem inefficient. The behavior itself doesn't make sense. This doesn't mean autistic people lack awareness of manipulation. Many become extraordinarily skilled at detecting it over time. It simply means deception often feels irrational. But again, why? Even with the small stuff, why lie? Why do they think no one will figure it out? It's all just a waste of time in my book. And many autistic people are taught to assume good intentions. Things like give people grace, see the best in others, be understanding, be compassionate. These are beautiful values. Unfortunately, some people exploit them. Manipulative individuals often recognize that people who are trusting are easier to control. They rely on the fact that others don't expect dishonesty. And this can place autistic individuals at increased risk for exploitation. Not because autistic people are unintelligent or gullible, but because many autistic people approach relationships sincerely. They assume others are operating from similar principles. Unfortunately, that is not always true. This can occur in friendships, romantic relationships, in the workplace, and so on. And after enough experiences with dishonesty, I know I've had more than my fair share, as have many of you, something often changes. The autistic person who once trusted easily may begin questioning everything, every statement, every compliment, every explanation, every motive. And this isn't healing. Sadly, it's hypervigilance. The nervous system begins expecting inconsistency, betrayal, and hidden agendas, especially when these things have been reinforced time and time again. Trust becomes difficult, relationships become exhausting, the world feels less safe, and many of us just want to hunker down at home and never come out because the world teaches us time and time again that others can't be trusted. And many autistic adults carry this invisible wound. Now let's talk about why gaslighting can be especially harmful. Gaslighting occurs when someone attempts to make you question your own perceptions. And for autistic individuals, this can be devastating. Many autistic people have already spent years being told you're too sensitive, you're imagining things, you're overreacting, you're reading it wrong, you're misunderstanding. And when someone intentionally manipulates reality, it often lands on top of decades of prior invalidation. And the result can be profound self-doubt. You stop trusting your observations, you stop trusting your instincts, you stop trusting yourself. That may be one of the most damaging consequences of chronic dishonesty. Not trusting yourself any longer. And one lesson many late diagnosed autistic adults may eventually learn is this: not every inconsistency is a lie. People are complicated. People change and make mistakes. People misunderstand themselves. People have blind spots. Sometimes inconsistency is humanity. Other times it's deception. And part of growth involves learning the difference. The goal is not becoming suspicious of everyone. The goal is becoming more discerning. So here are some red flags worth paying attention to and a useful question to help you detect if someone is lying or attempting to exploit you in some way. Ask yourself: do this person's words consistently match their actions? Not occasionally, but consistently. Do they follow through? Do they tell the truth when it's inconvenient? And this is a question about character, not comfort. Most people can be honest when honesty costs them nothing. The real test comes when the truth could make them look bad, disappoint someone, create conflict, or require accountability. It is easy to tell the truth when it benefits you. It is much harder to tell the truth when it risks your reputation, your relationships, or your immediate comfort. So pay attention to what people do when honesty becomes inconvenient. Do they admit mistakes? Do they tell you things you may not want to hear? Do they take responsibility when they have something to lose? Or do they avoid, minimize, distort, or conceal the truth when it serves them? And integrity is not revealed by convenient honesty. It is revealed by the willingness to be truthful when the truth comes with a cost. Do they revise history? Do they blame everyone else? Do they create confusion? Do they leave a trail of contradictions? Patterns matter, actions matter, consistency matters. So what does healing from lying and deception look like? Healing isn't becoming harder, cynical, or living under the assumption that everyone is lying. Healing is learning that trust should be learned rather than automatically granted. Let me repeat that because it's so important for everyone. Healing is learning that trust should be earned rather than automatically granted. Healing is learning that your observations matter. Healing is learning that confusion is information. And healing is learning that you can believe yourself. Many autistic adults were taught to ignore their instincts, and healing often means reconnecting with them. So if dishonesty affects you deeply, you are not weak, naive, or broken. Many autistic people build their understanding of the world through consistency, logic, sincerity, and pattern recognition. And when deception enters the picture, it disrupts the framework that makes relationships feel understandable and safe. The answer is not to stop trusting entirely. The answer is to trust wisely, to pay attention to patterns, to honor your observations, to believe what people repeatedly show you, and perhaps most importantly, to remember that another person's dishonesty is information about them, not evidence that there is something wrong with you. Okay, so there you have it. Thank you for spending this time with me today. And until next time, this is Dr. Allison Sucamelli. Be gentle with yourself and remember the diagnosis wasn't a box, it was a mirror, and the path was always yours. See you next week.