3:20am October 15, 2014

“

Because of the specific skills associated with having a fairly-high verbal IQ, I can put words together in a way which can usually be pretty well understood, and would not be identified as “sounding autistic”. But this, to me, is as though I were very fluent in a foreign language. My “native language” doesn’t seem to have any words… thus, if I had to use only it, I too would be nonverbal. It is only the use of adaptation which permits me to use words as I do. It is not my fault that my makeup happens to include the technical ability to use words in certain ways, in imitation of what I see other people doing. Some autistic folks multiply large numbers; I construct large sentences. It sometimes happens that this skill is useful in expressing certain ideas. Examining the structure and flow of the words I write might lead one to make assumptions about me based on those observations. Such assumptions would likely not be correct. What appears to be seamless integration is actually the skillful use of an “interface layer”, a veneer. If people tell me they would have no idea I am autistic, it is because they are seeing the interface layer, not me. It serves to mask, mute, and “adapt away” my differentness for the convenience of those around me. The inclination or desire may be to assume that “I” reside in that layer. I do not. It mostly-surrounds me, and is almost always kept in front of me, but it is not where I am located.

But having a good interface means that the amount and scope of an individual’s efforts at conformity would go undetected until they either failed pretty spectacularly or led to the person breaking down under the accumulated stress. Thus, an individual could be trying extremely hard to do what was expected, and have that actually work against him or her unless there had already been identification and the providing of a support system.

Sometimes we more-articulate autistic individuals are told that we have no understanding of other autistic people - that we are somehow different from them. I have been told this once or twice myself on the Internet. At these times, I think of a man named Vladimir Posner, who was a television commentator in the former USSR. He spoke flawless English, and certainly did not “sound” like a spokesman of the USSR. To me, trying to separate us more-articulate autistic people from our brothers and sisters elsewhere on the autistic spectrum is like suggesting that Vladimir Posner had no particular insight on the Soviet Union because he spoke such good English. It seems absurd. The interface is not the same as the individual behind it.

”

276 notes