I feel your pain

I feel your pain, I really do. Well – some of the time I do. It depends on what your pain is.

On the whole I’m not very good at reading other people’s emotions. I can tell if you are angry, or upset, or happy, but most of the more subtle emotions are guess work to me.

If, on the other hand, you are depressed or anxious, that’s a different story. I’ve dealt with these two conditions myself many times throughout my life. Indeed depression and anxiety are extremely common conditions for those who have AS.

Perhaps because I have so much experience with anxiety, your anxiety tends to rubs off on me, often badly. If you tell me that you are feeling anxious about something, then that’s how I’ll end up feeling. I immediately know how it feels to be in your shoes. Depression too, can have this effect, but perhaps less frequently.

I guess this is a little like the ‘Are you angry with me?‘ article. When you tell me about your anxiety or depression it sometimes feels like my problem, and not yours. I take the point of view that it must be my problem – why would you tell me about it otherwise?

Of course I know these days why you confide in me, and it’s not because you want your problem to be my problem. People with AS are seen as good open listeners. We are gentle people and very accepting of others without being judgemental. That’s why you wanted to unburden yourself on me – it feels safe to do so.

What I’d like to know is why your happiness doesn’t rub off on me too? Wouldn’t life be great if it did?

The perfect cover story

I’ve ended up in the profession that gives me the perfect cover story for my AS.

I stumbled into it many years before I even knew what AS was, mostly out of luck. I work in IT, and more specifically as a Systems Administrator. If you don’t know much about this field, then you probably don’t know the significance of me having this sort of role.

I’m sure you’ll have heard of the term geek, however. Geeks work in IT. They are solitary creatures who like to sit in darkened rooms, preferably on their own, and spend their working day tapping away at a large bank of computers that tower over their desk. They keep odd hours, often rising and then working late. They are usually single, and almost invariably have poor social skills. At least, that’s the stereotype.

That sounds rather like someone with AS, doesn’t it?

I think it does, and I’m sure that some proportion of those that behave like a typical geek do have AS, or some other Autism Spectrum condition.

The majority don’t though.

I’m sure of this, because geeks may appear to be like me, but actually, the superficial comparison is as far as it goes. Most of the geeks I know are actually quite sociable, and of the proportion that aren’t, most simply have poor social skills through being hopelessly addicted to computers to the point of not interacting much with real people. I think I can spot those on the Autism Spectrum pretty accurately these days because I know the signs to look out for, and I can usually see when camouflage is in use. Geeks do not, as the norm, have AS.

Having thought back across my 14 years of work in the field, I reckon maybe 1 in 10 IT people have an Autism Spectrum condition, though perhaps 1 in 4 of them at least loosely meet the stereotypes associated with geekery.

In each job I’ve had, I’ve quickly been accepted by the geeks as being one of them. I’m not though.

My AS traits mean that I fit the stereotype. It’s the perfect cover. As long as I’m careful to deploy my usual camouflage at least most of the time, then I’m simply seen as another geek, and I don’t have to explain away any of my convention-breaking behaviours to other the geeks, or even to management.

I’ve also noticed that geeks often have a cruel streak, and an almost pack-like behaviour. This is an area where I’m most definitely not one of them. From the comfort of a private chat room, I’ve seen decent people ripped to shreds simply to provide entertainment. The act is cowardly, with the victim never in the chat room at the time. I find this behaviour intolerable, but I also have to be honest and say that I’ve often gone along with it, to protect my cover. After all, without my geek ‘friends’, what friends would I have left?

Not many. But that’s another story.

What do I do now?

My routine is shot to pieces, and I feel lost.

We’ve had quite a large fall of snow that started on Sunday night and continued all through Monday – about 8 inches in total. We live on a large estate of houses on the top of a hill, and we don’t get priority access to snowploughs and gritters. All thus means that I’ve not been to work for two days, as I’ve not been able to get the car safely out to the main road.

My son’s school, at the top of our road has been closed too, so I’ve spent most of the last couple of days entertaining the kids in one way or another, either out in the snow, or once too cold and wet, back inside the warm house.

This may sound idyllic to you. No work! A winter wonderland, to explore with the kids! Snowmen to build! Bobsledding on old plastic compost bags! Hot chocolate to warm ourselves back up again after getting rosy cheeks outside!

Well, in a way it is, but if you’ve got AS, it also causes a couple of issues.

Firstly, I really enjoy playing with my kids, but I find it incredibly draining. I came into the house yesterday lunchtime, having been out in the snow for an hour and a half or so, and felt unable to do much more than collapse on the sofa for a good half an hour. My wife, who had also been out in the snow had to take the full strain all on her own of two kids complaining because they were cold and wet. I wanted peace, quiet, and to sleep, and it took me a while to come round again. Something similar happened in the afternoon – after coming in from the cold I had few words for anyone, and just wanted to curl up somewhere quiet and warm. I had been overloaded.

All of this is minor, however compared to the second problem. My schedule has been non-existent for the last two days. I rely on routine, and on planning out my day to feel safe and secure. Add some snow and a couple of days of being housebound into the mix, and I’m feeling very anxious. I’m back at work this morning, but I feel out of touch. What do I need to get done? Not sure. Where do I start? Dunno.

So I’ve started by writing this. I should be working, I guess, but my head is too full of mixed up emotion and anxiety to concentrate. Hopefully by expressing some of this, I’ll end up calmer and more able to sit down and plan what I need to do today. Today won’t feel normal though – it’ll probably be tomorrow before like I’m back to my usual routine.

Update:
It’s lunch time now, and I feel less anxious. I’ve jotted the things I need to do today, and have made some in-roads into tackling the easier ones. The feeling of routine is coming back. It’s not there yet, but I know it’s coming.

The bigger picture

I’m so observant!

That wood-grain effect on the table top at work. I can see where the pattern repeats itself.

And that billboard. I like the use of the sans-serif font – I think it sets the tone nicely for what they are trying to sell.

The aesthetics of my Apple laptop are brilliant. Look – they made the bottom of it flat, and the ports down the sides run from smallest at the front to largest at the back.

I see that you have an iPhone. Interesting. You clearly either like the form of the things or else you like to follow fashion. It’s reassuringly heavy, isn’t it? My Nokia works better as a phone though, despite it not being as snazzy.

I can see from the pattern of allow wheel on your car that you drive a Ford Focus. Mk 2. It’s probably a Zetec trim.

When I’m drunk I even see the texture of the paint on the walls. Look at those little mountinous bumps – that wall must have been painted with a medium pile roller. Oh, and look – the edges were definitely completed with a brush – you can see the up and down strokes.

Did you see those cows out of the train window a couple of miles back? They were waiting by the gate to be fed. You didn’t? Oh. A couple of miles back? Yes – that was about 90 seconds ago at this train speed.

I like the pattern of your shirt. In fact I can barely keep my eyes off it. That colour between green and blue on it just looks so odd. It’s neither green nor blue.

Yes – I’m so observant that I see everything in great detail.

What I don’t see though, is the bigger picture. The things that people don’t say yet want to convey to me pass me by all the time.

I don’t see other peoples emotions either, unless of course they are very obvious. If you are crying then you are either very unhappy about something or you are sad. But not both. And not any other emotion either. Unless I have some other context to go by, I couldn’t say which emotion it is, however, and because of that I daren’t react to you, in case my reaction is inappropriate.

I don’t see that my daughters nose is running and needs wiping.

I don’t see that my wife is tired of the kids and needs a break.

Whilst the ability to see the detail in things is great, and at work can be very useful, my disability in not seeing the bigger picture and the subtleties of human interraction causes me considerable frustration and sadness. It’s fair to say that it causes considerable frustion in those close to me as well.

I need reminders to pop up in my elecronic calendar to tell me it’s your birthday coming up, and even to put the bin out for emptying once a week.

And Dad’s birthday – is it the 27th or the 29th? My calendar says the 29th, but I really think it might be the 27th. I have this same argument with myself every year. I added ‘This is definitely the right date’ to my Dad’s birthday calendar entry this year, but I know that despite this I’ll have the same argument with myself next year.

If you want me to pick up some groceries before I come home from work, then I need to add it to my to-do list. If I don’t, it’ll get forgotten.

I don’t see your new hair-do, or that you’ve started wearing glasses. I can remember that you were wearing jeans yesterday, but not what you had on your top half. Are those new shoes? No? Oh.

It’s not laziness on my part, it’s just the way I was made. I see different things.