Things you did that looking back make your realise you were autistic

Hi. Just reading your list with interest. I too am very into things matching.

Also you mention colour combination and I wonder if that is similar to me. Colours in clothes in particular have to look good together. I often find it difficult to look at people on TV if tops and trousers/skirts don't go or ties with shirts. I am very particular with my own clothes, even the socks.

oh shut up. that's not something you should joke about.

I worked for a number of years with and on mass spectrometers. They tend to be grouped together in large laboratories, 'mass spec. halls'. As they operate under high vacuum, they all have very noisy vacuum pumps attached to them and mounted internally. Trying to work with colleagues on complex pieces of equipment, that require fairly constant modification or repair, in such a noisy environment was very difficult, to say the least. 

The headboard of my childhood bed had an appalling texture. Even thinking about it makes me a bit 'squirmy,' all these years later.

I think I showed the autistic signs as a child though it did go on unnoticed until I was at secondary school - I was diagnosed aged 13.

Totally get that. I’m 49 now and my mum is everything to me. I often think about when that day comes. 

Noise was a problem for me as a child. When my parents watched TV or my mum talked loudly on the phone in her phone voice lol I would hide under my bed with the duvet on my head. Noise was one of the biggest things I struggled with at school too. Until I read your post I hadn't considered it would be a sign of autism in myself at that age but actually I guess it probably was.

Sensitivity with clothing.

Meltdowns when things went wrong, but not understood as such. I remember biting things like pillows in frustration.

Not making eye contact and friends querying this, which I didn't understand.

Difficulty in being or entering large groups and getting to know new people.

Wanting to spend time alone in my room as a teenager which did help me to relax.

Doing repetitive things, like saying phrases in my mind.

The main problem was that little was known about autism in the community when I was young.

As a child I hated being separated from my mum. She's the only person I've ever felt close to and liked to be touched by. At school I used to cry and scream and would have what I now know is meltdowns when she tried to leave.

I still hated it when I was a teenager at school. I've never liked being away from my mum, I really can't imagine what it will be like when she's no longer here.

I upset people by being tactless and honest and unable to say little white lies when I'm put on the spot.

An example from school back in the 1980s.  Too embarrassing so I'm not saying it.

For me there were probably only a few that I can remember. I need to have a good chat with my mum to find out more. 
The first one is eye contact (this has always been a big deal) and secondly what appeared to be fussiness. Also crying all the time for no apparent reason and huge separation anxiety from my mum even at age 9 or 10. 

Caelus said:

wasnt autism called childhood schizophrenia at one time?
think someone on this site mentioned it

This is apparently true.

My little boys therapist told me the reason she wanted to work and specialise in this field was because of how autistic individuals were treated and put into institutions as well. 
She said it devastated her at the beginning of her career.

isnt the best test for schizophrenia whether you can see magical flying cats that talk to you none stop?

Shardovan said:

Storing the significance of that moment even though it wasn't some big external event, 'just' an 'oh, this is new' - something I suspect the average NT mind wouldn't do. 

This! Maybe not for the same thing (though I did notice getting earworms, but I don't recall dates well) but for various things. I even remember deciding to change stim to something not noticeable, ie twitching various muscles very subtly, and thinking that might one day be significant! Not sure if it was just leg jiggling I was trying to stop doing, which my parents would have kept telling me was annoying, or something else, but I find the really interesting thing about the memory is that I felt it worth making a mental note of, and then 40 or so years later lo and behold it actually was significant for my diagnosis.

Otherwise, so many things. When I read a list of traits of autism in girls I thought %$£&! is any of me actually me or is it all autism?! I did realise later of course I do have individuality, it's just variations on autism rather than variations of the whole population, which is fine. In fact if the majority neurotype was autistic i would be boringly normal rather than eccentrically unusual, which seemed weird at first as my whole identity has always been of being unusual.

I'm going to stop there or i will end up writing a huge essay and I don't want to.

the only 2 autistic people I know

Although everyone I know here is autistic, which begs the question: what is the difference between 'knowing' in real life and 'knowing' online?

Do they both count as much as each other, these 2 very different types of connection?

Amerantin (former member) said:

This is an interesting one. I’ve always had the same problem, making places like pubs almost impossible for me. I could never understand why nobody else seemed to be struggling with it.

I suspect that's a very common one.

It's very common in my world anyway in that the only 2 autistic people I know (myself and my friend) struggle with it

I completely switch off in a group (and if there is music too that makes me want to get a gun and shoot the speakers) and just recede into my head.

Shardovan said:

l could do with having that problem for a bit! 

Me too

Martin said:

Acute reactions to some textures - synthetic fibre cloth especially

Even now the memory of the texture of my parents’ 1970s sofa makes me feel ill.

Martin said:

Not being able to follow conversations if there is background noise.

This is an interesting one. I’ve always had the same problem, making places like pubs almost impossible for me. I could never understand why nobody else seemed to be struggling with it.

Let's see.

Selective mutism as a child.

Having no interest in food up to being about 8 years old - even now I can fast for up to 7 days without any real distress, though I do now find food interesting.

Acute reactions to some textures - synthetic fibre cloth especially.

Off-scale reaction to some smells, perfume and cigarette smoke in particular.

Not being able to follow conversations if there is background noise.

Not finding any form of sport remotely interesting, indeed hating that it is foisted on me so often in this inexplicably sport-obsessed society.

Preferring to have a tooth (that was not hurting me) extracted over going to school.