Not long after I got my second Covid vaccine, I was diagnosed with autism. Coincidence? Yes. 100%.
The above sentence is what I often imagine I will post on the socials when/if I should ever come out as someone on the spectrum. I think it's a solid joke. But who am I to judge?
Not of course that I have a diagnosis. It seems unlikely at this point that I will ever get one. Because as a citizen of America: The Greatest Country in the World (tm), I have no access to a doctor at all, let alone whatever specialist is required to give me the good and proper officiality.
But the more and more I think about this and look into the history and symptoms associated with the spectrum the more and more I see myself there among the others being described.
And I have been thinking about it a lot. It's kind of funny that I haven't mentioned it on here before (outside of the occasional hint here and there).
Maybe it's kind of telling that I haven't mentioned it yet, even on here, where I am the most vulnerable and exposed. It's a big thing to say. Especially when you aren't sure you have it. Or even really know what it is fully.
The thought really only entered my consciousness a week or two before I moved into the van. My roommate at the time self-diagnosed themselves after their best friend was officially diagnosed. In describing their experience and the now-rather-obvious-but-long-overlooked-symptoms they had, they mentioned that they had wondered if maybe I was on the spectrum as well.
This wasn't the first time someone suggested that of me. It has come up time and time again by friends and strangers alike. I would always respond, "nope, just home schooled." Which is another solid joke, but also what I thought was the truth.
I just assumed it was the highly isolated childhood (due to illness), the being home schooled by neglectful parents, and the super strict fundamentalist background is what caused me to act all the weird ways that I did.
And as an adult, a lot of these symptoms became identified as symptoms of depression or anxiety. Especially the shit about not making eye contact and being social, but also things like my propensity for dark and quiet spaces or getting easily overstimulated and overwhelmed, were all seen as signals that I wasn't doing well. Leaving me to believe I was constantly depressed and hopeless to overcome it despite years of therapy and medication.
There has been lots of masking too. Lots of learning to pretend to be normal. When I was in bible school, a few different people made it their goal for me to make better eye contact or have a more firm handshake or be comfortable with hugs or physical touch. I never really got better at any of it, but I eventually learned how to hide my discomfort at it.
Another thing from that time that is still crazy to me is how my particular brand of Pentecostal/Charismatic Christianity was so useful in helping hide some of my symptoms.
The weirdest example of this is that when praying or worshipping, many practitioners will repeat the same hand motions over and over. Jerking and erratic movement also were totally cool and normal in those settings. All of which is known as "stimming" in the autism community, and is a way that those on the spectrum can soothe themselves.
So every church service or prayer meeting or when I prayed before bed, I had the chance to stim in an acceptable and uninterrupted way. No wonder I got so deeply into prayer and worship.
Some people on the spectrum as children speak like adults and relate better to adults than children their own age. People with autism also have narrow "special interests" that they get obsessed with and learn everything that they can about that thing and also have trouble shutting up about it.
My special interest was the Bible and church history. This combined with my talking like an adult made the church elders see me as some super anointed wunderkind. I became a teenage preacher, typically just imitating other preachers I had seen. I was a different person on stage: bold, charismatic, funny. But I was just playing the part. Not in an inauthentic way, but more in the sense that this is how I thought it was done and I was really good at observing all the little tics and mannerisms and copying them exactly.
All of which, understandably, has thrown me for a real loop when I think about my past, my identity, my spiritual seeking, and everything really.
These last four months, I have just been replaying different scenarios and memories in my head and viewing them through the lens of my possible autism and it all makes so much sense and also reframes a lot of things in sometimes very uncomfortable ways.
It definitely explains why I can never tell if someone is interested in me sexually until a day or two after our interaction. Or the times I had made people cry without knowing what I did. Or all of the books on body language that I have read but still don't fully grasp.
It explains the persistent feeling that I am stuck in my head and body and am alone in rooms of crowds or friends or anyone. It might explain my seeming aromanticism (though the dead girlfriends might also account for my hesitance there).
I don't know. I think it explains a lot. If true, that is. But I am thinking it is true.
I have mentioned it to everyone I have spent time with on the road so far. Some have resisted the label for me. One even going so far as to read off the list of symptoms one by one and telling me she doesn't see it and disagreed with me when I listed the symptoms I for sure have.
But most of the people that know me well, especially those who knew me as a teenager, all kind of went "yeah, I see it." And that has been validating.
I haven't discussed it with any of my family yet. I have been dragging my feet on doing so because it usually doesn't go well when I try to talk about something real and deeper than sports or the weather.
I thought about copy/pasting the symptoms and asking my mom to go through them and say how many of them I had as a child, without her knowing that she was looking at a description of autism. I feel that is a good way to gather data in an unbiased way. But I might try that with my brother first.
Either way, I want to have that conversation with them before I see them here in the upcoming weeks. But I also might just wait until then. It's scary to talk about and I don't know how my folks will react.
This entry is the most I have "said" about it at all. I have been thinking about it obsessively, but when I float it to others it has been casually and indirectly. I haven't wanted to talk about it. Not because I think it's bad, I'm actually deeply relieved by it as an explanation for why I am how I am, but I don't want to be treated differently.
I am still processing all this anyway. It might be a secret for a while yet.
11:48 a.m. - 2022-02-19
Recent entries:
The Glorious future, The Tragic Past - 2022-04-02
On Time in Arizona - 2022-03-23
The end of the Van, the beginning of something else - 2022-03-16
20 Years a Blog - 2022-03-04
She and I - 2022-03-01
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