For years and years people have often assumed I’m autistic, and I’ve always said, no, no, I’m just awkward, the symptoms which largely resemble autism are all attributable to a tin that fell on my head as a baby - which may well be true, but this is the first year I’ve come around to seriously considering it.

I could list a great many symptoms and stereotypes, but I’ll just mention a scattering. I found learning to speak English extremely hard, by the time I got there I spoke with a way so awkwardly precise that people assume I’m either Swiss or am ‘taking the piss’. I’ve a tendency to take things extremely literally - which often means I read sarcasm very poorly, but more often means that I respond with puns. That isn’t something I’d thought of as ‘taking things literally’, but it’s been pointed out to me that, when anyone talks to me about anything, my mind immediately comes up with deliberate misinterpretations I can throw back as jokes. This is not appreciated in a serious conversation, as it can feel like I’m not processing anything emotionally, only as words to re-order. I feel for their predicament very heavily after the conversation, but my brain’s first response is very unhelpful. I’m working on that. Making friends has been immensely difficult, and I was close to having none throughout school. I assumed this was just down to being me.

Since the 2010s, when I say I’ll be at an event, I strive to keep by the Bible’s command of ‘let your yes be yes, and your no, no’. Quite a lot of times in the past few years I’ve been invited to a show or a party and I say I’ll be there, but then when the night comes around I’m having a mental health breakdown and can’t bear to face any of my friends. But I’ve said ‘yes’ to the invitation, so I can’t fail to show up, so I walk an hour or so to town, am seen at the venue before it begins, and then I sneak out without anyone seeing me, having only kept my promise for a minute and a half. That’s probably more confusing and upsetting for those involved, as they know I’m there and then I’m not, which only raises questions. Because of that my tactic evolved. I’d walk to town to the venue of the show, or to the friend’s house. I would walk close enough to touch the lintel of the door, meaning I had technically been to the physical location, and then I run away into the night before anyone spots me. On one occasion I was doing just that and a friend spotted me as I was making my escape. I became unable to speak, and was overwhelmed with a feeling of vulgarity and deceit, and had a running-away breakdown. Some of this might not be autism - it might be the very substantial depression and anxiety of the time, which is less worse now, thank goodness.

But when anyone came to me and said ‘yo citizen you seem autistic’ I’d say no, I can’t be. I don’t fit half the diagnostic criteria, and if I do that’s my fault and my inherent eccentricity, which I barely control, and not something credible and existing like autism. I feared being a wannabe. In fact it was the same as depression and gender dysphoria. I denied it as long as I could, because I feared being a pretender, and thought ‘everyone else I know is such-and-such but I need to be the normal one who can hold things together! Dear listener, this turned out to be a really unhelpful coping strategy in all of those cases.

I actually asked a prison psychologist if she thought I was autistic and she said ‘I don’t think so, because people with autism have no empathy, and you’re very empathetic’ — and though I generally respect that psychologist and her wisdom it subsequently turned out she was massively wrong about this detail. Some of the most remarkably autistic people I know have great empathy and understanding, comfort and encouragement, and understand my occasional horrors better than anyone. People with autism are more likely to lack ‘cognitive empathy’, which is a completely different thing. That is, they struggle to perceive just what someone is feeling - hence the difficulty knowing if someone is making a joke, being serious, flirting, mocking, or what have you — but once autistic folk grasp your feeling they’re as good as anyone else at emotional empathy - that is, feeling the feelings, sharing them, as if they were infectious - and at compassionate empathy, being moved to provide help and aid.

There’s plenty more reasons, symptoms and anecdotes I could throw in, but I was strongly in denial. My housemate Ava, who often says I beat myself up excessively and unhealthily, was keen that I at least consider the fact I *might* be autistic, rather than treating autism as a thing to flee from, or an excuse that I wasn’t worthy of. The thing that clinched it for me was looking back at my teenage years. I have plenty of autistic friends an acquaintances, and some of the signs that make it most obvious are things very overt and visible in teenage me. I came around to ‘Whether or not I’m autistic now, 17-year-old Ben was definitely autistic’. And it isn’t something you grow out of. It meant I’d got better at masking, or hiding, or doing the social actions that cover up your actual sense, which was a large part of why social life was leaving me tense and exhausted. That was enough to persuade me, in the end.

I haven’t pursued a diagnosis for it. It wouldn’t substantially help me, and one friend who was recently diagnosed told me I shouldn’t go after one because it would be a waste of NHS resources for the lack of substantial results, which felt at once an unkind but prudent response. I love to deny myself practical aid, so I went with it - but if you think there’s a good chance you’re autistic, dear listener, I recommend looking into it sooner rather than later. As with gender dysphoria, it’ll take years to get to the end of a waiting list, and it might help you feel comfortable, seen and valid, like a Zebra learning it’s a good zebra, not a failed horse — and it might open up a better understanding of yourself, which I think goes a long way.

When I came out to my friends as autistic a lot said ‘year, I knew that for years. Is this news to you’ - which was actually very reassuring. Some who weren’t autistic said ‘ah, of course everyone is on the spectrum’, which I’m told is the standard allistic response, and isn’t actually true. The spectrum isn’t like the Bristol or Kinsey scale of everyone being a percent from not autistic to wholly autistic’ - it’s a spectrum of different flavours and colours of autism, and it’s very much possible to not be on it whatever. I don’t begrudge people saying ‘everyone’s on the spectrum’, but by my understanding it’s not grounded in truth.

I don’t know if my discovery or embracing of myself as being in some way autistic means anything, portends anything or has any significance, any more than my being trans/non-binary or having an ongoing depression. I’m the same person, very much myself, but I can understand that self - and understand it as not as a social or moral flaw on my own count, and that’s probably a very good thing.