Bob and I have been having some great conversations lately about the differences between neuro-typical and autistic modes of perception and communication. In the course of these conversations, I’ve felt immensely frustrated, strangely comforted, and very enlightened, sometimes simultaneously. I’ll share the highlights of two of these talks.

The Way Bob Says It Is Not The Way I’d Say It
On Saturday, Bob went to synagogue for the Shabbos morning service, came home for lunch, and then went back for the Torah study in the afternoon. I took a long walk in the morning, in the course of which I met a huge, grey, wonderfully shaggy dog and his person. As you know, I hardly ever take off my headphones and earplugs to talk to anyone, but this dog was just too cool and I had to say something to the woman with him. I knew that I’d last for about a minute or so of conversation, and I did, and it was fine.

The woman who was with the dog obviously loved and appreciated him, and said something like, “You know, he wants to go smell all of these great things and wonders why we can’t smell them, too!” Whoa. Another person who knows that human perception is not all there is. I had been missing these small moments of friendliness with people out on my walks, and as I continued down the street, I realized that I had made the exception for her based entirely on instinct and a sort of childlike delight in her dog. And I thought, “That’s a very good basis on which to make an exception.” When I was done, I didn’t need to go and chat it up with several other people about their canine friends. This dog was an exceptional being, so I made an exception, and it filled me up, and it was fine.

When Bob got home in the afternoon, he told me that he’d run into Fred at shul (the guy who’d magically rendered me invisible) and had “put him out of his misery” concerning my non-response to his email. Fred had copied Bob on his email to me (the one I’d deleted), the email had made Bob “want to weep,” and Bob had gently told Fred that there was nothing he could do to make things better except to keep moving forward. So, of course, the first thing I did was to get defensive about the “want to weep” part, until Bob reassured me that yes, he understood that I was the injured party. And then, of course, the next thing I did was to ask for a blow-by-blow of the conversation, just to make sure that Bob hadn’t put Fred out of his misery without Fred realizing why he was in a state of misery in the first place. I do this a lot, especially when Bob is talking to someone who has been crummy to me. Actually, I’ve been doing it for about eight years now, and it’s gotten old, and boring, and I hate boring, because being bored makes me miserable. This time, though, I’d finally had enough of boring and was able to get beyond making myself miserable. Here’s a synopsis of how the conversation went:

Me: “I’m glad you talked with Fred and resolved things. But did you tell him why things happened as they did?”
Bob: “He understood the whole thing.”
Me: “How do you know that?”
Bob: “I don’t remember all the words. It was clear. He knew what he’d done.”
Me: “But did you use the word invisibility?”
Bob: “No.”
Me: “Why not?”
Bob: “Look, I say things my way.”
Me: “Yeah, but the invisibility thing is really important!”
Bob: [Extremely unsubtle body language that says I'm going to get up and do something else now.]
Me: “Wait, wait, don’t get up! Look, I’m not resolved about this thing. I mean, I told the guy that I needed him to use his words, and that I needed him to be honest, and that I needed him to tell me what was going on, and then he didn’t. Did he understand all that?”
Bob: “Look, I’m not in the guy’s head, and I don’t know what words he’s using to understand things, but he understood that he’d screwed this up and why, okay?”
Me: “Yeah, but how do you know what he understood if he didn’t say so?”
Bob: “I was there. I know.”
Me: “Yeah, but…Oh.”
[Silence]
Bob: “What?”
Me: “This is a neuro-typical thing, isn’t it? You say words, and he says words, and you do this whole nonverbal dance, and you somehow get it, and it’s done, and it’s in your own language. And then you come home and you say it to me. And then I try to translate it back into my language, and it doesn’t translate well.”
Bob: “I think that’s right.”
Me: “You know, from now on, I think you should handle these kinds of conversations. They’re a mystery to me, but you’re very good at them.”
Bob: “Thanks. I try.”
Me: “I know. I don’t give you enough credit.”
Bob: “I know. And you do really well speaking your language to people who understand you. It’s not your fault that neuro-typical people so often don’t understand what you’re talking about, or can’t fathom how sensitive you are or what you need from them.”
Me: “Thank you, honey. I love you.”
Bob: “I love you, too.”

So here was a day in which I came to two very important conclusions: 1) If I’m going to talk to an apparently neuro-typical stranger, keep it short and make sure it’s for a very good reason, and 2) let Bob be neuro-typical and handle things in his own way, because after all, he is completely supportive of my being autistic and handling things in my own way. (I think I’ve got that reciprocity thing down now.)

I Stand By the Side of the Road and I Still End Up In a Crash
The other day, Bob and I were driving down the highway, and I was talking about my frustration with socializing and making friends with neuro-typical people. One of things that became clear is that all of my challenges started showing up when I left the controlled situation of the workplace in 2003 and entered the completely chaotic situation of unstructured human interaction.

In the software industry, I did very well. I lasted 15 years, much longer than I’ve lasted in any other group of people. Because it was a limited, goal-oriented situation, it gave me the opportunity to do one of the things I do best: observe process. I figured out how meetings worked, what people needed from me, how to set limits, how to keep from working overtime, how to get what I needed to do my job, and so forth. I moved from job to job, but each time, I moved to a better job, and I did so based on my reputation, both personal and professional. Plus, working in the software industry coincided with a number of other successes: marriage, parenting, buying a house, and becoming part of a neighborhood.

And then, I left work to become a full-time mom and oy, all my troubles started. All of a sudden, I couldn’t navigate. True, I had entered hostile territory in my old community, but not every single person there was hostile, and a neuro-typical person might have handled the situation with more, shall we say, subtlety? I handled the situation with almost nothing except honesty and directness, because after all, isn’t that what Judaism teaches? Thou shalt not lie? And isn’t that what all my years in therapy had led me to believe I was destined to do—state my needs and feelings with clarity and without apology? So what was the problem? Why was everyone so upset when I kept speaking my mind and getting down to business? The more I tried, the worse it got. I’m not saying that I was to blame. Not at all. I’m just saying that I didn’t understand how to do it any other way.

But now, I’m starting to see that the way I do it has caused me to collide with other people and has allowed them to collide with me. When it’s over, there’s usually a scene of twisted metal and steam rising from cracked radiators, and I’m always wondering what the hell happened. Again. Just like last time. Over. And over. And over. And over.

In the course of my conversation with Bob in the car, I began to understand why this pattern has gone on for so long, and that I am already moving to a different paradigm. Here’s basically how the conversation went:

Me: “I know that neuro-typical people often find me rather blunt and feel offended by me. And it’s very weird to me, because in my sensory and emotional experience of the world, I feel like I’m getting hit with a blunt instrument a fair amount of the time. It’s not that everyone has ill will toward me. They don’t. It’s just how acutely I feel things. Most people don’t know how sensitive I am, and so they can’t understand how they affect me. And I don’t understand how important all their social rules and nonverbals signals are, so I don’t understand how difficult I can be for people to deal with. I just think that all that social crap—I mean stuff—is bullshit.”
Bob: “I know. There definitely seems to be a difference in the way that neuro-typical and autistic people experience bluntness.”
Me: “So how do neuro-typical people experience it?”
Bob: “Well, for us, there are two levels to navigating socially. One level is knowing what you want. The other level is trying to make sure not to crash into people’s sensibilities. It’s as though social life is like driving down the highway we’re on. You have to know where you’re going and how to get there. But if that’s all you know, you’re going to cause an accident, because you won’t be looking in your rearview mirrors, you won’t be watching the flow of traffic, you won’t know when to slow down, or speed up, or let someone into the lane, or pass them. Everything works on a highway if everyone is paying attention to everything. But now and then, you get someone going 95 miles per hour who insists on switching lanes constantly, driving in the breakdown lane, and getting past everyone, because he just has to get where he’s going and that’s all he can think about. That’s when the flow is threatened and people start crashing into one another.”
Me: “Okay, so I recognize myself in the person who just wants to get there. I recognize myself so well that I’ve learned to hang back in a major way and let everyone else go around me. In fact, I’ve gotten out of the damned car altogether, and yet, I still end up in crashes.”
Bob: “What do you mean, exactly?”
Me: “Take the situation with Fred. I didn’t walk into a complicated social situation with Fred. I kept it simple. I know better than to drive a car on a highway. I’ve learned my lesson. I wasn’t even in a car. I was standing by the side of the road, looking at the trees, waiting for him to get done driving hither and yon and meet up with me. After awhile, I realized he wasn’t going to come by and get me, and that made me sad, but I dealt with it. And then, all of a sudden, he broadsided me. I was just standing by the side of the goddamned road, looking at the trees blossoming, and the next thing I knew, I was lying next to the retaining wall and my head hurt really bad.”
Bob: “I see what you mean.”
Me: “You know, whenever this has happened in the past, I’ve thought, well, screw this, I’m getting off this highway and finding me another highway, because the people on this highway are crazed. And then I go and find another highway, and I stand by the side of the road, and bang! There I go, flying through the air, just when I’m enjoying the view. And I think, well, screw this, I’m getting off this highway, because the people on this highway are crazed. But now, after all these years, I can’t keep looking for new highways. They’re too dangerous. I imagine that there must be state police shouting at me on their bullhorns that pedestrians are not allowed on the roadway, and there must be people leaning on their horns as they swerve away from me, and the ones who come a little too close must be larger than they appear in the mirror, but somehow, I can’t see or hear them.”
Bob: “I think that’s true. So what do you do?”
Me: “I need to go find myself a bike path. Not a bike path where people wear spandex and race by you like they’re on the Tour de France. I mean a bike path where people are taking leisurely rides and other people are standing by the side of the road.”
Bob: “Sounds like a plan.”

So how do I find these other souls on this mysterious bike path? Easy. I write an article for my local paper, asking “Where are all the other autistic or otherwise atypical people in this community, because I’ve only met two others, and it’s statistically impossible that we are the only ones here.”

I know, I know. It’s very direct. But that’s just me.

© 2010 by Rachel Cohen-Rottenberg